Taliban enter Kabul as Afghan government on brink of collapse
smh.com.auWhat a failure of the US armed forces here. 20 damn years staying in the country with the only 2 goal - to help Afghans build an army and help defend themselves and to eradicate the Taliban. They failed miserably in both. Trillions spent and many lost lives. Why would we ever pour money into such a terrible, incompetent system? Of course, the cycle keeps repeating itself and we keep growing the military.
There's a sobering assessment of US performance in Afghanistan, What we got wrong in Afghanistan [1], in The Atlantic from a few days ago.
It was written by a retired veteran: Mike Jason retired in 2019 as a U.S. Army colonel, after 24 years on active duty. He commanded combat units in Germany, Kosovo, Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
It pulls no punches and, in my opinion, is worth reading.
[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/how-americ...
Thanks, that was an interesting read.
I read a book a while ago that was well researched and gave the impression that Afganistan would always belong to the Taliban. It was called "No Good Men Among the Living".
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17454723-no-good-men-amo...
Thanks for your recommendation, too. I've just read an NYT review of it [1] and am definitely going to read it. From the review:
Gopal’s book is essential reading for anyone concerned about how America got Afghanistan so wrong. It is a devastating, well-honed prosecution detailing how our government bungled the initial salvo in the so-called war on terror, ignored attempts by top Taliban leaders to surrender, trusted the wrong people and backed a feckless and corrupt Afghan regime. The book has its flaws, minimizing the role of neighboring Pakistan in the Taliban’s resurgence and letting the Taliban off too easy. But it is ultimately the most compelling account I’ve read of how Afghans themselves see the war.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/27/books/review/no-good-men-...
The US played a pivotal role in saving our asses over in Europe, and we are eternally grateful, but ever since, the US has been bad at war. It's not the firepower, it's not the soldiers, and it's not the organization. These are top notch. It's the **ing politicians dragging young men and women into wars not worth fighting.
This is a very ironic comment considering that the soviets, not the US liberated Europe from Germany. They fought the hardest battles, lost the most soldiers, fought for the longer time and were first in Berlin.
The public just believes otherwise because of 70 years of US propaganda [1]. The only thing US soldiers left us europeans with are a massive influx of refugees of which we have to take care of and for which we are ridiculed by US politicians and their citizens alike.
[1]: https://www.vox.com/2014/6/16/5814270/the-successful-70-year...
Ahhh, hammer and anvil. The tools are different. They look different. The purpose and effect are different, but basically useless without the other in most circumstances.
The role of the US and Russia are inextricably linked at the end of WWII and to pretend either was irrelevant, or either "really did all the work", is to simply ignore history.
> [The soviets] lost the most soldiers [...]
To be fair, the major reasons for this were that the Russian military leadership was utterly incompetent during the earlier stages of the war [1], and that they suffered from a serious lack of equipment and material. "Number of casualties" and "years spent fighting" aren't good indicators of military effectiveness.
[1] That's what happens when you liquidate your military elite or put them into gulags because they are on the wrong side of your class war.
Without the soviets, the war would not have been won, but how about we celebrate and honor this without shitting on America?
I suspect the OP feels the US saved them (also) from the Soviets, and that there was no need to replace one murderous ideology with another.
> The only thing US soldiers left us europeans with are a massive influx of refugees
Don't forget the military bases and the half-secret spy networks linked to terrorist attacks.
Unfortunately in these topics there are rarely saints on either side. While acknowledging its importance, one should not idealize the soviet liberation.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_during_the_occupation_o...
Occupied, not liberated. Does this look like US propaganda to you? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molotov%E2%80%93Ribbentrop_Pac...
WW2 was started by Germany and USSR hand in hand.
'Germany invaded Poland on 1 September 1939. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin ordered the Soviet invasion of Poland on 17 September'
American Lend-Lease kept the Soviets afloat. Stalin couldn't even supply his own army with cars.
> This is a very ironic comment considering that the soviets, not the US liberated Europe from Germany.
You're responding to another human, such that its a locality sensitive sentiment. To a French, Belgian or Dutch national the US is the savior of that war - the Soviets being uninvolved in their liberation.
As an aside, I wonder if there exist an Slavic-language HN where Eastern Europeans argue that American steel was the true winner in the war and the Soviets don't deserve glory...
> As an aside, I wonder if there exist an Slavic-language HN where Eastern Europeans argue that American steel was the true winner in the war and the Soviets don't deserve glory...
At least it is sure that many of them wished the Americans had liberated them, not Soviet.
The USSR for all its achievements was a harsh place to be for everyone except the luckiest ones.
"In America there is huge differences between rich and poor - in USSR everyone is equally poor".
> To a French, Belgian or Dutch national the US is the savior of that war - the Soviets being uninvolved in their liberation.
While the Soviet Union obviously never fought in Western Europe, the article that the person you are replying to quotes numbers from right after the war, where the majority of French people said that the soviets were the ones who were the most responsible for the outcome of the war. And that does make sense, considering for how long they bore the brunt of Nazi aggression, and the number of casualties speak for themselves.
There is a comparison with now, where of course most people would give most of the credit to the Americans. I think a lot of people in Western Europe aren't aware what the costs of the War in Russia were.
The Taliban is absolute horrible. US tried to do a good thing here. For me this is a failure of the Afghan people who are not willing to fight for their rights, especially the rights of their wives, sisters and daughters.
At least US tried to make a difference. EU is very passive in that sense (I'm from EU).
A failure of the Afghan people! Hahaha, OK. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. And ah, okay, the war in Afghanistan was to liberate women? Meanwhile the US is in bed with the Saudi's.
Exactly. Afghanistan people want Taliban, yet we're telling them no no no, you want our democracy. The US was "a nation of hypocrites", and still is.
some people in afghanistan want the taliban yes,
the mainy problem in afghanistan is the fact that not many people feel a common sense of being an afghani. The country is extremely decentralised and rural. Most people only look at their villages and community, not at the bigger picture.
The US approach will never work. It is just naive to think it will.
Chinese approach to radical islam will work. But West will never admit that.
Chinese see islam as totalitarian ideology that is incompatible with Chinese values and competing communist totalitarianism.
How would you like a foreign power invading and running your country? You better believe a large part of the Taliban are fighting not out of religious conviction but essentially (Pashtun) nationalism.
US did it during WW2, and it seemed to work out fine.
Only thing is that when they left, we made sure the Nazi's didn't come back.
Right now they were training Afghans to have their own military, but it's all so corrupt that it is just an impossible task. Those who can will flee the country instead of fighting for it.
You are assuming Taliban _left_, and Afghans are letting them come back.
