The War Nerd: Market Lessons from the Pashtun

The War Nerd / December 30, 2010

By Gary Brecher

“You know, win or lose, I gotta say I love my day job”: The Pashtun positive work ethic

I’ve been watching the news out of Afg—I like it spelled that way, “Afg”; kinda gets the spirit of the thing. The Afg news is simple: those Pashtun boys are keeping a hand in, having a good time, while they wait for a better offer.

A few weeks ago I read a story about a Stryker brigade leaving the Pashtun zone of Afghanistan. The funniest bit was this quote by a staff sergeant: “We set the tone there, and the biggest worry that my guys have is that what we did there will be forgotten. One thing is certain. If you ask the Taliban, they know who we are.” In my day they had a name for that kind of talk: selling woof tickets. It’s just plain sad when you leave a combat zone and the best you can say is that they won’t forget me, like some Summer Bible Study girl making the guy she held hands with in the pew swear he won’t forget her back home in Camarillo.

I’ll go one better, Sarge: they not only won’t remember you, they don’t even know who you are. They barely remember the British, even though the Brits were scary fuckers back then and most countries unlucky enough to get a visit from the Redcoats never forget it, if they’re lucky enough to still exist. It’s the Brits who remember Afg, not the other way around, because they left two armies chopped up on the road to Kabul, cut to pieces by the Pashtun.

Us? Not in the Brits’ league when it comes to Empire. I guarantee they won’t remember us ten years from now. They’ve forgotten the Russians already, 20 years after they slunk home, broke and beaten. It’s the Russians who remember Afg; the war in Afg was one of the bigger nails in the USSR’s coffin, and they left a good chunk of their total tank and APC production lying in the dust there. Barely made an impression on the Pashtun. Just another day at the office.

With us, they’re not even playing their A team. Seriously, they’re funning with us. You can see that if you read these stories carefully, with a cold eye. Here’s a classic example from that Stryker story, a little story about this local Pashtun kid whose heart’n’mind they won over, supposedly:

“A young boy came up to Outpost Outlaw with news of a buried bomb. Stick in hand, he took the soldiers to a trail a short distance away, but then seemed uncertain about just where to point. Finally, he gestured to a spot directly underneath the feet of Cpl. Wes Pfeil.
“Everybody kind of freaked out,” Pfeil recalled.
“The boy smiled and pulled a battery out of his pocket. He had already defused the bomb.”

The comedy here is so obvious I can’t believe the dipshit who wrote this thing even tried to pass it off as proof that the locals are coming around, warming up to us at last. This is open mike nite Pashtun style, the kid’s big debut. I bet the whole district was pissing itself laughing that night, the kid doing impressions: “Look, look, this is the Aliens’ faces when I show them the battery!” And the whole mud hut cracks up. Even the goats were laughing.

“We set the tone…” makes me sick. That’s not what Timur said after destroying Tokhtamysh’s empire. Timur was a man who didn’t worry too much about tone, just keeping the vultures fed. They still remember Timur in Herat, but they won’t remember us. Not even all the money we spent, because Afghans are not future software billionaires. They’ll spend it on guns or pretty little dancing boys, and it’ll all end up in the form of Muhajir merchant families, or the 32-foot Bayliners sitting in the driveway of some merc’s house in Tracy

One of the smelliest things about big-time journalism is the way they have to pretend everything’s serious. Like Afghanistan. Afghanistan is beach volleyball for people with no beach. Well, too much beach and not enough water. The typical Pashtun male is trained for life in Alexander’s day. In fact, like I’ve said before, if all these neocons who worship the Ancient Greeks, like Victor Davis Hanson, really want to know what their precious Greeks were like, those boy-fucking, throat-slitting, 400-verse war-song reciting founders of our glorious civilization and all that, they should go live in a Pashtun village. Get down and dirty with the true descendants of all those cleaned-up marble statues. These guys are not ready for economic prime time, and maybe they never will be. And maybe they don’t even want to be.

The Pashtun are not going to go out and start Smoothie franchises with cute green product names. They’re not going to design the next big Kinect game. They’re not going to get to wear the gold blazer for the Khyber Pass branch of Century 21. They have nowhere to go except Karachi, where Pashtun run the porter trade. Now that’s some monopoly, huh? Yessir, they’ve got that whole important industry sewn up tight, those wily Pashtun. So if you want a cushy job schlepping 400 pounds of knockoff polo shirts on your back in the hottest place in the world for a few rupees a day—well, you better be a Pashtun, baby! Maybe you can make a few extra rupees moonlighting as an extra in ANP riots, but there’s not much more money in that and you’re likely to end up stabbed to death by MQM goons.

And in return for that wonderful career opportunity, they’re supposed to give up two valuable stocks: their guns and their women. Granted, women aren’t their favorite livestock—there’re a lot of Pashtun proverbs like “Even a man’s own mother and sister are disgusting” which show the warm, gentle feeling they have toward wimmin—but they’re saleable, and that’s equity, the only equity your average Pashtun has. They’re supposed to let the women go free-range and hand in their RPGs and retrain for data entry—well I’ve been there and I’m telling you, don’t do it!

If I had that choice, I’d rather stay home and live the good old-fashioned way, keeping a good hard sandal on the womenfolks’ necks and moseying on over to the lookout point to take a few potshots at whatever crazy white people are visiting the valley this decade. In granddad’s stories it was the Brits, who could be dangerous. Now it’s these Americans, who are only dangerous when provoked—and the only thing that seems to provoke them is a wedding party. Anything else and they barely react. You’re even better off if it’s their German friends down there in the valley, because Germans aren’t even allowed to fire back for fear it might look kinda, you know, swastickey. So you can practice your marksmanship or do some tinkering with the fertilizer bombs in your three-goat garage with no fear of interruption.

Ho-hum: Just another day at the office for Mr. Pashtun and his colleagues

You may get killed, if the pilots circling up there haven’t had their wakey-pills yet and are in a bad mood. But what’s killing, after all? Not everybody has this death phobia like we have. The longer I look around the more I realize the attitude to dying I grew up in is weird…weird and pretty awful. The way I learned it in California, dying was proof you did something bad. Like smoked, or had a good time some other way. If you really lived right you wouldn’t die. Which is, now that I notice it, (a) a sure way to make dying even worse, and (b) just plain not true. We just don’t admit that jocks and marathon runners and CEOs die like every other stray dog by the freeway. The longer I live in CA…we’re fucked up, way more than anybody sees. You should see the faces at lunch. God damn, a war would do them good.

