A brief reflection on what happened in Afghanistan.
A couple of weeks ago, we all watched in amazement as the United States put an end to its military intervention in Afghanistan, after 20 years of conflict... although for many it is a distant and unfamiliar fact, I invite you... to reflect a little, and to consider such an assumption... for chaos and horror may be closer than we think.
But first a bit of history and context
The territory of Afghanistan is located mainly at the beginning of the Hindu Kush mountain range, that's right folks, it is not a desert as many in these regions think, it is actually a mostly mountainous country as you can see in the image below.
Some have referred to Afghanistan as the graveyard of empires, although for me... it is more a mass grave of people and their cultures...
since 331 BC when Alexander the Great conquered the region, and long before the birth of the Islamic religion, Afghanistan has been fought against conquest... the mountainous territory is difficult for conventional armies, which makes holding the territory gained very costly...
In 1221 and 1222 with the Mongol invasion, the brutality of the northern nomads' form of conquest ended up settling hatred and resentment of foreign rule in the region... where there was already a Muslim majority.
Then came the British... the Soviets... and more recently the North Americans...
But all this... Why?
Well Afghanistan is the gateway to the east... it borders Pakistan, and China... so in ancient times all the empires that wanted to conquer the east had to deal with the Afghans.
The problem is that even without foreign presence... in Afghanistan there is always violence... and that's what I wanted to reflect on....
There are currently 14 ethnic groups living in the region, among the largest are the Pashtuns, Tajiks and Uzbeks, each with their particular set of beliefs and customs... if we add to the mix the religious intolerance of many interpretations of Islam, the picture starts to become a little clearer... perhaps for us in the Americas it is difficult to understand so much division and violence... but let us reflect a little... our countries have lived nearly 200 years of peace, with some limited conflicts... but that does not prevent animosities from existing, even though in the eyes of the world we Latinos give the image of a homogeneous people... There are divisions... like the animosity between Chileans and Peruvians or Argentines and Brazilians...
Now imagine that... but in a region always marked by war... where you cannot have faith in a central government, as it constantly changes hands and interests... where you can only trust your clan, which is the only one that accepts you as you were born... where there are weapons everywhere, with limited resources, often violence, may be the only way to survive. ... that's why western projects to establish puppet governments have never worked... because people in the region do not accept the notion so common for us of central government, they do not understand police or national army... a president for them is a leader of another clan... who probably is their enemy and wants to exterminate them...
So why do they fight so much?
Well... religious and cultural differences... territory... resources... and the freedom to live as they have for thousands of years... and drugs... lots of drugs....
For us narco violence... but again, I invite you to imagine this... the level of narco violence in a country like Mexico... but with the divisions and historical violence I already mentioned above... it is a recipe for carnage indeed.
Afghanistan is the main world producer of poppy... taking an impressive 85% of the world market... and the business is booming, in 2001 it was estimated by the UN that in Afghanistan there were about 8,000 hectares of poppies cultivated... by 2020... it was estimated about 224,000... giving a net production in dollars of 460 million dollars per year... enough to make war on the most powerful nation in the world...
So let's think... Violence for millennia, ethnic divisions, religious intolerance, weapons, money and an unregulated business that is always controlled by the strongest...
It doesn't seem so strange anymore why they fight, does it?
When it is a matter of survival... when the prosperity of your clan and the food of your people depends on a business controlled by the most violent one, when the other one does not see you as a complete human being and would be happy to exterminate you and your people... that is when you have war and horror... that is why I do not believe that the violence in Afghanistan will end soon, not with any amount of planes and bombs... and that is why I believe... that in our countries, as impossible as it may seem... the same thing could happen one day... here there is narco-violence. ... and divisions... we only need to dehumanize ourselves... which I hope will never happen... it would be a real tragedy to see this beautiful land covered in red... as it happened in Afghanistan... which was also very beautiful...