Initially, Taliban offered surrender. US denied their terms. So they kept on fighting and rebuilding.
They took over the country in less than a month. They never left. They were always there.
They are fighting for it. It's just hard to see from you perspective because they are fighting against who you want to win.
So how do you explain all the Afghan refugees right now? Seems like they all love the Taliban so much they want to get out as soon as possible.
The many that collaborated with the US forces in any way fear retaliations. And if history provide insight, heads might roll. Look at what happened with French woman that slept with germans after WW2. Life is harsh and injust by default.
I wholeheartedly agree, and the effect this has on the perceived military capability of the US in particular and NATO in general can't possibly be downplayed.
US only implanted itself in europe. that was a genius move. to this day they have huge military bases there. USSR fought the decisive battles though. 80% of german war casualties where in the eastern front. US just swooped in and filled the power vacuum in western europe
You simply can't foster a regime, for the fostered government is by definition a puppet that simply does not command enough support of its people. What's surprising to me is the US government never learns despite so many failures around the world.
And an honest question: why do American people think that it's so damn important to spread American democracy at the cost of waging wars? Pew Research said 94%+ of Afghanistan adults support Sharia laws. So why do we risk our own people's lives, kill thousands of people in a foreign nation, and throw trillions of dollars just to force other countries to buy our own ideology? Isn't it text-book definition of pure evil? Another case in point: According to the book Skin in the Game, the western countries removed Assad in the name of bringing democracy, yet triggered one of the most brutal civil war in a country, left dozens of cities in ruins, and ironically fostered the largest slave market in the world. Yeah, slave market. Isn't it ironic?
And for that matter, G.W. Bush is the worst president in the US as he occupied two countries for no good reasons. His occupation destroyed lives, weakened American economy, and fostered generations of anti-American extremists. It's a forever shame on the US and its people.
Agreed and the answer to your question of why? This is the power engine of the American economy and dream. Our economy is based on us engaged in a conflict for which we print money and hand it to government contractors to later make its way to the rest of the economy. All the while sucking like a predator a far away land and people for every last juice they have.
This is the only way to keep the faux heaven looking as it does. Utopian.
It’s also the one topic you can have both sides of the aisle always agree on. No matter the political climate. When the military is working, it’s always at work in keeping us free.
Woodrow Wilson would have been proud at how we monetized his emotional button of American exceptionalism
This was not a failure of the Armed Forces, this was a failure of Washington policymakers. The same thing that happened in Vietnam, bureaucrats in Washington trying to run a war in Afghanistan but no clear objectives, and despite 20 years of death and destruction, no understanding of the region and its culture. Afghanistan was never going to be a democracy.
Remember that it was 20 very profitable years for some. Check the stock tickers, see what companies stocks have skyrocketed.
A friend of mine went to Afghanistan to help rebuild over a decade ago. He said some of the funds they received for schools were then allocated to lonely concrete blocks without teachers or equipment. But all the contractors involved would go there to show off their amazing progress.
Remember that the companies you talk about are not the only ones that profited here. It's not that different from when Hillary Clinton was laughing at the camera and saying the greatest thing about Lybia's liberation would be that they would pay for the reconstruction.
This is very true. There are plenty of people that probably consider the Afghanistan war a resounding success.
I think it’s more a failure of the people who sent them there than the forces themselves.
This is a management issue. For all of the failings of the current US president, getting the hell out of an endless, unnecessary war is a good thing.
I disagree that getting out is a good thing. It means a terrorist organization will control a nation and harbor terrorists once again in the future (remember the same Taliban sheltered 9/11 terrorists and is still allied with al Qaeda!). It means we lose a foothold in the region, militarily and economically. It means rivals like China expand their influence and force projection at our expense, since they plan to recognize the Taliban government and invest in their infrastructure via their belt and road initiative (https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/defense-national-s...).
We should have at least kept a smaller force around as a presence to maintain continuity. See this “rescue plan for Afghanistan” from the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board for more suggestions that aren’t blindly exiting Afghanistan in a few short months: https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-rescue-plan-for-afghanistan-t...
I am also not fully sold on the idea that getting out is a good idea, but for different reasons. The growth of Afghanistan's economy (300-400% GDP) and the quality of life improvements since the Taliban were removed has been notable, and if this regresses then there will be a real human toll.
But not pulling out seems to be just delaying the inevitable, and a continued presence is expensive and arguably incendiary/destabilizing to the whole region, so I can understand doing it.
This isn't a commentary on the specifics of how it was done, merely on whether a withdrawal should have been done.
Social media is already reporting thousands of refugees walking in Greece.
I have not seen one cogent argument why the US taxpayer should be funding the role of policeman indefinitely in faraway lands.
Terrorism in Afghanistan has zero to do with the US constituency.
A "foothold" is useless and unnecessary.
I feel badly for the Afghan people, but ultimately it isn't the US' problem, and never has been. If they'd like to have a civil war and get those assholes out, let them.
> It means a terrorist organization will control a nation
What terrorist acts have the Taliban committed? I've mostly only seen them fight back against foreign invaders.
> and harbor terrorists once again in the future (remember the same Taliban sheltered 9/11 terrorists and is still allied with al Qaeda!).
First they offered to look at evidence and consider extradition, then they offered extradition, both of which the U.S. refused.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/1539468.stm
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/14/afghanistan.te...
> It means we lose a foothold in the region, militarily and economically.
Why does the U.S. need a foothold in a region on the other side of the world?
> What terrorist acts have the Taliban committed?
Giving aid to a terrorist group that commits those acts doesn't make the Taliban less complicit. See this UN report from June about how the Taliban is still closely tied to al Qaeda (https://edition.cnn.com/2021/06/02/middleeast/un-report-tali...). As for what atrocities they've committed, there's a long list on Wikipedia, many of which meet the definition of terrorism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taliban#Condemned_practices).
> Why does the U.S. need a foothold in a region on the other side of the world?
So many reasons. First, to contain China, which is the principal threat to America's prosperity and control in the future. Second, to support other democratic nations like India, who will suffer from the Taliban's resurgence. Third, to expand our economic interests. Fourth, to continue our mission to sustain human rights which the Taliban is already eroding. There are others, and I am certainly not a foreign policy expert, but my point is - there's something there.
> remember the same Taliban sheltered 9/11 terrorists and is still allied with al Qaeda!
But when the Saudis presumably financed some of the same/similar bad guys it wasn't even worth much of an investigation? I find such "they're bad guys!"-arguments to be applied very inconsistently
> a terrorist organization will control a nation
those are the terrorists the US created by mercilessly bombing their civilian relatives.
The US also directly funded the mujahideen, the forebears of today's Taliban, back when they were fighting the Soviets.