Maybe it’s all a lie, just a big media myth that we like being alive. If life is so great, how come it’s always been easy to recruit cannon fodder? That’s one thing you find in every era, every continent: nothing easier than getting young, healthy guys to get themselves killed. The peaceniks just say, “Oh, they were crazy, they were lied to, man….” Maybe they weren’t so dumb, just like maybe the Pashtun aren’t. Who says those millions of farm boys who joined up as soon as a war came along didn’t make a logical decision: “Duh…fifty more years of scratching at my lice and shoveling cow shit…versus a quick glorious death if we lose, and lotsa enemy villages full of implied consent if we win?” I know how I’d choose.

Well, the Pashtun are sensible people too. They don’t have much to lose, and they’re not that scared of dying. It’s not going to stop them having a little fun with us. What we’re offering them in return is just a flat-out lie—that bullshit about how they’ll transform in one or two generations, zoom to the top, shave and learn to write up a winning business plan and start their own fro-yo empire. They’re never going to make it that way. If you’re Chinese, say, you have good reason to want to sweep away Maoism and play yuppie. That’s all familiar territory for the Chinese. But come on–a Pashtun illiterate with no skills besides marksmanship and pedophilia is going to compete and win against a middle-class Delhi kid or a math whiz from Shanghai? That’s just a lie. The best he can hope for is maybe his kids can get porter jobs, getting kicked and called a sister-fucker and cheated by every Muhajir customer, then flop in an alley til dawn. They may be lice-crawling illiterate thugs, but they know a bad offer when they see it.

They’ve got nothing coming from the whole Thomas Friedman world, and they’d be fools to think they do. They’ve got a better business plan: the Stay-Thug Plan. There’s a lot of money in being dangerous these days. If North Korea proves one thing, it’s that right now raw crazy courage, plus total disconnect from the global economy, is a valuable commodity for about the first time in history. Because it’s rare, for about the first time in history. We were all Pashtuns once; they’re just old-school. And old-school is worth something if you hold onto it long enough. Hold out, you crazy Pashtun kiddie-fiddlers! The more you act out, the better deal you’ll end up getting. And that’s called playing the market, which these Flintsone-faced losers seem to understand, long-term, a lot better than the pundits that want them to sell low. They’ll get a much better buyout from the pipeline companies if they hold out another ten years doing what they do best, sniping and popping out babies and being dangerous.

There are a lot of rumors these days that Afghanistan is going to become “the Saudi Arabia of Lithium,” which supposedly means big money.

That whole “mineral wealth” story was planted in the NYT by the Pentagon, and planted so bush-league obvious that even tame stateside writers complained about it. So the whole thing is probably a lie. But let’s take it seriously for a second and assume there really is a whole Saudi’s worth of lithium, whatever that is, under that Afg dust.

Personally, all I know about Lithium is that my Uncle Frank was on it and it made him gain about 100 pounds—that’s on top of a svelte 290 or so before he went around the proverbial bend for good–but we still liked him better on lithium than off it, because whenever he went off it he lost the weight and went totally manic, decided he was two of the apostles—not one, see, two of them, used to answer the phone “Apostles Thomas and Peter residence,” and drank so much water he had a potassium OD and fainted and pissed himself, and me and my dad had to carry his saggy-skin smelly carcasse into the emergency room. So, yay for lithium. Dose every thug in Afg. with it; fatten’em up, slow’em down. Made him smell, too, Uncle Frank, but something tells me that won’t be a problem in Afg.

Anyway, suppose, and it’s a big “suppose,” that all this pathetic hype about Afg. mineral wealth is for real; well, first thing you notice is that the NYT article has a map of Afg. with the mineral-rich zones marked, and a lot of them are in the Pasthun areas, the south and east. That’s the kind of stuff that goes up in value at a time like this one, when every kid in Asia suddenly needs at least two cellphones. The smartest thing the Pashtuns could do is sit on the stuff, and sit hard, because pipeline companies and mining companies suck every drop of blood from patient, trusting locals, but pay big to suck the paydirt out of dangerous tribes’ territories.

So even if the NYT is right and today’s Pasthun sasquatch is tomorrow’s lithium millionaire, they’re still playing it smart by staying thug. They’re sitting on a non-renewable resource while the price goes up. In ten years every kid in Korea will be uncool if she owns less than ten cellphones and five iPads, and all those rare metals will be worth ten times what they are now.

The real lesson here is like the econ version of this really mean, horrible—and absolutely true—line from Luke: “There is more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than 99 of the righteous.” I always hated that line in Sunday School, made me sick to my stomach. It was like some stepmom boasting right there in the living room about how she likes your handsome cool rebel brother better than you, no matter if you work five times harder than him. But even then, age six, I knew in my fat little bones it was absolutely true, one of those weird little moments when Jesus stops faking and laughs right in your face. And the Pashtun are the perfect free-market version of that horrible, true Scripture line. They’re the sinners here, and when they repent, sell off and get paid for it, there’ll be more joy in DC than there is over ten million hard-working Mexicans or Chinese who worked two jobs all their lives and never even got a traffic ticket. That’s what higher-ups love, thugs who flirt with them. The righteous they pay minimum wage, or less under the table, then laugh at.

So however you look at it, the Pashtun are playing it smart (even if it’s only by accident, or instinct. If only these free-market assholes really thought hard about the world, they’d see that, and we’d get self-help books like “Lice, Goats and an AK: The Pashtun Pattern for Winning CEOs.”

Would you like to know more? Gary Brecher is the author of the War Nerd. Send your comments to brecher@exiledonline.com. Read Gary Brecher’s first ever War Nerd column by clicking here.

