Afghanistan

[KG1]

Trump definitely set the stage to leave. I linked the document. You can be in favor of leaving while recognizing there are multiple ways to accomplish leaving and how it was done under Biden is a maddening catastrophe.

This is the key distinction.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

If/when we could leave without leaving these people like cattle ready for slaughter...

Then we'd be there forever. The people there are not cattle. They *could* have organized and fought. The Northern Alliance resisted the Taliban long before the US landed. I'm all for a more orderly withdrawal, but for all the reasons I've already mentioned Afghanistan is not going to have a strong enough central government to make it anything but a patchwork of warlords and tribal fighters with shifting alliances outside of the urban areas. The urban areas had their chance. They wasted it through corruption and general incompetence...because at the end of the day they were also just warlords but bigger.

 

[2A-Hoosier23]

Been thinking of something since you posted this. The Soviets invaded in 79, bugged out in early 89. SO that was 32-42 years ago. These guys are still alive?

Many of the commanders/warlords are.
Think of the Bin Laden-aged guys. (He was born in 1957)

Bin Laden fought the Soviets with CIA aid before going full Al-Qaeda.

Basically all the current Taliban commanders fought against the Soviets in their early days. Abdul Ghani Barader, Hibatullah Akhundzada, the list goes on. After the Soviet withdrawal, they regrouped to Pakistan where they came from (Mujahideen were largely traines through the Pakistani ISI's madrassas, basically Jihadi training camps) and started calling themselves the "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" (what everyone else calls the "Taliban"). Their hardline ideology became more potent and their recruitment grew until they had enough power to invade Afghanistan in the mid 90's.

Of course not all the former Mujahids became Taliban. After the Soviets withdrew and the communist government of Afghanistan collapsed, some Mujahideen leaders tried to find their spots in the new republic -- Ahmad Shah Massoud and Burhanuddin Rabbani are examples. Those guys would end up fighting the Taliban in the 90s.

So, not all Mujahideen became Taliban, but almost all Taliban commanders to this day were Mujahideen

 

[Hatin Since 87]

Real short version: Arabic naming conventions do not exactly match up to modern Western conventions of given name, middle given name, surname. That guy's "full" name is almost certainly longer, but just like we tend to not use middle names in most circumstances, that's the name he will use most of the time.

Longer version:
It's more complicated, and there may or may not be a family name (but in modern times it's by far the most common to have one). Sometimes what we would consider the family name will be a tribe or even an area. Kind of like old English "John of York" where York is where John is from, not his family or John Baker indicated his profession but now it's just morphed into a family name even if you aren't actually a baker. Abdullah Abdullah is certainly not his full name, if for no other reason than titles are omitted. Titles in this context are things like "son of..." or "father of..." and I'll touch on that shortly.

"Legal name" may or may not have any meaning, depending on how developed the area in question is. A "full name" could be up to five individual words, including titles.

Naming conventions aren't universal and are sometimes confusing and the name you are born with may not be the one you die with (which sounds odd at first, but Western women often die with a different surname then they were born with), but usually the father's name is in their somewhere. To make it even more fun, the father will now often use the first son's name with a title that means "father of ..." so if that guy is the first son of his father, his father may now go by Abu Abdullah. Women sometimes do the same with "mother of." We would generally consider that a nickname by Western standards, and in developed areas it won't be what's on their driver's license, etc. Tribal areas, from what I understand, tend to be less picky on "legal name" conventions.

My wife's (pre-marriage) name follows this convention: given name, father's given name, father's honorific, family name. Now it's given name, father's given name, my family name in the Western style. She could have taken my middle name in place of her father's given name, apparently, as I recall some discussion about it early on before she stuck with her father's. In Jordan either of us could legitimately go by (parent of): son's first name.

And then, just because what's a rule without exceptions, the "father of..." thing is not always literal but can be a joking nickname or an honorific. "Father of goats" for a local herder or "Father of justice" for a revered judge sort of things.


As best I can tell, it just remains "Abdullah Abdullah" because the 2nd Abdullah is the 1st Abdullah for the father and that 1st part is all you use. There's probably an unspoken "bin" in the middle, meaning "son of" if you were to find his "full" name.

Wow! That’s a lot to take in, but I work with a guy who raises sheep and we give him grief, so now he’s father of sheep.


I like our dumbed down simplified ways. I thought apu’s full name on the simpsons was a joke, I guess they were pretty accurate

 

[Hatin Since 87]

Also thanks for the time it had to take to write that out. Learning stuff like that about other cultures is really intriguing.

 

[bwframe]

Trump definitely set the stage to leave. I linked the document. You can be in favor of leaving while recognizing there are multiple ways to accomplish leaving and how it was done under Biden is a maddening catastrophe.

 

[rooster]

Another thing to keep in mind is that Afghans (and much of the tribal world) start their fighters young. A kid could have been 14-15 and fought the soviets. That puts him in his 50’s and a respected elder.

I’m not personally familiar with Afghanistan but from what I see a man who fought the soviets and then the Americans and survived all of it would probably Be a highly respected man.

 

[rooster]

Trump definitely set the stage to leave. I linked the document. You can be in favor of leaving while recognizing there are multiple ways to accomplish leaving and how it was done under Biden is a maddening catastrophe.

I think we can all agree that having to do an emergency muster and fly out of North Carolina is a catastrophe

 

[Twangbanger]

This is the end of locals helping us in any foreign entanglements. Anyone who hears around the world how we left the terps to the wolves is gonna think twice about taking that job.

Lots of people say this, but whenever Uncle Sam holds out his hand, there will always be takers. They know at some potential point in the future, there will be a seat on the helicopter for them (and a billet on the taxpayer payroll).

Hell, Baghdad Bob was the mouthpiece for the bad guys, and didn't he get a CNN job?

 

[rooster]

rumor has it he hasn’t moved in 6 hours. Nothing makes an old man happier than watching the news and yelling “come’on man” at the tv

 

[rhamersley]

Hell, Baghdad Bob was the mouthpiece for the bad guys, and didn't he get a CNN job?

How could you tell him from any of the other clowns they have?

 

[rhamersley]

rumor has it he hasn’t moved in 6 hours. Nothing makes an old man happier than watching the news and yelling “come’on man” at the tv

Don’t see the VP, is she under the table or something?

 

[JCSR]

 

[bwframe]

I think we can all agree that having to do an emergency muster and fly out of North Carolina is a catastrophe

You might want to be careful about suggesting that we can all agree with one of your woke political agenda statements, my friend.

 

[Twangbanger]

rumor has it he hasn’t moved in 6 hours. Nothing makes an old man happier than watching the news and yelling “come’on man” at the tv

I predict by Wednesday, Afghanistan will be memory-holed.

Are you all ready to hear 24/7 stories on Haiti Earthquake?

 

[JCSR]

rumor has it he hasn’t moved in 6 hours. Nothing makes an old man happier than watching the news and yelling “come’on man” at the tv

 

[Hatin Since 87]

Hilarious

 

[JCSR]

I thought I'd seen theses guys before...........

 

[rooster]

embassy personnel are all at allegedly at the airport. than a few westerns

 

[BugI02]

I know we're still kickin (I was 14 in 1979), but we're in the USA where we should make it to 80. People in general in the 'stan can't live to be that old (65 in 2019, it was 50 in 1990, I looked.) If your work history includes "Warlord in the Kandahar area" you got one up on Keith Richards!

Keith Richards cannot be killed by conventional weapons.