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Afghans were willing to fight. But we abandoned them on the battlefield.
Washington Post ^ | 8/19/2021 | Elliot Ackerman

Posted on 08/20/2021 4:43:18 PM PDT by Beave Meister

I have fought in two wars, Iraq and Afghanistan, as a Marine, and covered a third war, Syria, as a journalist. I’ve seen friends killed and wounded — been wounded myself — and in all three places witnessed the costs of American miscalculation and hubris. In all that time, across the battlefields of my generation, from Fallujah to the Korengal Valley to Kobane, I have never witnessed a more shameful U.S. failure than that of this week.

President Biden’s address to the nation Wednesday featured two statements that were, at best, self-serving interpretations of events, but I would categorize them as falsehoods. First, the president said he and his national security team “have been closely monitoring the situation on the ground in Afghanistan and moving quickly to execute the plans we had put in place to respond to every constituency — and contingency — including the rapid collapse we’re seeing now.” Not only did the administration not have plans in place for every contingency, it did not have plans in place for what any casual observer of the withdrawal might consider all but certain to occur contingencies such as an emergency evacuation of our Afghan partners trapped in the country and under grave threat from the Taliban. Beginning in April, a bipartisan group of more 30 members of Congress, led by Reps. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) and Jason Crow (D-Colo.), both veterans, petitioned the president for meetings at the White House and a plan for how to evacuate key Afghan personnel. Their requests were met with silence.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat
KEYWORDS: afghans; afghanstain; biden; fallujah; iraq; islam; presidenthouseplant; religionofpeace; sleepyjoe; taliban; talibanjoe; us
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President Houseplant is a pathetic failure.
1 posted on 08/20/2021 4:43:18 PM PDT by Beave Meister
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To: Beave Meister

Washington post you say?


2 posted on 08/20/2021 4:45:10 PM PDT by Celerity
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To: Beave Meister
Afghans were willing to fight. But we abandoned them on the battlefield.

We helped them fight for 20 years. The real problem is that we couldn't stop Pakistan from sheltering the Taliban and keeping it alive.
3 posted on 08/20/2021 4:47:22 PM PDT by AnotherUnixGeek
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To: Beave Meister

why am i seeing this from WAPO? Let’s see......CIA backed...so Biden getting skewered?


4 posted on 08/20/2021 4:50:00 PM PDT by RummyChick (Bagram was the most logical exit point. Stand up and justify your decision (hat tip Larrytown))
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To: Beave Meister

We could have given close air support, but Old Joe abandoned our base at Bagram so we would have to depend on carrier based planes. Joe also could have called in B-52 raids or A-10s but chose to bug out in the middle of the night leaving billions in weapons to the Taliban


5 posted on 08/20/2021 4:54:29 PM PDT by The Great RJ ("Socialists are happy until they run out of people's money." Margaret Thatcher)
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To: Beave Meister

You’re probably not talking about the young men that were fleeing on that military aircraft, right?


6 posted on 08/20/2021 4:58:34 PM PDT by Pilgrim's Progress (http://www.baptistbiblebelievers.com/BYTOPICS/tabid/335/Default.aspx D)
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To: Celerity

It was always part of the plan to install a puppet they would later remove.


7 posted on 08/20/2021 5:00:43 PM PDT by Revel
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To: Beave Meister

Funny, the interview I heard on Bongino said that 3 out of 4 Afghans were smoking hash from sun up to sun down, lazy, unorganized, no motivation,...


8 posted on 08/20/2021 5:05:10 PM PDT by eyeamok (founded in cynicism, wrapped in sarcasm)
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To: Beave Meister

According to Biden’s speech today, there were only 300 people in the Afghan military.


9 posted on 08/20/2021 5:07:01 PM PDT by GreenHornet
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To: Beave Meister

They outnumber(ed) the Taliban almost 5 to 1


10 posted on 08/20/2021 5:12:16 PM PDT by Mr. K (No consequence of repealing obamacare is worse than obamacare itself)
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To: Beave Meister

Old Joe has lost WAPO! How much longer till President Heels Up is sworn in?


11 posted on 08/20/2021 5:18:06 PM PDT by Greetings_Puny_Humans (I mostly come out at night... mostly.)
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To: RummyChick
why am i seeing this from WAPO? Let’s see......CIA backed...so Biden getting skewered?

If the insiders are universally blaming Biden - it wasn't Biden's idea. Even the media should be able to work that out.

12 posted on 08/20/2021 5:19:32 PM PDT by Mr. Jeeves ([CTRL]-[GALT]-[DELETE])
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To: Beave Meister

The people behind this debacle don’t care about Afghans doing anything. They care about contracts for the military industrial complex and they sure don’t care about this s-hole country or its people.

Besides, the Afghan army is illiterate and usually high as a kite. All of which means more money to the contractors teaching them letters and numbers and not to behave. They are useless.


13 posted on 08/20/2021 5:26:13 PM PDT by bigbob
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To: The Great RJ

The Taliban is now in possession of Blackhawks and Azerbijan has some more, courtesy of the Afghani air force. After 20yrs, they should have been flying their own close air support.
There is no excuse for the Afghan army collapse.
Not even A10s or b52s could have helped.


14 posted on 08/20/2021 5:31:25 PM PDT by Adder ("Can you be more stupid?" is a question, not a challenge.)
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To: Beave Meister
Afghanis are cowards with no Western values, who will turn and run at the first opportunity to abandon their wives and children. That much is obvious.
Could the evacuation be better organized, like keeping Bagrahm open? Of course.
There are certain translators who were useful, but bringing their families as well?
Do we really want to bring in 50,000 afghanis/dual citizens (with taliban sympathies) back to the U.S.?
Anyone still in Trashcanistan after months of warning, is clearly either too stupid to be an asset to the U.S. or potential terrorists.
15 posted on 08/20/2021 5:32:20 PM PDT by End Times Sentinel (In the conflict between the stone and the stream, the stream will always prevail.)
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To: Beave Meister

Is that what the Chi-coms paid the Compost to say?


16 posted on 08/20/2021 5:42:13 PM PDT by mass55th ("Courage is being scared to death, but saddling up anyway." ~~ John Wayne )
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To: Beave Meister

See Tagline. I’ve said for a long time that our only hope to avoid CWII or RWII is that the New York Times and Washington Post would “Come to Jesus” and start printing the truth. Is this the early stages of this? I doubt it, but one can hope.


17 posted on 08/20/2021 5:46:14 PM PDT by libertylover (Our biggest problem by far is that most of the news media is hate & agenda driven, not truth driven.)
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To: Beave Meister

Sometime the kids need to make decisions and go it on their own. I’d say 20 years or so is long enough to hold their hands when they cross the street.

This guy is dead wrong.


18 posted on 08/20/2021 6:00:20 PM PDT by Sequoyah101 (Politicians are only marginally good at one thing, being politicians. Otherwise they are fools.)
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To: Beave Meister

They were basically promised air support from Bagram, but Biden just plain bugged out. Without air support, with the enemy willing to go into your village and slaughter every child hoping to catch yours, it is a luzing battle.


19 posted on 08/20/2021 6:02:36 PM PDT by Kevmo ( 600 political prisoners in Washington, DC. You cannot comply your way out of tyranny.)
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To: End Times Sentinel
Do we really want to bring in 50,000 afghanis/dual citizens (with taliban sympathies) back to the U.S.?

We need to make a deal with our Gulf allies and have them live in places like Doha, Qatar and Dubai, UAE. No need for them to come to USA.

20 posted on 08/20/2021 6:06:16 PM PDT by MinorityRepublican
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