Bulletins and News Discussion from September 16th to September 22nd, 2024 - This Megathread Is Dedicated To The Brave Mujahideen Fighters of Afghanistan - COTW: Afghanistan

Image is of China's ambassador to Afghanistan, Zhao Sheng, meeting Taliban Prime Minister Hasan Akhund in September 2023.

I know the Rambo title card is a hoax.

The COTW was chosen in the wake of the aborted sequel to the attempted assassination of Trump being performed by a guy who is VERY enthusiastic about Ukraine, to the point of trying to sneak Afghan soldiers into Ukraine by setting up a house in Pakistan to house them and then further transport them. He also apparently offered to send thousands of Afghan soldiers to Haiti to help them combat gang violence. Whomst among us doesn't have the numbers of thousands of Afghan soldiers on speed-dial. Do you reckon there's a group chat?

Anyway, while there is still no official recognition of the Taliban's government by any country, China has taken a different course than the late USSR and the US - forming economic in-roads, rather than trying their own invasion. This has been a big boon for the struggling country, with various mines and oil and agriculture deals helping keep things barely afloat. A total disintegration of the social fabric of Afghanistan is not in the interest of any of the powers that border it - China, Pakistan, and Iran, with Russia not too far away - so an interesting dynamic of helping-without-official-recognition has been established. I wonder who will be the first country to fully recognize them?

The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.

The Country of the Week is Afghanistan! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

Please check out the HexAtlas!

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.

1.6K comments

New MoA post. Among things that have already been discussed here, they argue that the Israeli story of the explosives being discovered seems unlikely - why would any Hezbollah operatives not immediately inform their commanders, and how would Israel know of the discovery? Rather, the attack may have been a choice by Netanyahu to silence critics who claim he is not doing enough against Hezbollah.
- Rather, the attack may have been a choice by Netanyahu to silence critics who claim he is not doing enough against Hezbollah.
  Part of it is to try to make people forget about the Yemeni ballistic missile hitting Tel Aviv.
  
  Literally western media straight up stopped reporting on it
- Based on yesterday's MoA post though, it seems that Israel is gearing up for a war with Hezbollah, which would make the story of the discovered explosions more plausible. So the possibilities are like:
  Israel intended to use the device explosions to hamper an initial Hezbollah response, but they were discovered and it had to be done early, which is unfortunate for them if Israel intends to invade in the coming days or weeks. The most popular explanation here, I think? It's what my opinion is.
  Israel did not intend to use the device explosions to hamper an initial Hezbollah response, just general disruption of Hezbollah (and any civilians that die are a "bonus"), therefore the discovered explosions story is false/irrelevant because it's fine if it's activated at any time. This seems kind of a strange thing to do, but there's a lot of unknown unknowns here.
  Israel did not intend to use the device explosions to hamper an initial Hezbollah response because they think that it would not be effective for whatever reason (perhaps Hezbollah has several backup communication methods?), it was purely for terrorism and to boost internal support (and any soldiers that die are a "bonus"). This seems to be what MoA is arguing if we want to keep their posts consistent.

1610 comments