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92 Comments

Add your own

1. Action Jackson | December 30th, 2010 at 12:20 pm
Brilliant stuff, Gary. One of your all-time best. Kudos.
2. Duarte Guerreiro | December 30th, 2010 at 12:59 pm
Whoa. I think I remember articles like this from the eXile days. Full-on war nerd. Brutal honesty with a dash of romanticism. We missed you Gary.
3. John Figler | December 30th, 2010 at 1:33 pm
Indeed.
4. Marquelot | December 30th, 2010 at 1:40 pm
Damn, and it seems like I just read a new War Nerd the other week. If they’re all gonna be this good, keep ’em coming!
5. lylelylelyle | December 30th, 2010 at 1:43 pm
cool article, also rip timur and the timurids, they were cool.
6. Flatulissimo | December 30th, 2010 at 1:44 pm
Yasssss! Here’s hoping there will be lots more War Nerd in 2011. Keep ’em coming.
7. tom | December 30th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Classic war nerd style. Awesome
8. Tyr | December 30th, 2010 at 2:50 pm
A new War Nerd column, just what I wanted for xmas !
9. BahamaPapa | December 30th, 2010 at 3:38 pm
I bought War Nerd I, I will buy War Nerd II. Publish it! Publish it! Publish it!
10. Sean Strange | December 30th, 2010 at 3:41 pm
Wow, this is vintage Gary Brecher brilliance! I don’t know any writer who cuts through the bullshit of our time better than the War Nerd!
I just realized who Brecher reminds me of: Robert E. Howard. Like Two-Gun Bob, Gary celebrates man’s barbaric nature and mourns our dark age of flaccid liberalism and bankrupt materialism. I suppose the Pashtun are the closest thing we have to modern Cimmerians, and as long as they hold out against empires there is hope for us all.
I can only hope that Gary continues his insightful writing and finds in it a reason not to blow his own brains out the way that crazy Texan genius did in 1936.
11. Ignorant | December 30th, 2010 at 3:47 pm
I thought that the mineral wealth deposit was legit, but that the information wasn’t new, only regurgitated information from when the Russians were in Afghanistan and figured out all that shit was there. We re-released it in the US around the time when Obama was shirking his withdrawal deadline for, I don’t know, the third time or something (I lose track) as a way to deflect attention from the negative aspects of continuing our wonderful vacation in Kandahar.
We’ve known those minerals were there, but we also know that it is in the Pashtun area and that there is no fucking way you can hire enough mercs to guard any significant mining operation in the area, not when the Russians were there, not now, and probably not ever if they aptly “stay thug.”
Someone correct me if I’m wrong
12. tom | December 30th, 2010 at 5:46 pm
I already read this 3 times. So good. More please.
13. Fissile | December 30th, 2010 at 6:08 pm
War Nerd, your cynicism is really over the top this time. So the Pashtun are all a bunch of slackers who are interested in nothing save for throat slitting, boy buggery, and women beating? I’ll have you know that Mr. Pashtun’s entrepreneurial spirit has flourished under US occupation….er, liberation. Every year since the US has been in Afghanistan, opium production has increased and is at a current all time high….no pun intended. The people running Exxon dream about profitability like that. It’s a fine example of the good ol’ fashioned Islmo-Protestant work ethic.
14. matt | December 30th, 2010 at 7:49 pm
The idiots at foreign policy have a preview of next years possible wars:
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/12/28/next_years_wars?page=full
War Nerd should do that, since it won’t be as boring as goddamn foreign policy mag.
15. Fischbyne | December 30th, 2010 at 8:11 pm
You’re not wrong. http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2010/06/no-the-military-didnt-just-discover-an-afghan-mineral-motherlode/
16. RPG Cunthair | December 30th, 2010 at 9:00 pm
Paedophilia.
You dumb fat cracker. Pushtoons exact revenge, as you are finding out, for farting. I can’t imagine what they do if you diddle their kids.
17. pmx? | December 30th, 2010 at 10:30 pm
Nice. The article has that “feel” like the classic articles at exile.ru.
Keep up the great work.
And I second the request for a preview of the next possible wars: Which are for real, which are only blowing steam. Much better than reading about depressive news about the economy or the drug war.
18. Grimgrin | December 30th, 2010 at 10:37 pm
Here’s Afghan entrepreneurship.
Sit in your valley. When someone wants to take something valuable through that valley, politely explain that they can a) pay a toll b) die horribly.
Been that way since the Silk Road first got started, back around the time an itinerant preacher calling himself Yeshua bar Joseph got nailed to a cross for pissing off the religious authorities in Judea.
And if you read about the contractors paying for ‘security’ to bring supplies for US troops, that’s how they’re rolling now.
19. Ahmad | December 30th, 2010 at 11:57 pm
Hahahaha, epic article.
I love this guy.
20. Eddie | December 31st, 2010 at 1:08 am
Amen brother. Waited a long time for this one. And it turned out even better then I had hoped.
21. korman643 | December 31st, 2010 at 1:19 am
@matt: the War Nerd should do that not much because the FP is boring (though it is boring!), but because it’s wrong – these guys doesn’t seem to have a good grasp of future potential flashpoints, so they’ve simply made a list of fucked up places, thinking “If it’s fucked up/unstable, there’s should be a war there, right?”.
Which is quite funny, considering WW1 started in Western Europe – hardly a fucked up or an unstable area back in 1914. But there are other good counterexample to this silly way of thinking – Thirty Years War, Seven Years War, First Roman-Persian War, War of the Three Kingdoms (the war of “Red Cliff”) all started in wealthy or flourishing or just relatively stable environments/economies.
I’m pretty sure the War Nerd has a better insight on international geopolitics than these dudes. But I suspect also that he may just shrug and say there’s no room for real war today and we’re just left with glorified bar room fights…
22. Christo | December 31st, 2010 at 1:35 am
Good post, Gary, but I always thought that it was a Wolf Ticket, as in
“What’s a Wolf Ticket?”
“A wolf ticket is a lyin ass mother fucker…”
23. CHarlie | December 31st, 2010 at 2:27 am
UPDATED NEW YEARS RESOLUTION:
“Stay Thug”
24. trollololol | December 31st, 2010 at 4:24 am
Gary, you are a fag.
Sincerely,
Your father
25. Punjabi from Karachi | December 31st, 2010 at 4:46 am
Oi War Nerd! I’m a Punjabi from Karachi. Fuck the MQM – And when we need to that’s what an alliance with the ANP is for. Anyway, what’s the prognosis on Swat and South Waziristan? And BTW Afghans hate us Pakistani’s as they think we’re the ones responsible for aiding and abetting the destruction of their country. Think the Afghans remember us?
26. H. Khariq | December 31st, 2010 at 5:12 am
