The whole "we brought the light of reason and liberty vs the brutal taliban" schtick we're getting everywhere is pretty exhausting. We funded death squads, we looked the other way on child sex trafficking, we shoveled truckloads of money into the hands of some of the worst people alive because their cruelty and barbarism aligned with our interests.
There is no reality where a Trump-led withdrawal isn't infinitely worse.
Idk I saw a photo this morning of someone falling several hundred feet from an ascending aircraft in their desperation to escape. At some point this "well the other guy would do even worse" just seems obscene
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
If Afghanistan was always doomed to fail then I guess we should have brought over as many people as refugees as possible to help them escape both the Taliban and corruption within the U.S. occupation force.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
If Afghanistan was always doomed to fail then I guess we should have brought over as many people as refugees as possible to help them escape both the Taliban and corruption within the U.S. occupation force.
Yes, we improved lives for some people, but we still should have gotten the fuck out.
When would have been the optimal time to leave?
I think the point people are trying to make to you is that whether it had been ten years ago, today or ten years from now, it would still have looked like this.
I'd really rather not imagine what Trump would do in an alternative universe where he won the election.
Watching the planes with crowds of people climbing onto them, desperate to get inside, is heartbreaking enough that I don't want to explore what it would look like if the people responsible were gleeful about it.
I'm not sitting here fucking happy that Biden has only fucked this up this much.
Similarly I couldn't give two fucks what Republicans are saying about all of this. They'd have something to fucking say no matter what. In some alternate universe where we got the refugees out, R state governors are on CNN telling reporters "They're not coming to my state!" so they can just fuck the fuck off forever.
With my limited knowledge of the culture and region, I don't know of a better option than just relocating everyone to a less terrorist-filled place and granting them citizenship there. But that was never going to happen.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
If Afghanistan was always doomed to fail then I guess we should have brought over as many people as refugees as possible.
Everyone in Afghanistan with reason to fear oppression or harm under the Taliban would probably fill up a Los Angeles sized city. And I don’t mean “would probably fill the capacity of such a city to take refugees” I mean that you could literally go out in Wyoming or somewhere, build a city with housing for 8 or so million people, and fill it up with legitimate asylum seeking refugees from a Taliban run Afghanistan.
I'd really rather not imagine what Trump would do in an alternative universe where he won the election.
Watching the planes with crowds of people climbing onto them, desperate to get inside, is heartbreaking enough that I don't want to explore what it would look like if the people responsible were gleeful about it.
I'm not sitting here fucking happy that Biden has only fucked this up this much.
Similarly I couldn't give two fucks what Republicans are saying about all of this. They'd have something to fucking say no matter what. In some alternate universe where we got the refugees out, R state governors are on CNN telling reporters "They're not coming to my state!" so they can just fuck the fuck off forever.
Look at what Stephen Miller has been on about recently re: afghan refugees with a dash of the Trump Kurd pullout and that's basically the core of what Trump would have been doing in this situation imo.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
If Afghanistan was always doomed to fail then I guess we should have brought over as many people as refugees as possible.
Everyone in Afghanistan with reason to fear oppression or harm under the Taliban would probably fill up a Los Angeles sized city. And I don’t mean “would probably fill the capacity of such a city to take refugees” I mean that you could literally go out in Wyoming or somewhere, build a city with housing for 8 or so million people, and fill it up with legitimate asylum seeking refugees from a Taliban run Afghanistan.
Part of the issue is that several of you are making the arguement that the good done over the last 20 years was unsustainable without American support.
The rest of us agree.
You then follow up with words that imply it was a mistake to try from the start.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
If Afghanistan was always doomed to fail then I guess we should have brought over as many people as refugees as possible.
Everyone in Afghanistan with reason to fear oppression or harm under the Taliban would probably fill up a Los Angeles sized city. And I don’t mean “would probably fill the capacity of such a city to take refugees” I mean that you could literally go out in Wyoming or somewhere, build a city with housing for 8 or so million people, and fill it up with legitimate asylum seeking refugees from a Taliban run Afghanistan.
The whole "we brought the light of reason and liberty vs the brutal taliban" schtick we're getting everywhere is pretty exhausting. We funded death squads, we looked the other way on child sex trafficking, we shoveled truckloads of money into the hands of some of the worst people alive because their cruelty and barbarism aligned with our interests.
There is no reality where a Trump-led withdrawal isn't infinitely worse.
Idk I saw a photo this morning of someone falling several hundred feet from an ascending aircraft in their desperation to escape. At some point this "well the other guy would do even worse" just seems obscene
Under Trump we would have been gone in May. He also reduced troop numbers before Biden was even in office.
Biden deserves criticism for how sloppy this is, but acting like he wasn't dealt a shit hand or that Trunp would have handled this better is nonsense.
