Are the Taliban going to allow that though? It’s my understanding, and maybe I’m wrong, that they take their stance against opium production in the country very seriously. Like when they came to power the first time they immediately shut all of that down. And they did it again when the US finally ran away.
Who knows? I assume they have a price they’d be willing to become collaborators for: for all that they’re all people who grew up under the terror of US occupation and spent their literal whole lives fighting against it, they’re also reactionaries and so cannot possibly have any real beliefs or convictions that aren’t up for sale for something. The US easing off sanctions and returning some seized assets (or just bribing some officials) might be all it takes to get a lease on the base and some under the table deal to start selling the CIA opium. That’s not say they necessarily would sell out like that, and they may have such justifiably bitter grudges against the US that their price to sell out is higher than the US is willing to pay, but considering the US brought ISIS and Al Qaeda back into the CIA’s fold it’s certainly not unthinkable for the Taliban to join them too.
Like I can’t see the US managing it without active collaboration from the Taliban, because there’s just not the logistics capacity to invade Afghanistan again just to occupy a single region. They either get them to sell out and become compradors, or it just never happens and becomes something the odd reactionary talking head brings up wanting now and then at the most.
Are the Taliban going to allow that though? It’s my understanding, and maybe I’m wrong, that they take their stance against opium production in the country very seriously. Like when they came to power the first time they immediately shut all of that down. And they did it again when the US finally ran away.
Who knows? I assume they have a price they’d be willing to become collaborators for: for all that they’re all people who grew up under the terror of US occupation and spent their literal whole lives fighting against it, they’re also reactionaries and so cannot possibly have any real beliefs or convictions that aren’t up for sale for something. The US easing off sanctions and returning some seized assets (or just bribing some officials) might be all it takes to get a lease on the base and some under the table deal to start selling the CIA opium. That’s not say they necessarily would sell out like that, and they may have such justifiably bitter grudges against the US that their price to sell out is higher than the US is willing to pay, but considering the US brought ISIS and Al Qaeda back into the CIA’s fold it’s certainly not unthinkable for the Taliban to join them too.
Like I can’t see the US managing it without active collaboration from the Taliban, because there’s just not the logistics capacity to invade Afghanistan again just to occupy a single region. They either get them to sell out and become compradors, or it just never happens and becomes something the odd reactionary talking head brings up wanting now and then at the most.