MOAB Dropped in Afghanistan

[heydaralon]

I think the contemporary Islamic Terrorism comes from World War One, just like everything else. The Germans tried to recruit and incite Muslims in the Empire to insurge against the British, on the British side, T.E. Lawrence recruiting the Arabs to overthrow the Turks by assymetrical warfare.

Before Lawrence, the Arabs never even considered it, after Lawrence, they knew that they could take down Empires, and the legend lived on.

Have you read the book A Peace to End all Peace by David Fromkin? If you haven't you would probably enjoy it. It talks about WW1 in the Middle East and Lawrence of Arabia. Europe did the former Ottoman Empire pretty dirty after the war, but it explains the context of the fuckery. Honestly, the Arabs were negotiating in bad faith as much the British and French. The arabs promised a huge army for Lawrence, and they didn't deliver. IMO Lawrence was not a game changer. The jihad idea precedes Lawrence though. The Young Turks attempted to play that card, because they had Mehmet VI as the Caliph. They told Indian muslims and all Islamic subjects throughout the British empire to revolt. It didn't work out for them.

[TheReal_ND]

This is quality

[Smitty-48]

I think the contemporary Islamic Terrorism comes from World War One, just like everything else. The Germans tried to recruit and incite Muslims in the Empire to insurge against the British, on the British side, T.E. Lawrence recruiting the Arabs to overthrow the Turks by assymetrical warfare.

Before Lawrence, the Arabs never even considered it, after Lawrence, they knew that they could take down Empires, and the legend lived on.

Have you read the book A Peace to End all Peace by David Fromkin? If you haven't you would probably enjoy it. It talks about WW1 in the Middle East and Lawrence of Arabia. Europe did the former Ottoman Empire pretty dirty after the war, but it explains the context of the fuckery. Honestly, the Arabs were negotiating in bad faith as much the British and French. The arabs promised a huge army for Lawrence, and they didn't deliver. IMO Lawrence was not a game changer. The jihad idea precedes Lawrence though. The Young Turks attempted to play that card, because they had Mehmet VI as the Caliph. They told Indian muslims and all Islamic subjects throughout the British empire to revolt. It didn't work out for them.

Lawrence was a game changer because he completely rewrote the strategy, a huge army would have been a mistake, a huge army would have been an unwieldy instrument which the Turks could have come to grips with, in order to find fix and destroy, just more mouths to feed to no particularly greater utility, Lawrence showed that a huge army was not even required, he's the father of contemporary assymetrical warfare, basically invented special operations as we know it.

The British had experience with Guerilla warfare dating back to fighting Napoleon in Spain, but it was always a sideshow, it wasn't hollistic and coordinated, it wasn't the thing that defeated the French, Lawrence took Guerilla warfare to the next level, from the sideshow, to the main event, where you could take down an entire empire, by Guerilla warfare alone, no army required at all.

What Lawrence did, was convince the Arabs that they could win, with just the "Minutemen", and no "Continental Army", with just the "VC", and no "NVA" at all, just Mujahadeen, with no back up at all from the British Army, and he really was the first one in the modern context, to ever pull it off.

The British didn't think that Lawrence could pull it off, the British didn't even want Lawrence to pull it off, they just wanted to tie the Turks down, they did not believe that Lawrence could, nor did they want him to, take the entire Arabian Peninsula, by Guerilla warfare alone. None the less, every Guerilla force, has been trying to recreate what Lawrence did, ever since, with very limited success actually.

Even the Vietnamese, perhaps the greatest assymetrical warfighters of all time, still relied heavily on a massive conventional NVA component. The Tet Offensive failed, the VC did not take Saigon, what Lawrence did, was make the Tet Offensive work, he went all the way to the proverbial Saigon, by VC alone, no NVA required at all.

You do realize that Star Wars is inspired by Lawrence of Arabia, right? Both cinematically and in terms of the plot, the rag tag rebel force takes down the Death Star, all by themselves, to wit, Lawrence of Arabia, is in fact Luke Skywalker. It's no coincidence that George Lucas got Alec Guiness to play Obi-Wan Kenobi, Star Wars, is just Lawrence of Arabia in space, Alec Guiness is King Faisal all over again, just as Omar Shariff was the original Han Solo, Mark Hamill, was just the new Lawrence, "use the Force Luke"; to take Damascus.

[heydaralon]

Lawrence was a game changer because he completely rewrote the strategy, a huge army would have been a mistake, a huge army would have been an unwieldy instrument which the Turks could have come to grips with, in order to find fix and destroy, just more mouths to feed to no particularly greater utility, Lawrence showed that a huge army was not even required, he's the father of contemporary assymetrical warfare, basically invented special operations as we know it.

The British had experience with Guerilla warfare dating back to fighting Napoleon in Spain, but it was always a sideshow, it wasn't hollistic and coordinated, it wasn't the thing that defeated the French, Lawrence took Guerilla warfare to the next level, from the sideshow, to the main event, where you could take down an entire empire, by Guerilla warfare alone, no army required at all.

