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The Lesson of Afghanistan is a Simple One, But Probably Not What You Think
Flopping Aces ^ | 08-20-21 | Vince

Posted on 08/21/2021 7:47:03 AM PDT by Starman417

Joe Biden is being roasted for his indefensible handling of the Afghanistan exit.  As well he should be.  Indeed, his incompetence is so legion that he’s actually getting roasted by a media whose only job appears to be to prop up the Biden regime.  Both the New York Times and the Washington Post pilloried him while over at CNN: 'the debacle of defeat and chaotic retreat in Afghanistan' is a 'political disaster' for President Biden. The Wall Street Journal suggested his statement 'washing hands' of Afghanistan 'is one of most shameful in US history'.

They’re of course right.  This may be the most incompetent diplomatic/military exercise in American history… and it came straight from the Commander in Chief and his incompetent cabal of woke advisors.

Given the tragedy unfolding today, one wonders if Americans will learn the real lesson of Afghanistan.  Sure, while one lesson would be to never put a senile incompetent leftist in the position of Commander in Chief, that’s not the real lesson to be learned…

American direct involvement in Afghanistan started out twenty years ago after the attacks of September 11th.  It didn’t take long to discover that the Taliban had been giving Osama Bin Laden and Al Queda training bases and a home from which to attack the US.  George W. Bush sent troops in to rout them, which was largely accomplished within months.  But of course, the troops didn’t come home. They stayed, with the ostensible mission of helping Afghanistan craft a nation that would no longer be a haven for terrorists, and a government unwilling to protect them.  We – Americans, not me personally as I did not serve during that time nor in that theater – built roads, schools, bases, buildings, shepherded the writing of a constitution, facilitated elections, and helped form a government with all the trappings of legitimacy.  One of the most laudable efforts was help to give girls and women opportunities that they had not seen in Afghanistan in generations.

Of course, the Taliban, while defeated in terms of running the country, never quite went away.  They hid in the hills. They hid in Pakistan and actually took parts of it over.  They operated under the cover of night and gave a constant reminder that they were never far away.

All of this “progress” cost a great deal, both in terms of money and the lives of brave servicemen.  When all is said and done, the United States will have spent somewhere between $1 and $2 trillion seeking to build Afghanistan into a democracy with a functioning military and government.  At the same time, 2,500 American service members lost their lives executing that mission.

All for what?  Not much, apparently.  In just a number of days, the Taliban took over the entire country.  The president fled. Americans were airlifted from the roof of the embassy.  Girls are now being stolen from their families to be given as wives to Taliban fighters.  Those who assisted the Americans and local police are being rounded up and killed.  The Afghan military has essentially evaporated, leaving the Taliban in possession of tens of billions of dollars of American-supplied weapons and equipment.  Soon the Taliban will bring Afghanistan back to the 7th century, from whence they came.  Sharia law.  Women in bondage. No freedom.  Economic backwater.

The lesson of Afghanistan is not that the United States couldn’t turn The Graveyard of Empires into a thriving democracy, such as our own. That was never in the cards.  The American colonies grew up as part of the British Empire and had been marching slowly towards a representative government with individual freedoms for centuries, culminating in the signing of the Declaration of Independence and the ratification of the Constitution.  Of course, neither of those was the final word and the United States has been evolving towards a More Perfect Union ever since.

Afghanistan doesn’t have anything resembling the history we have.  Just the opposite.  The nation, to the degree that is actually a nation, exists largely on a map.  The people are far more tribal than they are Afghani, and most live lives like those their ancestors lived 1,000 years ago.  Nation-building in Afghanistan was always likely to be a failure, whether the United States spent $2 trillion or $20.

And therein lays the lesson of Afghanistan, through the words of Ronald Reagan. 

(Excerpt) Read more at floppingaces.net...


TOPICS: Government; Politics
KEYWORDS: afghanistan; biden; blogpimp; california; nancypelosi; waronterror
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1 posted on 08/21/2021 7:47:03 AM PDT by Starman417
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To: Starman417
he’s actually getting roasted by a media whose only job appears to be to prop up the Biden regime

They're letting him off easy. Imagine what they'd do to him if he didn't give them a heads up to get their people out of there.

2 posted on 08/21/2021 7:49:57 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all.)
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To: Starman417

“Nation-building in Afghanistan was always likely to be a failure”

Nation building in any muzzie country will be a failure. Hey, let’s try somalia again, or maybe yemen./s


3 posted on 08/21/2021 7:51:14 AM PDT by dynachrome ("I will not be reconstructed, and I do not give a damn.")
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To: Starman417

Didn’t The greatest democrat president of all time, barrack insane obama, tell us the tolly bun was totally defeated? Hmmmmm.


4 posted on 08/21/2021 7:55:24 AM PDT by exnavy (grow some thick skin, i do not care for whiners)
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To: dynachrome

All these writers have a deadline to say something relevant.

This is obvious fodder for the non-Freeper.

