the world is at stake

Say hello to the village leader, and Babur enters the village.

A few young people were fiddling with the radio, and a group of children listened around - the radio knob was adjustable, but it was designed to only listen to a few fixed channels, all of which were Pashto propaganda from Kabul.

The Turkish Communist Party was a good propagandist back then, exposing social problems in various forms such as literature, art and news was very sharp-the dragon slaying technique is still there, but some of the descendants of the brave people in those days have turned into evil dragons.

The same trick works just as well in foreign countries, and it can even be bolder.

Seeing Babur, the young people in the village rushed over to ask questions.Most of them have never left the village where they were born, and the farthest they have traveled is to go to a neighboring village to marry their wives when they get married.

Babur will talk about the outside world, but not about the offensive content, the focus is on the war between the 'Taliban' and the 'Northern Alliance'.These are things that the adults in the village are quite concerned about.

During his training in Kashgar, Babur accepted the basic principles of Central Asia established by the 'Holy Light Team' - do not try to lead tribal societies into the industrial age.

Therefore, Babur's description is very objective, right and wrong are judged by the audience - in fact, the extreme thinking of the 'Taliban' is unbearable to most people.

The young people in the village can discuss, quarrel and argue fiercely by themselves.For caravans, that's enough.Don't think too much about other things, 'Holy Light' is not here to enlighten people's wisdom.

After nightfall, a teenage woman in the village gave birth to a child.With the help of the female midwife who came with the caravan, the mother and child are still safe.

The level of midwives is similar to that of barefoot doctors. At worst, they can perform a lateral incision on the parturient, and they can almost deal with some common diseases.

Providing medical services is also one of the purposes of the caravan, which is a great blessing for the backward villages that lack medical care.Although they will only thank Allah afterwards, this is also a manifestation of influence.

The caravan stayed in the village for two days. When they came, there were more than a dozen three-wheeled motorcycles full of goods. When they left, the goods on the motorcycles were not only not less, but several times more.

In addition, there were several young children in the caravan, both male and female.They plan to go to Kabul with the caravan to see the world.As for what to do after you go?have no idea.Anyway, staying in the village is hopeless.

There are hundreds of caravans like Babur, they are active in the area ruled by the 'Northern Alliance', and gradually infiltrated south.Within months, villages across Afghanistan knew of their presence.

The goods brought by the caravan were urgently needed by farmers and herdsmen.The business is fair, and the old and the young are not deceived. This is a great gift to every village.

The total amount of agricultural and animal husbandry products taken away by the caravan is actually not worth a few dollars, but at least the operation of 'Holy Light' in Afghanistan at the grassroots level is in a state of meager profit and will not lose money.

As for the communication base stations expanding all the way, it is like an invisible network, connecting the bottom of Afghanistan and supporting the decision-making of 'Holy Light'.

After a few years, the 'Holy Light' had a better understanding of Afghanistan than the local government, and the caravans they sent out were able to mobilize the grassroots.Kabul is going to hold elections, so President Zhou has the final say on who will be the president?

And when the caravan continued to approach Kandahar in the south, a piece of new equipment was transported to the joint base in Kunduz by a military transport plane.Vehicles covered with red and blue plastic sheets are transported into the hangar after leaving the engine room, and outsiders cannot get close.

The technical team that came with the equipment asked one thing when they got off the plane, "Is the navigation base station ready?"

"It hasn't been set up yet, and it will take half a month at the earliest." The base supervisor shook his head. "We can only do some drills and wait for the people in the caravan to finish their work."

This is Babur, whose caravan continued to go south along the Helmand River. After arriving in the southern city of Lashkar Gah, it turned to the east and approached Kandahar controlled by the 'Taliban' step by step.

After learning the lessons of Kabul, the command center of the 'Taliban' is not in the city, but arranged to swim in the mountains outside the city.

According to the information sent back by the lurking personnel, the leader of the 'Taliban', Omar, has no whereabouts, does not have a radio station around him, and never stays in the same place for more than 24 hours.

Omar could be in a village, in a cave in the mountains, or in a vehicle by the side of the road.In short, except for his absolute cronies, no one knows where he is.

But the leader of a power cannot be in a state of dissociation for a long time.Otherwise, when his subordinates find that it is the same with or without this 'mascot', then he will really be useless.

Therefore, Babur's ultimate task is to find clues that can determine Omar's location, and make sure that the spiritual leader of the 'Taliban' will not run away for at least half an hour.

