"Biden is not only a phony, but an incompetent one."
-Thomas Sowell

I wrote this a few days ago elsewhere. I had no idea a few days later the entire country would fall. To add insult to injury we just armed the Taliban. They get to trade in their 40 year old AKs for all the US supplied gear we gave to afghan government. What a sad time. I pray for our soldiers that sacrificed so much and the people of Afghanistan who will never know freedom.

+++++++

All around bad. Our soldiers are not the world police. Our ONLY involvement over there should have been to slap them in the dick hard. Blow up a bunch of shit and roll out. Probably could have done it from the air alone.

I have zero interest in nation building, or in this case generating an entire generation of fanatics that hate our country and putting the innocent people in their country now in harms way.

We spent more billions (trillions?) than I can count over there, but the human loss of our boys and girls over there (now men and women, if not grandparents) is the worst part.

That country is fucked either way no matter what we do, we could occupy it for for another two decades, all we would do is delay the inevitable. In the end they are a sovereign country and if they choose religious law and brutal ruling it's been proven no country can change that. The USSR and USA tried it with different objectives.

Time to rip the band-aid off. It's going to suck, we will see Taliban takeover and brutality, and it will hurt us deep down. We can't stop it, only slow it at great cost. I pray for their innocent citizens that just want to live their best lives.

Good luck Afghanistan, and hopefully goodbye.

Did anybody in a decision making capacity, not think that maybe, just maybe, a Winter time departure would've been a better option?

I'm still baffled that Bagram was closed and now the only viable air-bridge, is within the city limits of Kabul, a city teeming with 4.5 million people and growing.

For all the justified lamentation about the obvious lack of preparedness, I wonder if any level of planning could have avoided this disastrous dynamic of collapse once allied troops pulled out. I've long held that the way to defeat started as soon as a year into the mission
when, with pretty much no strategic goals reached, Afghanistan got put on the back burner to go for Iraq over Saddam's role in 9/11 or something. That sucked up huge ressources, and moreover undermined domestic and international public and political support for the War on Terror overall. In fact it increased the terror threat and had other adverse effects down the line, at least in Europe; including the 2014/15 refugee crisis.

Mind, the US isn't alone in having acted on dreamland ideas. In charge of rather quiet ISAF Regional Command North, Germans used to look down on the trigger-happy Americans bombing wedding parties in the South rather than winning heart and minds - until they found that somehow the Taliban had still set up base between all those new schools, wells and bridges, and locals complained they weren't fought aggressively enough. Incidentally, when the commander of PRT Kunduz called in a US airstrike on two hijacked tanker trucks which may have killed a number of civilians who had come to scavenge fuel after the trucks got stuck in a riverbed, the locals had the least heartburn about it of all involved.

It's not like there hasn't been a gradual drawdown over half of the total mission time, and the Taliban have filled whatever space was vacated by allied troops. Individual NATO partners began announcing withdrawal plans from ISAF as soon as 2010. RESOLUTE SUPPORT replaced the latter as an expressive train-and-assist mission in 2014. The US slashed its commitment by more than half in 2016; at that point, the Taliban already controlled 10-20 percent of Afghanistan again, threatening 70 percent a year later.



In February 2020, the Doha Agreement envisioned a pullout within 14 months. The Biden admin actually moved that back by four months. Poor planning or not, short of tearing up Doha on the grounds that the Taliban weren't honoring it anyway and just staying on, I'm not sure this could have been averted.

Pretty much says it all:


https://twitter.com/AKudej25/s.../1427225502817861632

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
For all the justified lamentation about the obvious lack of preparedness, I wonder if any level of planning could have avoided this disastrous dynamic of collapse once allied troops pulled out.

Yes, this was absolutely NOT inevitable.

The withdrawal of all embassy and essential personnel could have been done in an orderly fashion over a period of time - it did NOT have to be a total clusterfuck and panic at the disco. Total failure of leadership and planning and no one will be held accountable.

pa·thet·ic
/pəˈTHedik/

1. arousing pity, especially through vulnerability or sadness.
"she looked so pathetic that I bent down to comfort her"

2. miserably inadequate; of very low standard.
"he's a pathetic excuse for a man"

It looks like the situation at the airport is going to hell. What happens to that last rear guard of troops that were sent in to protect the evacuation? How do they get out?

^^^via Helicopters, from the Rooftops....Hopefully w/ Air Cover!

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:I've long held that the way to defeat started as soon as a year into the mission
when, with pretty much no strategic goals reached, Afghanistan got put on the back burner to go for Iraq over Saddam's role in 9/11 or something. That sucked up huge ressources, and moreover undermined domestic and international public and political support for the War on Terror overall. In fact it increased the terror threat and had other adverse effects down the line, at least in Europe; including the 2014/15 refugee crisis.