This article is really annoying. There are a lot of literate Pakhtuns in Karachi and lots of non-MQM Muhajirs who don’t hate all Pakhtuns. Also there are a lot more avenues for the illiterate Pakhtuns besides the ‘porter trade’; they dominate the transport industry and most of the construction workers and dock workers are Pakhtuns. Also a large percentage of clerics and seminary students in Karachi are Pakhtuns, disproportionate to their share of the population. Also the idea that Karachi is some sort of El Dorado to the Pakhtuns whether Pakistani or Afghani is just MQM propoganda.
27. Michael | December 31st, 2010 at 6:30 am
Jesus…you’re absolutely right. How depressing.
28. Jim Buck | December 31st, 2010 at 7:38 am
Harold Macmillian’s first rule of politics:
‘Never invade Afghanistan,’
29. BCS | December 31st, 2010 at 7:40 am
I was thoroughly enjoying the sarcastic minutiae of this piece when I discovered it was Gary from the eXile. I should have known, I used to read you a lot back in the day. Whether you are aligned with the political viewpoint or not, the man’s writing is worth reading for the laughs and the ascerbic insight.
30. Charles Bucolicowski | December 31st, 2010 at 7:53 am
Most of the coffee in the supermarkets says “100% Colombian” when, in fact, it’s produced by the erstwhile Mr. Charles Cong. And the Nam vets are slurping it right up along with everyone else.
I’m just trying to figure out how they’re going to market lithium-flavored goats. But I’m sure they’ll find a way.
31. badnewswade | December 31st, 2010 at 9:01 am
Brilliant. Truly, truly brilliant. Your column should be stuffed up the noses of every whining pro-war liberal-pussy fuckpig on Earth. Peace out!
32. Steaming_Wookie_Doo | December 31st, 2010 at 10:07 am
Geez, I had to have a smoke after that multiple sarcasm. Excellent stuff. This article should be a coupon good for a free bang from some accommodating young woman. I am hoping that you don’t have that dancing boy thang like the Pashtuns. Seriously, are they really muslim? If the Quran says you can’t have a blowjob or a beer, I can’t imagine buggering dancing boys would be on the OK list.
Anyway, back to the topic at hand. We would love to see you on CNN offering your own real war analysis. Plus it’d be worth it to see Anderson Cooper try and hold it together when you go off on the boy buggering topic. At least keep up the youtube videos.
33. peter | December 31st, 2010 at 10:10 am
Two articles in a row…. I must be dreaming.
Enjoy em while they last or are you back for sure??? Anyways brilliance a pure hardcore warnerd…. You are the man
Happy new year and may the next year bring us new wars for you to write.
34. QuestioningGuy | December 31st, 2010 at 10:32 am
Hey, are all pastun people really that horrible? Must be an awful place.
35. Plamen Petkov | December 31st, 2010 at 12:47 pm
required reading. I shall be spreading this link to everyone I know. Brilliant. Back in top form dude.
36. Mark | December 31st, 2010 at 2:05 pm
Just a day at the office? How about we drop a few thermonuclear weapons on them? So we try to treat these animals like human beings and for that we are laughed at. How about we shoot that kid with the battery right between the eyes and wipe out the whole village. Who is going to laugh then? The only reason they get to laugh is because we let them laugh. If push really came to shove, who do you think would win. The only reason we loose people there is because we want to give these idiots a decent life so that hands don’t get chopped off for stealing a loaf of bread never mind that there is now so much bread around that nobody has to steal to keep from going hungry. Want to keep on laughing, well just go onto open ground and wave your Kalashnikov to the Predator in the sky — we even provide these morons with an express elevator to the 30 virgins.
37. Destro | December 31st, 2010 at 4:02 pm
I am pretty sure the Afghans remember the Soviets because they killed a whole bunch of the natives before they left. The Taliban were formed in Pakistani refugee camp schools for the most part. The lesson War Nerd should have gotten from that is that if the Soviets killing millions of Afghans did not end the war how will Americans who are less blood thristy win this war?
38. Joe | December 31st, 2010 at 7:38 pm
Dolan is in Iraq and the War Nerd disappears; Dolan returns and the War Nerd reappears. Coincidence?
39. Dave | December 31st, 2010 at 8:44 pm
I must be the lone dissenter here. This article is way too long and full of too much crap. Needs streamlining to drive home the message. I got lost/bored in the middle. Probably because I’m a complete dumbshit whose opinions aren’t worth the shit they’re wiped on.
40. Jack | December 31st, 2010 at 10:38 pm
I agree w/ man…rip that foreign policy article
41. ed L | January 1st, 2011 at 2:23 am
H. Khariq
“they dominate the transport industry”
Sure they do, they are brigands. I expect nothing moves unless they get their cut – either of the curse of someone’s neck.
42. Jiha | January 1st, 2011 at 9:48 am
Gary, you ain{t taking into account the insane beliefs of Islam.
These cave niggers belive in jihad and think that the magic moon god will give em 67 magic hookers and 50 cents mansion when they die for allah.
That}s why they ain{t scared for shit, they{re going to be fucking porn starts at 50s mansion and drinking heinekens for eternity whenever they blow shit up as far as their insane bloodthirsty madness teaches.
43. postman | January 1st, 2011 at 10:36 am
The sooner all the Americans realise that 9/11 was perpetrated by the Israeli Mossad, with USA Government approval and total media help, the earlier they can come home from Afghanistan. Especially because they started bombing it for 9/11 in the first place.
And it is not secret or something new or hidden. I mean, the only people who ever got officially arrested on that day in connection with the terror attacks were the 5 Mossad agents, known as “the dancing israelis”. They were moving in New York in a van on which a mural was painted of an airplane diving into NYC, the bomb-sniffing dogs found bomb residue in their van, they failed the lie detectors, etc… And it was Michael Chertoff who sent them home based on “visa violation”, and Chertoff is a dual citizen of guess which two countries, one is USA…The other is Israel.
44. Carney | January 1st, 2011 at 1:33 pm
Why is it always so “cool” to bet against America, to constantly predict defeat for us? So tiresome, so predictable. I thought War Nerd offered something new and interesting.
45. 4r328uju8 | January 1st, 2011 at 2:34 pm
The guy in the picture has great teeth. Maybe the war is bring corn sweetener to Afghanistan and rot their teeth to drive up medical costs.
46. Roquentin | January 1st, 2011 at 5:49 pm
How I have missed these articles.
47. Stefen | January 1st, 2011 at 7:21 pm
Another classic, thanks Gary.
But please keep away from diet-coke and other bad stuff, we want to see you live longer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe-CxnU-hFE
