Afghanistan: Who Would Be King?

My cat ventures into alien territory every night. There he seeks to be king. There he should be learning but, like the Generals of Armies, Catly is a slow learner.

Certain of his big-cat power , he fears no racoon, no possum, no skunk, no Russian. From them he simply stays clear. Neither he nor they seek war. The alien enemy he sets out to command or destroy is more intransigent, more elusive, more hidden. For this enemy is in his own territory where many have intruded and retreated in disarray.

Gophers in a clay hill, rarely seen and with an unimaginable maze of tunnels and caves. Gopher territory. Many cats have hunted there with little success. All but Catly have abandoned the hunt. Catly is a slow learner, but he would be King.

Cats rule the hill by permission of the gophers. The gophers pop out when they will and quickly hide when Catly approaches. Catly reaches down into their caves, claws about, and catches nothing. The gophers go on digging caves and eating flowers.

Gophers are like guerrilla fighters. Like the troops of General George Washington. They live to fight another day. Washington's army had hills and woods. The gophers have hills and tunnels. The guerrillas of Afghanistan have mountains and caves. Governments rule by the will of the people unless they are willing to kill all the people. Cats cannot rule gopher hills and no invader has ever ruled the people of Afghanistan.

The "Man Who Would Be King" ventured into Afghanistan, the land of mountains, and returned only as a withered head in a bag. Rudyard Kipling wrote a metaphor to teach the armies who would be King in Afghanistan. But armies do not learn.

In the first British war in Afghanistan, 1838-42, Akbar Khan killed Sir William Hay Macnaghten with his own hands. Whereupon 4,500 British troops march out of Kabul but few survived.

The second war, 1878-81, created the Durand Line -- the hiding place of Osama bin Laden.

The third war, 1919-21, accomplished nothing. Armies in Afghanistan accomplish nothing. Alexander the Great had the wisdom to pass through quickly and never return.

The Russian invasion of Afghanistan, 1979-89, was a major factor in the fall of the Soviet Union.

Then came the Taliban, as barbaric a Muslim regime as ever known, followed by in invasion by the United States in 2001. In 2006 the Taliban are the gophers hiding in the caves The United States is the invader who would be King. My cat and Kipling could give advice on being King in a land of caves.

Armies march into Afghanistan and march out in lesser numbrs. Armies never learn. The German army did not learn from Napolean's trip to Moscow. The English marched into Baku, Crimea, Gallipoli, Afghanistan (three times), and each time marched out again with fewer men. Armies never learn.The American army did not learn from the British and Russian visits to Afghanistan, nor its own visit to Vietnam. My cat has learned from invasions of gopher territory, but cats are smarter than armies.

Governments rule by the will of the people, including guerillas hiding in mountains, whether of New Jersey, Pennysylvania or Afghanistan or in the tunnels of Vietnam. NATO and the United States Army under NATO command will fly out of Afghanistan with fewer men than flew in.

and about Islam and Islamists?

Go to Islam page.