Why so much money being poured into Afganistan?

[VHG]

So we are going to give MORE money to Afganistan (we have already given £500 million in the last four years in aid).

At the same time we are slashing our school rebuilding program in our own country as we have no money.

I bet when the UK population pay their taxes they expect it to go on our schools, hospitals, the police etc, not to look after a hell hole of a country hundreds of miles away.

I wonder if Afganistan would ever give us money if the roles were reversed.

[jno]

come on, VHG, you know why we went into Afghanistan: 9/11 and Taliban support for it. I believe we screwed up by charging off into Iraq before finishing the job; it doesn't look as if we're going to win either of these, and we can only hope the Taliban aren't back stronger than ever in ten years. Is it worth laying out money now to try to stop that happening? I don't think the answer is as obvious as you suggest.

[jake-the-peg]

Yes because we're just going to pull out of Afghanistan and they'll all go back to living a nice peacefull existance and there will be proper government and Al Qaeda won't be straight back in there and Julie Andrews will skip over the Khyber pass singing songs in a nun's costume.

The whole withdrawal concept is based around the Afghans taking over security in 4 years

Hmm isn't that just before the election - what an odd coincidence.

That's not going to happen without money is it?

[sp1814]

VHG

It comes down to natural resources. We're not doing this merely for altruistic purposes.

Immediately across the Caspian from Azerbaijan, is the former Soviet Central Asian republic of Turkmenistan, an area of 488,000 sq. miles, bigger than the whole of Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana and Oklahoma combined. It has enormous oil, gas, coal and other natural resources and significantly, directly adjoins Afghanistan to the south.


Uzbekistan, which covers an area of 172,000 sq. miles, roughly equivalent to the combined states of Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, has vast resources in oil, gas, coal, copper and gold as well as being a huge cotton producer. It too, has a frontier with Afghanistan to its south, as does Tajikistan. Tajikistan Tajikistan is over 55,000 sq. miles, an area slightly bigger than Illinois. It too has very rich deposits of oil, gas, coal, lead, zinc, uranium, radium and many other minerals.

[sp1814]

The biggest plum in the Central Asian pie is Kazakhstan, a country of more than 1,000 000 sq. miles. This is almost twice the size of Alaska, the largest of the American states and greater in extent than the combined Canadian provinces of Ontario and New Brunswick. It has absolutely vast reserves of coal, oil, gas, manganese, copper, bauxite, gold, uranium and many other minerals as well as a high degree of industrial and agricultural development, including much of the former Soviet aerospace and defense industries. It is bound to the west by the Caspian sea and on the south by Uzbekistan, through which it can be reached from Afghanistan.

The strategic importance of Afghanistan is therefore the route into a vast region covering almost 2 million sq. miles with vast untapped natural resources and other than through Iran or China, which are not options available to the US. or UK. Afghanistan is the only feasible bridgehead to the principal major markets in the Pacific rim.

It's in our best interests to promote stablilty and open 'in roads' into the region.

It's WAY more complicated that simply "bunging cash at the region with no payback".

There's payback all the way down the line.

[jno]

excellent answer, sp1814 - with the proviso that it's all a gamble; it could go pear-shaped and we might never get any payback at all. A risk worth taking in my opinion but I think VHG's well within his rights saying the opposite.

[anotheoldgit]

sp1814

What publication did you copy all that from?

If all that was correct, do you think Russia would have given up so easily?

And do you think China would also be happy to sit back and let NATO take overall control?

[jno]

what makes you think Russia *has* given up, aog?

[sp1814]

AOG

It's extracted from http://www.opendemocr...nistan_to_the_u_s_b_0

As a side bar, the site has a particularly interesting take on the burqa ban:

http://www.opendemocr.../dangers-of-burqa-ban

Seems to a 'left leaning' site, but with some well-written and researched articles.

[keyplus90]

Because they are trying to buy few loyal people. After all Karzai want to go out of his room sometime without a fear of beig shot dead.

[sp1814]

Steve.5

I wasn't advocating the war - just trying to explain our involvement in the region and continued aid.

[rov1200]

The Andrew Neill show on BBC2 was worth watching when he grilled Alan Duncan about aid to Afghanistan. Neill pointed out the money that was stacked on pallets waiting to leave the country while the poor Afghans received nothing. Neill pointed out that our money was being wasted but the only reply was that Britain is leading the world in how to give charity.

If these same politicians are adept at putting taxpayers money in their own pockets it doesn't surprise me they are using the same money to satisy their consciences.

[anotheoldgit]

sp1814

/// Seems to a 'left leaning' site, but with some well-written and researched articles.///

Not a touch of bias here then?

Would you have said "seems to a 'right leaning' site, but with some well-written and researched articles"

But then you would not be trawling right leaning sites would you?

[oscarina]

It's ridiculous the exorbitant amount of money that the government give away when more should be spent at home. I have a family friend waiting to come out of hospital to be looked after at home but he is still waiting as they told him their was no funding for his home care! Doesn't make sense!!