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Radio War Nerd #291 — Afghanistan Collapse, with Anatol Lieven (Patreon)

Published:
2021-08-13 03:13:44
Imported:
2026-06
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Guest: Anatol Lieven, author 

Recorded: August 11, 2021

We talk to author Anatol Lieven, who first reported on Afghanistan back in the late 1980s, about the the shocking speed of the Taliban's takeover of Afghanistan, and the collapse of US-backed Afghanistan regime. 

At 58:40 - the Nerd & Ames discuss the latest from the Tigray-Ethiopia conflict, and the books they're reading.

Maps:

*Latest control map (as of August 12, 2021)

*Political Map (from our friends in Langley)

Read Anatol Lieven's books, including Climate Change & The Nation State, Pakistan: A Hard Country, and Chechnya: Tombstone of Russian Power. Check out his latest article on Afghanistan, "An Afghan Tragedy: The Pashtuns, the Taliban and the State". Follow Anatol on Twitter.

Other books cited:

"The Taliban At War" by Antonio Giustozzi

"Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia" by Ahmed Rashid

"Kobane Calling" by Zerocalcare

"Empire of the Sun" by JG Ballard

"City of the Chasch" by Jack Vance

*

Total time: 1:32:59

Direct link to this episode's mp3 here 

Files

Comments

NYCM&AHole

I’m across the river from Manhattan and my AC is busted. Also Paris sucks in the Summer.

Gengeros

Was there a deal between the USA and taliban, whether formal or inform, to hand the country over to taliban rule?

xnfec

Another potential benficiary of trouble for Ethiopia might be Egypt. They have a major beef with the Ethiopians over the Rennaisance Dam.

a clash of purple

I think the Taliban would regain power regardless, so why would they bother making a deal with the Americans? Especially since the U.S. has demonstrated that they can't be trusted to keep their word.

JohnG

I have been looking for an RSS feed to add to my podcast app since joining a few months ago. Anyone know where I can find it?

online Leftist Archive Project (LARP)

I'm reading the paper by the interviewee and it's excellent. Also now is a good time for everyone to revisit Adam Curtis's "Bitter Lake." I believe it's on YouTube.

cointelbro

At the top of the newsletter

David Andrews

Great guest today. It's amazing that nobody in the US foreign policy establishment is being held accountable. (Or maybe it's not)!

radiowarnerd

Hi John, your gmail is in our newsletter database. The RSS feed url is up top in the newsletter, have you been getting them? If not, search your gmail for the war nerd newsletter, gmail has a funny way of hiding things in folders you never set up. If you don't find it let us know and we'll send you more.

Jason Thompson

I was wondering what your thoughts are on Ballard! I LOVE his short stories and his apocalyptic novels. They depict landscapes so amazingly, and I find something compelling in his (insane? 😅) protagonists. I’ve never read his autobiographical novels.

James Whale

Great episode! Really wonderful to listen to you guys. Just downloaded that jack vance book mark recommended for drive up to Olympic peninsula to get out of this 100 degree heat in Olympia!

James Whale

Its terrible especially if you are broke like I have been every time I was there. Smells terrible. All good people leave city for August.

NYCM&AHole

I can't tell if you're talking about New York City or Paris. I vividly remember walking by a thermometer display in Paris at 9 at night and it was 38.5C

d.s

City of the Casche! Such a great series; the opening of book 1, which mark mentions, is such a good hook for the story. I'm still hunting for the last two in the series but god Vance is a great writer.

mt

That Taliban working from ground up is mighty impressive. In Sweden the media is screaming their lungs out about the fate of the interpreters in Afghanistan. Sometimes you get the feeling that they are building up a reason for invading the country again and why not, the reason for invading Afghanistan has varied between helping women, children, fighting terrorism, catching bin-Laden, fighting narcotics and what not else. Anyway, the comment about Taliban being medieval about lay down your weapons and join us would solve the problem for the interpreters. Other way, they helped foreign invaders and bet on the wrong horse. War is nasty.

a clash of purple

It wouldn't cost the U.S. and its allies much to ensure the safety of their collaborators & vulnerable local populations. Either airlift them all to safety in the States or pay the Taliban to leave them alone. Certainly it'd be cheaper and less disruptive than fighting a war. But of course, no one in power really cares about the fate of these people, they're just looking for excuses to continue the occupation, like you said.

Jacques Robespierre

Love to have a journalistic outlet that posts maps. Love maps.