>>>Why would we ever pour money into such a terrible, incompetent system?
Not that the US DoD is in any way a model of efficiency, but I suspect you are vastly underestimating the difficulty of the problem set.
Over the past 200 years, the British, Soviet, and American empires have all failed to pacify Afghanistan. Probably the Mongols and Alexander the Great struggled too, I need to dig into the history of those campaigns for more specifics.
Can you articular which particular aspects of our nation-building and counter-insurgency techniques are distinct from our equally-failed predecessors? Have you considered that the objective may not have been to erect a fully-functional Afghan government and military, but instead to conduct a multi-decade delaying action to stymie Chinese expansion for as long as possible?
The British actually got their war goals despite losing most of the time. That's why the Pashtun are divided by a line the British made. The Soviets managed to create a state that outlasted them, stopping the equivalent mujahideen attack in its tracks[0]. That state only fell when the USSR itself fell. The US failure is exceptional in the amount of resources cost, the quickness of collapse, and in failure to reach objectives.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_Civil_War_(1989%E2%80%9...
> Over the past 200 years, the British, Soviet, and American empires have all failed to pacify Afghanistan. Probably the Mongols and Alexander the Great struggled too, I need to dig into the history of those campaigns for more specifics.
I recommend checking out this thread, as the whole Afghanistan = Graveyard of empires meme only applies to quite recent history.
https://twitter.com/Alex_Khaleeli/status/1425608335726940166...
Does china really have designs on Afghanistan? For what purpose?
(I mean this as an honest question, i don't know that much of the geopolitics of the region)
Because of this:
"Afghanistan may be sitting on one of the richest troves of minerals in the world, valued at nearly $1 trillion, scientists say."
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/science-news/rare-earth-afgh...
The Chinese will ask no questions, will do the work, and wont bother the Taliban with annoying issues like freedom and democracy. A perfect match.
> freedom and democracy
Are you aware that one of the most cliché jokes told outside of the U.S. is some variation of "when an American says democracy, everyone ducks for cover"?
Not about that one but I heard one that I found relevant: How can the US promote Democracy abroad if it can’t even protect it at Home?
I don't think there were designs on Afghanistan, but these strategies usually work like chess, where having an opposing piece in one place constrains actions in another. Afghanistan is next to Xinjiang, where some subversive actions were demonstrated, so China ended up having to pay a lot of attention to the western front and therefore had less strategic flexibility in the near Pacific where her main interests lie.
Having said that, it didn't work at all. China patiently used those 20 years to develop its economy and infrastructure, locked down Xinjiang against subversion, set up Belt and Road, and gained strategic tempo in the South China Sea and the Taiwan Strait while the US got much too carried away in Central Asia.
Potentially with the belt and road initiative, which may now even expand into Afghanistan with the US redrawal.
China would be happy if US stayed and maintained stability in the region, so US didn't lose, they created a problem for China. The military industry made a lot of money, Afghanistan has been the training ground for terrorists attack in Pakistan (recently a bus bomb against Chinese), and Xinjiang. Let's see how Taliban manage the country. If Afghanistan become stable, then US might not be very happy about it.
Here is a quick review of the geopolitics: https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2021/07/16/geopolitics-afgha...
Unchallenged access to the west
> Does china really have designs on Afghanistan? For what purpose?
To humiliate America
Other than the Khybar Pass, Afghanistan is a piece of land of very little value, and only 38 million of very proud, and militant people.
> multi-decade delaying action to stymie Chinese expansion for as long as possible?
That wasn't in the original brief, and I've never heard it before in the 20 years?
Frankly if it's an expensive unpacifiable area, let China have it. They can sink effort into an unwinnable war instead.
Also, having consulted a map, how do you expect China to physically get there?
China, at least, is not limited by public perception, and will have no qualms about doing war crimes, and they will call it conquering.
On the other hand, it seems a lot of Afghan soldiers deserted to the other side. They see no upside to the new Afghan regime.
Americans love to say this:
"China, at least, is not limited by public perception, and will have no qualms about doing war crimes, and they will call it conquering."
But, really, China is pretty peaceful compared to US thuggery. I prefer China. At least they are rational.
>>That wasn't in the original brief, and I've never heard it before in the 20 years?
Yeah it's one of those unspoken "national interests" that underlies how the US plays The Great Game, but rarely states explicitly.
>>>Frankly if it's an expensive unpacifiable area, let China have it. They can sink effort into an unwinnable war instead.
If we are lucky, that will be the outcome. If the Chinese find a way to balance transit routes and natural resource extraction without somehow pissing a conservative Muslim population (while they are simultaneously oppressing Muslims in their home territory)....that could turn into a problem. If they build out links to Iran, it will not only throw a lifeline to that economically-struggling adversary, it will help China pivot away from reliance on maritime lines of communication. That maritime reliance is key to the US's strategy of threatening economic strangulation of Chinese coastal industry in the event of a conflict.
>>>Also, having consulted a map, how do you expect China to physically get there?
Via their shared border? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan%E2%80%93China_bord...
Via China's ally Pakistan, the same routes most of US military logistics took into Afghanistan for the first decade?
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/257931864_The_Afgha...
China won't fight a war in Afghanistan, but it'll be a lot easier for them to get there than the US.
The media narrative is only the cover story for the plebs and democracy/terrorism have been great ones over the years. US military actions around the world, especially decades long ones, tend to be strategic in nature. Although as some point out above, even that might be a cover story for Congress, and the real motive is private profit.
Your blurb further clarifies not just our deep incompetence but also our extraordinary arrogance. Even though there is a history of nations failing in Afghanistan we somehow thought we will succeed. This is nothing but a power and money grab by our politicians and defense contractors.
Certainly, Afghanistan was for the containment of China/Russia and Iraq was for the containment of Iran/Russia. Still, were those really successes?
>>>Still, were those really successes?
Probably not. There's definitely something we are doing wrong. Personally I look at the Russian intervention in Syria as a model for "hybrid warfare done -r-i-g-h-t- well enough". I think they manage to prop up client states, accomplish strategic objectives, and do it all without completely breaking the bank.
Ask yourself why US taxpayers keep pouring money into such a terrible, incompetent system.
I did. So many times for so many years. As an Afghan I grew up with this question. I kept hearing this from our elders in their conversations. All of us keep thinking if we can see choosing bedfellows like Mujahedin in 80's and the later to be rebranded Taliban in 90's is akin to nourishing a viper in one's bosom. We the simpletons could see and predict any effort of nation building, establishing freedom, democracy and modern human rights is doomed to fail if your partners are the most corrupt murderous warlords Afghanistan had to offer. How could Pentagon, CIA and all the think tanks with their thousands of smart annalists and experts keep missing this? Year after year. For almost half a decade. So brother you're asking the right question, the only question that matters IMO.
