Originally Posted by
Easy Street
Exactly, it's just another example of how conflicting objectives and strategic myopia in western capitals hamstrung the campaign right from the start. Principle of war #1: selection and maintenance of the aim. If the US was serious about winning in Afghanistan, it would've held its nose and struck a deal for some Hips.
We did purchase and supply Mi 17’s, quite a number of them in fact, however the politics that subsequently followed, the way in which the various contracts were awarded, the amount of dollars involved, the behind the scenes infighting of “the 17 can’t do this, the 60 can” by the US manufacturer, backed up by various Senators, the “punish the Russians for x, y and z” infractions around that time, led to a ban on any Russian aviation products, from helo’s to consumables to overhauls.
Yet certain programs managed to skirt around the edges, with a blind eye turned multiple times.
in my opinion, we did a vast disservice to the Afghan Air Force, it was perfectly capable of operating and maintaining the Russian equipment, it had done so for years prior.
However, in the aviation arena, and others, we purposely led them down the road of the latest/greatest, a path to failure right from the start, why, sad to say, money.
There are a multitude of stories regarding the above, a couple of them that would absolutely dumbfound folks if they ever came to light, however, years have passed, best let sleeping dogs lay.