Hence why the GOP scrubbed Trump's pullout "credit" from their list of accomplishments.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
At least with the U.S. presence in Afghanistan people got a couple decades of reprieve and quality of life improvements, as well as hopefully a greater ability to foment dissent through increased literacy and knowledge of how things were better before the Taliban took over.
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
I don't give Biden much slack because, like I said before, dude knew going into the election that this shit was something he needed to deal with.
Watching the media focus so much on how this is "Biden's failure" or having the neo cons come on to speak about how Biden "fucked up" feels like watching vultures circling road kill
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
With my limited knowledge of the culture and region, I don't know of a better option than just relocating everyone to a less terrorist-filled place and granting them citizenship there. But that was never going to happen.
There's probably some way to like, spend a hundred years to actually get a result, but it's not possible to do it when management changes every four.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Most people never cared in the first place because it's not relevant to their day to day lives.
The larger issue I'm mentioning here has been hotly debated since at least the 90s on various fronts. But that's among like political thinkers and elites and foreign policy people and whatever.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
I guess people feel better if they know that they weren't involved in any way with suffering, even if the suffering is greater without their involvement.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
Are you arguing that fewer Afghanis died from the war than would have died without it?
Watching the media focus so much on how this is "Biden's failure" or having the neo cons come on to speak about how Biden "fucked up" feels like watching vultures circling road kill
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
Fuck'em. The media has their share of blame for framing the American mindset and glorifying our invasions and occupations.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
Over 200,000 have died in the War in Afghanistan
+8
Options
Shortytouching the meatIntergalactic Cool CourtRegistered Userregular
Watching the media focus so much on how this is "Biden's failure" or having the neo cons come on to speak about how Biden "fucked up" feels like watching vultures circling road kill
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
well, that's also because the failure is theirs, as well, and they know it. many of the same people, literally the same individuals, were happy to cheerlead for this war two decades ago.
Watching the media focus so much on how this is "Biden's failure" or having the neo cons come on to speak about how Biden "fucked up" feels like watching vultures circling road kill
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
well, that's also because the failure is theirs, as well, and they know it. many of the same people, literally the same individuals, were happy to cheerlead for this war two decades ago.
Just remember their hard-ons for every time Trump bombed something. They ain't learned shit over the past 20 years.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
Over 200,000 have died in the War in Afghanistan
And now all those deaths are in vain as the progress that was made to improve the quality of life (education, women's rights, etc) in the country is swept away. The only glimmer of hope is that the 20 year period where things improved will lead to greater internal resistance against the Taliban to regain those improvements.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
Over 200,000 have died in the War in Afghanistan
And now all those deaths are in vain as the progress that was made to improve the quality of life (education, women's rights, etc) in the country is swept away. The only glimmer of hope is that the 20 year period where things improved will lead to greater internal resistance against the Taliban to regain those improvements.
Yeah, it was a huge mistake to invade, and a bigger one to stay
+9
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
Yeah, this whole Savior America bit is too much for me.
Watching the media focus so much on how this is "Biden's failure" or having the neo cons come on to speak about how Biden "fucked up" feels like watching vultures circling road kill
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
That's why for every president it was easier to kick the can down the road. Whoever actually withdraws gets the albatross buck medal. Or whatever that's called.
I appreciate that Biden is willing to take the political and legacy hit for a decision he believes in.
If you’re going to tel me the primary reason for women not being educated in the first place (an organization well known for their violence towards women) that has now retaken power and will suddenly accept women who were educated in their absence, then i don’t think there’s anything here to discuss. I feel like this is absurdly optimistic, to put it as nicely as possible.
The alternative so far is the bunch of borderline suicidal posts coming from vets on Twitter about the sheer pointless of it all. The "grim happiness" essay making the rounds.
The only alternative to withdrawal is occupation.
I'm saying that even with this withdrawal some of the changes that occurred during occupation thanks to the oppressive force of the Taliban being curtailed, at least for a time, could lead to better outcomes in the future than had occupation never happened at all.
I guess we'll see.
I don't put a whole lot of faith in religious zealots to be cool about it.
Religious zealots didn't like it when the printing press and rising literacy rates made it possible for laypeople to read the Bible for themselves. The first guy to translate the Bible into English was in fact betrayed and executed as a heretic, but the genie couldn't be put back in the bottle despite attempts by religious zealots to do so.
I mean sure
But also the ME was fairly modern in the 1960s
So it kind of looks like you absolutely can put that genie back in.
Well then I guess it was all pointless and the people who oppose oppression should just give up and submit to their rule.
It wasn't pontless.
A lot of people made a lot of money off of a lot of suffering, and now they left the country to rot.
