Finally - an end to the Afghan war?

mtierney said:

TDS is rampant!

 https://edition.cnn.com/2021/04/18/politics/trump-afghanistan-troop-withdrawal/index.html

mtierney said:

And so, we leave …

And the alternative is???  If, after 20 years, we haven't managed to find a government that can stand up to the Taliban, what makes you think we ever will.  For how long should we throw good money after bad?

tjohn said:

And the alternative is???  If, after 20 years, we haven't managed to find a government that can stand up to the Taliban, what makes you think we ever will.  For how long should we throw good money after bad?

 For mtierney? Clearly until a Republican president can take credit for leaving. This is why she's a boring poster.

PVW said:

 For mtierney? Clearly until a Republican president can take credit for leaving. This is why she's a boring poster.

 So why do we read her posts? Avoiding them completely may be difficult, but why respond? I know I am guilty on occasion but some seem compelled to respond to every post. 

well, the country is falling a lot faster than I thought it would.

I find it hard to believe though, that the few thousand troops we had their had anything to do with whether the country fell or not. If the Taliban had decided to do this last year, would anyone have stopped them?

drummerboy said:

well, the country is falling a lot faster than I thought it would.

I find it hard to believe though, that the few thousand troops we had their had anything to do with whether the country fell or not. If the Taliban had decided to do this last year, would anyone have stopped them?

If they had decided to do this last year and they engaged and killed any of our forces, T**** would have brought hellfire down on them. 

Very big difference.

I keep thinking of the blow this is to the women of Afghanistan. Just one of so many places around the world that women have no freedom. They are oppressed by religion and culture. I need a visual. Some kind of color coded map that highlights the level of restrictions on women around the globe.

I don't know the answer other than more women lobbying for them. 

Coincidently I've spent the last several weeks watching Homeland for the first time. 

Started a thread on women's rights or the lack and stumbled on this about women in Afghanistan. Just reading it now.

https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/08/05/i-thought-our-life-might-get-better/implementing-afghanistans-elimination

This is a painting of British troops retreating from Kabul in 1842 ("The Last Retreat" by William Barnes Wollen).   The Soviets retreated in 1989 after "only" ten years there.  Never get involved in a land war in Asia is really good advice. 

The very first words spoken by Sherlock Holmes to Dr. Watson were

“How are you? You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive.” 

Later Holmes explained that Watson was a doctor but with a military bearing and a sun tan 

I know the buck stops at Biden's desk, but he was obviously given a bunch of hogwash by military and intelligence personnel about how this was going to play out. Many heads should roll after this debacle.

this is worth a re-read.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/investigations/afghanistan-papers/afghanistan-war-confidential-documents/

drummerboy said:

I know the buck stops at Biden's desk, but he was obviously given a bunch of hogwash by military and intelligence personnel about how this was going to play out. Many heads should roll after this debacle.

 You know how I feel about Biden but I think the situation was irretrievable once Trump ordered the withdrawal by Christmas 2020.

Klinker said:

drummerboy said:

I know the buck stops at Biden's desk, but he was obviously given a bunch of hogwash by military and intelligence personnel about how this was going to play out. Many heads should roll after this debacle.

 You know how I feel about Biden but I think the situation was irretrievable once Trump ordered the withdrawal by Christmas 2020.

To be clear, what I'm talking about is the rapidity of the fall, and the complete uselessness of the Afghan military. I have no doubt that behind closed doors, Biden is fuming.

I mean, just a few days ago, the official word from the U.S. was that they weren't expecting Kabul to fall for thirty days. 

drummerboy said:

To be clear, what I'm talking about is the rapidity of the fall, and the complete uselessness of the Afghan military. I have no doubt that behind closed doors, Biden is fuming.

I mean, just a few days ago, the official word from the U.S. was that they weren't expecting Kabul to fall for thirty days. 

 One wonders who would have been served (other than the international community) by 30 days of fighting before a foregone conclusion.  Certainly not the vast majority of the people living in Kabul.

I don't think "30 days" necessarily referred to 30 days of fighting. Anyway, that's not how I took it - especially since the comment by the U.S. was made after so many cities had fallen without combat.

This might be the most "peaceful" revolution in history.

The original goal of going after Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, and after the Taliban for harboring them, made sense. But that mission quickly expanded in scope into a much larger and ill defined goal. The Biden administration, along with future ones, will be tempted to remain very involved in Afghanistan. I hope they are able to resist the temptation, and limit future involvement to areas where US security is directly threatened -- ie actual, provable actions aimed at attacking US nationals. I would also like to see us make it much easier for anyone fleeing the Taliban vision of society in the future to find permanent residency in the US.

The Afghan military became useless because they had to go into hiding in order to begin growing their beards, so they could blend in with Taliban.   /guess

Klinker said:

drummerboy said:

I know the buck stops at Biden's desk, but he was obviously given a bunch of hogwash by military and intelligence personnel about how this was going to play out. Many heads should roll after this debacle.

