Posts

The Taliban are vile. Democracies must still engage with them

Image
  Leaders | Our cover The Taliban are vile. Democracies must still engage with them Five years after America’s exit, the Afghan regime is not going anywhere Save Share Illustration: MOA Aug 13th 2026 | 5 min read Listen to this story F ive years ago President Joe Biden pulled American troops out of Afghanistan. He was not forced to. America could have defended Afghanistan’s flawed but democratically elected government indefinitely, but chose not to. Voters were weary of America’s longest war, against the Taliban, a militia that controlled much of the countryside. Donald Trump set a timetable for pulling out; Mr Biden did so completely. America’s looming departure prompted every Afghan with a gun to revise their expectations about who was likely to win their country’s civil war. Warlords switched sides; government soldiers abandoned their posts and melted away. The government fell almost immediately. The Taliban seized power almost unopposed. Desperate civilians fleeing their new r...
Post a Comment
Read more

Culture | Albert Camus, 50 years on Prince of the absurd

Image
  Culture | Albert Camus, 50 years on Prince of the absurd In search of the real Camus Save Share Jan 7th 2010 | 5 min read Albert Camus: Solitaire et Solidaire . By Catherine Camus. Michel Lafon; 206 pages; €39.90. Buy from Amazon.fr Les Derniers Jours de la Vie d'Albert Camus . By José Lenzini. Actes Sud; 144 pages; €16.50. Buy from Amazon.fr Albert Camus, Fils d'Alger . By Alain Vircondelet. Fayard; 396 pages; €19.90. Buy from Amazon.fr Albert Camus . By Virgil Tanase. Gallimard; 416 pages; €8.10. Buy from Amazon.fr WHEN Albert Camus was killed in a car crash 50 years ago on January 4th, at the age of 46, he had already won the Nobel prize for literature, and his best-known novel, “L'Etranger” (“The Stranger” or “The Outsider”), had introduced readers the world over to the philosophy of the absurd. Yet, at the time of his death, Camus found himself an outcast in Paris, snubbed by Jean-Paul Sartre and other left-bank intellectuals, and denounced for his freethinking refu...
Post a Comment
Read more