I think it shows that the US were no more than a foreign occupation force. Everyone knew how powerful their military was and how much money they had to distribute so perhaps the majority went with the flow but the current events show that this meant little to the workings of Afghanistan and its culture.
In my view there's always arrogance in thinking that GIs can literally fall from the sky and "save" the locals...
US forces abandoned the country 'overnight' - leaving behind all of the military equipment the Taliban would need for their reconquest:
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20210814-weapon-seizur...
Why wasn't all this equipment repatriated or destroyed? Why were the bases just abandoned without proper transition to Afghan Control, so that in some cases they were even looted by civilians?
Possible explanations:
1. Extreme incompetence or total apathy by US Commanders/Politicians
2. There was no land/sea transport route through Pakistan to retrieve all the equipment
3. The US Military-Industrial Complex was happy for all this stuff to be lost, so it could be reordered
4. The US wanted the Taliban to reconquer the country quickly, so that any power vaccuum could not be filled by China or Russia
5. Managed decline of the US Empire, requiring deliberate humiliation and demoralization of the US forces, enabled by corrupt senior US commanders and politicians who have made deals with China.
You are too hard on US. Afgan Army had 300 thousand soldiers trained and well equiped.
If Afgans do not want to fight Taliban themselves what US can do?
U.S. could have not cynically installed the most pliant pro-American corrupt thugs to be in charge and told the people to obey, after having destroyed their homeland and treated them like idiot children for an entire generation.
> U.S. could have not cynically installed the most pliant pro-American corrupt thugs to be in charge and told the people to obey
Which of course has been the post-WW2 standard operating procedure for the U.S. in more countries than I care to count. And it always comes back to haunt us, god knows what the long-term ramifications of this latest fiasco will be.
There are 6 million people in Kabul plus some elite Afgan Army. That is enough to make a no passaran moment to Taliban. Theoretically.
But it seems like all Western-minded urban Afgans want to get evacuated to US, Europe, Canada rather then put up a good fight. So why the West shall fight for their freedoms?
How many more dead bodies do you want to add to your tally for your Hollywood movie moment? They don't want a civil war. How is that not obvious to you?
They do not want to fight for their freedoms so why shall we Westerners feel obliged to do the fighting for them? They can go back to Middle Ages.
We started the fight
Not only that, US initially empowered Taliban to fight the cold war.
They do not have 300,000 troops. It's a fiction.
No idea why they dont want to fight ? Have a look at
https://observers.france24.com/en/20200218-afghanistan-corru...
The corruption is incredible, even this 6 year old article (discussing a book on corruption) knew about it: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/01/19/corruption-rev...
E.g. an excerpt:
> [A]s Chayes studied the graft of the Karzai government, she concluded that it was anything but benign. Many in the political élite were not merely stealing reconstruction money but expropriating farmland from other Afghans. Warlords could hoodwink U.S. special forces into dispatching their adversaries by feeding the Americans intelligence tips about supposed Taliban ties. Many of those who made money from the largesse of the international community enjoyed a sideline in the drug trade. Afghanistan is often described as a “failed state,” but, in light of the outright thievery on display, Chayes began to reassess the problem. This wasn’t a situation in which the Afghan government was earnestly trying, but failing, to serve its people. The government was actually succeeding, albeit at “another objective altogether”—the enrichment of its own members. Washington supported Hamid Karzai and his ministers and adjutants in the hope that they could establish a stable government, help pursue Al Qaeda, and keep the Taliban at bay. But the Karzai government wasn’t a government at all, Chayes concluded. It was “a vertically integrated criminal organization.”
Biden would disagree:
> Q Mr. President, some Vietnamese veterans see echoes of their experience in this withdrawal in Afghanistan. Do you see any parallels between this withdrawal and what happened in Vietnam, with some people feeling —
> THE PRESIDENT: None whatsoever. Zero. What you had is — you had entire brigades breaking through the gates of our embassy — six, if I’m not mistaken.
> The Taliban is not the south — the North Vietnamese army. They’re not — they’re not remotely comparable in terms of capability. There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of a embassy in the — of the United States from Afghanistan. It is not at all comparable.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/20...
> There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of a embassy in the — of the United States from Afghanistan. It is not at all comparable.
That did not age very well. https://www.npr.org/2021/08/15/1027806863/the-taliban-seize-...
Look at my post in this thread basically 30 days ago...
Some of the trucks etc were broken down or worn out and some might have been contractor or personal vehicles brought over that they probably decided wasn't worth the cost to take back.
The ammo, weapons and military vehicles I believe quite lot of it technically belongs (or belonged) to the Afghan national army or at least was donated to them, although from what others on here have said, they were barely functioning as a force with rampant corruption at all levels.
None of this is new, pretty much exactly the same thing happen after South Vietnam fell, with the North Vietnamese getting an even more massive stockpile of basically US military equipment that makes what the Taliban have captured pale in comparison. https://www.nytimes.com/1975/03/29/archives/arms-left-by-us-... https://militarymatters.online/weapons/vietnam-loves-america...
Not to mention all the helicopters they just pushed into the sea during the Saigon evacuation to make more space on the decks of ships.
Even back to end of world war 2 they dumped huge amounts of equipment into the sea or buried them or just left them in place to avoid the costs of taking them back. I suppose it does make some sense from an overall cost and logistical point of view, but on a personal level it does seem incredibly wasteful. https://www.warhistoryonline.com/instant-articles/wwii-ended...
> 3. The US Military-Industrial Complex was happy for all this stuff to be lost, so it could be reordered
... and if some group (Talibans?) fetches it then become a foe, he will be a serious one, and therefore the Complex will sell more stuff.
4. Profit!
Mullah Omar said:
“God has promised us victory, and Bush has promised us defeat. We’ll see which promise is more truthful”.
From the article itself:
"The fall of the last major city [Jalalabad] outside the capital secured for the insurgents the roads connecting Afghanistan to Pakistan, a Western official said."
It's interesting to note that DRA (the pro-Soviet Afghanistan government) has fought for 3 whole years after the Soviets have left Afghanistan. And it was with the almost complete lack of military support from the USSR (you know, the Union collapse and all) and with Taliban being actively funded by the US and Pakistan. Meanwhile, the current government probably will fall even before the US will finish its humiliating retreat and it does not look like Russia or China have substantially supported Taliban, at the very least it most certainly was not on the US scale of 30 years ago.
