Russians

[dageir]

If the Taliban is the strongest faction, they will dominate. What we think about that is irrelevant as long as we are not willing to pay the price to remove them. If Russia and USA (and maybe China and even India) agreed on cooperating in this and not try to screw eachother up while not being overly humane, Afghanistan might be "solved". But as usual if one great power sees another trying to intervene somewhere you an be sure others support "insurgents". The tribal system in Afghanistan makes it more vulnerable to influences like Taliban since such an arrangement in it self counters a centralized government. Afghanistan wil be in a state of civil war until the Taliban takes charge. As much as I disagree with everything Taliban stands for, they might represent the stability needed to form an actual centralized govenment, dismantling the tribal system. This in turn might prepare the ground for reforms and revolutions on the basis of an actual functioning state. Its a long haul, but its the only realistic one.

[jwhitehorn]

If the Taliban is the strongest faction, they will dominate. What we think about that is irrelevant as long as we are not willing to pay the price to remove them. If Russia and USA (and maybe China and even India) agreed on cooperating in this and not try to screw eachother up while not being overly humane, Afghanistan might be "solved". But as usual if one great power sees another trying to intervene somewhere you an be sure others support "insurgents". The tribal system in Afghanistan makes it more vulnerable to influences like Taliban since such an arrangement in it self counters a centralized government. Afghanistan wil be in a state of civil war until the Taliban takes charge. As much as I disagree with everything Taliban stands for, they might represent the stability needed to form an actual centralized govenment, dismantling the tribal system. This in turn might prepare the ground for reforms and revolutions on the basis of an actual functioning state. Its a long haul, but its the only realistic one.

Removing a Tribal System is never the right call. What Afghanistan needs is for one of their Tribes to rise up and offer a system where other people may pay them in goats, once per month, depending on how much land they use. In exchange for this the Tribe that offers such a thing should offer them protection against those who would steal their goats.

Problem solved.

Chief PeePookaka
MM Tribe

[dageir]

Sorry, after your enlightened post, I realize my error. A goat based economy is the way to go.

[RainbowMoostache]

A Russian stole some lime out of the barrel I was using

I knew a Russian, he seemed like an alright guy. Then I ran into this other Russian who was a complete ******* and caused me some troubles, for which he paid with his life.

That Russian I thought was alright? Turns out he's an ******* too.

Not saying all Russians are evil but they stick together, even when one of them is a total immature *****. For this reason, and because so many Russians are immature ***** in this game I don't trust Russians. It's not at the point where I'd pick a fight, but damn it's getting close. All the Russians I have known long enough have shown absolutely zero respect for other people who aren't Russian eventually.

No respect for me, no respect for you. It's a simple equation.

[thl111]

Do what the british did, build outposts on Afghan frontier and let them fight each other. I don't see the importance of that god forsaken land.

[kulbek]

Do what the british did, build outposts on Afghan frontier and let them fight each other. I don't see the importance of that god forsaken land.

Actually the concept of "Russian" often includes peoples living on the territory of modern Russia. This number includes Bashkirs, Tatars, Nogais, which are quite close relatives of the Afghans. That by the way is confirmed by modern genetic research. So invite Afghanistan to join to Russia..

[Claeyt]

In fact a lot of Russians don't drink alcoholic beverages.

do you even check before writing something? Russia is 4th in amount of alcohol consumed per person and 1st in amount of people considered 'Alcoholic' according to WHO. Russia also has the 3rd highest rate of fetal alcohol syndrome in the world.

In fact, the war in Afghanistan was not aggressive, but we wanted to bring them communism, freedom. But given that we have abandoned the Communist ideology(perestroika began in 1987), and the meaning of the war was lost. That's why we brought the troops.

The true version of that story, is that the Soviets engineered first Duad's coup of the stable monarchy, then a communist coup of the relatively unstable un-democratic Duad monarchy and turned Afghanistan into an un-democratic communist regime unsupported by the general population. These communist coups were the initial spark that started the hell that is Afghanistan. Radical Islamic factions wrongly supported by Pakistan and the US then began a civil war that has lasted for 35 years. First against the Soviet supported communist government, then each other, now against the US and also each other. The best that can be hoped for is that we maintain a mild non-Islamist some-what corrupt Narco-state with a small force of Nato troops until some stability can be found. The Afghan communist government was a puppet state with no local support. Karzai at least has the support of the non-Pashtun population (40%).

. And of course you may have helped to capture Paris, but Napoleon did take Moscow.

Moscow was not the capital of the Russian Empire. Paris was the capital of France

What kind of Jackass statement is that? Yes, St. Petersburg was the "Capitol" and seat of the monarchy, but Moscow was by far the largest city. Why the hell would Napoleon have attacked the partially built swamp of St. Petersburg while the Russian army was in front of him at Moscow.

And a lot was the victories of the Turkish and Muslim armies over Russian?! Also I would like to note that the Russian army will always been a multiethnic and multi-confessional.

Yes actually there were many victories of the Muslims over the Russians and Orthodox armies of Eastern Europe.

Russia and it's army is neither multi-ethnic nor multi-confessional whatever that is. You're spouting Putin's propaganda so as to cover up the several hundred thousand dead Chechen's and other ongoing ethnic wars along the border of Russia.

In fact the number is growing in Russia at the expense of refugees from neighbouring countries.

Yes, Chechnya, Dagestan and the other war zones created by the Russian military and Putin have led to many refugees, some of them have even fled the Russian Army and moved to the US unfortunately. The population of Russia would still be shrinking without them.

Kulbek, you are spouting propaganda if you say "Communism is Freedom". You live in a country that kills it's reporters and has a long history of suppressing the media. Find some outside source of information to better see and understand your own country. I do this by reading several international papers and following news outlets in other countries. I suggest you do the same. Don't believe Putin's lies.

[thl111]

One other thing I have to ask, how in the devil's name can Putin and Medvedev take turns being President and PM? Are they planning to dissolve the Duma any time soon?

[Claeyt]

One other thing I have to ask, how in the devil's name can Putin and Medvedev take turns being President and PM? Are they planning to dissolve the Duma any time soon?

No they did this because Russia only allows the President to serve 2 terms. So, Putin (2 terms), then Medvedev (1 term), then Putin (2 terms), then Medvedev (1 term) and on and on until Putin dies, I suppose. Russia really only has one political party, 'The former KGB', and the populace is too afraid of instability and is incredibly uninformed by the state approved media to actually vote them out.

[thl111]

Stalin must be very proud.