Afghanistan

[Chap]

In some ways Afghanistan's identity as a country is that it is NOT a country: that no one group or tribe has primacy. Tribal alliances and autonomy, rather than a common political ideology, are what define the people

Yup. You can't really conquer the whole of Afghanistan and say 'mission accomplished', because there isn't a real single thing called Afghanistan that you can grasp hold of and say 'this is ours now'. Long ago Britain learned that on more than one occasion, and Britain in the mid to later 19th century was not a power deficient in the will to fight colonial wars, or in the means to do so.

Wasn't it Dorothy Parker who said of some undistinguished (in her eyes at least) place 'When you get there, there's no there there'? What is there is a lot of really tough guys with guns who live in the mountains, and care about their tribal group rather than any abstract national idea. The cities are of course a whole different ball game ... but they are not 'Afghanistan'.

[Brack]

I can't claim to be any kind of expert on what happened to Afghanistan, but, from much of what little I have read about it, I get the impression that deeply entrenched corruption within the American supported Afghan government itself had a lot to do with its ultimate and probably inevitable demise. As I understand it, even the Afghan government we supported was, in many ways, not a whole lot more admirable than the Taliban. If it had been, perhaps things might have turned out a bit more favorably for the Afghan people and it might have had more popular support, and there might have been more determined popular resistance against the Taliban.

If I suggested this event moved the probability of Republicans taking the Senate and House in 2022 higher, and upped the odds of Trump or someone like him claiming the White House in 2024 would you believe it? Would it concern you?

We are all part of an interconnected system. These things don't happen "over there" without consequences everywhere.

The Republicans will likely take back the House in 2022. I don't know about the Senate in 2022. Looking ahead to 2024, I don't think that Biden will run for re-election, and I don't think that this will be that much of an issue then.

[ajax18]

The Republicans will likely take back the House in 2022. I don't know about the Senate in 2022. Looking ahead to 2024, I don't think that Biden will run for re-election, and I don't think that this will be that much of an issue then.

And it could be why Biden may have bucked his handlers on this issue. He knows he will be a one term president. If the Republicans take back the Senate, it will be even more difficult to ram through their radical left wing agenda. He won't be remembered for getting much done and this legacy is of concern to him.

[canpakes]

.
From - https://slate.com/news-and-politics/202 ... bacle.html

In a highly detailed report released Tuesday, Pentagon auditors concluded that the prospect of building a stable, peaceful Afghanistan was “elusive” from the start and that the U.S. government was never “equipped to undertake something this ambitious in such an uncompromising environment,” no matter how much money it spent.
…
In what may be the most damning section of the report, the authors note that rebuilding Afghanistan “required a detailed understanding of the country’s social, economic, and political dynamics”—yet U.S. policymakers in Washington and field workers on the ground “were consistently operating in the dark.” As a result, they “… clumsily forced Western technocratic models onto Afghan economic institutions; trained security forces in advanced weapon systems they could not understand, much less maintain; imposed formal rule of law on a country that addressed 80 to 90 percent of its decisions through informal means. … Without this background knowledge, U.S. officials often empowered powerbrokers who preyed on the population or diverted U.S. assistance away from its intended recipients to enrich and empower themselves and their allies. … [Thus,] projects intended to mitigate conflict often exacerbated it, and even inadvertently funded insurgents.”

The report, titled What We Need to Learn: Lessons From Twenty Years of Afghanistan Reconstruction, can be viewed at -

https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/lessonslearne ... -46-LL.pdf

[Alf'Omega]

For those of you who are losing your minds about Afghanistan, here is the agreement the United States made with the Taliban back in February of 2020. In a nutshell, the agreement to withdraw our troops was already in the works.

https://www.state.gov/wp-content/upload ... .29.20.pdf

Weird how the Taliban is a peaceful group looking to do better when Trump was in office, but once Biden takes over they're considered nothing less than Isis.

“Two days ago, the United States signed a deal with the Taliban so that after 19 years of conflict and very close to 20, we can finally begin to bring our amazing troops back home.” — Trump, in a campaign rally, March 2, 2020

“We’re dealing very well with the Taliban. They’re very tough, they’re very smart, they’re very sharp. But, you know, it’s been 19 years, and even they are tired of fighting.” — Trump, in a news conference, Sept. 18, 2020

"We should have the small remaining number of our BRAVE Men and Women serving in Afghanistan home by Christmas!" - Trump tweeted October, 2020
“Getting out of Afghanistan is a wonderful and positive thing to do. I planned to withdraw on May 1st, and we should keep as close to that schedule as possible.” — Trump, in a written statement, April 18, 2021

“I started the process. All the troops are coming back home. They couldn’t stop the process. Twenty-one years is enough, don’t we think? Twenty-one years. They [the Biden administration] couldn’t stop the process. They wanted to, but it was very tough to stop the process.” — Trump, at a political rally, June 26, 2021

[Res Ipsa]

For those of you who are losing your minds about Afghanistan, here is the agreement the United States made with the Taliban back in February of 2020. In a nutshell, the agreement to withdraw our troops was already in the works.

https://www.state.gov/wp-content/upload ... .29.20.pdf

Weird how the Taliban is a peaceful group looking to do better when Trump was in office, but once Biden takes over they're considered nothing less than Isis.