> Meanwhile, the current government probably will fall even before the US will finish its humiliating retreat
The humiliating part is that the U.S. was there at all, not that the U.S. finally pulled out of a place where troops should never have been sent.
Having to send new troops just to evacuate embassy personnel before your old troops have finished leaving isn't the proudest moment ever, I'd think.
That is: the humiliation isn't in retreating, but in things collapsing even before you've left.
Most of us knew this was inevitable as soon as Biden became president. What happens when weak leadership takes over is weak results. Tale as old as time.
Worth quoting this passage from an insightful article[1]
People fought in Afghanistan, and people died, but not always in the obvious way. They had been fighting for so long, twenty-three years then, that by the time the Americans arrived the Afghans had developed an elaborate set of rules designed to spare as many fighters as they could. So the war could go on forever. Men fought, men switched sides, men lined up and fought again. War in Afghanistan often seemed like a game of pickup basketball, a contest among friends, a tournament where you never knew which team you’d be on when the next game got under way. Shirts today, skins tomorrow. On Tuesday, you might be part of a fearsome Taliban regiment, running into a minefield. And on Wednesday you might be manning a checkpoint for some gang of the Northern Alliance. By Thursday you could be back with the Talibs again, holding up your Kalashnikov and promising to wage jihad forever. War was serious in Afghanistan, but not that serious. It was part of everyday life. It was a job. Only the civilians seemed to lose.
Battles were often decided this way, not by actual fighting, but by flipping gangs of soldiers. One day, the Taliban might have four thousand soldiers, and the next, only half that, with the warlords of the Northern Alliance suddenly larger by a similar amount. The fighting began when the bargaining stopped, and the bargaining went right up until the end. The losers were the ones who were too stubborn, too stupid or too fanatical to make a deal. Suddenly, they would find themselves outnumbered, and then they would die. It was a kind of natural selection.
Sounds a lot like the Italian mercenary armies in the middle ages, where they mostly maneuvered for advantage rather than fought. Being mercenaries, they had little interest in dying for their employer's cause.
Another example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_and_let_live_(World_War_I...
This example was discussed in Robert Axelrod's "The Evolution of Cooperation".
Fall of Saigon v2. Although I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong level of popular support.
In these parts of the world, 'defecting to the winning side' is a basic survival skill. As soon as the US stopped its support it was obvious who'd win (the people still getting state support from Pakistan). So why should a smart faction fight and die? To make the people who aren't there anymore look better?
I think you're overestimating Pakistan's capability. It gave Taliban leaders shelter at their worst moment, and that is about the only leverage ISI had.
The moment Taliban started to carve out territory inside Afghanistan, that leverage was gone. There's some gratitude, but also lots of resentment among Taliban leadership about the way they were treated by the Pakistani authority.
Yep, totally right. I think you need to also tell about Afghan government itself "returning Pakistan a favour," and dispatching the Pakistani Taliban.
The amount of support Pakistan provides Taliban is severly overblown. Did they provide them refuge when Taliban was on the back foot? Sure, probably.
Is Pakistan aiding them in this current offense? It really doesn't seem like it.
ISI help is significantly more than refuge. That said, the Taliban didn't need help for this offensive. They've been handed the country on a platter.
I don't know that much about the region, but the us-supported side had 20 years and lots of money to prepare for this day. I would assume if they enjoyed more popular support in the near past they would have built something that would less obviously be the losing side today, and people wouldn't have jumped ship so quickly.
The US built their side so as to maximally depend on them and then pulled support abruptly, while all but grovelling to the Taliban in public. There could have been no other result the way this withdrawal was done.
The corruption is so bad soldiers in hospitals starved to death.
It's clear that in the past 30 years afganistan did not have a functioning government at all. Its not about popular support, its a failure of 'statebuilding'
https://observers.france24.com/en/20200218-afghanistan-corru...
Most of the Afghan government just pocketed as much money as possible and stashed in (and their families) in Dubai:
https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2019-11-04/the...
Well Russian government also pockets the money and stashes them in foreign countries, but it is not totally dysfunctional - they can get infrastructure built and the army organised. They dont do it well, but they can defend themselves.
Absolutely the government were in it for themselves, not for the people. The average Afghan has no love for the Taliban or the government but it’s pragmatic to side with whoever is winning.
And then there were "phantom soldiers"- it's the practice where officers would just create non-existent soldiers to pocket their salary.
> I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong level of popular support.
The explanation is very, very simple, but I don't see any Western media talking about it at all.
Basically, Afghan government fell apart when USA withdrew the pork barrel of military contracts from locals.
People forget that 20 years ago USA mounted all kinds of warlords, and other rogue elements into seats of power. The entirety of regional elites which emerged in these 20 years are a product of that system.
The only things securing their loyalty to USA, and thus to the government in Kabul were American money.
The moment they ran out, it all fell apart just like Middle Eastern, and Latin American US friendly regimes. The "Our Bastard!" theory showed extreme naivete of people following it yet again.
There is no such things as "Our Bastards!" Time to learn that after 60 years.
Henry Kisinger lured USA into a geopolitical deathtrap with his lunatical political theories. Now US has found itself in the world surrounded by backstabbing, and turncoat regimes of its own making, who nor fear, nor respect it now, and who will pounce the moment USA stops spoonfeeding them, and shows its back.
USA has less allies in the world now than at any time in the last century.
USA can't now fight half the world dominated by solidified group of corrupt regimes.
Escaping this situation will be extremely hard.
USA cannot rely on allies who are loyal only to American printing press.
USA will not score any real allies without changing itself first
This was always the view of Americans: Monry can buy everything. While it may be true for their democracy it is not true for other things that people value.
> USA can't now fight half the world dominated by solidified group of corrupt regimes.
If there is anything the past few decades have shown, it's that the pocketbook and the sword are both useless tools when it comes to any kind of Middle Eastern policy.
The locals keeping their heads down in the face of an insurgency the Afghan state is clearly unable to defeat probably shouldn’t be presented as “strong popular support” (the true level of which is supposed to be about 10%).
Is there even such a thing as an "Afghan state"? From what little I know of their culture, they're more accurately described as tribes or clans who happens to speak similar languages and have the same religion rather than a nation-state.
Taliban is certainly more popular than they were 25 years ago.
Last time there was a pretty strong grassroot movement against Taliban, particularly in the northern parts of the nation. Taliban didn't have to fire a shot in many of these places this time.
They are surely sick of 20 years of useless war so they will support the new leaders.
Vietnam ultimately became a pretty nice country a few years after the US government finally gave up on trying to turn it into hell on earth, and it’s only getting better.
If this really is Saigon 2.0, 20 years from now Afghanistan will be a peaceful country with active tourism. With the Taliban seemingly making efforts to appease China for economic gain, who knows, it just might happen.