You figured that out all on your own?

quote:

Originally posted by 92fstech:
It looks like the situation at the airport is going to hell. What happens to that last rear guard of troops that were sent in to protect the evacuation? How do they get out?

All the reports on the ground I have seen indicate that there is NO security or 'rear guard of troops' - it's total chaos and no one is in charge and no one knows what's going on.

quote:

Originally posted by BamaJeepster:
Yes, this was absolutely NOT inevitable.

The withdrawal of all embassy and essential personnel could have been done in an orderly fashion over a period of time - it did NOT have to be a total clusterfuck and panic at the disco. Total failure of leadership and planning and no one will be held accountable.

That certainly comes under "poor planning". But what I really mean is the dynamic of collapse leading to chaos at the last airport. Sure you could, and should, have evacuated the embassy sooner, and not just the American one. But at some point the last Western troops have to walk onto the last plane. I fear that the images of that would have been pretty much the same, minus the particularly evocative ones of helicopters over the embassy. At least at the same time.

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
That certainly comes under "poor planning". But what I really mean is the dynamic of collapse leading to chaos at the last airport. Sure you could, and should, have evacuated the embassy sooner, and not just the American one. But at some point the last Western troops have to walk onto the last plane. I fear that the images of that would have been pretty much the same, minus the particularly evocative ones of helicopters over the embassy. At least at the same time.

That's why you do this in the winter, when the Taliban is not active and would not have been threatening the capital.

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
That certainly comes under "poor planning". But what I really mean is the dynamic of collapse leading to chaos at the last airport. Sure you could, and should, have evacuated the embassy sooner, and not just the American one.

You don't think a withdrawal after "fighting season" (yes Virginia, they have that there, which also says a lot) wouldn't have been smoother? Half or more of the Taliban would have been in Pakistan...

You seriously can't make this up.

A mostly peaceful and friendly death chant.


https://twitter.com/sophiabfis.../1427277156913139716

My question is, why should we care? Why should the US care? "Terrorism"? What, the terrorists don't exist unless they occupy all of Afghanistan?

The only way that perpetual stinking shithole of a "country" is ever going to have peace, is ever going to be stable, is for every single Afghan living there to simply vanish. POOF! Gone, vanished into thin air. And anyone who attempts to cross the border into that joke of a country, the asshole of planet Earth, POOF!

That's it. That's the only way- the only way for that pigsty to be quiet and peaceful- no people, not a single one. Otherwise, it's just more of the same old shit, day after day, century after century.

Piss on that place and everyone in it.

quote:

Originally posted by 92fstech:
It looks like the situation at the airport is going to hell. What happens to that last rear guard of troops that were sent in to protect the evacuation? How do they get out?

They'll be on the last plane out, probably in the dead of the night. The clandestine guys and SOF guys will change into civilian-looking clothes and work their way to remote sites previously set-up for pick-up. The amphibious group in the Arabian Sea will likely be coordinating these desperate pick-ups.

The very last guys will attempt to make their way into Pakistan or, one of the "friendlier 'stans" where we have an embassy.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/...eda-members-n2594185

The Taliban seized the formerly U.S. controlled Bagram Air Base on Sunday, which was turned over to the Afghanistan government last month, freeing thousands of prisoners held at the base in the process.

According to the Associated Press, there were approximately 5,000 prisoners being held at the base, including members of al Qaeda, ISIS, and the Taliban.

Bagram is 40 miles north of Kabul and is impressive in size: The installation covers about 30 square miles.

quote:

Originally posted by stoic-one:

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
That certainly comes under "poor planning". But what I really mean is the dynamic of collapse leading to chaos at the last airport. Sure you could, and should, have evacuated the embassy sooner, and not just the American one.

You don't think a withdrawal after "fighting season" (yes Virginia, they have that there, which also says a lot) wouldn't have been smoother? Half or more of the Taliban would have been in Pakistan...

Yup, this is what happens when inept, ill-informed power hungry ideologues [certainly foolish too...feel free to insert add'l descriptors here] are in charge, and pick arbitrary yet predetermined, calendar driven dates with the intent to generate feel good soundbite driven twitter posts! Unfortunately these over-educated imbeciles running the show are incapable of the requisite sound analysis to anticipate any potential outcomes that don't fit the narrative of these 'brilliant ideas' they cook up in their 'brilliant minds'!

This is a HORROR Show, and I fear we don't have any idea how bad it's going to get. We know those C17's with the Embassy personnel were NOT airlifting the last of the Americans out of Afghanistan....It's a certainty that MANY remain in harms way, and I fear for their safety!