The Chinese will bribe everyone in sight, and completely ignore any atrocities. They don't give a damn.

I guess we could arm the freedom fighters against the Chinese

quote:

Originally posted by oldbill123:
I guess we could arm the freedom fighters against the Chinese

I think we did on our way out.

quote:

Originally posted by HayesGreener:

quote:

Originally posted by HayesGreener:
Deja Vu, Saigon, April 29, 1975. Iraq, but you get the idea

After over two years in both Iraq and Afghanistan and seeing so many mostly young lives lost, it is disheartening to know we will end up right where we started

The only way we could have won would have been to kill every man woman and child in that god forsaken country. That is the problem that everyone has had there they won't go biblical. Now the Chinese have entered, they are the only ones who might get the job done, because they really don't care who or how many they kill.

quote:

Originally posted by FishOn:
The Chinese will bribe everyone in sight, and completely ignore any atrocities. They don't give a damn.

The first time I landed at Kabul, it cost ten thousand dollars cash to offload the aircraft; it bought us about six hours on the ground, and we dealt with tribal people on horseback, among others. By the time we got it down to 2,500 in cash, we thought we were getting away with murder. With military control, that went away, but earlier on, it wasn't under control.

Most of the time we've been in Afghanistan, the Chinese have quietly been taking large amounts of precious metals out of Afghanistan. They didn't just arrive; they've been there the whole time. It wasn't widely broadcast here.

The Chinese were able to do what they did, at our expense. Nobody wanted to rock the boat.

quote:

Originally posted by sns3guppy:
The Chinese were able to do what they did, at our expense. Nobody wanted to rock the boat.

Like every other organization, the institutional inertia at the executive-level is overwhelming and clouds all sense and ethics.

quote:

Originally posted by oldbill123:
I guess we could arm the freedom fighters against the Chinese

Now that would be the ultimate irony right there

Wife had NBC news on last night when I got home

Richard Engel was given or doing a tour of Bagram and talking about the conditions, and how 'The Americans" (his words) had left the place in a shambles, no IT stuff, power off, but a stocked medical facility,


guess the douche did not realize (or likely care) that he was one of the Americans there, and didn't think to ask if the Afgan's had any electricians,,,

quote:

Originally posted by lyman:
Wife had NBC news on last night when I got home...

That had to be painful.

Did Engel by any chance link the "shambles" to the Demokratic administration? No, I didn't think so.

no , not at all,

guessing he must have bribed or lied to the locals and told them he was not Americans, since ever other word was how The Americans tore the place up,



he was at a local gunshow filming a few years ago,
fortunately, he skipped my tables (I sell guns with wood stocks mostly, so not tacticool enough to make a point)
he also may have heard me say 'hey, there's that dipshit from NBC' ,,,

I used my outside voice

Should not have been there in the 1st place but since we were should have told them to clean up their act in 30 days or be prepaired to have their entire country turned into a sheet of glass. But we know that would have never happened. These people have been fighting each other since before the time of Christ and are not going to stop until they kill all of the other side. The US needs to stop trying to be the worlds police force. They want us gone so let us give it to them and cut off any and all aid. ......................... drill sgt.

To be accurate, the people there haven't been fighting each other since the time of Christ; the damage there has been going on long, long before Christ, and it's been invaders destroying them, not them destroying each other. Once one of the wealthiest spots on the spice trail, the destruction was so great that not a single plant or blade of grass was left alive.

Cursed for all time might be a better description.

Actually just back home from there. We closed down Fenty, KAF, Dwyer, new antinik and bagram. The split FRST left the hospital well stocked. Power was turned off well before departure. We left Dwyer with hundreds of vehicles, generators and other equipment to include medical. The equipment was all very serviceable.

Fuck Afghanistan. All that is left is Harat and Hkia. I hope they bail ASAP.

We should have left A-stan YEARS ago (like, mid 2000's). It was probably necessary to go there in the first place, but we got bogged down, and there was NO WAY we could ever just 'turn the keys over' to a bunch of corrupt camel-herders and expect them to re-create the US government system.

What's the saying - if you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

I feel bad for the people of A-stan, but there is no way we can 'fix' that country, and we shouldn't waste effort and money trying.

quote:

Originally posted by sns3guppy:
To be accurate, the people there haven't been fighting each other since the time of Christ; the damage there has been going on long, long before Christ, and it's been invaders destroying them, not them destroying each other. Once one of the wealthiest spots on the spice trail, the destruction was so great that not a single plant or blade of grass was left alive.

Cursed for all time might be a better description.

I would like to make a slight correction to your post. They fight each other all the fucking time. The various ethic groups all hate each other and will fight each other at the drop of a hat. They just hate invaders more and will fight them first. Once the invaders are gone the tribes will fight each other. If there is not another tribe to fight than village will fight village. Fuck em all.

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Originally posted by Herkdriver:
A long fucking time ago.

Some of you have heard this story before.

I spent a year there as an advisor a decade ago. I was embedded with a helo unit (yeah, I know, it doesn't make any sense, go ask Big Blue why they did it). As advisers we were a mixed nationality unit. I worked with guys from Hungry, the Czech Republic, and Croatia, most of them pretty good guys who had been there before. Those who had been there before said we were dealing with the same problems in 2010 that they saw in 2007-8. Graft, no accountability, no command and control, no training. I saw no progress while I was there and heard the same stories from guys who were advisors 2-3 years later. The only Afghans I met that were worth a damn were some of the translators that worked for us. We can not enforce change in that country from outside. There is not a fucking thing there that is worth another drop of American blood. Fuck em.

Herk...were you CAPTF? I was there 2008-2009 at SKAIA as we made the transition to NKAIA

quote:

Originally posted by Hound Dog:
I feel bad for the people of A-stan, but there is no way we can 'fix' that country, and we shouldn't waste effort and money trying.

For a brief amount of time, Kabul at least, was on a modern trajectory, just like neighboring Iran. My uncle was with the US Corps of Engineers, he was there in the 60-70's building all sorts of stuff. No burkas except for the hillbillies, women wore dresses and pants, guys in suits, denim; buildings weren't pockmarked with bullet holes, electricity was available. Then the communists got into power, as they lost elections and their ideas were say...violent, they called up the Soviets for help and then, it all crumbled. The country experienced a massive brain drain, many immigrated to the US into Fremont, CA, what was left was either the warlord/stakeholders or, the hillbillies aka the Taliban.

The irony of it all, my uncle's son, my cousin, went there for several deployments with the Army as an engineer as well. Anything they built, would end up getting destroyed by the Taliban-types and/or, stripped for scrap by the vultures. Funding that was supposed to go into contractor's hands for projects would get siphoned-off at every level, very frustrating.

quote:

Herk...were you CAPTF? I was there 2008-2009 at SKAIA as we made the transition to NKAIA

Yeah

April 2010-11. Left exactly 1 week before the Kabul 9 killing. I would have been in the room where everyone was killed or next door.