Very unlikely, a version of Algeria 2.0 is far more likely than Vietnam 2.0.
More like Saudi Arabia but they don't have lot's of oil just poppy.
They don't have all that support from population; it's more like "if you can't beat them...". Unfortunately among those surrendering without any resistance it's the Afghan Army, with all their weapons, which means now the Talibans are much more heavily armed than a few months ago.
Just over a month ago [July 8] the President was actually arguing that the Afghan army would win:
Q Is a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan now inevitable?
THE PRESIDENT: No, it is not.
Q Why?
THE PRESIDENT: Because you — the Afghan troops have 300,000 well-equipped — as well-equipped as any army in the world — and an air force against something like 75,000 Taliban. It is not inevitable.
...
I trust the capacity of the Afghan military, who is better trained, better equipped, and more re- — more competent in terms of conducting war.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/20...
It's almost as though the American leadership doesn't really understand Afghanistan.
Of course they do. But is a nice playing ground for the army and the military industrial complex makes good profits. The lifes of milions do not matter for them.
I'm not necessarily doubting this, but I feel like this is always a convenient goto excuse to criticize any terrible, unethical military strategy the US is responsible for. Is there good evidence that certain powerful corporations/people made so much money and have so much power that they could and did successfully pressure politicians for two decades across a bunch of administrations into staying in Afghanistan? Not only successfully pressuring them to start the war but successfully pressuring them to stay there for so long?
(I of course don't at all doubt that the big military contractors have been making a ton of money from the wars, but I'm specifically referring to their corporate influence being the primary/secondary/tertiary/etc. force behind why we were still in Afghanistan after two decades.)
My own uninformed Occam's razor assumption would've been that it's primarily a matter of tangled geopolitics rather than a military-industrial complex scheme from day one to today. That is, that the State Department and top-level strategists and policy advisors are mostly the people to blame.
Maybe it's all of the above or some complex mixture. But what I want to know is the actual individuals responsible, or at least where they're contained. Not just an opaque storm cloud labeled "the military-industrial complex" or "the Deep State". For example, it could potentially be the case that this narrative might actually unintentionally help to shield the people who are truly culpable.
If a Muslim country will invade a Christian country, say Sweden, to improve democracy, what will happen when they will leave?
Like Caliphate of Córdoba?
They have 300,000 troops that are either poorly trained, lead by incompetent officers and/or corrupt to the bone. It is expected to lose badly. This was known, that makes the speech a big lie as many speeches of most leaders of most countries.
And wasn't there recently something shared here, that the afghan air force cannot really fly, because the US cancelled their contracted maintainance service?
Also with the sheer size of the US embassy - it rather looks to me like there never was a sovereign afghan government in the first place, so of course they don't stand a chance on its own. It was all too artificial and US dependent.
Now, who's equipped? History repeats itself...
He was obviously posturing to make the question go away. Everybody knew this would be the outcome, the die was cast.
More like Fall of Phnom Penh v3
...assuming you're referring to indiscriminate shelling of civilians and then mass reprisal killings... what was v2?
Maybe v1 is 1945/08/15 by his definition
They just have strong level of petro-dollar support from the Gulf.
And America has "just" the biggest invested army world wide. I guess you need more than money to win the fight sometimes.
Ken Burns Vietnam War documentary, exemplifies really well how limited commitment to fight a war, will result in similar situation as in Korea (to a degree, I guess), Vietnam, almost in Iraq, and now in Afghanistan.
Wars are not meant to be win. If you win a war quickly you don't make any profit.
US pulled out only because the general American public was bored of being in Afghanistan. Americans would had stayed there forever if they wanted to, and kept the Taliban at bay.
petro-dollar support from the gulf if actually exists was peanuts compared to 100s of billions from the US, Nato and India.
What makes you think they don’t get the same amount from the Gulf?
Only US and NATO provided military assistance. Others like India invested billions in constructive projects like Salma dam.
What would the talibans do with the money? It is quite obvious the Afghan army has a more expensive operation than talibans with rifles and pickups.
I guess the Afghan army should have focused more on quality than size to be able to afford talanted soldiers.
I don’t think that’s a valid question. What would they do with money? Buy more weapons, I guess? Invest in training. Hire more recruits.
Both you and the parent poster are missing the forest through the trees.
The failure is not in money, training, or conscription. The failure is in not giving the army any reason to fight.
If you don't give a rat's ass about your cause, and there's a serious possibility of defeat, why would you keep fighting?
The problem is that in twenty years, the coalition-supported government failed to make enough of its constituents give a rat's ass about their cause. They might not like the Taliban much, but they seem to prefer to live under them, than die for what is perceived as a corrupt, self-serving, ineffective government.
Ye well I agree. It is still astonishing how the army could collapse in this way. I guess the general staff more or less folded in some agreement with the Talibans. There should have been plenty of reports of artillery shelling with civilian causalities otherwise. Some kind of blood bath when high ranking officers have their backs against the wall.
> If you don't give a rat's ass about your cause, and there's a serious possibility of defeat, why would you keep fighting?
Keep fighting? My understanding is that there was no serious effort to fight from the army's side.
Exactly this.
Not really. Most Gulf states are petrified of militant Islam, and the Taliban subscribe to a creed (Deobandi) that's not particularly popular among Arabs.
Nevertheless, the funding they receive is more than enough to keep them going, as such point where US pulls out and they could fight the fledgling Afghan army.
I remember having seen a similar scene in a couple of times by now.
I guess we will be getting an Hollywood version of the facts in 10 years timeframe.
My heart goes to those that died for nothing, and those that will now face the revenge of Talibans.
Plenty of those that helped the Americans and other troops are now facing gruesome execution by the Taliban. Translators, people working for them in any capacity, teachers, they're all on the run fearing for their lives. Turkey is overrun by a wave of people getting out of Afghanistan.
Yeah really bad, and Germany is still doing extraditions there. :(
Wars are won by men willing to die for their cause. The US, Canadian and many other soldiers who helped liberate Europe in the 2nd World War were willing to die for freedom. And the Taliban are willing to die for theirs.
I wish a safe return to the very professional troops from more than 20 countries still on the ground. Once again they are victims of incompetent politicians.
But it 20 years, was it not always obvious, that a young Afghani, that just got in the Army because it was only available well paid job would not be willing to die for some very local nebulous cause? To defeat a group that embodies the cultural heritage that prevailed in the country for the last few centuries?
