IP: Wanna make biological weapons and take out cities? $10. (fwd)

[jamesd at echeque.com]

    --
On 21 Nov 2001, at 16:37, Blanc wrote:
> But what I anticipate would happen at that point is another 
> Afghanistan, with ten thousand bloomin' territories full of 
> prickly warring tribes and war lords.
>
> The first thing which happens after a power vaccuum is 
> created is that another group steps in to "establish law 
> and order", with the acceptance, support, and relief of the 
> majority (coincidentally, right now it feels like the 
> Taliban is growing on these shores).
>
> History repeats itself.  What would prevent it from doing 
> so again?

Untrue:

The Taliban was not a spontaneous internal phenomemom, not a 
response to an outcry for law and order.  There were 
repeated, massive, and bloody efforts by foreign powers, 
primarily Pakistan, to "assist" the aghans in achieving law 
and order, and the Taliban is only the most recent, and most 
bloody, of these.

Far from reflecting a spontaneous desire for government, law 
and order, these various wannabe governments found it 
necessary to devastate and depopulate vast areas that they 
were unable to govern.

The Taliban was only able to achieve "law and order" with 
massive external support, and an ever increasing number of 
foreign troops backing it up.

The foreigners would first back one group to form a 
government, and that group would fail catastrophically with 
enormous bloodshed, then they would back another group, and 
that group would in turn fail catastrophically with vast 
bloodshed, huge areas devastated by scorched earth policies 
where they killed everyone who did not flee, then bulldozed 
the houses, dynamited the wells, filled in the irrigation 
ditches, attempting to make any area they could not govern an 
utterly barren wasteland where nothing would grow and no one 
would live, and then finally, after two very bloody tries, 
the foreigners attempting to create a government backed the 
Taliban on their third try.

As we speak, the British and American governments are 
quarreling because the British want to have another go, a 
fourth try.  Each try has been bloodier, and more
devastating, than the last. 

    --digsig
         James A. Donald
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