R H

It'd be great to hear a show on the role of the protectorates, or tributaries, like Canada, in these adventures. From July 2003 to December 2011 via Task Force Afghanistan/OP Athena under ISAF, Canada played an outsized role in Kandahar Province. Besides various headquarters and support outfits, the Canadian Forces deployed an entire battle group (think Kampfgruppe, Canadian style). Canada even deployed civilians through CANCAP (Canadian Forces Contractor Augmentation Program) - personnel who, by the way, we rarely hear about in terms of what they experienced, let alone how they've fared since.

Taggart

Love reading Vance too 😁

Jim Vail

He hopes the Taliban will fight the heroin trade? What is this Anatoly smoking? Like Uncle Sam's war on drugs?

Md0

Indeed! Also thought of this, is Egypt involved with supporting and/or inflaming any of this? Much cheaper to do this than bomb the dam as they threatened in the past, piss off lots of Ethiopians that bought dam bonds and unifies them in a war against Egypt.

Drake Myers

I think it's because they had previously done so. the Taliban successfully banned poppy production in 2000, only for it to resume after US invasion.

Ander Pierce

I wonder how stable Taliban rule will be

radiowarnerd

That's a good point. I don't know but I'll look into it.

radiowarnerd

Yeah, I like those too but I would say that Empire of the Sun is his best writing.

radiowarnerd

Micael, yes, there's a demand from the mainstream media: "We helped create this debacle, how can YOU watch it happen?" The switch in pronoun is a rhetorical ploy.

radiowarnerd

Doesn't everybody? People who don't love maps are weird.

radiowarnerd

Commonwealth troops have historically been gung-ho for any project, even or especially the grimmest (Gallipoli, Boer Wars). What would be interesting is why and when they withdrew.

radiowarnerd

As you heard, Anatol Lieven thinks it will be pretty stable. He considers the Taliban unusually stable as Afghan populist movements go.

R H

True that - the whole "ready aye ready" routine, but the Canada/U.S. relationship is a little... 'different' than the one we had with the Empire. Why we left in 2014, and are remaining oh so conspicuously quiet regarding current disastrous events (due to impending election perhaps?), is certainly worth looking into. I don't believe in coincidences when it comes to Canada's foreign policy. Around the time Canada pulled the plug 'for good' in Afghanistan, Ukraine became a big issue. Besides the ever-present desire to please Washington, and look important, this may have something to do with the influence of the Ukrainian (Galician) diaspora on the government not to mention inside the CF. A look at Canada's current Deputy Prime Minister's background would go a long way toward explaining our continued support for OP UNIFIER. War with Russia will also always sell better than some rolling around in a Godforsaken sandbox.

online Leftist Archive Project (LARP)

Jesus this guy called it exactly in his paper: "These patterns, together with the constant contacts and conversations taking place between members of the government and Taliban fighters who, though ostensibly on opposite sides, belong to the same Pashtun tribes, suggest that after the US withdrawal, the collapse of the Afghan state in the Pashtun areas may at some point happen not just very quickly, but also quite peacefully, as Pashtun soldiers and police simply go home, while their commanders flee or make their own deals with the Taliban. This, after all, is very much what happened both when the communist state collapsed in 1992 and the mujahideen took over, and as the Taliban swept through the Pashtun areas in 1994–96 and displaced the mujahideen warlords."

Jay Sea

Always appreciate the book recs, fiction and non fiction. Likely will read the GustoZzi book. Also look at what was posted TODAY: https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/619769/ Just lol at Western media. Its my fault that I wanted to end that miserable war that mentally destroyed my brother!

john

We need a good guest on for more about the war in Ethiopia. It’s been a crazy story (horrifying as well) and it’d be good to hear from someone with extensive knowledge of the region and the conflict.

Steff

You guys should unpaywall this one! I want to share this one

Md0

I wonder was anyone held accountable/scapegoated for the equally shameful saigon retreat debacle?

MS

Yeah - deffo agree about gving this free access.

MS

I still can't tell who the good guys are ? i.e. the most oppressed and with the fewest atrocities to their names. :)

john

Kinda feels like there are no good guys in this conflict though I have some sympathy for the TPLF since it seems like the ENDF is committing ethnic cleansing in western Tigray. That being said, the TPLF is clearly guilty of war crimes as well. Additionally, a total collapse of the Ethiopian state (which seems to be becoming an increasing possibility) would almost certainly be a bad thing for all Ethiopian peoples, and more TPLF victories make a collapse of the Ethiopian state more likely. But its almost impossible to have sympathy for Abiy Ahmed as his military is committing horrible crimes and he is clearly grossly incompetent and unqualified. Overall its just a horrible, sad situation.

