Yes, your point is a valid one, CET. You are quite correct that countries are always motivated by geopolitical reasons when they make the decision go to war. It's pragmatism of one sort or another...although it may be based on various forms of unrealistic dogma too at times...and it may be poorly thought-out pragmatism in the long term. That's always up for debate.

What concerns me about Afghanistan, and indeed about the whole region all around there, is that a number of countries are acting as agents for the big multinational oil companies. I think that is the real game that is being played, and I think that's the principle reason why the West has soldiers in Afghanistan and in Iraq. (not that Afghanistan has oil itself, but it is strategically positioned in regards to several vital areas that do)

If so, I can't approve of the game. The money from the oil in the Caspian region and in the Middle East should go to the local people to better their own societies, not to a bunch of multinationals based in the USA, Canada, and Great Britain. It should be 100% in control of the nations under whose ground it rests.

Chavez has earned the ire of America for the same reason. He's controlling his own country's oil revenues instead of permitting foreign control. That's what makes him an outlaw in the view of the USA. That's what's makes Iran an "outlaw" too. They control their own land and their own oil. They are autonomous.

As they should and have every right to... BUT the one thing a big Mafia boss does NOT permit is autonomy on the part of shopkeepers who reside on what he considers HIS territory...and the big oil companies and the USA consider pretty much the whole world to be their territory (with the conditional exception of Russia and China who are well-armed enough to protect themselves).

That's why I say that war is in fact nothing more than armed robbery. It is an attempt to take by force something that rightly belongs to someone else. First you offer them a deal they "can't refuse"...but they do refuse...then you apply some pressure, then some more pressure, then you openly threaten them and apply sanctions, finally you attack them and kill those who won't give in. That's how it works, and it's just armed robbery.

Exactly like the Mafia, but on a much bigger scale.

Would they do the same to us if the positions of power were reversed? Yeah, probably. That doesn't mean I'm going to approve of it, either which way. There has to come a point where as a single species on this planet we collectively rise above this sort of criminal behaviour.