Joe Biden has taken the damned-if-he-does and damned-if-he-doesn’t decision to pull US troops out of Afghanistan after two decades. Critics predict civil war may erupt, lead to the collapse of the Kabul government and the struggling army; and al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups could re-establish havens within two years, using them as launch pads to attack the US. It will almost certainly be a disaster for the country’s 39 million people — in particular, its women, wiping out any progress made at the cost of more than 2,000 American lives and hundreds of billions of dollars.
Afghanistan has had a turbulent history as far back as the eye can see becoming independent in 1919 but going through convulsions since 1979, first from the ill-judged and unsuccessful Soviet-Afghan War against the mujahadeen, then a civil war and from 2001 the American invasion after Al Quaeda’s 9/11 attack, with Bin Laden hiding in the mountains. Having toppled the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban regime there the US found, as in Vietnam, that starting was easier than finishing.
The Afghanistan Independence chart, 19 August 1919 12 am Kabul, has a rebellious, uncompromising Uranus opposition Saturn as well as a Leo Sun squaring onto a hidden 12th house Taurus Moon conjunct the South Node; with a stressed and explosive Uranus inconjunct Mars. The Moon in the 12th square Uranus MC and Saturn Sun relegates the feminine to an inferior place.
What is significant is how sensitive this chart is to influences which hard aspect the Fixed T square of Sun, Uranus, Saturn, Moon, Node. The Soviet War started with tr Uranus in Scorpio squaring the Sun and then moving round the other planets. The USA 2001 invasion occurred when tr Uranus was conjunct the Solar Arc North Node and Solar Arc Saturn was moving to square the Afghan Sun; and the Solar Arc Midheaven in Taurus was also colliding with the same points. In 2001 as well there was the war-like, tough-conditions tr Saturn in Gemini opposition tr Pluto, which was moving to conjunct the Afghan Ascendant in 2022.
Tr Uranus will start to shake up the Afghan Fixed T Square from 2023 to 2027; with major high-risk stresses coming from early 2022 through 2023 as tr Pluto opposes the Afghan Mars. So it does not look settled ahead, far from it.
The Invasion chart, 7 October 2001 4.25 pm Kabul, is predominantly an Air chart with only one Earth sign – Mars in Capricorn – hidden away in the financial 8th. Strong on hopes and theories but not practical. The gung-ho Mars opposition Jupiter is also significant since it suggests an attempt to put a cosmetic often sanctimonious veneer on an aggressive act.
At the moment the Solar Arc Mars is conjunct the Invasion Neptune for a sense of failure which may increase over the next two or three years as the Solar Arc Sun moves to square the Neptune – the fear is, like Iraq, that having pulled out they may have to go back in if the situation deteriorates too much.
Trump sounds off on the withdrawl plan: “Trump said that while leaving Afghanistan is “a wonderful and positive thing to do,” he had set a May 1 withdrawal deadline and added that “we should keep as close to that schedule as possible.”
In rebuke, “South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who tweeted Sunday evening: “I could not disagree more with former President Trump regarding his support for President Biden’s withdrawal of all forces from Afghanistan against sound military advice.”
So what’s the best thing to do? Spend more trillions…or just leave and be done with it? We did it in ‘Nam. What a disaster. The US has become notorious for overturning existing govenments in the “pursuit of global democracy”
Afghanistan has been a hot potato for centuries due to its geopolitical location. I dont see that changing anytime soon, so as Marjorie says, Biden, like Obama will be damned if he does, and damned if he doesnt.
Isn’t this more fallout from the slice and dice approach of the old British empire? Country borders all neat, straight lines…?
No don’t think so. That was more the Middle East with the Franco-Brit carve up. In the 19th Century Afghanistan was the pawn in the power struggle between the Russian Empire and the British.
Thanks Marjorie. Afghanistan used to be known as “The Graveyard of Empires”, a troubled location for centuries it seems. Curiously, the Second Afghan War started on 21 November, 1878 with a fixed t-square of Jupiter in Aquarius, Neptune in Taurus, and Mars in Scorpio. It also had Scorpio Sun opposite Pluto in Taurus.
There’s a chart on Astrotheme for Afghanistan – 14th August 1747, that’s interesting. It has Sun Leo square Mars/Pluto in Scorpio, with the nodes in Aquarius/Leo also in aspect. It has Uranus in Aquarius at 10 degrees – echoing these charts here for 1919 and 2001 with their Uranus in Aquarius.
In ‘A Study in Scarlet’ (1887), Sherlock Holmes meets Dr Watson for the first time, and remarks “You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive”. Dr Watson’s health had been wrecked whilst serving in Afghanistan…..