Posted on 08/17/2021 8:08:40 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
RE: Bottom line, we should never have been there.
So, we just let Osama Bin Ladin skate without avenging what he did to our citizens in 9/11/2001?
As for “what are we still doing there after 20 years”, all we have to do is pull out and see.
As for whether we can live with a Taliban Afghanistan, we are all going to get a front row seat.
Tribalism over nationalism.
Trump took the Afghan fighting season into account [pullout in May] to minimize the damage to US interests.
Biden's puppeteers took the Afghan fighting season into account [see post #18] to maximize the damage to US interests and maximize the benefit to Muslim and Chinese interests.
Funny how this debacle is President Trumps fault, but if it had gone smoothly, it would have all been Joes, absolutely no credit to Trump.
After a failed Iran hostage rescue attempt and several other operations left on the table, Jimmy Carter did not impress the Ayatolla Khomeini. We sat on Gonzo station for over a year just waiting, most of that time in general quarters. It was stressful and there was a feeling of helplessness that no action or direction from Carter’s administration would come to break this malaise. It left our hands tied in over a year long waiting game. The day Ronald Reagan was sworn into office the hostages were released. The Muslim Caliphate only respect and fear strength. Carter was weak, Reagan projected strength.
The Taliban feared Trump. Biden is a joke in the world’s eyes. Even weaker and more feckless than Carter.
The pulling out of air support left the door wide open for the Taliban to sweep across the country and into Kabul.
It’s not wrong to want the people of Afghanistan to have freedom and a higher standard of living.
What is wrong is to expect that we could do that on the cheap and that they could be like Massachusetts.
What is also wrong is to ignore human nature.
Lots of Afghanis and Americans saw this escapade as a means to make money. Lots of money.
And today they are crying all the way to the bank.
“But I don’t think it would have been the disorganized mess that Biden is overseeing.”
Yes. At the very least we should have taken actions that showed that we sought to minimize suffering. Biden just gave up.
Lady Sale would concur
The fact that they didn’t have a functioning government and useful army within 5 years made it inevitable. At some point we were going to get tired of being there, and they just weren’t going to be willing or able to stand on their own.
People forget that Iran used to be our ally.
The Democrats changed that.
Freedom to do what?
As far as I can see, they won their freedom Saturday night.
Exactly. This what they want. Otherwise they would have done something about it the 20 years we were there. And now thousands of Afghans will bring it to the US.
Too simplistic. As noted by Matt Zeller, the Afghan forces have lost many more fighters that we have. Once we pulled out of regions, they faced a brutal enemy who were not above kidnapping their family for compliance. Without air support or re-enforcments they were in an impossible situation.
Matt Zeller on MSNBC responds perfectly to President Biden’s speech
” Once we pulled out of regions, they faced a brutal enemy who were not above kidnapping their family for compliance”
Excuse me, but did you ever study anything in school under the general heading of “war”?
Biden is an INCOMPETENT BUFFOON who makes Jimmy Carter look like a genius. He and Harris OWN THIS MASSIVE DEBACLE. Thousands of Afghan women and children will be raped and murdered because of their STUPIDITY. I still can’t believe they gave up Bagram AFB (which was rock solid secure) and let 6 to 7 thousand Taliban prisoners there go free. Unbelievable and we’ll just have to fight these scum again elsewhere. 20 years, trillions spent, 2500 American brothers and sisters dead, and it all goes up in smoke in a few days because LEFTIST DEMOCRAT IDIOTS ARE MINDING THE STORE.
That being said, I always had my doubts the ANA (Afghan Army) and the ANP (Afghan Police) could make it on their own without us propping them up. Even though I worked along side them as a US Army combat Infantryman, I could NEVER TRUST OR TURN MY BACK ON THEM. After my unit left our combat outpost in NE Afghanistan in 2012, 3 US soldiers from the unit who replaced US were murdered by an ANA soldier who turned his weapon on them. Many ANA would shrink away in firefights with the Taliban. For the most part their loyalty does NOT lie with their country like here in America. The average Afghan’s loyalty lies with their TRIBE or whoever gives them their next bowl of soup. I feel the most sorry for the women and children in Afghanistan. Many of the Afghan men are depraved cowards or sexual deviants - homosexuality and pedophilia are RAMPANT among many Afghan men (look up “The Dancing Boys of Afghanistan “). I told my wife the only way I’d go back to Afghanistan would be as a Christian missionary because those people need a saving relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ above all else.
The structure of the Afghan military was deficient. It was not sufficiently supervised by US personnel. It should have consisted of Afghan enlisted under US officers, a proper colonial army organization, used by many nations for centuries, and which almost always delivered reliable soldiers.
The US used such a structure several times, with success, such as with the Philippine Scouts.
Both the British and the French colonial armies had many such units of Muslim troops (among many others), most of which fought very well in many wars.
The layer of US oversight would have prevented egregious corruption and inefficiency, and helped morale.
That could have been the basis for a reform.
It was not done, I think, because of concern for US, international and Afghan sensibilities. Also the Afghan forces were built out of former warlord armies.
RE: The fact that they didn’t have a functioning government and useful army within 5 years made it inevitable.
Short answer bases on what you wrote... what happened would have happened anyway even if the great Donald Trump were President. So, we can’t really blame Joe Biden for something that’s inevitable.
ISIS got to its limits when it hit substantial Shiite and Kurd territory, which is most of the country.
Afghanistan has Shiites (Hazara), but they are a small minority.
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