Trump negotiated an opening to get U.S armed forces out of a place they should have been out of after the Taliban offered to surrender in 2001. Biden took the opening. Good for both of them for bringing a 19 year farce to an end.
Yes, it's a horrific tragedy. I hope we keep these videos handy for the next time somebody gets the bright idea to send our troops halfway across the world without a clearly defined mission and exit plan.
Beyond being tragic in how it is ending is that these things don't actually end. How we tie a chapter of history up influences the chapters that come after it. Whether we should have left now, a year from now, or held on forever is only one debateable issue involved. I don't disagree with the claims that the failure of the national government to hold together as soon as the scaffolding of US support was removed shows further investment was not going to change that outcome.
But the claim the Afghan government would be undermined if we pulled out the people who supported us while we were there so we couldn't execute a large-scale extraction mission in advance of the withdrawal undermines that argument while also undermining our credibility to both our other assets in problematic parts of the world, nations struggling with authoritarian threats or being pressured to look to Beijing for support they can count on, and off the generation of Afghans who just watched us walk out the door and close it behind us. Families left behind because our visa program was not set up to get them out, people who worked with our troops but had difficulties due to complications and bureaucratic indifference...these carry blowback.
It's wrong to think this is resolution. And as I said in the OP, I think it highlights just how unserious, self-destructive, and faux-principled we are as a nation. We can't be bothered to be informed, and when crap like this goes down we respond with precanned partisan gobbledygook.
The Taliban claims it is not the Taliban of 1994 and wants international recognition suggesting a best case scenario of it becoming a client state of Pakistan. Worst case, things could be pretty dark. But my personal guess is we are looking at a body that includes members of the original Taliban and ISIS who bring perspective and lessons learned that will make this theocracy something new we haven't seen before.
Well. I don’t think ISIS members will find a welcoming place among the Taliban, but I’m not sure what the 2021 iteration of the Taliban will have as a policy with regard to reconciliation of members of the umma or dar el islam. I think most people viewed ISIS as a fanatical religious sect looking to impose an extreme form of islam on a caliphate, and that was their messaging, but the ground reality was that ISIS was a criminal syndicate, literally a shakedown MLM. My hunch is once the Taliban gets to the Bagram AFB stockade there’ll be more ISIS executions than pardons. Rapes, thefts, and other felonious crimes are a death sentence with the Taliban. So. There you go.
As far as my experience goes, all I can tell you is the Afghan government was just hoarding wealth, incompetent, not interested in a long-term functioning society modeled off the West. This filtered down to the ANA and police. Back in 2009, again with regard to my personal experience, it was obvious we were wasting our time. To a last, my fellow Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, and Airmen I interacted with felt what’s happening now was inevitable UNLESS we stayed there indefinitely. And by indefinitely I’m being literal. That region needs about 100 years of Netflix and chill to even have a shot at transitioning to modernity, and even then it’s a 80% chance of them just reverting back to their ways.
The Taliban claims it is not the Taliban of 1994 and wants international recognition suggesting a best case scenario of it becoming a client state of Pakistan. Worst case, things could be pretty dark. But my personal guess is we are looking at a body that includes members of the original Taliban and ISIS who bring perspective and lessons learned that will make this theocracy something new we haven't seen before.
Well. I don’t think ISIS members will find a welcoming place among the Taliban, but I’m not sure what the 2021 iteration of the Taliban will have as a policy with regard to reconciliation of members of the umma or dar el islam. I think most people viewed ISIS as a fanatical religious sect looking to impose an extreme form of islam on a caliphate, and that was their messaging, but the ground reality was that ISIS was a criminal syndicate, literally a shakedown MLM. My hunch is once the Taliban gets to the Bagram AFB stockade there’ll be more ISIS executions than pardons. Rapes, thefts, and other felonious crimes are a death sentence with the Taliban. So. There you go.
As far as my experience goes, all I can tell you is the Afghan government was just hoarding wealth, incompetent, not interested in a long-term functioning society modeled off the West. This filtered down to the ANA and police. Back in 2009, again with regard to my personal experience, it was obvious we were wasting our time. To a last, my fellow Soldiers, Sailors, Marines, and Airmen I interacted with felt what’s happening now was inevitable UNLESS we stayed there indefinitely. And by indefinitely I’m being literal. That region needs about 100 years of Netflix and chill to even have a shot at transitioning to modernity, and even then it’s a 80% chance of them just reverting back to their ways.
- Doc
Cam in your estimation could our exit have been handled differently with regard to to a better outcome for U.S. and Afghan allies? If so, how?
It seems to me (admittedly ignorant on the subject) that the Taliban had a long time frame in which to prepare to take over re: Trump's agreement with the Taliban. In other words, they had advanced notice on account of the agreement made under the Trump administration.
LIGHT HAS A NAME
We only get stronger when we are lifting something that is heavier than what we are used to. ~ KF
Trump negotiated an opening to get U.S armed forces out of a place they should have been out of after the Taliban offered to surrender in 2001. Biden took the opening. Good for both of them for bringing a 19 year farce to an end.
Yes, it's a horrific tragedy. I hope we keep these videos handy for the next time somebody gets the bright idea to send our troops halfway across the world without a clearly defined mission and exit plan.
Beyond being tragic in how it is ending is that these things don't actually end. How we tie a chapter of history up influences the chapters that come after it. Whether we should have left now, a year from now, or held on forever is only one debateable issue involved. I don't disagree with the claims that the failure of the national government to hold together as soon as the scaffolding of US support was removed shows further investment was not going to change that outcome.