48. hamsterfist | January 2nd, 2011 at 2:18 am
@Destro me thinks somebody missed the point of this article.
49. Jim Buck | January 2nd, 2011 at 8:34 am
postman wrote:
‘They were moving in New York in a van on which a mural was painted of an airplane diving into NYC’
You must be an antisemite, postman; otherwise you would have mentioned this coincidence:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:TheCoupCoverLarge.jpg
Of course, Alan Blumlein, who founded EMI, was of Jewish descent—so maybe that explains the covers prescience (what bollocks!)
50. burbl | January 2nd, 2011 at 9:44 am
But come on–a Pashtun illiterate with no skills besides marksmanship and pedophilia is going to compete and win against a middle-class Delhi kid or a math whiz from Shanghai?
Yup, so it’s better for everybody to keep them like that.
They came dangerously close to escaping in the 50.
And whenever they escape they run for professorship in the US, fucking immigrants stealing the jobs of red blooded ‘murikans instead of picking oranges in California, sheesh…
51. Derp | January 2nd, 2011 at 11:23 am
Derp derp derp! Don’t worry Carney, I predict we’ll have freedom and democracy and a Starbucks on every corner once we win the war one year after a Republican wins from Obama, derp derp derp!
52. Punjabi from Karachi | January 2nd, 2011 at 12:34 pm
Khariq bhai, don’t be annoyed. This Brecher fatass jerkoff is a burnt out charia from the states. He always writes in this sarha howa style. He’s an utter choot when it comes to most Pakistanis and expresses his hate for us in no uncertain terms. Let the fat bitch have his hate. He’s angry over his precious NATO being the Taliban’s bitch. What I would like to know is what this anti-Pakistani fat fuck, with apparently a large audience, thinks of our efforts against our domestic terrorists.
Don’t mind the War Nerd; him and his friends got made into kutties by Pakistanis earlier in their lives.
53. my talkative ringpiece | January 2nd, 2011 at 1:59 pm
#30 and your point is?
Go into your local Viet pho place and ask for a ca phe sua da (caw phee soo dah) and try it, you’ll understand why the Viets kicked our asses.
54. John | January 2nd, 2011 at 5:54 pm
When China eventually goes to war with a country, who will be their first victim?
55. Wittgenstein | January 2nd, 2011 at 6:42 pm
Punjabi from Karachi, it seems the War Nerd struck a nerve. Makes complete sense. Denial is the only thing people in that region have anymore, with their countries left in shambles by the hordes of idiots clamouring for a perpetual theocracy. It’s easier for them to stick their heads in the sand (there’s lots of it after all) and go through the list of nations to find the next scapegoat for their ills. Pedophilia and thuggery are much easier than fixing that mess. Anyone with half a brain is looking to flee that shithole or trying to accrue as much wealth and power as possible. Can’t say I blame them.
56. Pedro | January 2nd, 2011 at 9:31 pm
Nice read Gazza; well done. I used to hate the Bible story of the Prodigal Son which seems to share a common theme with the 99 righteous vs 1 repented sinner. The message I took away was that if you do the right thing no one gives a stuff and you’ll be used as a doormat.
57. Punjabi from Karachi | January 3rd, 2011 at 12:14 am
Wittgenstein
Don’t worry son. You’re going to join us very soon.
58. Punjabi from Karachi | January 3rd, 2011 at 12:28 am
Witty boy, we have an army or three of Michael Moores or Julian Assanges, fighting to take down our powers that be. That’s why our Af-Pak establishment, with the aid of your Uncle Sam, first let the fundoes loose on us in the first place. And we’re clawing every inch back from those fuckers. And it’s a joy to watch them die, and your NATO dweebs squirm in Afghanistan. Remember; the country with the largest Pashtun population in the world is Pakistan. And the War Nerd just gave that one fifth of my country the Gary Brecher seal of approval.
59. postman | January 3rd, 2011 at 9:51 am
Dear Jim Buck,
I have never seen that album cover before 9/11! Only after the event as a sensation! Did you see that album cover before 9/11?
And I am not anti-semite in the sense you say. If we say semitism means favouring the jewish people, well, then I am an anti-semite.
But saying the truth does not make you a hater, it makes you a truth teller.
So, listen to me bro: there is NO AL-QUAEDA! An islamist extremist terror group called Al-Quaeda plainly does not exist and never existed! Al-Quaeda is a CIA-Mossad joint operation, employing mercenaries sometimes like Blackwater, it is a PSEUDO-TERRORIST GANG!
Did you ever believe any legit iraqi resistance movement bombing their own people? Have you ever heard of the Rhodesian Selous Scouts? Google their tactics, it is on the net. You will have a few a-ha moments I guarantee…
60. tomkow | January 3rd, 2011 at 11:33 am
A splednid return to form. congratulations. Too bad you don’t have a better outlet or, you know, video or something.
61. postman | January 3rd, 2011 at 12:31 pm
Dear Jim Buck,
A link on Selous Scouts (I bet Gary would approve):
http://selousscouts.tripod.com/rhodesian_experience.htm
About the 9/11 israeli connection:
http://theinfounderground.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=5367
About the Mainstream Media (owned by the you-know-whos) involvement:
http://septemberclues.info/
By the way, do you remember that article of Gary in which he said if there would be war between Israel and good old US of A, it will be over in 10 minutes with America surrendering as Congress would back Israel all the way?
62. Leif Oldhart | January 3rd, 2011 at 4:58 pm
A well-written piece there, war nerd. However word has it that the Pashtuns are as honorable as they are tough; and if our British-Israel-Zionist World Occupation Government(the “BIZWOG”)hasn’t corrupted them as they have us. . . then they probably still are. Of course, “honorable is as honorable does” and one man’s honor is another mans terrorism. As you know. Anyhoo, folks can read up on the Pashtuns in several books published by the late Afghan funnyman, Idries Shah and his friends and family including his mother, a Scottish lass who married a Pashtun warlord back in the day. She wrote a dandy book titled “My Khyber Marriage” under the pseudonym,Morag Murray. It’s the real thing, folks, with blood feuds, wedding feasts, early morning attacks on the mountain stronghold and much, much more! Google it or get it through your public library. And yeah, war nerd: sometimes “honor” is just a synonym for “stupid.” But sometimes it ain’t!
63. Carney | January 4th, 2011 at 11:25 am
Punjabi, “Pakistan” isn’t a country. It’s a ramshackle, stapled-together, rickety Hapsburg Empire of nationalities with nothing more in common than Islam, and not even that, since Sunnis and Shi’ites are, as usual, at each other’s throats, and a few brave souls even dare to be Christians or Hindus.