Afghanistan's situation is obviously as complex as it can get but at the level of day to day experience of majority of locals (not only elite city-dwellers) Taliban are hated/feared but consistent, and they generally practice what they preach. In my brief personal encounters, and observations of what locals face: the corrupt government, its police and its army is like the "Zahhak the Snake Shoulder" (an evil figure in Persian mythology); an insatiable unstable monster better avoided at all cost. I suspect this is one of the main reasons nobody really put up a fight this time around.
Afghanistan's tragic contemporary conflicts has many winners and losers that switch places every so often but there's been one constant loser: its civilians.
In what sense are "locals" not in government, police, army or indeed the Taliban ?
To state the obvious, the Afghans in aggregate, were not willing to build an army and were not willing to defend themselves against the Taliban.
This Is What Winning Looks Like (2013?): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja5Q75hf6QI
Clausewitz famously said in his book On War that "War is the continuation of politics by other means." Following this logic, I don't see any reason that Afghanistan government wouldn't collapse. I mean, for what will their troops fight, and for whom will their troops fight? Most of the people there do support Sharia law per Pew Research. Afghanistan people are famous for being independent and for fighting foreign occupation to death. So, the troops were not fighting for their ideals, neither for their people. Besides, they knew they would lose. The US intelligence said the government would fall in 90 days. Then why would the troops fight their own people for a losing war, especially given that Taliban will exact bloody reprisal on those who didn't surrender?
Seems like the Taliban are holding back to allow foreign personnel to evacuate. I wonder if that is part of an explicit agreement, or just them not wanting to create problems for themselves when they've already clearly won.
Hunting down a retreating enemy has always been a bad war tactic.
The only thing it can accomplish is creating additional casualties on your side, and you gain no additional turf.
Killing them while they're trying to retreat just makes them turn around and start shooting back, because if they're going to die no matter what, they might as well go down in a blaze of glory.
Giving safe passage for a defeated enemy is an ageold courtesy. Having an airborne brigade fighting with their backs against the wall is probably not what a militia wants.
“We are awaiting a peaceful transfer of power,” Taliban spokesman Suhail Saheen told the BBC.
When did terrorist groups get spokespeople, geez.
Ever since they had an aspiration to govern Afghanistan?
Apparently they also have a English website: http://alemarahenglish.net/?p=48412
Wow, that's amazing.
What's amazing?
I believe they consider themselves to be a governing body. So they'll have PR, HR departments, etc
Maybe next time we protest against starting a war, listen to us.
Yeah I called this one in real time right as I watched the planes hit the towers. Knew we'd kill hundreds of thousands of people in the middle east before we had to pull out defeated. I didn't quite expect it to take 20 years though.
Then protested Iraq and they cheered our freedom of speech, then rolled tanks into Baghdad anyway and the WMDs weren't there, just like Scott Ritter told them. That worked out well.
Really should have listened to us when it came to Kuwait in 1991 as well. The towers might still be standing.
I eagerly await the mental tap dancing and 'splaning that results in us being the hopelessly geopolitically naive ones, when the other side of the argument has been wrong for a solid 30 years straight.
Hell, if you zoom out from the Middle East, you can go all the way back to Vietnam. (I don't know much about Korea.) That's over six decades of being wrong--sixty years of belligerence with nothing to show for it but a horrific body count and whole generations turned against us.
Yeah I was just sticking with events in my lifetime, I just wasn't alive much for Vietnam, and wasn't very concerned with politics right after I was born.
Someone reminded me about Reagan sending weapons to Afghanistan to fight the Taliban, which I do remember (and Carter boycotting the Olympics).
>>>That's over six decades of being wrong--sixty years of belligerence with nothing to show for it but a horrific body count
The problem with this argument is we have no way of definitively proving it one way or the other. If Communist Vietnam hadn't spent 10 years and a million lives dislodging the US, could Communism have overtaken SE Asia? Would Vietnam have had the military experience necessary to depose the Khmer Rouge after that regime killed ~25% of Cambodia's population? How many excess deaths would you be counting if Thailand's Communist insurgency had eventually turned into a Khmer Rouge clone (itself having copied the worst excesses of Mao's Cultural Revolution)? https://www.cia.gov/static/e73ecdedf076611c592b1d8397cbe61a/...
Bottom line: Hindsight is 20/20. Don't assume that the outcome we have is the worst one possible and therefore all has been for naught. That said.....hold people accountable for shit decision-making, and there definitely has been that in spades.
So will the Taliban stop the opium production again?
On the contrary. Taliban increased poppy fields by 50 percent in 2020 and they are also pushing meth through their channels. Taliban budget estimated at 2 bilion dollars is supported chiefly by opium trade...
https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/07/19/taliban-expanding-drug-...
Questionable story, drugs are a huge taboo for devout muslims. Hard to square with the Taliban rank and file showing strong support for their leaders.
Given all of the other Islamic laws they bend or break, do you really think it’s unlikely that someone desperately in need of operating funds has found a distinction between using drugs themselves and selling them to others?
Believe in what you want to. Or use Google…
https://www.unodc.org/unodc/en/frontpage/2021/May/afghanista...
https://theconversation.com/amp/afghanistan-what-the-conflic...
there is a russian blogger in Kabul, you can use google translate to read his articles, in short there're plenty of heroin addicts in plain sight
https://varlamov.ru/tjm1DhGAHsj
https://varlamov.ru/gLxlGFc6GCc?cda=
https://varlamov.ru/VndQif0KCJw?cda=
a lot of very interesting photos
Thanks for sharing. The proof will ultimately be in the pudding, if opium trade goes down or not in a few years time.
Is this intentional, desired policy on their part or more of a "means to an end?" I understood it that, historically, the Taliban were anti-opium. I suppose if Western nations pursue a North Korean containment style policy, that this would continue similar to NK methamphetamine operations.
It is just the new US administration falling into the Pakistani-Chinese trap.
What trap?
Very mixed feeling about this. The implications for minorities, women and progress are now obviously dire. Though I can't help feel somewhat pleased to see Dubya/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfo's legacy ground to dust and all their supporters/apologists with pie on their face. I couldn't believe Dubya prancing around like an elder statesman while Trump was in office. There's an element of their m.o. that has overflown from the military to other branches of US life as the military got less stretched in recent years. The mistakes made haven't been as educational as they should've been.
One hopeful prospect is that the radical Taliban will alienate neighboring Iranians into moderation.
Saigon 2: Sharia Boogaloo
The Biden administration doing this so haphazardly is irresponsible and with little to no reward - political or anything else.
Moving away from US centric debates on the economic value of this war and attempt at governance; I fear Afghanistan will again become a breeding ground for Islamic terrorism atrocities and also put increased pressure on Europe in terms of migration.