But the claim the Afghan government would be undermined if we pulled out the people who supported us while we were there so we couldn't execute a large-scale extraction mission in advance of the withdrawal undermines that argument while also undermining our credibility to both our other assets in problematic parts of the world, nations struggling with authoritarian threats or being pressured to look to Beijing for support they can count on, and off the generation of Afghans who just watched us walk out the door and close it behind us. Families left behind because our visa program was not set up to get them out, people who worked with our troops but had difficulties due to complications and bureaucratic indifference...these carry blowback.
It's wrong to think this is resolution. And as I said in the opening post, I think it highlights just how unserious, self-destructive, and faux-principled we are as a nation. We can't be bothered to be informed, and when crap like this goes down we respond with precanned partisan gobbledygook.
I don’t think it’s resolution either. It is hubris to think that we could ever resolve anything in that part of the world other than maybe punish the government that was hiding Bin Laden at the time.
And of course it causes blowback. Everything we do militarily has blowback, especially in that part of the world. Everything we do diplomatically has blowback. In that part of the world, especially out unwavering support of Israel. Blowback comes with the territory of being a powerful nation. It’s also hard to predict. We were chased out of Saigon as the dreaded commies were flooding in — the very domino that was supposed to lead to communist subjugation of the world. How is Viet Nam today?
War is tragic. Armed occupation against an armed insurrection is tragic . Withdrawal without a complete peace agreement is tragic. Not making sure everyone left behind is tragic. But what’s really tragic is making the same arrogant mistakes over again. We had Vietnam. E we saw the Russians try to occupy Afghanistan. And then we made the same mistakes.
I’m just not going to spend a bunch of time wringing my hands about ending something that should have ended 19 years ago. And I’m not going to play idiotic political games over something that has had the grubby fingerprints of both parties on it for almost 20 years.
he/him we all just have to live through it,
holding each other’s hands.
I hear we left billions of dollars worth of weapons and equipment for the Taliban to confiscate and use against us when we start having more 9/11s as well. This goes beyond poorly planned. I don't understand the Biden administrations motives on this but it doesn't seem near as politically popular as the usual writing people checks and inflating the dollar to avoid paying it back.
And when the Confederates saw Jackson standing fearless like a stonewall, the army of Northern Virginia took courage and drove the federal army off their land.
I hear we left billions of dollars worth of weapons and equipment for the Taliban to confiscate and use against us when we start having more 9/11s as well. This goes beyond poorly planned. I don't understand the Biden administrations motives on this but it doesn't seem near as politically popular as the usual writing people checks and inflating the dollar to avoid paying it back.
Well if that's what you "heard" it must be true huh?
I hear we left billions of dollars worth of weapons and equipment for the Taliban to confiscate and use against us when we start having more 9/11s as well. This goes beyond poorly planned. I don't understand the Biden administrations motives on this but it doesn't seem near as politically popular as the usual writing people checks and inflating the dollar to avoid paying it back.
Well if that's what you "heard" it must be true huh?
It never ends with Xanax. How in the “F” does this guy not swallow his tongue in his sleep is a mystery.
Our ancestors had generals like George Washington, Ulysses Grant, my avatar, and Douglas MacCarthur. Our generation gets Mark Milley. It's not surprising that Joe Biden's handlers prefer to have him watching Matlock than answering questions about this.
The Biden administration is focused on combating “white supremacy” as Americans are in peril in Afghanistan, Kash Patel, former chief of staff to the acting secretary of defense, remarked on Monday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Daily with host Alex Marlow.
Patel, former head of the National Counterterrorism Center at the National Security Council during the Trump administration, said the Taliban have no fear of consequences from President Joe Biden.
“The Taliban knew that President Trump was leaving office and that Joe Biden was coming in,” assessed Patel. “All they had to do was wait, but if you look at the withdrawal — the controlled conditions-based withdrawal we executed under President Trump — it was just that. It was done with the Taliban fearing U.S. reprisal if they hurt security interests of the American people. It was done with the Taliban fearing that if they didn’t show up for negotiations in good faith, then harm would fall upon them and their populace.”
He continued, “All of that disappeared when Joe Biden took office, because the Taliban knew Joe Biden did not have a controlled plan of withdrawal, and on top of that, they knew Joe Biden didn’t have the backbone that President Trump did when it came to Afghanistan.”
Patel noted how Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley warned of “white rage” and “white supremacy” as top national security threats. In June, Biden framed “terrorism from white supremacy” as “the most lethal threat to the homeland.”
He said, “Mark Milley is supposed to be the most apolitical person [as] the highest-ranking uniformed military officer in the U.S. government, and this is what happens when that individual politicizes the national security interests of the United States just to try and keep his job.”
“[Mark Milley] is running up to Capitol Hill when Biden gets elected to talk about ‘white rage,’ and him and Secretary Austin issued a stand-down border saying the biggest threat [according] to the Department of Defense is ‘white supremacy,” he recalled. “When you order three million people to review that posture, you know what they’re not doing? Protecting American interests and serving in Afghanistan and other places around the world. That’s just the nature of the national security apparatus.”
The Biden administration undermines national security in its ostensible pursuit of the illusory phenomenon of “white supremacy,” Patel held.
He remarked, “If you refuse to collect intelligence on terrorist threats and refuse to support your soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan because you’re focused on ‘white supremacy’ — a phantom ghost that doesn’t exist — because you want to satisfy a media headline, then you hurt national security interests, and that’s what Mark Milley has done.”
And when the Confederates saw Jackson standing fearless like a stonewall, the army of Northern Virginia took courage and drove the federal army off their land.