It would be far smarter for us to break up both “Afghanistan” and “Pakistan” and re-draw the borders to conform with the ethnic facts on the ground. Create a single Pushtunistan, give Balochistan independence, allow the Tajik and Uzbek areas to be annexed by their co-ethnic neighboring nation-states. A government of Pushtunistan, being a proper nation-state, would have far more legitimacy in the eyes of the locals than some multi-cultural diversity consultant silliness. And the borders would be far more rigorously patrolled when on the other side there are hostile ethnic foreigners rather than friendly co-ethnics willing to help you smuggle or flee from alien central authorities. Hard to have banditry with no safe haven to flee to. At that point you can ruthlessly shut down all the madrassas and the crazy mosques, and begin a MacArthur regency.
64. Punjabi from Karachi | January 4th, 2011 at 1:19 pm
to break up both “Afghanistan” and “Pakistan”
Come and try.
and re-draw the borders
Please. Be our guests. We’re known for our hospitality. And the shivs on the way out.
to break up “Afghanistan”
Been there nine years; haven’t tried yet have you?
65. Bary Grecher | January 4th, 2011 at 1:22 pm
The following claim in the article seems really weird: “and they left a good chunk of their total tank and APC production lying in the dust there”.
Found on the internet: “Soviet equipment losses included 118 jets, 333 helicopters, 147 tanks, 1314 armored personnel carriers, 433 artillery pieces or mortars, 1138 communications or CP vehicles, 510 engineering vehicles and 11,369 trucks.”
If these figures are true, the losses were just a fraction of the USSR tank and APC production. Look up the Russian APC (keyword: BMP) and tank production figures – they were produced in tens of thousands. To lose less than 1,500 of these in a 10-year war is not that much.
Am I wrong? Am I wrong??
66. postman | January 5th, 2011 at 8:24 am
Dear Bary,
You are defenitely wrong, but not in the numbers. You are wrong in not understanding Gary Brecher’s satirically humorous style.
67. Realpolitik | January 5th, 2011 at 12:19 pm
Ethnic disaggregation in the Mideast would probably be a net good**, but it would impose huge costs on many individuals, as Punjabi has conveyed – inspiring those very very numerous individuals to resist. The US is not going to do it, and soon will be unable to afford it. Only China could consider it, but it seems almost out of the question.
** Actually, though, it’s probably not a net good. Scratch that. It would be if the security of those nations were assured, and wars between them could be made futile by outside force. But that is not the case. And since it isn’t, those nations are going to hold on for dear life to anything they can tax. They need revenues for their military security, and no amount is too much. That – along with the extremely costly border border disputes that would surely arise, also highly important – is basically why the existing states don’t want to re-do everything in such a fashion. Thus it is that various states want to keep their Kurds, the Habsburgs wanted to keep Hungary and the Balkans, and so on.
68. Stewart in London | January 5th, 2011 at 12:30 pm
How to whack a big fellow
At 90% oil imports China isnt becoming the next global hegemon. They’d be coming at you on donkeys and ho fun electric bikes, the donkeys become the rations when the batteries run out.
But in the great game they intend to mean business. And they’re just so big you cant square up to them. Dont forget that.
Like ourselves a Chinaman loves something tasty at the weekend, but they’ll pass on that for a nice bit of smack. Its just not as easy to get hold of as it was in great, grandfathers day.
This is why the Brits are busy securing that ‘age old’ gap in the market. Our ‘modern’ expedition force are ‘carrying on up the Kyhber’, ramping our demand led supply interventions, straight into the Turkic backside of Chinaland (we got our familiar HK drop off points too).
Its pretty easy to shift that stuff in China, they lurve it, even keeps them from gambling, for a few hours. Think about those cheap shipping containers going back every hour of every day, emptied of shite … but not always!. Customs officials like a bit too.
North Americans can ask Olly North about this kind of thing, but us Brits been there long time, we got Tea shirt.
We would be better off using your carriers for ‘deliveries’. Better chance of pacifying the natives, they’d love us too!
Pashtun peasants indeed!
chin chin
69. Mike Nomad | January 6th, 2011 at 6:26 am
Glad to see War Nerd is back in circulation, and can still hit ’em out of the park. Have missed the satire, sarcasm, piss & vinegar.
However, you missed an opportunity. The title of the article should have been your best line in it: Even the goats were laughing. Pure HST.
BZ
70. NS | January 7th, 2011 at 5:19 pm
Goddamn brilliant. BRB, circulating this among my friends.
71. M | January 9th, 2011 at 1:24 am
Killer.
72. Stenz | January 9th, 2011 at 11:09 pm
Excellent article.
73. Jeremy | January 10th, 2011 at 3:19 pm
Strong work sir!
I recognize and salute a worldview that would have broken more delicate psyches before the age of 20.
Carrying around that much truth must be exhausting.
I also enjoy the impotent rage of some of your readers with their classic american military jingoism; fantasizing about nuking their problems away instead of having to admit that the mujahideen have already won.
Deaf and blind to the lessons of a thousand years of history, and wilfully ignoring the reality today.
Isn’t pathological imperialism fun? Death to the empire! 🙂
74. Dark Markets | January 10th, 2011 at 10:45 pm
Mighty Aweswome, WN!
“The typical Pashtun male is trained for life in Alexander’s day. In fact, like I’ve said before, if all these neocons who worship the Ancient Greeks, like Victor Davis Hanson, really want to know what their precious Greeks were like, those boy-fucking, throat-slitting, 400-verse war-song reciting founders of our glorious civilization and all that, they should go live in a Pashtun village. Get down and dirty with the true descendants of all those cleaned-up marble statues.”
As you point out, today’s multi-millionaire effete NY/DC “national security experts” and Neo-Con academics would s*** their pants if they had to spend even a day on the march with Alexander’s Greeks (Macedonians, and other ruthless hired mercenaries… eg Scythians, etc.) – much less actually go into fighting with them.
In similar vein, today’s limousine millionaire preachers (and even those “mighty warriors” over in israel… and American military in Iraq & Afghanistan) might sneer and scorn at those “heathen A-rabs” or Afghans (and Bedouins in particular) as nothing more than “camel jockeys” or “sheep herders,” but were Jesus, or Moses, to come back to life today, they would be instantly familiar with, and feel at home in, the Bedouin life.
75. Zoner | January 11th, 2011 at 6:13 pm
Interesting article about Pashtun boy-fucking:
