Why do the Taliban still exist?

[Smith_3]

America has been at war with the Taliban since 2001. Now its 2009 and they are still not defeated. I somehow don't buy it that we are still at war with the same people that we were at war with in 2001. With the amount of bombs dropped on Afghanistan, one would think they would be all gone by now. Or are there millions of them? Somehow that doesn't exactly match with the story that we are at war with "a few radicals that have taken a country hostage". To me it seems much more like we are at war with a nationalistic movement that is deeply routed in Afghan society and that has the primary goal to drive foreign occupants out of the country. Sort of like in Vietnam.

[babylonsister]

1. I guess you missed that contrived war in Iraq, where most of our

resources went to. How'd you do that?

[Smith_3]

3. I don't buy that "overstretched front" line.

Surely it cannot be that hard for the mighty USA to fight two wars.

[babylonsister]

5. Tell that to soldiers who are on their 3rd, 4th, 5th deployment. nt

[Smith_3]

9. I thought the US military was the most powerful in the world.

Iraq and Afghanistan are not such big countries. What I am saying is that either we are not actually trying to defeat the Taliban, or there are much more of them than just that "band of crooks who seized power". It appears that there must be millions of them, which means they are not just a band of crooks but a population of their own. This in return means that we are not waging a "war on terror" but a war on the native population of a certain area.

[CJCRANE]

2. It's New Improved Taliban

now funded by the heroin trade (that was banned under Classic Taliban).

[nichomachus]

4. For the same reason the Viet Cong never went away

Even after we killed 350,000,000 of them (if you believed the daily body counts from the military).

[cali]

6. Why would you think they'd be all gone by now?

In large part, the Taliban is rooted in tribal struggles for dominance. Part of the resistance is surely rooted in the occupation, but the Talban movement is still one that seeks to impose its religious philosophy on others. Even if we left tomorrow, that would be unlikely to change.

[Smith_3]

8. Because the "few radicals who have seized power" line sounded like it would be a group

of like 100 people or so. Like the leading nazis. But now it seems more like we are at war with an entire population. If there are actually millions of Taliban, it is hard to argue that they are just a few crooks that hold everyone else hostage.

[Marksbrother]

7. Heroin business in Afghanistan has some very tough players

That's why eliminating the competition has proven to be unusually difficult for the CIA.

[NeedleCast]

10. They may still exist, but they've been stripper of the total control they once had

and as far as I'm concerned, that's a good thing.

The Taliban does not exist to drive foreign occupants out of the country. From what I saw, they're happy to accept foreigners who share their fundamentalist views.

[KharmaTrain]

11. Cause Most People Don't Understand Who The Taliban Are...

They're as much a tribal nationalist movement as they are "terrorists" or extremists. The Taliban represents Pushtan tribes that have long inhabited the regions that make up south and eastern Afghanistan and western Pakistan. National borders were drawn by outsiders, not them...and they've fought for centuries to maintain their own national identities.

Fundamental Islam plays a role in this movement as a reaction to the "secular" opposition they face within the country. In recent years this has been represented by the Soviets and now Americans as well as successive Pakistani goverments and juntas. It's as much a culture clash as it is any real ideological movement.

Eventually we will have to deal with this distinction or be doomed to a long and ultimately futile war of attrition.

[mmonk]

12. After all the support they received from Pakistan and the US

in the past, partcularly from Pakistani intelligence and military connections, they won't go away that get easy.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

13. Because we can't defeat them. See Vietnam for precedent.

[JonQ]

14. Because they are very popular

with a certain subset of the population. Also, loosely defined and organized. Hard to kill off essentially a gang with a dispersed leadership and the ability to blend in with the locals.

[Tyrone Slothrop]

15. Read this book

http://www.amazon.com/Graveyard-Empires-Americas-War-Afghanistan/dp/0393068986/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1244731231&sr=8-1

It answers your question pretty well and in a hell of a lot more detail than anyone on a message board is going to provide.

[Smith_3]

16. Bookmarked.

I might order that.