Corbyn: “disagreements about the social attitudes” of Taliban…
Jeremy Corbyn is generally one of the more principled and left-wing members of the current Parliamentary Labour Party – not that that’s saying much .
But I’ve had cause previously to wonder about his exact attitude to the Taliban. In today’s Morning Star, he writes the following:
“This is a war of colonial occupation that can only suck in more and more troops as the Taliban increasingly represents nationalist feelings, even if there are disagreements about the social attitudes of its leadership.”
I’ll leave aside, for now, Corbyn’s fundamentally mistaken understanding of the US / Britsh war aims and his equally mistaken suggestion that the Taliban enjoy majority popular support on a nationalist basis (though, it should be noted that anyone who shares Corbyn’s analysis should, logically, not just oppose the war, but positively support the Taliban…). No, what I want to know is what does that slippery and evasive phrase “even if there are disagreements about the social attitudes of its leadership“, actually means. Disagreements? From whom? Forces within the Taliban itself? The Afghan people? Jeremy Corbyn?
And by “social attitudes” does he mean this sort of thing?
Jim Denham said,
December 2, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Comrade Paul Hampton draws attention to something else in today’s ‘Morning Star’:
Hilarious/dreadful Stalinist review of Trotsky biography
http://www.workersliberty.org/blogs/paulhampton/2009/12/02/tanks-trotsky
shug said,
December 3, 2009 at 7:13 am
Like all good comrades when it comes to control there can only be one.And Trotsky, found that out the hard way.Although it should not have been of surprise to him have being what can be described as the (enforcer)for the revolution.Seems that the lessons of the past have not been learned.Sad really.
Laban said,
December 3, 2009 at 10:25 am
Corbyn next year ? ” the BNP increasingly represents nationalist feelings, even if there are disagreements about the social attitudes of its leadership.””
Of course the Taleban, like the BNP, represent more ethnic/tribal (Pashtun) than nationalist feelings. I doubt they see Hazaras or Uzbeks as ‘us’.
entdinglichung said,
December 4, 2009 at 12:18 pm
reminds me of a member of the German SWP clone who in 2001 said, that the Taliban are “not a medieval regime” and that they do “have welfare programs”
Bruce said,
December 7, 2009 at 11:55 pm
Jeremy Corbyn obviously thinks he is applying the 70s mantra – the roots of which go back much further – of ‘unconditional but not uncritical support’ for ‘anti-imperialist’ movements who would murder anyone to the left of Genghis Khan.
Some of us broke with this sort of thing over 20 years ago.
draguito said,
December 10, 2009 at 6:51 am
But didn’t the British army admit 2/3 of the resistance in Afghanistan aren’t from the Taliban? And where’s the evidence that the current warlords who the US and UK are keeping in pwoer as their strategic and economic agents, are any less socially reactionary than the Taliban?
Jim Denham said,
December 10, 2009 at 11:55 pm
Is it possible to be *more* “socially reactionary than the Taliban? My view is that some social forces (eg the Nazis and Islamic fundamentalists) simply *have* to be defeated, at any price, and with any alliances. It’s a a matter of social hygiene and human decency and progress. *Any* price is worth paying in order to defeat these forces.
draguito said,
December 11, 2009 at 1:02 am
“My view is that some social forces (eg the Nazis and Islamic fundamentalists) simply *have* to be defeated, at any price, and with any alliances.”
Funny, you weren’t saying this in the 1980′s.
Let’s be honest you’re just an opportunist trying to win recruits by sucking up to national chauvinism and apologising for whichever feudal warlords it is currently bankrolling.
Victory to the colonialist-feudalist alliance which will bring Afghanistan into the 21st and defeat the Taliban!
Another brave Pakistani murdered by fascists « Shiraz Socialist said,
March 2, 2011 at 10:07 pm
[...] fascism (in both Afghanistan and Pakistan) as somehow ‘progressive’ all the more disgusting and [...]