“Kandahar’s Pashtuns have been notorious for their homosexuality for centuries, particularly their fondness for naive young boys. Before the Taliban arrived in 1994, the streets were filled with teenagers and their sugar daddies, flaunting their relationship. It is called the homosexual capital of South Asia. Such is the Pashtun obsession with sodomy – locals tell you that birds fly over the city using only one wing, the other covering their posterior – that the rape of young boys by warlords was one of the key factors in Mullah Omar mobilizing the Taliban,”
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/MA11Df03.html
76. c-man | January 12th, 2011 at 12:28 am
Yeah, this article fails to mention that all the notorious Pashtun pederasts are US allies from Gul Agha Sherzai to Asfandyar Wali. It is actually the Taliban and other anti-US forces who are anti-pederasty.
77. Jason Martinez | January 13th, 2011 at 6:53 am
Brilliant (lol)…. I spent seven years of my life in the Army and served three of those years overseas, in Iraq and Afghanistan. I have to agree with Gary Brecher, the Pashtu are playing it smart. Let them play the poor, ignorant, Thursday man loving, Pashtu boys, so we can listen to our great diplomats of this nation tell us how and I quote: staff sergeant: “We set the tone there, and the biggest worry that my guys have is that what we did there will be forgotten. You backwoods sister loving redneck. I had to listen to so many of these knuckle head Sergeants while I served and the scariest bit is they are in the majority. No, as a Non Commissioned Officer (NCO) myself, I was not liked by many of these individuals. On another note, it’s so funny that corporations like, “Halliburton” account for 50% of all contracts over there. Do not quote me on that but, they were pretty damn close when I was over there and who pretty much owns Halliburton, Dick Cheney. Ohhh but, we are over there to fight the war on terror and liberate these people. BS in my book! I felt the whole reason I was over there was to make certain companies, i.e.: Halliburton, at the time “BLACKWATER” (SCUM of the Earth), KBR richer beyond belief. Ohhh also, to be shooting targets and the occasional RPG, IEd, and so on. Yeah, we pretty much had our hands tied behind our backs. Wait until you see them shooting directly at you before you can shoot back. Cuzz that works out so well.
78. Igor Surov | January 17th, 2011 at 3:24 am
You all kidding? “Great article”? This is a typical white-office-boy fantacy, completely out of touch with reality.
Lesson One for all of you basement strategists: there is NOTHING cool, or competitive, or promising about tribes that live by the same pattern from century to century. All of the nations that managed to make a breakthrough in history were characterized by an ability to learn, adapt, give up their old ways, take the best from their more successful rivals and outdo them.
Think Japan after WW2, think South Korea, think China since the 1980s. Take all of Russia’s great wars: it tended to start them as a self-content, backward old bear, get badly beaten and humiliated, then pick up, copy a lot from its own enemy and wind up on top. Same pattern, even against the best of them, like Carl XII of Sweden, Napoleon or Hitler.
It takes good learners to win big time, not self-admiring mud-hut dwellers who think they’re already perfect.
Afghanistan? The Brist didn’t succeed because warfare capabilities of the time were of little use in mountain terrain (no choppers, no missiles, no drones). The Soviets lost because their army and the empire itself was already in decay. The Yankees are losing now because they’re trying to make politics, not war.
I’ll tell you what’ll happen next. Once China’s interests grow as far as “Afg”, the Chinese will go in and solve it like they solve everything: slowly, systematically and efficiently. And then it will be all over. That is, no more Pushtun for you bored first-world kids to admire.
79. Phoenix Woman | January 17th, 2011 at 9:06 pm
Igor Surov: China already is interested in Afghanistan’s metals. They’re just waiting for us to give up on the place before they move in.
80. F | January 20th, 2011 at 9:00 am
Igor Surov:
The Chinese political system did not change in the 80s, also the japanese(whom had a great and relatively modern empire before the WW2) and koreans preserved most of their culture. What made them succesfull was adapting market economy(in case of china) and advanced industrial technologies with the help of foreign investors.
The Mongols succeeded centuries before the British in Afghanistan, with inferior technologies compared to them.
What the Taliban learned is building EID -s from cell phones and fertilizer, and using the Mass Media in order to break their enemy’s will from continuing the fight.
81. GhostUnit | January 20th, 2011 at 2:52 pm
@78. Igor Surov
I think the reason nobody can take Afg is because no one there has anything to be too attached to and lose it. They also learn the ways of tribal warfare since very early on their lives and are always willing to live in squalor as long as they get to fire their rifles every once in a while.
Against Afg you only have two options: Either you wage a war of extermination (like the Mongols did) or you get what the US is getting now: a continued military presence yes, but one that comes very expensive and which will also always continue to be constantly “prickled” by IEDs, suicide bombings and what not.
It would be “interesting” to see what the Chinese could do there, especially since they have been shown to be all of cold-hearted, extremely nationalistic/racist, very very greedy/hungry for other countries’ resources (check out their activities in Africa) and also extremely stubborn politically (check out last year’s conflict with Japan over islands).
82. GhostUnit | January 20th, 2011 at 2:57 pm
(continuing my previous comment)
Anyways, since the Afghans/Pashtun don’t really have anything to lose and love the fighting/insanity, they can keep up their insurgence up all the decades they want, while the rich occupiers eventually run out of money and guts to maintain their half-assed occupation.
The Soviet Union was in shambles before going in, yes, but that wouldn’t have changed the outcome of their occupation.
However, if the Chinese go for an occupation… maybe the massive numbers of their army (3.5 million strong) may actually win by flooding them? Perhaps, but then again these people are mobile, and can also bring more from Pakistan, etc. Who knows?
83. nofear | January 28th, 2011 at 1:57 am
Like it or not, Britain has always dominated the US so shut your mouth you arrogant writer. Your p[aper will never be big. It fails
84. empire in decline | January 28th, 2011 at 2:24 pm
“That’s one thing you find in every era, every continent: nothing easier than getting young, healthy guys to get themselves killed.”
Yep. Nothing more typical than young bored males who want to go on an adventure because they don’t want to work a shitty factory job or on a corn farm.
