Quote:
Originally Posted by Abbott Shaull
As far as Afghanistan goes, the Soviets were there for almost 10 years and they had superior technology and couldn't win the war. The locals are only doing what I would suspect, people would do when some foreign army moves in. They are fighting back. Much like the French did during WWII, and numerous other places since.
There are many countries in Asia and Africa that remain nation in name only where very little beyond the Capital is under the control of the "Central Goverment".
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The French were not the best exemple you could come up with
. French freedom fighters were active but they were far from being fighting all the way back. Yougoslavia, Poland, Netherland and even Germany were much better exemples. 2 million germans were killed during ww2 fighting Nazi. They were the most active freedom fighter and could not count on any ally support.
In Afghanistan, I can see only two ways of winning the war: Genocide of most of the Afghan population (perfectly inacceptable for US) and paying warlords/talibans (increasingly bearable). It was the same for the Soviets. As long as they remained in Afghanistan they were on the losing side. From 1988 to 1991, the communist government of Afghanistan reverted to victory. It would have achieved it if soviet backing (3 billion US$/year) had not stopped in 1991. Something else about Afghanistan, NATO has soldiers, they have warriors.