Scorched Earth

Thanks for the Duolingo tip. Move to Montreal is my future and I need to brush up on my French.

mt

Also it pulls away the money-rug from CIA so it would be top prio would I be taliban.

Paul M

The US military was effectively transformed after Vietnam. Maybe I'm too presentist, but it's hard for me to think the US military will be fundamentally different 10 years from now.

Paul M

He said he hopes the Taliban would be willing to clamp down on the heroin trade in exchange for bribes. That last part is key. In the late '90s, the Taliban effectively ended the heroin trade for (1) money and (2) to increase the price. As mentioned, Iran is hit the hardest from the trade and China also has incentives to limit it. None of this means the Taliban will stop it, but that doesn't mean we can't hope that there will be an alignment of interests and incentives.

Paul M

This was touched on in the interview, but it's probably too early to know if this will happen, but I'm nervous that the US (or another actor) might try to increase divisions inside the Taliban to destabilize it. It's exactly the kind of short-sighted policy that is done again and again and again. Anatol said it would be evil, which is true, but it would also be incredibly stupid. (Is there are saying about the stupidity of evil?)

Scorched Earth

I think we can officially declare the outcome of this war as: STALEMATE. The Talibs had the good sense to stay up in the mountains because Western forces would have slaughtered them if they dared to come down. Western forces had the good sense not to go up into the mountains in search of Talibs or they would have taken casualties galore. It’s only because the Yanks decided to pull up stakes and go home why the Talibs could come down from the mountains and roll into Kabul. In the great history of warfare, it’s quite rare for a war to end in a stalemate; but there you have it. It wouldn’t look so bad if the opponents were a more sophisticated military like the Russians or the Chinese. But when the Western force’s opponent-at-war are a bunch of illiterate goat-fu…sorry, I meant goat herders with only AK-47s and RPGs, that’s really sad.

Connor Francis

They had been gaining ground for the past few years. The taliban was in control before we invaded they are in control again. If us running home with our tail between our legs is a stalemate what is victory on their part? Complete take over of the US government. They wanted it more. Afghanistan is 3 and 0 against world empires. Also what’s wrong with herding goats asshole it’s a living bet you couldn’t herd a goat to save your life. Politics are part of war even if you don’t lose a war militarily if you run out of the political capital to maintain it it’s still a loss just like Vietnam.

Ben

Jesus Christ, the absolute state of mainstream media… when all else fails, just start gaslighting the American people

Brian Bonnell

Doesn’t seem like a stalemate to me when they end up achieving every goal they laid out for themselves. We lost.

Dorst Savijeski

I don't do legal advice and can't read a lot of small letters but for those reading this, your assets could be eBay's

Dorst Savijeski

All he wants is that you buy more stuff, work harder and then sell them for the best price on eBay

Dorst Savijeski

If you know the traffic flow? What's the product your getting money for you work or stuff???

Dorst Savijeski

Serious note , so the whole privatisation and rise of team insecurity. Is a bad copy from good holdings? If they get rewarded we need to choose who get rewarded???

Dorst Savijeski

Did some more dd into Mr. eBay and it's not good he sells to richer

Dorst Savijeski

Amarta Sen imho is proven right agency and security are a good starting point. The critical decision space is more complex.

Dorst Savijeski

Go to eBay if you don't know how he thinks, but it might be to late.

Dorst Savijeski

Fucking hell just found my espresso machine eBay, yes true drifting in Japan was a reference to the Masai. (Peace corps wanted to also go to Japan..)

Dorst Savijeski

Yeah looks like a good deal pay later to get it of eBay....

Dorst Savijeski

I thought war nerd (👍), kicked out of the KSA (👍), living Kotkins nightmare (👍), .....rather be associated with messing with the city to break the pound to be honest.

Dorst Savijeski

I thought Mr eBay learned his lesson after the ddos berghain heist. He has to pay for boom boom I am cool door hussle.

Dorst Savijeski

Zag ik niet aankomen achter het paaltje en toch team security. Is echt het profiel schaken en lusiteren. Wat de potentaten Sudan hebben gedaan consultants haha, zou die never nooit doen. Die krijgt zo iets klaar niet eens omdat tie dezelfe school had. Dat hier zijn generatie ant live life loven is....