“Two days ago, the United States signed a deal with the Taliban so that after 19 years of conflict and very close to 20, we can finally begin to bring our amazing troops back home.” — Trump, in a campaign rally, March 2, 2020

“We’re dealing very well with the Taliban. They’re very tough, they’re very smart, they’re very sharp. But, you know, it’s been 19 years, and even they are tired of fighting.” — Trump, in a news conference, Sept. 18, 2020

"We should have the small remaining number of our BRAVE Men and Women serving in Afghanistan home by Christmas!" - Trump tweeted October, 2020
“Getting out of Afghanistan is a wonderful and positive thing to do. I planned to withdraw on May 1st, and we should keep as close to that schedule as possible.” — Trump, in a written statement, April 18, 2021

“I started the process. All the troops are coming back home. They couldn’t stop the process. Twenty-one years is enough, don’t we think? Twenty-one years. They [the Biden administration] couldn’t stop the process. They wanted to, but it was very tough to stop the process.” — Trump, at a political rally, June 26, 2021

Always nice to have the background. If memory serves, when Biden became president, there were about 1500 American troops left in Afghanistan. It would be interesting to track the actual troop levels since the agreement was signed in February 2020.

[Res Ipsa]

In some ways Afghanistan's identity as a country is that it is NOT a country: that no one group or tribe has primacy. Tribal alliances and autonomy, rather than a common political ideology, are what define the people

Yup. You can't really conquer the whole of Afghanistan and say 'mission accomplished', because there isn't a real single thing called Afghanistan that you can grasp hold of and say 'this is ours now'. Long ago Britain learned that on more than one occasion, and Britain in the mid to later 19th century was not a power deficient in the will to fight colonial wars, or in the means to do so.

Wasn't it Dorothy Parker who said of some undistinguished (in her eyes at least) place 'When you get there, there's no there there'? What is there is a lot of really tough guys with guns who live in the mountains, and care about their tribal group rather than any abstract national idea. The cities are of course a whole different ball game ... but they are not 'Afghanistan'.

I don't know if it was Dorothy Parker, but I recall the subject being Oakland, CA. We're still dealing with the fallout of how colonial powers drew up borders. Not just in that region of the world. I guess the absence of Kurdistan and Palestine are two examples that spring to mind in the Middle East.

[Res Ipsa]

.
From - https://slate.com/news-and-politics/202 ... bacle.html

In a highly detailed report released Tuesday, Pentagon auditors concluded that the prospect of building a stable, peaceful Afghanistan was “elusive” from the start and that the U.S. government was never “equipped to undertake something this ambitious in such an uncompromising environment,” no matter how much money it spent.
…
In what may be the most damning section of the report, the authors note that rebuilding Afghanistan “required a detailed understanding of the country’s social, economic, and political dynamics”—yet U.S. policymakers in Washington and field workers on the ground “were consistently operating in the dark.” As a result, they “… clumsily forced Western technocratic models onto Afghan economic institutions; trained security forces in advanced weapon systems they could not understand, much less maintain; imposed formal rule of law on a country that addressed 80 to 90 percent of its decisions through informal means. … Without this background knowledge, U.S. officials often empowered powerbrokers who preyed on the population or diverted U.S. assistance away from its intended recipients to enrich and empower themselves and their allies. … [Thus,] projects intended to mitigate conflict often exacerbated it, and even inadvertently funded insurgents.”

The report, titled What We Need to Learn: Lessons From Twenty Years of Afghanistan Reconstruction, can be viewed at -

https://www.sigar.mil/pdf/lessonslearne ... -46-LL.pdf

Nice catch. The original hubris can be found in the writings of the Project for a New American Century.

[Doctor CamNC4Me]

If you have an hour, and want an honest documentary that literally shows you why Afghanistan was a waste of time, then I strongly urge you to give this a go:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja5Q75hf6QI&

Any GQP’er who suggests Biden screwed this up is ignorant at best, and a downright lying sack of crap at worst. Remember, 72% of Americans support a withdrawal, and if we were all forced to watch this documentary it’d probably approach 100.

- Doc

[Moksha]

Sounds like Afghan women will have their freedom and safety stripped away by these Islamic TBMs.