One of the more intellectually lazy approaches to commenting on current affairs is to take a look at history in a linear fashion, pronounce some version of “this always happens there and has for hundreds of years,” and throw in big words like “geo-political,” “geo-strategic” or “Great Game” for added measure. I have read missives from professors and generals along those lines when it comes to the usual obsession the chattering classes have with the Middle East and Afghanistan.
The world is rarely static, and less so in the information age when the amount of knowledge available to humanity increases substantially every few years, as does access to the same. The ensuing withdrawal of coalition forces from Afghanistan can be easily dismissed as a continuation of sordid history whose contours are well-known. But such a simplification leaves out legitimate concern for that half of the Afghan population that has most to lose should things go south: Afghanistan’s women.
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