Lessons from theatre of wars past
Like Iraq before it, Afghanistan is haunted by the questions that tend to vex discretionary wars.
Why are we there? What are we really trying to do? Can we win? How much blood and treasure should be sacrificed? And so on...
These questions nag us like a tongue returning to an aching tooth and they demand a bit of historical context. If you're interested - and shouldn't we all be? - I urge you to see Nicholas Kent's production of 'The Great Game'.
Played predominantly in the 19th Century with Afghanistan as the board - Russian, British soldiers and Afghan fighters as the pieces - it is this game which created the graveyard of empires. First the British, then the Soviets, and now Nato?
In 12 short plays, Kent tries to examine the fatal allure of Afghanistan. Why did a succession of foreigners want to control it? And why did they keep on failing? The play examines history from a dozen different angles with a mixture of wit and poignancy.
I haven't seen all of it yet. The weekend showings start at 11am and end at 11pm with two long breaks. But what I have seen so far is astonishing. The best line was uttered by the former President of Soviet Afghanistan, Dr Najibullah, in a posthumous imagined conversation with a British aid worker. When lamenting the haunted history of the neighbourhood he points out that "the roots of all our troubles are the imaginings of British Imperial surveyors." He was talking about the colonial officers who blithely drew up maps that owed more to geometry than to tribal borders.
There is a whole history to be written about the curse of bad maps drawn up by the British Empire. After seeing the Great Game in London, Britain's most senior soldier declared he wished he had seen it before deploying troops to Afghanistan. It would have made him a much better commander, he said.
I hope Mr Kent and his troupe of actors get invited to the Pentagon. Unlikely, but he will take his play on tour to Minneapolis, Chicago and New York.
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What, they're not stopping by Philly?
Alas. We shall have to trek up to that absurdly unsustainable city just north of us... New Yak or somesuch wossname.
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"These questions nag us like a tongue returning to an aching tooth"
I'm always awe struck by the prose of BBC journalists - I'm also an avid listener to the BBC World Services radio station, so I always get my daily dose of illuminating expression.
I'm just wondering - is there a journalistic reference book or cheat sheet provided by the BBC for staff perusal?
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