The Indian role in Afghanistan (new title)
12 June The Australian - Indian Troops to Fight Taliban by Bruce Loudon.
Quote:
India is doubling its deployment of highly trained commandos to combat the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.
The commandos, from the crack Indo-Tibetan Border Police force that specialises in high-altitude operations in the Himalayas, are being sent to guard about 300 Indian road builders working on the 218km Zaranj-Delaram highway, which will connect Afghanistan's second city, Kandahar, with the Iranian border.
The highway, part of an Indian aid project, traverses the heart of the Taliban badlands and engineers working on the project have been the target of frequent attacks.
The new deployment meant almost 400 commandos would be in the area to combat Taliban attempts to halt construction of the highway, Indian news agency PTI reported...
Higher profile for India?
I do not recall much reporting on the Indian involvement in Afghanistan, so apologies if 'old news'.
When the Taliban government dominated Afghanistan the Northern Alliance, led by General Dostum, there was a small Indian military advisory team, much to the annoyance of the Pakistanis. Less certain now, the advisers provided artillery expertise and assisted the American intervention. After Kabul fell the Indian advisers went low profile.
So Indian has para-military police in Western Afghanistan, I wonder how ISAF manages that relationship?
davidbfpo
India conquered Afghanistan. Anciently it was a province of India.
http://www.esamskriti.com/essay-chap...m-India-1.aspx
Conquering Afghanistan- What The West Can Learn From India
By Rakesh Krishnan Simha , [ rakeshmail@gmail.com]
Chapter : 1
The western media says no country has ever conquered Afghanistan, but the fact they conveniently forget is that not too long ago the Indians conquered and ruled Afghanistan, an episode of history that is carved into the recesses of the Afghan mind.
... But first a flashback to the past. Afghanistan had always been a part of India; it was called Gandhar, from which the modern Kandahar originates. It was a vibrant ancient Indian province that gave the world excellent art, architecture, literature and scientific knowledge. After Alexander’s ill-fated invasion in the 4th century BC, it became even more eclectic – a melting pot of Indian and Greek cultures, a world far removed from today’s Taliban infested badlands.
It was an Indian province until 1735 when Nadir Shah of Iran emboldened by the weakness of India's latter Mughals ransacked Delhi. ...
... Nadir Shah’s successor Ahmad Shah Abdali had been launching repeated raids into Punjab and Delhi. To check this Ranjit Singh decided to build a modern and powerful army with the employment of Frenchmen, Italians, Greeks, Russians, Germans and Austrians. In fact, two of the foreign officers who entered the maharaja’s service, Ventura and Allard, had served under Napoleon. Says historian Shiv Kumar Gupta: “All these officers were basically engaged by Ranjit Singh for modernization of his troops. He never put them in supreme command.”
After conquering Multan in 1818 and Kashmir in 1819, Ranjit Singh led his legions across the Indus and took Dera Ghazi Khan in 1820 and Dera Ismail Khan in 1821. Alarmed, the Afghans called for a jehad under the leadership of Azim Khan Burkazi, the ruler of Kabul. A big Afghan army collected on the bank of the Kabul river at Naushehra, but Ranjit Singh won a decisive victory and the Afghans were dispersed in 1823. Peshawar was subdued in 1834.
Too much nonsense, too little history
I will be the first to say that the unconquerable Afghanistan myth is a myth. Afghanistan has been conquered MANY times, usually by conquerors passing through on their way to better real estate. But this particular article is really silly and very very superficial. Ancient Afghanistan was on the periphery of Ancient India and if we are talking about the Mahabharata, we are in the realm of myth, not in the realm of proper historiography. (again, I am a fan of the Mahabharat and highly recommend the simplified short English version by RK Narayan, but lets not get carried away).
In "historical times", Afghanistan has more often been the source of people who raided or even conquered the Indian plains and not the other way round (which, to my mind, is neither here not there as far as present times are concerned as the whole notion of genetically unconquerable and conquerable people is false, so I am not reading too much into that either).
For example, the writer states that until 1735, Afghanistan was an Indian province. Since the ruling dynasty in India (the Moghuls) advertised themselves first and foremost as "Taimuris" (descendants of Tamerlane) and were from central asia and ruled Afghanistan BEFORE they ruled India, and their predecessors (the Lodhis) were actually pathans who had moved into India as part of conquering Afghan armies, this is a bit too clever an assertion.
Ranjit Singh did indeed capture what is now the Pakistani part of traditional Pathan lands (which is why those parts are IN Pakistan...they became British when the British defeated Ranjit Singh's incompetent successors) but that is hardly the same thing as conquering Afghanistan. A case can be made that he COULD have taken Kabul if he wanted, but what exactly does that prove? that a superior military led by a superior leader can defeat a weaker nation?
Ranjit Singh's successful subjugation of his Pathan subjects does tell us that there is nothing inherently unconquerable about these tribes (or any other tribes). Is that news?
btw, Hari Singh Malwa conquered Hazara in what is now Pakistan's Hazara division, which has nothing to do with the Afghan Hazarajat. That whole paragraph makes no sense whatsoever.
India & Russia share concerns on Afghanistan
This the nearest hospitable place for this report.
Apparently Prime Minister Putin this week in a statement after a new arms deal with India commented that Russia shares India's concerns over the Taliban in Afghanistan.
After a search I did find this on an arms & nuclear power deal: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8561365.stm and a suggestion that they did share concerns: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/i...ow/5673201.cms
How the Afghan state will react to such 'shared concerns' is not clear, especially as the Pakistani reaction maybe to label this as strategic encirclement and exert their own response. I'm puzzled that Russia even considers the Afghan peoples will accept their help - assuming 'concern' becomes a reality.
India's role in Afghanistan
Cross reference added as this subject IMHO deserves it, to a SWJ Blog notice:http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ad.php?t=10787
some interesting material on an"interesting" situation...
Not sure what the fallout from this will be geopolitically (Indo-Pak relations may worsen with Pakistan given a pretext, if it needed one, of further destabilisation in India although from India's persepctive might actually be an attempt to payback Pakistan by playing in a territory considered by Pakistani strategists as affording them strategic depth)...but given our travails I suppose the more the merrier!
According to India & Afghanistan: Charting the Future
India's reasons for intervention/participation are fourfold;
1. Denying the ISI strategic depth to train terrorists to attack India;
2. breaking the narco-terrosim nexus; &
3. secure Afghanistan as a trade/resource hub regarding hydro-carbons; &
4. tapping Afghanistans oil potential (?)
Sounds like classical geopolitical encirclement to me.
&
And the Pakistani take...Afghanistan-Evolving an Indo-Pak Strategy: Perspectives from Pakistan
&
The CSIS's take India and Pakistan in Afghanistan: Hostile Sport
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A paper outlining India's strategy with regards for foriegn aid, Emerging Donors in International Development Assistance: The India Case, which also ties India's assistance to Afghanistan as an attempt to tie them into a pro-India sphere of influence thus tacitly breaking Afghanistan's tie to Pakistan (from whom it gets nothing worth writing home about.)
&, finally,
A useful backgrounder from the Council on Foreign Relations, India-Afghanistan Relations