What Lawrence did, was convince the Arabs that they could win, with just the "Minutemen", and no "Continental Army", with just the "VC", and no "NVA" at all, just Mujahadeen, with no back up at all from the British Army, and he really was the first one in the modern context, to ever pull it off.

The British didn't think that Lawrence could pull it off, the British didn't even want Lawrence to pull it off, they just wanted to tie the Turks down, they did not believe that Lawrence could, nor did they want him to, take the entire Arabian Peninsula, by Guerilla warfare alone. None the less, every Guerilla force, has been trying to recreate what Lawrence did, ever since, with very limited success actually.

Even the Vietnamese, perhaps the greatest assymetrical warfighters of all time, still relied heavily on a massive conventional NVA component. The Tet Offensive failed, the VC did not take Saigon, what Lawrence did, was make the Tet Offensive work, he went all the way to the proverbial Saigon, by VC alone, no NVA required at all.

You do realize that Star Wars is inspired by Lawrence of Arabia, right? Both cinematically and in terms of the plot, the rag tag rebel force takes down the Death Star, all by themselves, to wit, Lawrence of Arabia, is in fact Luke Skywalker. It's no coincidence that George Lucas got Alec Guiness to play Obi-Wan Kenobi, Star Wars, is just Lawrence of Arabia in space, Alec Guiness is King Faisal all over again, just as Omar Shariff was the original Han Solo, Mark Hamill, was just the new Lawrence, "use the Force Luke"; to take Damascus.

Damn. I didn't think of Star Wars that way, but that makes sense. I don't know as much about Lawrence as you do, but from what I've read it seems like his impact on the Middle Eastern theater is overblown. He has been romanticized to an extent by that awful Peter O'Toole movie, but my understanding was that he essentially launched some successful raids on railroads and he was more of a PR figure than anything else. The arabs were not the first people to get to Damascus, but the British attempted to convince the world they were, to prevent France from getting the mandate over Syria and Lebanon after the war. Also, how much did he know about the post WW1 partition? I've read differing accounts on this, but apparently he promised Faisal and Hussein Sharif an independent Arab state, when in reality he knew exactly what would happen once the Ottomans were defeated. What are your thoughts?

This is completely irrelevant, but it is also extremely likely that he was raped by Turkish soldiers when he was captured. (They left that part out of the movie)

[C-Mag]

Since this is our only thread on America's longest war I'm putting this here.

Trump chewing the Generals Assess for not coming up with a winning Strategy in Afghanistan.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/tru ... ls-n789006

Recently Trump rejected McMasters latest strategy, Trump said it's the same strategy you've been trying for over a decade and sent him and his staff back to work.

I don't know what the answer is in Afghanistan, maybe it's Total No Holds Barred War, maybe it's to get out. But I know one thing, it's not doing the same thing.

[SuburbanFarmer]

Not a war. Our longest "police action", or "intervention" or "Executive clusterfuck", but not a war.

[C-Mag]

Not a war. Our longest "police action", or "intervention" or "Executive clusterfuck", but not a war.

Well, when you try some Progressive bullshit Nation Building it usually fails. Nation Building only works after Conquest. You have to go as Conquerors first, completely destroy the enemy, the nation and instill fear in the families and allies of your enemy that you can build a new nation.

[SuburbanFarmer]

Not a war. Our longest "police action", or "intervention" or "Executive clusterfuck", but not a war.

Well, when you try some Progressive bullshit Nation Building it usually fails. Nation Building only works after Conquest. You have to go as Conquerors first, completely destroy the enemy, the nation and instill fear in the families and allies of your enemy that you can build a new nation.

I'm pretty sure we've done that, we just didn't use the word "conquer".

[C-Mag]

Not a war. Our longest "police action", or "intervention" or "Executive clusterfuck", but not a war.

Well, when you try some Progressive bullshit Nation Building it usually fails. Nation Building only works after Conquest. You have to go as Conquerors first, completely destroy the enemy, the nation and instill fear in the families and allies of your enemy that you can build a new nation.

I'm pretty sure we've done that, we just didn't use the word "conquer".

Not even close.
The first thing W did is pick out friendly tribes, and 'friendly' Afghans, installed Hamid Karzai. For 15 + years we've been doing our best to work with the 'Moderate' Afghans, build their infrastructure, try to build an economy.

AND, WE'VE BEEN DOING THAT SHIT SINCE 2001, without having fully conquered the country first.

[SuburbanFarmer]

Well, when you try some Progressive bullshit Nation Building it usually fails. Nation Building only works after Conquest. You have to go as Conquerors first, completely destroy the enemy, the nation and instill fear in the families and allies of your enemy that you can build a new nation.

I'm pretty sure we've done that, we just didn't use the word "conquer".

Not even close.
The first thing W did is pick out friendly tribes, and 'friendly' Afghans, installed Hamid Karzai. For 15 + years we've been doing our best to work with the 'Moderate' Afghans, build their infrastructure, try to build an economy.

AND, WE'VE BEEN DOING THAT SHIT SINCE 2001, without having fully conquered the country first.

'Moderate' paramilitary groups. That always cracks me up.