Anatol Lieven: Afghanistan - The Desert of Death

Of course, just as in the late 1980s, such deals threaten both the central government’s and the Talban high command’s control over their local commanders. Rather than the Taliban sweeping Vietnam-style over the ramparts and destroying the regime after US forces withdrawal, what we may well see in southern Afghanistan for a number of years to come is a patchwork of local truces in some areas and battles in others, depending largely on local tribal rivalries, and agreement (or lack of it) on the division of the heroin trade. As after 1989, however, this situation is unlikely to be stable, for such local compromises are deeply vulnerable to pressures from powerful outside forces, in Afghanistan itself and in the region.


Mein Blog befasst sich in einem umfassenden Sinn mit dem Verhältnis von Wissen, Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft. Ein besonderes Augenmerk richte ich dabei auf die Aktivitäten des Medien- und Dienstleistungskonzern Bertelsmann und der Bertelsmann Stiftung.