you are viewing a single comment's thread.

view the rest of the comments →

[–]CompleteDoubterII[S] 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

There is one claim here that I doubt. That is that the 'Chinese are swooping in to make deals with the Taliban'. The New World Next Week link he gives has him saying, with regards to China and Afghanistan, that they're going to be there to make their deals, they will easily beat N.A.T.O.'s spending, their pledges and the demand to get rid of ETIM. The Xinhua article is mainly just about those pledges with that demand mentioned. The U.S. News article cites anonymous sources for recognising the Taliban as Afghanistan's legitimate ruler if Kabul falls. I don't find it very convincing. The article also links to a War on the Rocks article with verifiable sources and concludes that it will most likely stay neutral, meaning work with both the Afghanistan government and the Taliban in the future, or have a rather restrained relationship with the Taliban. Likewise, this is further supported by the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs declining to comment in the U.S. News article, for if they were swooping in to make deals with the Taliban it would benefit relations to confirm their recognition of them as Afghanistan's legitimate ruler; likewise denying it would anger the Taliban but improve relations with Afghanistan's current government; but they do neither, showing in my view a willingness to stay neutral.