Afghanistan is the graveyard of nations, the graveyard of empires.
Even Alexander the Great ran to ground in the Konar Valley in 327BC:
Alexander the Great sent his supply trains through the Khyber, then skirted northward with his army to the Konar Valley on his campaign in 327 bc. There he ran into fierce resistance and, struck by an Afghan archer's arrow, barely made it to the Indus River with his life. Genghis Khan and the great Mughal emperors began passing through the Khyber a millennium later and ultimately established the greatest of empires -- but only after reaching painful accommodations with the Afghans. From Michni Point, a trained eye can still see the ruins of the Mughal signal towers used to relay complex torch-light messages 1,500 miles from Calcutta to Bukhara in less than an hour.
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/...
And losing my virginal beliefs and understanding in poking around the cemetery.
Most recently, that God damned stupid bastard George W. Bush
Among the many lasting consequences of the Bush administration’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003 was the collateral damage it inflicted on Afghanistan and the war there against Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Money, troops and expertise were diverted to Iraq, and as the RAND Corporation political scientist Seth G. Jones observes in his useful new book, the initial success of the military operation in Afghanistan was squandered.
The slender window for securing a stable democracy in Afghanistan began to close, and by 2006, Mr. Jones writes, a “perfect storm of political upheaval” had gathered, with several crises ominously converging: “Pakistan emerged as a sanctuary for the Taliban and Al Qaeda, allowing them to conduct a greater number of operations from bases across the border; Afghan governance became unhinged as corruption worked its way through the government like a cancer, leaving massive discontent throughout the country; and the international presence, hamstrung by the U.S. focus on Iraq, was too small to deal with the escalating violence.”
http://www.nytimes.com/...
Compounding the shenanigans of a Texas congressman and a CIA thug:
Nonetheless, Crile's account is important, if appalling, precisely because it details how a ruthless ignoramus congressman and a high-ranking CIA thug managed to hijack American foreign policy. From 1973 to 1996, Charlie Wilson represented the 2nd District of Texas in the U.S. House of Representatives. His constituency was in the heart of the East Texas Bible Belt and was the long-held fiefdom of his fellow Democrat, Martin Dies, the first chairman of the House Un-American Affairs Committee. Wilson is 6 feet, 4 inches tall and "handsome, with one of those classic outdoor faces that tobacco companies bet millions on." He graduated from the Naval Academy in 1956, eighth from the bottom of his class and with more demerits than any other cadet in Annapolis history.
Chalmers Johnson:
http://hnn.us/...
Unintended consequences ... :
In the final chapter of Charlie Wilson’s War, Crile discusses the “Unintended Consequences” of the Soviet-Afghan War faced by the U.S. and the Western world. In fact, the Soviet Union and the Afghan people also suffered unintended consequences. In 1979, the Soviet Union did not intend to entrench itself in a quagmire that would eventually contribute to its own downfall. In 1979, the Mujahideen did not intend to plunge their country into three decades of constant warfare that would profoundly damage almost every aspect of the Afghan state. In 1979, the other sponsors of the Mujahideen (such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Egypt and China) did not intend to spark the precarious flame of Islamic extremism. Thus, all three factions suffered from unintended consequences.
http://www.tcr.org/...
And opening God damned cans of worms:
Pakistan/Oil/Boundaries and stuff
Since the mid-1970s it has been Pakistan’s policy (not the Soviets’) to destabilize Afghanistan and destroy its infrastructure by training, paying, supplying and deploying Islamic fundamentalist guerillas to keep Afghanistan too weak to assert re-negotiation of the 1600 mile border between the two nations, known as the Durand Line. The Durand Line, is named for Sir Mortimer Durand, who arbitrarily drew it on a map in 1893, dividing the Pashtun and Baloch ethnic regions and cutting Afghanistan off from the sea.
The people who live along this line do not recognize it, and have been fighting separatist rebellions against the Punjabi dominated Pakistani government since the formation of Pakistan in 1947. If the Pashtuns and Balochi peoples ever achieve their goal of independence or repatriation into Afghanistan, Pakistan stands to lose everything west of the Indus River, in other words, over half of its territory. Though logical, their endless pursuit of the destruction of Afghanistan is nonetheless diabolical.
Follow the Bouncing Drill Bit
In 1978, Joanne Herring, then married to Robert R. Herring, the founder of Houston Natural Gas (later known as ENRON), was offered the position of Honorary Consul for Pakistan to the United States. Mrs. Herring told me that the government of Pakistan first asked her husband to accept the position, but when he declined and recommended her instead, they accepted her, because, as she put it, “They hemmed and hawed, and I’m sure they thought, what can we do?
We don’t want to offend this man, because they hoped that he might drill for oil in our country.” Coincidentally, also in 1978, two American oil companies, Occidental Petroleum and Union Texas Petroleum, received permission to explore for oil in Pakistan. They had each been granted a 30% share in their Pakistan concession, with Pakistan’s national company, OGDC, holding the remaining 40%. In 1981 Union Texas made its first big strike and Oxy’s first Pakistan well came in shortly thereafter. The Pakistan Army courteously agreed to truck the crude from the field to the refinery in Karachi.
http://pubrecord.org/...
Joanne Herring, Houston Natural Gas (later ENRON), Occidental Petroleum, Union Texas Petroleum, ARCO, British Petroleum (AKA BP), and oil industry conjugal orgies:
Um, Union Texas Petroleum, copulating with ARCO in 1988...
British Petroleum (AKA BP) marries a harem:
British Petroleum merged with Amoco (formerly Standard Oil of Indiana) in December 1998, becoming BP Amoco plc. In 2000, BP Amoco acquired Arco (Atlantic Richfield Co.) and Burmah Castrol plc. As part of the merger's brand awareness, the company helped the Tate Modern British Art launch RePresenting Britain 1500–2000 In 2001, the company formally renamed itself as BP plc and adopted the tagline "Beyond Petroleum," which remains in use today. It states that BP was never meant to be an abbreviation of its tagline. Most Amoco stations in the United States were converted to BP's brand and corporate identity. In many states BP continued to sell Amoco branded petrol even in service stations with the BP identity as Amoco was rated the best petroleum brand by consumers for 16 consecutive years and also enjoyed one of the three highest brand loyalty reputations for petrol in the US, comparable only to Chevron and Shell. In May 2008, when the Amoco name was mostly phased out in favour of "BP Gasoline with Invigorate", promoting BP's new additive, the highest grade of BP petrol available in the United States was still called Amoco Ultimate.
http://en.wikipedia.org/...
For a rather detailed history of various and sundry oil industry copulations, orgies, et al, refer to:
http://www.virginia.edu/...
Damn! Everything is oil! And, being stupidly naive, I did not expect this particular disclosure in the narrative of the nation of graveyards, Afghanistan.
But, it was all about oil, wasn't it? And it essentially comes down to British Petroleum, doesn't it?
Iran in 1953, scheming in secret with Dick Cheney in 2001 over the divvying up Iraqi oil, inexplicable actions in Afghanistan circa Carter, Reagan and onward ... and the enigma of Pakistan.
Sex and death and oil.