At that point, another, more powerful precision-guided weapon will send him to hell.

Chapter 37 'Long Sword' ready!

The Hindu Kush Mountains run from the northeast to the southwest of Afghanistan and cover most of the country.But the mountains stopped in southern Afghanistan and turned into a huge desert hundreds of meters above sea level.

The Helmand River cuts through the high mountains to form the largest oasis in southern Afghanistan, Lashkar Gah, on the edge of the desert.There are no high mountains and cold winds here, only endless sand seas and rolling heat waves.

Babur's caravan stops at Gryshk, north of Lashkargah.

This is a small oasis city with only more than 2 people. It is only a hundred kilometers away from Kandahar, and it is already the sphere of influence of the 'Taliban'.

The dirt runway outside the city was crowded with hundreds of people, and four or five pickup trucks equipped with heavy machine guns aimed at the sky.Babur and the local leader Akhtar stood together, and the two embraced and kissed each other like brothers, just like a family.

After waiting for about half an hour, an erratic double-winged 'Yun Wu' flew in the sky.It circled the airport and landed briskly on the runway.

The machine gun pickup was still pointing at the sky vigilantly, while Babur invited Akhtar to count the goods delivered by the transport plane together—more than a dozen local soldiers could not wait to gather around the cabin, waiting to see what this transaction was. ?

More than a dozen wooden boxes were removed from the cabin, and grass was used as stuffing inside.It started with fifty 'AK's, and [-] rounds of ammunition.The wooden box behind contains urgently needed medical medicines.

Such as anti-inflammatory debridement alcohol.

Akhtar didn't pay much attention to those assault rifles, but the medical alcohol made him very happy.He opened a tin barrel in the cargo, and smelled the strong smell of alcohol, and felt a kind of drunken joy.

"My brother, you have been a great help to us." Akhtar stretched out his arms and hugged Babur again, stronger and more enthusiastic than before.

Medical alcohol looks inconspicuous and can be seen everywhere in industrial society, but its functions are very extensive and very important.

In a semi-closed agricultural society like Afghanistan, even daily drinking water cannot be guaranteed to be hygienic, and various trivial diseases can kill people.

Medical alcohol has become a kind of rigid demand in this doomsday-like environment, and it is a hard currency.

After accepting the gift from Babur, Akhtar patted his chest to guarantee his safety, allowing him to enter the city to do business and obtain supplies and goods locally.

Grishke has a source of water and a population.

The economic strength of this small town is much stronger than that of the poor villages in the ravines.Although there is no high-quality mountain cashmere, the food production here is much more, and there are more cattle and sheep.

Akhtar is the local leader, he can join the 'Taliban', or trade with the caravans of the 'Northern Alliance'.In a life of misery, what is a position?

Who can get water pumps for irrigation, tractors for farming, pickups for transportation, walkie-talkies for communications, panels for power generation, wires and light bulbs for electricity, as well as heavy machine guns, mortars, and rocket launchers.

Whoever is a friend of the local forces.

Consumption demand in poor places is very strong, but there is a lack of money.

The "Holy Light" repair factory in Kabul has been completed. The repaired Soviet-style weapons are not only equipped with its own mine guard team, but also openly supplied to local warlords.

In order to make Afghanistan more chaotic, Zhou Qingfeng even allowed 'credit'.One local faction sold armored vehicles, so is the other going to follow suit and buy some rocket launchers?

Otherwise, 'the neighbor stores grain and I store guns, and the neighbor is my granary'.

However, after Babur arrived in Grishke, there were too many things in demand, and the caravan's dozen or so three-wheeled motorcycles could not be transported, so he had to rely on airplanes.He asked if an airstrip could be built locally.

Akhtar laughed and said there was no need to fix it, Grishk had an airstrip.After reading it, Babur felt that it was indeed 'simple'.

The airport doesn't even have a tower or a hangar, it's just a slightly flat loess runway, only about 700 meters long, and only small aircraft can take off and land.

When the plane arrives, you have to prepare your own return fuel, otherwise you will not be able to return.

But it's also much better than climbing a ravine.

A "Yun-[-]" flew over quickly. In addition to the "gift" of the relationship, it also unloaded the navigation, weather, and landing aid equipment, and took away a ton and a half of sheepskin along the way.

