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Afghanistan defeat: British Failures of “the White Man’s burden” by Moin Ansari

“When you’re wounded and left on Afghanistan’s plains,
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
An’ go to your Gawd like a soldier.” Rudyard Kipling

MEMORANDUM

TO:             Britain

FROM:       Moin Ansari

DATED:     Today 

SUBJECT: Your “White Man’s burden”, and post Colonial involvement in Afghanistan

Some level of alterity is in order. When your last general left the Subcontinent, Pakistanis and Afghans believed in the cynosure chimera that “you” would really leave. We thought we would remember you for the trains bequeathed by Lord Delhousie’s. The West Asian aviary must have apocryphal magnetic powers over Englishmen. The Union Jack keeps coming back to the Middle East and South Asia.

The Empire is gone but incredulously you keep coming back. Why is it so? Is there an eschatologically obsessed version of Christianity that tries to make British foreign and domestic policy conterminous with their biblical worldview?” Is it because there were no lessons learned and the pusillanimous Kiplingish “White Man’s Burden” keeps on raising it’s ugly head every few decades. How many times will you try to civilize us?

Take up the White Man’s burden–

Send forth the best ye breed–
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives’ need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild–
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child. 

Even in the 19^th century technology was not the panacea that prevented defeat. Are there any lessons learned from the “Charge of the Light Brigade“.  

Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
“Forward, the Light Brigade!
“Charge for the guns!” he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.

 How many times will you “To veil the threat of terror“? 

Take up the White Man’s burden–
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain
To seek another’s profit,

And work another’s gain Unfortunately the lessons of unmitigated disaster of “Auckland’s Folly”, (First Anglo-Afghan War 1838-42) have not been taught to the Oxbridge students. Perhaps Blair and Brown never saw Lady Butler’s famous painting of Dr William Brydon, the sole survivor, gasping his way to the British outpost in Jalalabad. This painting epitomized the limits of the British Empire and focused on  Elphinstone’s retreat from Kabul and established Afghanistan’s reputation as a graveyard for foreign armies.  

Take up the White Man’s burden–
The savage wars of peace–
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch sloth and heathen Folly

Bring all your hopes to nought The lessons learned from the defeat of Lord Curzon’s (1878-1893) “On to the Oxus” policy are not taught to the Eaton and Harrow graduates. ”Forward, the Light Brigade!”

Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Someone had blunder’d:
Their’s not to make reply,
Their’s not to reason why,
Their’s but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred  

The lessons of the Peloponnesian war when Athens lost its democratic roots and it’s independence, because of her prolonged war with Sparta are very appropriate in our current times.  

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.

 The lessons of the British defeat in Iraq and Afghanistan should be codified. 

Take up the White Man’s burden–
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper–
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go mark them with your living,

And mark them with your dead. Will Britannia learn her lessons ever?

Flash’d all their sabres bare,
Flash’d as they turn’d in air,
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder’d:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right thro’ the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel’d from the sabre stroke
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they rode back, but not
Not the six hundred.

 Does no one in Britain read Robert Fisk anymore? 

Take up the White Man’s burden–
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard–
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:–
“Why brought he us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?” 

The minority Northern Alliance led non-Pashtun government has been a total failure. The worst is yet to come in Iraq and Afghanistan. The last allied or NATO troop will be reminded to “turn the lights off”..  

Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley’d and thunder’d;
Storm’d at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came thro’ the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

 Images of the last American helicopter leaving Saigon is etched into the collective memory of political scientists around the world 

Take up the White Man’s burden–
Ye dare not stoop to less–
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloke (1) your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your gods and you. 

The only way out of the Afghan quagmire for NATO is to negotiate with the Talibaan and the Pashtuns. Pakistan’s vital interests in Afghanstan have to be taken into account, and the Hindu Kush mountains cannot be used to launch terrorism into Pakistani Baluchistan.  

When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made,
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred.

 An American led “Marshall Plan” for Pakistan and Afghanistan will reduce tensions, and provide employment to the  disaffected youth of the area. 

Take up the White Man’s burden–
Have done with childish days–
The lightly proferred laurel, (2)
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years
Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!

Those that the gods will destroy they first make mad…

The last mayor of Kabul’s failures spell the end of Afghanistan. How long can the inept Karzai blame others for his corrupt Narco Warlordism?

http://rupeenews.com/ideas-on-afghanistan/bugti-karzai-vs-pakistan/

UK Afghan defeats at Maiwand, Gandamak: Lessons learend for NATO and ISAF)

Afghan defeat?

Hollow victory and defeat’s agony