"Imperial Cemetery"-Afghanistan

recently, I have noticed that the name of a country always appears in the news media: Afghanistan.

On 23rd of last month, US Secretary of State Pompeo visited the Afghan capital to discuss the withdrawal of US troops in Afghanistan.

If you remember, you may remember that at the end of February, the US government signed a landmark peace agreement with the Taliban. According to the agreement, the United States promised to reduce the number of US troops stationed in Afghanistan from 13, to 8,6 within 135 days, and the remaining US troops and NATO Coalition forces will leave Afghanistan within 14 months.

In fact, the US Afghanistan policy has been widely criticized in the United States. The main criticism is that the United States has fought in Afghanistan for 18 years and spent $2 trillion, but it just threw itself into a bottomless quagmire and wasted a lot of manpower and material resources.

Recently, I read an article on WeChat official account's WeChat "Show the World", which reminded me that the United States can't blame itself for paying such a heavy price in Afghanistan, because Afghanistan itself is a tough bone, and there is even a nickname called "Imperial Cemetery".

When talking about Afghanistan, many people can only think of bin Laden and terrorism, or vaguely know that Afghanistan is a very underdeveloped country.

but think about it, a country can become the so-called imperial cemetery, and there must not be a first condition, that is, the empire must be willing to come to this place.

yes, Afghanistan is not rich as a country, but geographically, it is a battleground for military strategists.

Tell you about the neighbors around Afghanistan, and you will understand. China is in the east, Central Asian countries are in the north, Pakistan and India are in the south, and Iran is in the west. As long as you are a little familiar with history, you can certainly hear that Afghanistan's geographical location is the intersection of several civilizations, which is the so-called "crossroads" in Central Asia.

what's the point of the intersection? That is, no matter which forces occupy Afghanistan, they can use it as a basis to threaten the surrounding civilizations in four different directions. This is why we say that Afghanistan is a "battleground for military strategists".

In history, I am afraid that Tsarist Russia and the British Empire have fought the most fiercely for this region of Afghanistan.

During the 18th and 19th centuries, Russia and Britain both wanted to become world hegemons. Coincidentally, these two countries are located in one east and one west of Europe, but their road to world domination is very similar, and both of them have made two plans.

on the one hand, they are prepared to let European countries check and balance each other, and they will hit whoever takes the lead; On the other hand, they should open up a back garden of their own, secretly develop and wait until the time is right. Russia found the back garden in Central Asia, while Britain found India.

If you look at the map, you will find that it is very interesting. Two ambitious empires have circled a big circle, one in the south of Afghanistan and the other in the north of Afghanistan.

Britain is more concerned about this matter. As we said just now, Afghanistan is a "battleground for military strategists". Once a force occupies Afghanistan, it will easily go south and harass India.

In order to prevent India, the jewel in the crown of the British Empire, from being taken away by others, Britain launched three wars in Afghanistan, and after each war, a pro-British regime was established in Afghanistan.

After the third war in Afghanistan, simply let Afghanistan become an independent country. In this way, whoever wants to occupy Afghanistan will certainly face the condemnation of the international community.

These efforts are essentially aimed at making Afghanistan a buffer zone, reducing direct contact between the two countries and avoiding unnecessary conflicts.

Then comes the question: Britain and Russia, both powerful countries in history, have fought many wars. Why are they just fighting each other over the hill in Afghanistan, preferring to make Afghanistan independent as a buffer zone for each other rather than swallow it at one go?

If we want to answer this question, we have to mention the other side of Afghanistan as an imperial graveyard, that is, it is very difficult to conquer.

Although Afghanistan is not large in size, its terrain is very complicated. The Afghanistan we see today is run through by a tall mountain range from east to west, separating the north from the south. This mountain range, the Hindu Kush Mountain Range, is about 16 kilometers long, with an average elevation of 5 meters, and the highest peak, Mir Peak, is 769 meters above sea level.

what are the consequences of this mountain?

In fact, if we think of China, we can understand that Hanzhong and Xi 'an are separated by only a Qinling Mountain, but culturally, one belongs to the south and the other belongs to the north. This law is also true in Afghanistan, because the barrier of Hindu Kush Mountain leads to the cultural separation between the north and south sides of the mountain. If a ruler wants to rule Afghanistan, he needs a variety of governance methods.

In addition to being difficult to unify in culture, this mountain range also set an insurmountable hurdle for the traffic between the north and the south, which made it difficult for rulers to take care of both sides effectively in ancient times.

You may have to ask after hearing this. Afghanistan's complex terrain makes it difficult for it to grow into a powerful regime, but why can't foreign empires pack it up?

We should return to the geographical features of Afghanistan. The geography of Afghanistan not only causes cultural division, but also brings another problem, that is, the shortage of resources.

The arable land in Afghanistan is very small, accounting for only .2% of the whole country, and most of the residents mainly graze. This is because in Afghanistan, mountains and plateaus account for 8% of the country's area. Even if there are plains, because Afghanistan is located in the interior of Asia and the climate is dry, the plains are mostly barren.

what's the result?

The small area of cultivated land and the lack of natural resources have led to the fact that even if Afghanistan has established a government, it will not be able to operate stably for a long time because of its poor hematopoietic capacity. If an empire wants to support the local government in Afghanistan and become its own agent, it must invest continuously for a long time, which is equivalent to poking a hole in its purse that can never be blocked.

Moreover, although Afghanistan is very important geographically, it is beyond the reach of many empires. This means that even if an empire wants to conquer Afghanistan, it must go a long way and continuously transport the resources in the center of the empire.

In this way, whether it is to support local agents or to leave the country in person, Afghanistan will make the empire pay high governance costs and become a quagmire from which it is difficult for the empire to get out.

Even in modern times, Afghanistan is a very difficult place to be ruled, because its terrain has written the gene "invincible" in its bones.

We can imagine such a cycle: it is difficult to establish a strong unified government in Afghanistan because of the terrain, which leads to the local people being very unruly and unruly in character, and the local people's personality characteristics have increased the difficulty of later rulers.

We can also see that Afghanistan, as a "tough bone", has had a major impact on the world pattern twice in the past half century.

one time was mentioned at the beginning, which dragged the United States into a quagmire. The other time was against the Soviet Union-historians generally believe that the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, followed by a 1-year war, which brought great loss of national strength and became one of the reasons for dragging down the Soviet Union.

To sum up: In fact, why Afghanistan became an imperial cemetery can be summarized in eight words: the center of contradiction and the imperial border.

The center of contradiction means that Afghanistan has become a battleground for military strategists because of its special geographical position, and many empires in history want to get their hands on Afghanistan;

The imperial border means that Afghanistan is beyond the reach of many empires because of its complex geographical environment and its distance from the center of the empire. Even if it is determined to conquer, it will pay a huge price.