Soon the simple runway was extended to 1000 meters, and the "Yunqi" with a commercial load of [-] tons came.The follow-up shipments were still weapons, and the goods shipped away were not only leather and grain, but also gold artifacts confiscated from the people.

The runway continues to be extended, and the next one is the 'Yunba' with a commercial load of [-] tons.The armored vehicles of the BTR series came, and the live sheep and cultural relics on the ancient Silk Road in Central Asia were transported away.

While air freight is expensive, trekking through the mountains of Afghanistan is even more so. 'Holy Light' has always wanted to find a suitable transport aircraft, but it has not found anything better than the antique 'Yun Wu'.

Considering that PLA used the 'Yun 7000' to fly more than [-] kilometers and transported goats across five countries to the UAE in order to maintain its fleet, it doesn't matter that 'Shengguang' uses the 'Yun [-]' as an air jeep.

For a while, Akhtar was strong and strong, and his strength was rapidly improving, and other warlords around him suddenly felt pressured.When Babur expanded his business, he no longer needed to give gifts as a stepping stone, but was invited to go.

Once the miniature 'arms race' starts, it will not stop until local resources are exhausted.As long as the local warlords are strong enough, the 'Taliban' will be weakened.

It would be nice if the warlords fell apart again.

The repair shop in Kabul then became busy.It mainly repairs the firearms discarded by the Afghan government forces, then sells the small artillery in stock, and then various modified armored vehicles.

Domestic arms factories were disappointed by this.

Because the purchasing power of Afghan customers is too poor, the quality of soldiers is even worse, and they cannot handle advanced weapons.They can only buy repaired garbage, and they can't afford slightly more expensive high-end products.

The 'Northern Alliance' made some money by selling its own oil fields, but only bought two 'Yun-[-] B's as commuter planes, specially used for the travel of government officials.

In addition, it is great to buy some "Great Wall" pickups with enhanced protection to improve the mobility of troops.Or just buy some military uniforms and quilts to improve the appearance of some troops.

As for the rest of the money... If it wasn't for the 'Holy Light' paying monthly and stipulating the ratio of in-kind offsets, more than half of the senior officials of the 'Northern Alliance' would become naked officials in the blink of an eye and even flee with the money.

Because of this, Zhou Qingfeng cursed angrily——Whose Afghanistan is this?I'm here for business, how can I act like the 'King of Afghanistan'?

If I'm really the 'King of Afghanistan', all the scum who took my money will die!

Take it easy, things have to go on.

Babur is very cautious in 'making friends', doing business, and expanding personal connections in the South.He gradually contacted a 'Taliban' cleric, and used 'sugar-coated bullets' to drag him into the water.

In a village on the outskirts of Kandahar, Babur offered the priest $[-] in cash.After receiving the money, the priest gave a marked map of a dozen of Omar's hidden footholds.

"After the retreat from Kabul, the 'Taliban' top brass dispersed. Our soldiers turned to work as farmers and shepherds, hiding in cities and villages."

The priest spoke dejectedly.

"The failure came too fast, and no one was prepared. Everyone gradually lost contact and could only survive on their own. I didn't expect it to become like this, and I don't plan to continue."

For the 'Taliban', the defeat in Kabul was more psychological than the military loss.Mental frenzy cannot offset physical death.

The gap between backward countries and developed countries is now greater than the gap between China and Japan during the Anti-Japanese War.Who can bear the fact that the opponent is crushed by a rocket launcher?

Babur ignored the priest's self-pity.

From the bottom of his heart, he hates the 'Taliban' who destroyed the social order in Afghanistan, but he has to admit that the former Afghan government he worked for was extremely corrupt and completely disregarded the life and death of civilians.

After several months of training in Kashgar, Babur did not study hard.But when he was sent to the mountainous area to work as a caravan for several months and met those old herdsmen who were so poor that they only had a single felt, he recalled a lot of knowledge he had learned.

However, I didn't learn it well at the beginning, and I only remembered some vague concepts. What I remember deeply is not some exciting revolutionary theory, but that the development of modern industrial civilization will not give any chance to backward religions.

Omar's hiding places are scattered throughout southern Afghanistan, and some even in Pakistan.Babur tapped his finger on the map and asked, "Where is Omar?"

The priest shook his head, "I don't know where Omar is? He hasn't been in good health recently and needs oxygen from time to time. It's not suitable for running around, so he's staying somewhere to recuperate.

But precisely because he stayed still, those responsible for his safety were more vigilant.I once caught him giving me orders in two places at the same time, and I had no idea where he was.