 You know how I feel about Biden but I think the situation was irretrievable once Trump ordered the withdrawal by Christmas 2020.

I have almost nothing nice to say about Trump, but his instinct to pull U.S. forces back from various commitments, while messy and embarrassing and tragic, was one I agreed with.

Rather than say when the situation became irretrievable, perhaps you explain at what point, we had a realistic hope for success.  It seems to me that we were deluding ourselves about long-term results in Afghanistan more or less from the beginning.  

tjohn said:

I have almost nothing nice to say about Trump, but his instinct to pull U.S. forces back from various commitments, while messy and embarrassing and tragic, was one I agreed with.

Rather than say when the situation became irretrievable, perhaps you explain at what point, we had a realistic hope for success.  It seems to me that we were deluding ourselves about long-term results in Afghanistan more or less from the beginning.  

It is difficult to disagree with this. The complete unwillingness of the US-trained and equipped Afghan army to put up any fight at all is a pretty clear indication of a male population indifferent to the Taliban’s atrocities.

Indifferent or perhaps even supportive.

It’s difficult to help people who do not want to help themselves.

drummerboy said:

Klinker said:

drummerboy said:

I know the buck stops at Biden's desk, but he was obviously given a bunch of hogwash by military and intelligence personnel about how this was going to play out. Many heads should roll after this debacle.

 You know how I feel about Biden but I think the situation was irretrievable once Trump ordered the withdrawal by Christmas 2020.

To be clear, what I'm talking about is the rapidity of the fall, and the complete uselessness of the Afghan military. I have no doubt that behind closed doors, Biden is fuming.

I mean, just a few days ago, the official word from the U.S. was that they weren't expecting Kabul to fall for thirty days. 

 As far as the rapidity of the fall, I can only imagine there are plenty who saw the US leaving with their money, and the Taliban moving in with their money and decided to follow that. It's not switching sides if if your side is "getting paid."

I supported strikes on the Taliban in Afghanistan as a response to 9/11 way back at the outset of this whole thing, ie fall 2001. But then once the mission crept into nation-building and forcing democracy and "freedom" on the country I knew it was doomed to fail. Really I think it has been kaput/hopeless for a number of years now, but keeping troops there maintained the facade of still working towards something. This just makes it official.  

I don't think representative democracy can be imposed on a society.  Now, some may cite Germany and Japan as examples of where this worked, but those two countries were already parliamentary democracies before the military took over in Japan and the Nazis in Germany.

I can't recall and Afghan leader who has truly led to the occasion to lead.  Karzai was a recognizable name and he led for 10 years til 2014.  But I hardly heard mention of the latest.  

Also in 2014 - they tried to install Abdullah Abdullah as CEO - This role ceased to be as of last year.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abdullah_Abdullah

I didn't remember this in the 2019 election:

After the election results showed that Ashraf Ghani was declared as the winner, Abdullah declared himself winner as well, sparking a political crisis and leading him to publicly state that he would form a parallel government. On 9 March, both Abdullah and Ghani took the presidential oath of office at separate inauguration ceremonies. The United States pressured the Afghan government to come up with a solution by cutting $1 billion of aid. This, with mounting international pressure and the threat of the Taliban, forced officials to strike a deal between Abdullah and Ghani. The deal left President Ghani in charge of executive power and created the High Council of National Reconciliation. Mr. Abdullah is head of The Council, where he will lead peace efforts with the Taliban.

Whatever it’s shortcomings, Trumps refusal to include the Afghan government in peace negotiations guaranteed its imminent demise. 

Klinker said:

Whatever it’s shortcomings, Trumps refusal to include the Afghan government in peace negotiations guaranteed its imminent demise. 

 Trying to hang the blame on Trump is pointless.  The writing was on the wall years ago - started during the Bush Administration.

Has any American president managed the art of successfully winding down a mistaken major military campaign? By "successfully" I'm thinking of, first, doing right by the people in the country in question, and secondarily, managing the domestic politics of it.

tjohn said:

Klinker said:

Whatever it’s shortcomings, Trumps refusal to include the Afghan government in peace negotiations guaranteed its imminent demise. 

 Trying to hang the blame on Trump is pointless.  The writing was on the wall years ago - started during the Bush Administration.

 Yeah, Trump had little to do with this fiasco. And Biden should fire a sh!t ton of people for lying to him.

drummerboy said:

 Yeah, Trump had little to do with this fiasco. And Biden should fire a sh!t ton of people for lying to him.

 ????  Trump announced that the US would be withdrawing on a timeline that wouldn't have even allowed for the removal of the heavy equipment.  US soldiers would have been burning Patriot missile batteries to keep them from falling into Taliban hands.

There is plenty of blame to spread around for the general conduct of the Afghan War but, when it comes to the course of this disastrous withdrawal, Trump clearly screwed the pooch and there was nothing that Biden (or anyone else) could do to unscrew it.

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