Top Links #12 Afghanistan

How a regime falls.

How a regime falls:

From inside Afghanistan’s embassy in India, before it was deleted:

James Oaten @james_oaten

This tweet has been deleted. But the journalist in me was too quick. Screenshot below. #Afghanistan #Taliban

A central banker escapes

Ajmal Ahmady @aahmady

1/The collapse of the Government in Afghanistan this past week was so swift and complete - it was disorienting and difficult to comprehend. This is how the events seemed to proceed from my perspective as Central Bank Governor.

Ahmady is American-raised. Alum of UCLA & Harvard. Experience as US Treasury, World Bank, private equity and asset management and Booze Allen Hamilton.

Background: the anti-Taliban campaign and why it failed

Still the best podcast I have heard, the UK security expert Paul Rogers on Politics Theory Other. Has stood up for almost a week.

Background: Afghan politics

From one of the best economic historians on twitter a fantastic rundown on ethnic politics of Afghanistan.

Pseudoerasmus @pseudoerasmus

Afghanistan enters the news cycle, and there are always people rehashing the 1980s…. Periodic reminder: Taliban ≠ the mujahiddin of the 1980s. If anything, the Taliban have just driven from power the remnants/descendants of the mujahiddin/ex-communist coalition of the 1990s

The Afghan Opium business and the failure of suppression

Great thread on the microeconomics of opium farming.

Jeffrey P. Clemens @jeffreypclemens

An underrated mistake in US policy in Afghanistan was its long-running effort to suppress the cultivation of opium poppy and, in turn, the production of heroin and other opiates. A thread. 1/19

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Context (1): On Russia’s relaxed view

Why is Russia so calm about the Taliban?

Mark Galeotti’s take in the Moscow Times.

Context (2): The Indian view on China, Xinjiang and Afghanistan

The price of M16s:

Well if you were small time arms dealer with a cache of M16, the hundreds of thousands of guns the Afghan army is throwing away are bad news for your balance sheet!

Cᴀʟɪʙʀᴇ Oʙsᴄᴜʀᴀ @CalibreObscura

#Afghanistan I have enquired as to the value of an M16A4 such as this on the (offline) black market. Jun 18th 2021: $2410 July 2nd 2021: $2375 𝗔𝘂𝗴 𝟭𝟰𝘁𝗵 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟭: $𝟭𝟱𝟬𝟬 37.75% price drop in the value of fresh rifles in ~2 months. Been most dramatic in past 3ish weeks.

Cᴀʟɪʙʀᴇ Oʙsᴄᴜʀᴀ @CalibreObscura

#Balochistan: An exclusive look at a fresh and extremely clean FN M16A4 purchased from #Afghanistan recently. This former ANA gun was sold on by the Taliban to the BLA and cost just over $2400. Lots of people not mentioning 2nd & 3rd order effects as regards proliferation. https://t.co/CoRekyuBOR

Bond markets and the Taliban

As the region is rocked by the collapse in Afghanistan, both Reuters and the FT reported pressure in the bond markets of Pakistan and Uzbekistan.

So far it is Pakistan’s 2036 eurobond that is worst affected

If it spreads much beyond that particular debt issue, it will show up in the data here.

BHL

Most commentators responded in fairly predictable ways to events yesterday. Not so the French philosophizer Bernard-Henri Lévy. He was on TV to proclaim not only that the Taliban are not much to speak of as a military force, but that the people who (had) actually taking power in Afghanistan were the emancipated young women.

Poète dubitatif @evil_SDOC

«Les Taliban n’étaient pas en train de prendre le pouvoir, c’est faux ! Celles qui étaient en train de prendre le pouvoir, c’est les femmes qui s’étaient prises à rêver […] d’égalité et de liberté». Belle analyse au scalpel, sans doute rédigée à la lueur des balles traçantes. https://t.co/PonUAoVV7i

BFMTV @BFMTV

Bernard-Henri Lévy: "Les talibans sont des bons terroristes mais sont des mauvais soldats" https://t.co/qnunx5s6kE

BHL loves himself a war and a bit of cleavage.

Daniel Zamora Vargas @DanielZamoraV

When BHL was dressed as a mujahideen