By the way, Omar has a Turk named Kakhevich next to him.The latter can always get some urgently needed gear and items, so they can be trusted.Maybe you can check him out. "

The priest only provided the name 'Kahvich', without any photos, no history, or even the exact spelling of the name.But from the time and behavior of this person's appearance, Zhou Qingfeng concluded that he was a hostile candidate.

At this time, the wandering chosen ones play a role.

Seyit spent a small amount of money to get Pakistan's customs entry and exit records, and found out the "Avenger" air defense missiles that were recently shipped to Peshawar by the CIA.

From the cargo to the transport vehicle, and then to the person who handled it, Kahevich, who used a false name and a fake passport, was exposed.He continued to purchase large quantities of supplies in Pakistan and shipped them to Kandahar, which was hard to hide.

"The team, Kahevich needs the team. Find the team and you'll find him, and you'll find Omar."

The information was fed back to Babur in front of him.He trekked for months in the Hindu Kush, knowing that he could basically do nothing in Afghanistan without enough convoys.

Although there is no high-tech, insufficient funds, and no tall image of wealth and power, the caravan network composed of dozens or hundreds of "Babur" penetrates into every corner of southern Afghanistan, directly eroding the foundation of the "Taliban" rule .

During this process, a certain Chinese logistics maintenance squadron has been on standby at the joint base in Kunduz.When a certain time came, they received an order from their superiors - 'Long Sword' ready!

Chapter 38 I will always like 'Long Sword 10'

In the dark cave, the ventilation fans were humming and turning, and the hanging electric lights were whistling and flickering.In the monotonous environment, only a certain low voice was reciting scriptures, which made people drowsy after listening for a long time.

Kahvich had just dealt with the generator failure outside the cave, and when he stepped into the cave, he frowned and looked up, cursing the Pakistani businessmen who sold inferior Indian goods.

Inside the cave, Omar, who is blind in one eye, is sitting on a carpet teaching his children to read scriptures.Three wives served him back and forth, one of whom was the eldest daughter of 'Bin Laden'.

Omar was able to become the leader of the 'Taliban' not because of his ability, but because of his 'pious belief'.To put it bluntly, it is a tendon.

Because the extremely poor poor cannot get material gains, they must choose spiritual extremes, and following the 'Taliban' has become a helpless choice.

This is why many elderly people in China believe in religion, because their spirit is extremely empty and lost.

Kakhevich originally thought that this "leader of the believers" could perform miracles. After all, it took the U.S. military 20 years to eliminate the "Taliban".But the reality also gave him a heavy blow, because this time the opponent is not the US military.

The U.S. military also engages in poverty alleviation, but they don’t trust the locals at all, and only like to guide them from above.

'Holy Light' is not as rich as the US military. Instead, it took the initiative to understand the local culture and recruited a large number of local people without even thinking about changing anything.

The power of this "one can be strong without desire" can make Kahevich suffer a lot.He began to look forward to the 'Northern Alliance' coming. After all, the tens of thousands of 'Taliban' soldiers fighting day and night were pure consumption.

No war, no waste, no less food and drink.

But the 'Northern Alliance' is also a rookie, and they didn't even think about going south.

So the two sides confronted each other, just like the poor ghost of the 'Taliban', tens of thousands of mouths easily wiped out the 2000 million US dollars in aid given by the 'Brotherhood' within half a year, leaving nothing behind.

The 'Brotherhood' is already hesitating. After all, no one's money comes from a strong wind. 2000 million US dollars is not much, but no results can be seen.

Thinking about the "two trillion yuan" spent by the US military for 20 years, who is willing to throw money into this bottomless pit?

Kakhevich also wanted to learn from the painful experience and wanted to learn from 'Holy Light' to build a caravan for self-sustainment.But as long as he turned over the map and looked at it, he had to cry two lines of tears.

Most of Afghanistan's population is not in the deserts of the south, but in the valleys of the north.Anyway, there is still some snow melted water in the valley, which can be used for some farming and animal husbandry.

Except for a few oases in the south, most of it is desert. There really is nothing in the 'Taliban' territory but sand.

Kabul has a population of two to three million, and the caravan of 'Holy Light' can purchase leather, dried fruits, cattle and sheep in the northern valleys, and can also find time to engage in hydroelectric power generation.

In Kandahar, a city of only 20 people, Kakhevich can't get anything.