It’s a curse being so informed sometimes.


5 posted on 08/21/2021 7:56:04 AM PDT by Eddie01 (Only a fool plays a rigged game by the rules)
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To: Starman417

Nations hostile to US➡️Soros➡️Clintons➡️Democrat Party➡️Press

Nations hostile to The United States are actually running the Democrat Party and our press.


6 posted on 08/21/2021 7:57:23 AM PDT by blueunicorn6 ("A crack shot and a good dancer”)
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To: Starman417

Economic backwater.…..

Hardly. They’re now making meth. They already supply a substantial amount of the worlds heroin.

Soon, with their Chinese partners, they’ll be shipping that stuff by the shipload, to Mexico where it will walk across our border

They could become one of the biggest narco states the world has ever know.

You may not like how the money is being made but they’ll be making tons of it.


7 posted on 08/21/2021 7:57:31 AM PDT by qaz123
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To: dynachrome

Our Army is even worse then the mgmt. by stats 2nd Inf Div in 73-74. That unit did not even know squad tactics. Now DADT, plus more has trashed it.


8 posted on 08/21/2021 7:58:32 AM PDT by Lumper20 (Get the border wall built and get back to work on the keystone.)
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To: Eddie01

“It’s a curse being so informed sometimes.’

Yes it is. Often people ask me did you see the news story today about XXXX or did you know that XXXX. I have to be careful not to offend them and say “Yes I knew that days (or weeks ago).”


9 posted on 08/21/2021 8:01:17 AM PDT by mad_as_he$$
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To: Starman417

The lesson of Afghanistan is the same lesson too many people haven’t learned despite witnessing one disaster after another. Never let a bunch of corrupt draft dodgers send someone else’s kids to fight their stupid wars.


10 posted on 08/21/2021 8:02:11 AM PDT by Alberta's Child ("And once in a night I dreamed you were there; I canceled my flight from going nowhere.")
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To: Texas Eagle

The Biden regime is just that a regime. Joe Biden is not making any decisions for himself. His regime is where the blame should be focused. For starters actually putting him on the ballot to start with was a plan that should never have been enacted.
Now we have a bunch of faceless nameless unaccountable people making decisions. The only clear thing is that the motive is the destruction of our country.


11 posted on 08/21/2021 8:02:49 AM PDT by Eternally-Optimistic (anything is possible)
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To: Starman417

The lesson is an old one but unlearned by half the voting population: Democrats will betray everyone and everything. Their sugary words are lies, their thoughts are selfishly evil, and their hands are always in someone else’s cookie jar.


12 posted on 08/21/2021 8:03:49 AM PDT by Telepathic Intruder
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To: Starman417

I guess, the humane war. Just days after the victory 2001, there were reports of Taliban being abused and killed.
To win the war, you have to kill some people, sometimes in gruesome way.


13 posted on 08/21/2021 8:05:02 AM PDT by AZJeep (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O0AHGreco RomNQkryIIs)
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To: Eternally-Optimistic

You are correct, sir. Somebody is running the show with Joe al-Scranton serving as the front man. Interesting that that person or those persons do not want their identies known.


14 posted on 08/21/2021 8:07:12 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all.)
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To: Texas Eagle

I said that to a group of my liberal friends when Senile Joe “won” the presidency: “who will really be running the government?” They were astonished I would think such a thing. But it is evident there is someone or several someones running things bc it ain’t Joe and it ain’t Kamala.


15 posted on 08/21/2021 8:09:14 AM PDT by laconic
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To: exnavy

They were defeated.

But then he and the Democrats snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.


16 posted on 08/21/2021 8:09:21 AM PDT by Rurudyne (Standup Philosopher)
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To: qaz123
Hardly. They’re now making meth. They already supply a substantial amount of the worlds heroin.

*************

First thing we should have done was salt bomb the opium fields.

17 posted on 08/21/2021 8:10:11 AM PDT by ealgeone
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To: laconic

Nope. They’ll find out the hard way.


18 posted on 08/21/2021 8:11:41 AM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all.)
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To: Starman417

Bkmk


19 posted on 08/21/2021 8:11:48 AM PDT by sauropod (Time is like quicksilver, smearing the years... - Bill Nelson)
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To: Starman417

Were we really there to “fight terrorism” or were we there to impose feminism and tranny stuff on a backward population? Did it start out as one, then turn into the other at about the time Obama took over? The only clear goals ever stated were “get bin Laden” and nation-building. One of those was no longer an Afghanistan thing after about 2005, we lost the other one.

One big lesson is to never let the neocons run our foreign policy again. Most of them are pretty quiet. What do Richard Perle, Paul Wolfowitz, David Frum, David Brooks, Bill Kristol, and the rest of the old gang have to say? Trump’s fault or something like that, I’m sure.


20 posted on 08/21/2021 8:15:15 AM PDT by cdcdawg (Blame Biden and pray for his downfall.)
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