Originally Posted by
Dromikaites
Forcing values onto others did work time and again, provided the resources allocated to it were adequate. In recent history the most prominent experiences would be those of the Soviet Union, China, Cuba or North Korea.
So here is how it could be done in Afghanistan, using "Soviet" methods.
Step 1:
All property is "confiscated" by the sate. Of course land, factories, etc don't go anywhere, except now only the state bureaucrats decide how they are used;
Step 2:
People living in areas hard to defend/control are forcibly relocated to places easy to control. Since all the land belongs to the State, there's no problem that those people would be moved on somebody else's property;
Step 3:
In order to build the needed accommodation and infrastructure to relocate the people to places easy to control, Stalinist type methods are used (= people are forced to work/build stuff at gunpoint). Of course in practice things would work just as they worked in the Soviet Union in the '30s, meaning a lot of people would die in the process either through repression or because of malnutrition, disease and cold, before the said infrastructure is in place.
Step 4:
Once there is enough infrastructure in place, life becomes acceptable (from the material point of view, as in shelter, food, sanitation). The overwhelming majority of the people who survive would notice their current living standards are better than what they used to be in their native villages (they would have running water, medical care, sufficient food, etc). Thus they become much more open to the work of the state propagandists.
By the way, "Soviet style" propaganda means more than just posters, movies and songs. People are forced to attend "reeducation" classes where in addition to listening to the propaganda they have to speak themselves in favor of the measures taken by the government. Since as I said, those who survive the stage of building infrastructure do enjoy much better living conditions than in their original villages, sincerely agreeing with the official point of view is less difficult than you might imagine.
This is how communist regimes managed to survive for 70 years in Soviet Union, 40 years in Central and Eastern Europe and can still cling on to power in North Korea and Cuba: a combination of transforming the whole country into one giant concentration camp combined with enough infrastructure to make the life bearable.
Now that I hope I've put to rest the "forcing your values onto others is impossible" idea, I'll discuss the more expensive approach, compatible with the Western values, but very expensive (and therefore not going to happen).
1. Concentrate first on developing the areas which can be easily secured. That means heavily investing in both training all sorts of people (policemen, doctors, engineers, clerks, factory workers, teachers, lawyers, etc) and in developing the economy and infrastructure of those areas;
2. Expand the control from there, investing heavily in every "newly conquered" area. If the first step was properly done, some of the investment would be generated locally, by the "developed part" of Afghanistan itself. In addition to that, the "conquering" would be done mostly by the Afghans, which would solve many issues.
The main problem with what happens today in Afghanistan is that the levels of investment in training people and building up the economy and infrastructure are still inadequate even though a lot of money have been poured into that since the invasion. There is little incentive for the Western governments to spend more, so nothing would happen.
To better understand why things won't happen, I'll give you some very practical examples. A lot of infrastructure Afghanistan needs is rather low-tech (like concrete, pipes, wire for electrical networks, bricks, etc). The right approach would have been to set up factories to manufacture that stuff, and to train the workers needed there.
All the former East European communist countries which went from predominantly agricultural economies to modern economies did so in roughly 10 - 15 years, and that happened in the context of the total technological embargo from the West, typical for the early stages of the Cold War. Afghanistan wasn't under such embargo after the ousting of the Talibans, therefore industrializing Afghanistan to the point it can build its own infrastructure (generating jobs and strengthening its economy and rising the standards of living in the process) could have been done easier than how it was done in Eastern Europe from 1945 till 1960. Except there was a "small glitch" - whatever the Afghans would manufacture themselves won't be bought from the West.
There is a method to fight "capitalistic greed" with "capitalistic greed": provide the capital needed by Afghanistan as loans. So instead of making money by selling stuff to the Afghans, make money by collecting interest on those loans.
The problem is credit is based on credibility, which means trust. Those who would lend money to Afghanistan, so the Afghans develop their country themselves, need to be confident those loans will be paid back. Unfortunately most experiences with lending money to a country in the hope to see them back show that's not the case. Most of the loans given to third-world countries after WW2 had to be written off.
Frankly Afghanistan would have been much better off had the Soviets be left alone in the '80s. In the worst case scenario, it would have looked like nowadays Uzbekistan, Tajikistan or Turkmenistan: poor, dictatorial but much better than what it has today. In the best case scenario it would have ended up like Kazakhstan or Azerbajan. Still dictatorial but well developed.
Pakistani Tablian staying classy and winning hearts and minds...with grenades in a movie theater
I honestly do not understand how they could let the northern part of their country go to shite so badly if it wasn't almost deliberate hesitation and holding back of their full strength.
Reply With Quote
Way to miss the point completely.