To the latter point, Europe is already on the breaking point here and further stress will probably - judging from recent experience - lead to further success of conservative and anti-immigration political parties.
> The Biden administration doing this so haphazardly is irresponsible and with little to no reward
The same was said about Bush administration when the war was started. The same was said about the whole 'nation building' and troop surge and so on that happened until now...
Judging by the lack of fighting back, nothing was achieved in 20 years and same thing would happen even if US stayed 20 more years...
Regardless of the downvotes I’ve received I think it’s pretty clear now after the fact that the withdrawal is a complete mess and failure.
Once you go in - you at least have a responsibility for the manner in which you get out.
In particular for all the allies that helped you for the past 20 years and now are at risk.
The Afghan army couldn’t fight back once Biden forbade all service technicians to stay in the country and maintain the machines and veichles, and certainly not when the army was trained to work in coordination with US Air Force which hastily left.
It’s a complete failure all around.
> The Afghan army couldn’t fight back ... when the army was trained to work in coordination with US Air Force ...
Did their AK-47s need special US Air Force attention to work?
> Once you go in - you at least have a responsibility for the manner in which you get out.
The people living there had every chance to train and fight for their freedom. Apparently they did not want that.
The pull out was announced and negotiated 2nd of Feb 2020, they had ample time to prepare.
Did you have the same oppinions then as well regarding the pull out?, and did you do anything about it then?
Full press release from back then:
https://theweek.com/afghanistan-war/1003748/gop-takes-down-2...
PRESIDENT TRUMP HAS CONTINUED TO TAKE THE LEAD IN PEACE TALKS AS HE SIGNED A HISTORIC PEACE AGREEMENT WITH THE TALIBAN IN AFGHANISTAN, WHICH WOULD END AMERICA'S LONGEST WAR
On February 2, 2020 , the Trump Administration signed a preliminary peace agreement with the Taliban that sets the stage to end America's longest war.
Under the agreement , the U.S. will withdraw nearly 5,000 troops from the country in 135 days in exchange for a Taliban agreement to not allow Afghanistan to be used for transnational terrorism.
Time Magazine reported that other components of the agreement included an agreement that U.S. counterterrorism forces stay in the country, permissions for the CIA to operate in Taliban-held areas, and details of how the Taliban's promises to reduce violence will be monitored and verified.
The deal has been called the " best chance to end this conflict ," a " decisive move " towards peace, and " the best path " for the United States.
The war in Afghanistan is the longest in U.S. history, a conflict that has killed more than 3,500 U.S. and NATO troops and cost U.S. taxpayers nearly 900 billion dollars.
As part of the peace agreement, the Taliban and the Afghan government recently began historic peace, talks which would end decades of war that Afghanistan has consumed.
The negotiations will cover the terms of a " permanent ceasefire, the rights of women and minorities, and the disarmament of the country's many militia groups ."
As Trump himself stated: intuitively you want to leave. But it’s all subject to an analysis of consequences. Something this administration completely blundered.
US still has forces and bases in Okinawa, South Korea and Germany etc. The scale and purpose of the operation of course changes as the context changes.
Merely withdrawing “before 9/11” (as if that is some relevant symbolism…) was irresponsible and clearly not even planned in any serious manner.
I don’t have any defense for the Afghan army, it’s government nor the people. Many have come to Europe under false statements of age and now we are stuck with them. Many turn to criminality simply because the European job market has no use for them. It’s a horrible result for all involved.
It’s well known that US presidents since Bush have wanted to leave and not spend more dollars on these foreign adventures. Many arguments can be made that more countries in Europe should have made larger contributions to the war against terrorism.
Again, it matters in the manner how you scale down, and what you leave behind.
Had it been Trump (or anyone else) - of course I would have been equally critical. This immediately affects my life in Sweden; and it’s just horrible to see the consequences in Afghanistan with the Taliban barbarians subjecting the people to their tyrannical rule.
It’s not hard to see this area turning into a place for terrorist plots again. And then what. At least the Trump administration clearly has that in mind. It’s hard to imagine what Biden has in mind - if anything at all.
I'd say Saigon but let's be honest the South Vietnamese army did fight pretty hard and clinged on for longer.
The Taliban has already entered the capital (https://www.wsj.com/articles/afghanistans-taliban-seize-jala...). This is an utter disaster for Biden and America. We should instead have performed a slower withdrawal and also continued to maintain a military presence permanently at Bagram field. Instead it appears China and Pakistan will welcome a new Taliban government and build new economic ties while America loses influence in the region. This withdrawal was so poorly handled that just two days ago the administration claimed Kabul would fall in 90 days when it seems it may fall today. Meanwhile the Taliban, who harbored 9/11 terrorists and is still allied with al Qaeda, is literally taking over American weapon stores that were left behind in this hasty evacuation (https://news.yahoo.com/weapon-seizures-massive-boon-taliban-...). What an utter and complete failure of leadership, military intelligence, foreign policy, and “nation building” (or rather lack thereof).
EDIT (in response to reply, since I got the dreaded rate limiting message): Trump didn’t initiate a departure. He set up a deal that included numerous conditions and phases contingent on commitments and actions from both the Taliban and Afghanistan government (https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/us-sign-historic-deal-taliba...). But it really doesn’t matter. Biden is either the President or he isn’t. The withdrawal timeline he set and executed is his to own. Anything less than full ownership means he isn’t fit to be President.
It would be shortsighted to try to pin this failure on your disfavored party. During 20 years of Afghanistan, 11 saw a Republican president and 9 saw a Democrat president. Not to mention other allies in the field, who contributed quite a lot to the peacekeeping effort.
Afghanistan isn't a modern country and cannot sustain a modern military or modern governance. Taliban is adapted to local conditions, Afghan govenrment isn't. But modern countries cannot help someone build a tribal fighting force best suited for the most remote mountains on the planet; people tend to replicate their own institutions wherever they go, because they are the only ones that we actually understand.
This is not a disaster for Bidden. I'm sorry to say it but it is really a victory for Bidden to limit the loss of lives.
As usual though the Democrats are the ones that wind up holding the bag and doing the necessary thing, so that they're the ones that will carry the blame as far as political simpletons go.
Remember that it was trump who initiated departure from afghanistan, and deals were signed.
It’s kind of a joke that this administration keeps blaming the Trump negotiations, as if the Taliban has kept their side of the agreement. They haven’t - the US has no obligation to either.
The deals mature in 20 or 30 years. Very sad bad days ahead for the locals now. Happy days once again for the globalist Prosperos at six degrees removed, eventually. Olympics 2064, Khabul? Was there a stratroot cause they could have tackled before the halfway mark over the last 20 years and realise the vision for victory, today?