19 September—Donald Trump wants the Bagram Air Base back in American hands. Why not!? As he said, “We gave it to them for nothing.” And, about 25 miles north of Kabul, Afghanistan, “it’s an hour away from where China makes its nuclear weapons.” Bagram, built by the Soviets in the 1950s, had in fact been the NATO military hub in Afghanistan for two decades, after all, before Joe Biden effectively gave it to the Taliban in July 2021, just before our unceremonious and ignominious abandonment of Afghanistan the following month. The Taliban currently control most of the country. (In the very way Trump would like to control the United States. But that’s irrelevant. For now.)

Although Trump hasn’t (yet) mentioned military force to make Canada the 51^st state, he hasn’t ruled it out to annex Greenland and Mexico. But evidently he reckons that it might just be possible for the U.S. to reclaim Bagram without force “because they need things from us.” Surprisingly, he’s not wrong. Because, among other things:

The United States and several European countries have frozen billions of dollars belonging to Afghanistan’s central bank—now controlled by the Taliban, of course—purportedly to prevent the buggers from accessing the scratch while not doing anything to alleviate Afghanistan’s severe humanitarian crisis, conspicuously exacerbated since the Taliban took over.

(It should be noted that about $7 billion of Da Afghanistan Bank Assets are held in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Which might just be a reason Trump wants to usurp control of the Fed. And Da Afghanistan Bank is not to be confused with a rapper. But that’s also irrelevant. For now.)

Some 23 million Afghanistanis—over half the country’s population—are in dire need of assistance. U.S. aid had, as usual, been the largest source of whatever assistance was needed. But Trump scotched that when he killed USAID—the U.S. Agency for International Development—as one of his first despicable executive orders right after his second despicable inauguration on 20 January. Currently, the Taliban are forced to extort and abuse aid only from the UN and various NGOs.

Of course, the Taliban naturally want the UN and EU to lift all sanctions, remove their designation as a terrorist organization, and formally recognize them as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. Seems perfectly reasonable. Yeah, right.

Back to Bagram, then, Trump claims that China has moved in to the base. The Taliban and China claim otherwise. And various sources confirm that, as usual, Trump is full of it. In all events, the Taliban have indicated they’re willing to talk about the base but have made it clear that no U.S. military personnel would be permitted.

In that case, if the Taliban figure that Trump really wants to open a luxury resort in Afghanistan, they’d better think twice before doing any business with him . . .