Despite what anyone says there’s nothing special about being brave or good on the battlefield. Countless million of brave good individuals died for the most stupid, selfish and hateful political reasons. If they do what’s right politically that’s worth more than all the braveness or goodness of any soldier.
It’s just in this country when a soldier dies trying to murder an illiterate goatherder, nobody wants to point out how those people were never a threat to this country and had nothing to do with 9/11. That instead highly educated Saudis who provide this country with cheap oil and a high standard of living produced those terrorists as a byproduct of their corrupt, illegitimate and dictatorial rule and realizing that would require sacrificing for ideals this country obviously does not have.
Politicians have to lie because the people want to believe in those lies to justify their middle and upper class lifestyles. “Let us hold on to what we have for just one more generation!! We’ll sacrifice all our morality and ideals just don’t make us pay $5.00 a gallon for gas!!” Hopefully what’s happening in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and elsewhere will change that.
85. McDonald Brother | March 3rd, 2011 at 12:30 am
I enjoyed reading the article but I have my reservations on two things.
The first is about the picture. I don’t think the picture represents the true facial features of the Pashtuns. Pashtuns are amongst the most fair-skinned people in the area and the guy seems more like an Arab or a Punjabi in a Taliban attire.
The second is the whole issue about the ‘dancing boys’. Well, that’s all-right if you talking about the Tajiks and Uzbeks and their central-Asian culture, but not the Pashtuns. They are in no way more pedophilic than their neighboring ethnic groups or actually far less. The Pashtun have a traditional dance of their own called ‘the attan’ which is considered more of a war ritual than a dance. They even don’t equate it with a dance nor do they call it so. Dancing is considered something against Pashtun’s honor and is deemed too feminine. A Pashtun man will die rather than participate in dancing but he would proudly go to an ‘Attan’ which is a group of men of all ages moving in a circle making back and forth movements, sometimes also holding swords and rifles in their hands.
There is not even a word in the Pashtu language for pedophilia or homosexuality. They use the Dari/Persian word for it which is “Bacha bazi” literally meaning boy playing.
Wearing ‘Burqa’ is another such thing that is prevalent in Tajik areas and is wrongly associated with the Pashtuns. The Taliban adopted and imposed it as a part of their dress code for women because it suited their interpretation of Islam.
There were ‘dancing girls’ in Swat area though before the local Taliban invaded the place. But never heard of ‘dancing boys’ there too.
An entirely wrong picture of Pashtuns is being painted these days by the media and other outlets. I’ve found Pashtuns the most friendly, hospitable, and honorable people in this area. And mind you they are very intelligent too and you’ll find a lot of well-qualified and educated people among them. The best way to understand these people is to live amongst them and learn their language. Only then would be able to properly judge them and have a clearer picture of them.
There have been secular nationalist movements amongst the Pashtuns for quite a long time. Had the Americans not ignored them and made them stronger, they might not be facing the strong Talibanization trend these days.
Remember most of the people who were active in the communist revolution in Afghanistan in 1978 were Pashtuns including their leader Noor Mohammad Tarakai.
I am a Norwegian and have been working in Afghanistan and Pakistan with various international organizations for the last 15 years and making research on the culture and various ethnic groups has been my area of interest and specialty. I am writting a book on this area which would be published in the near future.During my stay in this part of the world I’ve also learned the languages here such as Pashto, Dari and Urdu.
The only possible solution for the US in the current conflict would be to strengthen the secular nationalist Pashtuns who would certainly act as counterweight for the Taliban influence. Forming and supporting a militia of such forces on the lines of the PKK in the Turkish Kurdistan can bear really good results in terms of cleaning the area from the Taliban and extremist forces who a big majority of the Pashtuns are fed up with and certainly dislike.
86. boy | July 8th, 2011 at 8:45 am
kill you all US and alie
87. Pacifist | October 13th, 2011 at 2:52 pm
This article is a piece of shit! total racism!
The author certainly doesnt know anything about the Pashtuns.
The dancing boys are a culture of Uzbeks and Tajiks not Pashtuns! get your facts write before writing an article which you talk about a whole 50 Million people!
For all those who are praising this article I would recommend them to go and study about these people, dont praise a fool who certainly has some hate for these people.
@McDonald Brother
Great to know that someone else who actually knows something and does not praise an idiots stupid work
88. Pacifist | October 13th, 2011 at 2:53 pm
I have to mention that the picture is not a Pashtun, it’s certainly an Panjabi Pakistani.
89. Pashtun | February 11th, 2012 at 3:44 am
You are clueless when it comes to Pashtun culture, you say we “think even our mothers are disgusting”
While you obviously have no background on Pashtunwali or Islam to make such a boldly dishonest statement, why don’t you look at the multiple sexual partner having, materialistic, fake breast implanting, STD carrying women of the Western world and tell me where your respect lies for your own female counterparts?
90. Adnan | June 4th, 2012 at 10:59 am
About the pedophiles.
If you were a pedophile in afg, as you call it, you would be shot, hanged and burned at the same time. Of course afg has its own drug abuses and criminals and maybe even a cannibal or two but if you mess with someone’s child they will kill you. This is coming from a Pashtun.
Replies to azeb97@gmail.com, no pedophiles please. But professional dancing boys, please apply. Include butt jpg.
91. Akshay Srinivasan | August 28th, 2012 at 11:02 am
How can i be facebook friends send me an invite and i will gladly accept 🙂 akshay.srin@gmail.com/Akshay Srinivasan the guy with a pic of himself playing squash in a glass backed squash court 🙂
92. Ra. | July 26th, 2016 at 12:11 am
I am a Pashtun, I live in Afghanistan, and I never saw or heard of those immoral things you mentioned. Honestly, I only heard of boy-girl relations, but boy-boy…never.
Also, I’ve been to Karachi and many other cities in Pakistan. I walked the streets there when the weather was good wearing the traditional clothes. I am always respected. Only the God damned police took money from me a few times in Peshawar.