The literacy rate went from 8% to 43%, a generation of women grew up knowing greater freedoms, maternal mortality halved, life expectancy increased, access to clean drinking water went from 16% to 89% in cities, etc. You can't just ignore all those things because they're inconvenient to the narrative that the U.S. presence was entirely negative.
I don't think anybody is ignoring them
if you want to argue that the U.S. should indefinitely continue to prop up an at-least-relatively-egalitarian society in afghan cities at the point of the bayonet (or the drone, as the case may be) then fair enough. I don't think it's irrelevant that the U.S.' values are better than our British and Soviet predecessors in-theater, either. But that sort of benevolent colonialism was considered a bridge too far even for the Bush administration, not least because it's really hard to make the case without sounding like Winston Churchill.
The two major sides I see regarding the current situation are 1) the U.S. is abandoning Afghanistan to the Taliban, who will be enforcing their brand of oppression upon the populace and 2) the U.S. should have never been in Afghanistan in the first place and should have let whatever happened play out.
The decision to go to Aghanistan in was made 20 years ago, and the lives of many of the people of Afghanistan improved as a consequence of the U.S. presence. The best we can hope for now is that the gains in literacy and the 20 years of greater freedoms for women help inspire resistance against the Taliban by the people of Afghanistan.
Personally, I feel it was irresponsible to leave without a means to ensure that the progress the people of Afghanistan had benefited from during the U.S. presence couldn't be easily taken away.
And how, exactly, were we supposed to do that, when we couldn't in 20 years? As people have pointed out, your argument - no matter how good intentioned it might be - ultimately is an argument for indefinite occupation.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
Over 200,000 have died in the War in Afghanistan
And millions from have died from war, disease, and famine since Clinton pulled out of Mogadishu.
My family is at risk of dying from a car bomb at this very moment.
Then there's the Nairobi mall attack, the Ethiopia college attack, and many others.
Not to mention the thousands who died trying to reach Europe.
Part of the issue is that several of you are making the arguement that the good done over the last 20 years was unsustainable without American support.
The rest of us agree.
You then follow up with words that imply it was a mistake to try from the start.
That us where we disagree.
Take up the White Man's burden—
Send forth the best ye breed—
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness
On fluttered folk and wild—
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half devil and half child.
Take up the White Man's burden—
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain.
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.
Take up the White Man's burden—
The savage wars of peace—
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch Sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.
Take up the White Man's burden—
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper—
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go make them with your living,
And mark them with your dead!
Take up the White Man's burden—
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard—
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:—
"Why brought ye us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?"
Take up the White Man's burden—
Ye dare not stoop to less
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloak your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your Gods and you.
Take up the White Man's burden—
Have done with childish days—
The lightly proffered laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years,
Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!
Watching the media focus so much on how this is "Biden's failure" or having the neo cons come on to speak about how Biden "fucked up" feels like watching vultures circling road kill
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
That's why for every president it was easier to kick the can down the road. Whoever actually withdraws gets the albatross buck medal. Or whatever that's called.
I appreciate that Biden is willing to take the political and legacy hit for a decision he believes in.
I think because of his time with Obama especially he came into office with a dim view of the military's bullshit on ending the war and so he just pulled the trigger.
Posts
No doubt.
This is just getting started, though, so we shouldn't take that as a comfort.
Idk I saw a photo this morning of someone falling several hundred feet from an ascending aircraft in their desperation to escape. At some point this "well the other guy would do even worse" just seems obscene
Immediately after we got all the refugees out.
If Afghanistan was always doomed to fail then I guess we should have brought over as many people as refugees as possible to help them escape both the Taliban and corruption within the U.S. occupation force.
The issue is that ultimately we have yet to find a solution for the problem of other fellow human beings over there suffering horrible in various ways that is actually feasible or functional.
Which leaves us stuck with both something like "the Taliban are stoning women to death for wearing tight clothing" and "20 years of admittedly incompetently run occupation weren't able to actually fix that".
Probably.
I think the point people are trying to make to you is that whether it had been ten years ago, today or ten years from now, it would still have looked like this.
Watching the planes with crowds of people climbing onto them, desperate to get inside, is heartbreaking enough that I don't want to explore what it would look like if the people responsible were gleeful about it.
I'm not sitting here fucking happy that Biden has only fucked this up this much.
Similarly I couldn't give two fucks what Republicans are saying about all of this. They'd have something to fucking say no matter what. In some alternate universe where we got the refugees out, R state governors are on CNN telling reporters "They're not coming to my state!" so they can just fuck the fuck off forever.
Everyone in Afghanistan with reason to fear oppression or harm under the Taliban would probably fill up a Los Angeles sized city. And I don’t mean “would probably fill the capacity of such a city to take refugees” I mean that you could literally go out in Wyoming or somewhere, build a city with housing for 8 or so million people, and fill it up with legitimate asylum seeking refugees from a Taliban run Afghanistan.
Look at what Stephen Miller has been on about recently re: afghan refugees with a dash of the Trump Kurd pullout and that's basically the core of what Trump would have been doing in this situation imo.
Ok
The rest of us agree.
You then follow up with words that imply it was a mistake to try from the start.
That us where we disagree.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Sounds good let's do it.
Under Trump we would have been gone in May. He also reduced troop numbers before Biden was even in office.
Biden deserves criticism for how sloppy this is, but acting like he wasn't dealt a shit hand or that Trunp would have handled this better is nonsense.
Hence why the GOP scrubbed Trump's pullout "credit" from their list of accomplishments.
I guess this explains the apathy that a lot of people feel about atrocities that happen in other parts of the world. Why care if attempting to help is either fruitless or leads to worse outcomes?
At least with the U.S. presence in Afghanistan people got a couple decades of reprieve and quality of life improvements, as well as hopefully a greater ability to foment dissent through increased literacy and knowledge of how things were better before the Taliban took over.
Feels a lot like under Trump: media doing whatever gets clicks and stokes outrage without recognizing the complete failure of 20 years of the foreign policy establishment
There's probably some way to like, spend a hundred years to actually get a result, but it's not possible to do it when management changes every four.
3DS: 0473-8507-2652
Switch: SW-5185-4991-5118
PSN: AbEntropy
Better a few thousand civilian casualties from getting involved than a hundred thousand bodies counted from the sidelines.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Most people never cared in the first place because it's not relevant to their day to day lives.
The larger issue I'm mentioning here has been hotly debated since at least the 90s on various fronts. But that's among like political thinkers and elites and foreign policy people and whatever.
I guess people feel better if they know that they weren't involved in any way with suffering, even if the suffering is greater without their involvement.
Are you arguing that fewer Afghanis died from the war than would have died without it?
Avoid the talking heads:
Nothing happening yet though.
https://www.npr.org/2021/08/16/1028086877/biden-is-returning-to-the-white-house-to-give-an-address-on-afghanistan
Fuck'em. The media has their share of blame for framing the American mindset and glorifying our invasions and occupations.
Fuck. Them.
Over 200,000 have died in the War in Afghanistan
well, that's also because the failure is theirs, as well, and they know it. many of the same people, literally the same individuals, were happy to cheerlead for this war two decades ago.
Just remember their hard-ons for every time Trump bombed something. They ain't learned shit over the past 20 years.
And now all those deaths are in vain as the progress that was made to improve the quality of life (education, women's rights, etc) in the country is swept away. The only glimmer of hope is that the 20 year period where things improved will lead to greater internal resistance against the Taliban to regain those improvements.
Yeah, it was a huge mistake to invade, and a bigger one to stay
That's why for every president it was easier to kick the can down the road. Whoever actually withdraws gets the albatross buck medal. Or whatever that's called.
I appreciate that Biden is willing to take the political and legacy hit for a decision he believes in.
And millions from have died from war, disease, and famine since Clinton pulled out of Mogadishu.
My family is at risk of dying from a car bomb at this very moment.
Then there's the Nairobi mall attack, the Ethiopia college attack, and many others.
Not to mention the thousands who died trying to reach Europe.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
Take up the White Man's burden—
Send forth the best ye breed—
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness
On fluttered folk and wild—
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half devil and half child.
Take up the White Man's burden—
In patience to abide,
To veil the threat of terror
And check the show of pride;
By open speech and simple,
An hundred times made plain.
To seek another's profit,
And work another's gain.
Take up the White Man's burden—
The savage wars of peace—
Fill full the mouth of Famine
And bid the sickness cease;
And when your goal is nearest
The end for others sought,
Watch Sloth and heathen Folly
Bring all your hopes to nought.
Take up the White Man's burden—
No tawdry rule of kings,
But toil of serf and sweeper—
The tale of common things.
The ports ye shall not enter,
The roads ye shall not tread,
Go make them with your living,
And mark them with your dead!
Take up the White Man's burden—
And reap his old reward:
The blame of those ye better,
The hate of those ye guard—
The cry of hosts ye humour
(Ah, slowly!) toward the light:—
"Why brought ye us from bondage,
Our loved Egyptian night?"
Take up the White Man's burden—
Ye dare not stoop to less
Nor call too loud on Freedom
To cloak your weariness;
By all ye cry or whisper,
By all ye leave or do,
The silent, sullen peoples
Shall weigh your Gods and you.
Take up the White Man's burden—
Have done with childish days—
The lightly proffered laurel,
The easy, ungrudged praise.
Comes now, to search your manhood
Through all the thankless years,
Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,
The judgment of your peers!
I think because of his time with Obama especially he came into office with a dim view of the military's bullshit on ending the war and so he just pulled the trigger.