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'm willing to bet good odds he got pushed into it by the Taliban and it wasn't entirely his timeline.
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
I wonder if the people of Afghanistan who benefited during the time period, particularly the women and girls aged 20 and younger, would agree.
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!
Would you strike the same tone if it was your people forgotten by America except when Activision needs a new place to shoot brown people?
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
I wonder if the people of Afghanistan who benefited during the time period, particularly the women, would agree.
I wonder if the people murdered by our death squads would agree
I’m sympathetic to anybody earnestly arguing that the loss of limited progress in limited parts of Afghanistan is going to mostly be felt by those who have historically been oppressed, specifically Afghan women.
I’m not sympathetic to the idea that there was or is a military solution to that problem. That doesn’t mean we get to walk away now that the military portion of this is ‘over.’ If you want to fight for better conditions for people the world over, this is a learning opportunity on how not to do that, and on what to push back against in the future when somebody inevitably suggests we occupy some other country under the pretense of preserving human rights.
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.
I believe the estimates for the Rwandan genocide are at over a million. Which is also one of the incidents often used to argue for the need for international awareness and intervention in human rights issues in foreign countries.
+7
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HonkHonk is this poster.Registered User, __BANNED USERSregular
It’s entirely too much to quote fucking white mans burden
It’s twenty times entirely too much to quote it directly at a person who fled Mogadishu
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
I wonder if the people of Afghanistan who benefited during the time period, particularly the women and girls aged 20 and younger, would agree.
Yeah this sucks dog shit but what do you want? Another 20 years of occupation? Maybe the government would actually make it all the way to the withdrawal date then.
There is enough sin in this world to justify 200,000 lives as collateral damage if you can change things for the better. No one blinks at the German or Japanese construction crews getting blown up by ww2 bombs.
But as I said in the BLM thread, people like Lindsey Graham and mitch McConnell will sabotage any effort made for the greater good, resulting in America's forces arriving a day late and a billion short.
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.
There was no way to change afghanistan for the better before changing america for the better. America failed the afghan people, but continuing on like this would only continue those failings.
+2
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Shortytouching the meatIntergalactic Cool CourtRegistered Userregular
personally I think if we're gonna play the Shoulda Coulda Woulda game, it's weird to pick the Bush invasion as your starting point, and weirder still, if you're talking about the welfare of Afghanis, to stand at that moment in history and present it as a choice between war and nothing.
during the Carter years, Brzezinski should have been told to shut the fuck up when he floated the idea of destabilizing the duly elected Afghani government. if you must start in 2001, they should have set up an apparatus to allow anyone who could get into a neighboring country to immigrate to the US.
After that "I won't shrink from my responsibility, I'm the president and the buck stops with me" I can't help but think
This is the moment Biden became president
There won’t be any of that with Biden but don’t worry Cilizza will be back with a new flavor of his incredible irrelevant stupidity just as soon as all the warlusty ghouls are done getting their pasty faces all over the cable news split screens
Biden for all his faults at least grasped the fundamental issue in Afghanistan: there is no ‘winning’, only deciding how you prefer to lose.
As much as I enjoy kicking dirt on the bush administration, re-litigating what the country should have done 10 or 15 or 20 years ago is navel gazing at best. The question is what we ought to do today.
it was the smallest on the list but
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
I don’t agree with putting any blame on Afghan soldiers, and Afghans in general. I found that highly inappropriate (when it’s not directly about government officials). Biden similarly doesn’t have a satisfying answer on the question of refugees because there isn’t one. Or on how the pullout itself went.
On the question of the war itself, which was the largest portion of his speech, he was appropriately honest and non-apologetic about the decision to end the war, and more or less invited anyone who disagreed to come out and say that they’d send troops to Afghanistan again.
I think that those of us who are fortunate have a moral responsibility to help the less fortunate. The sticking point is that I fundamentally believe that the United States Military is a tool that literally cannot due that due to the interests it serves, and any benefits it grants are accidental at best.
There is enough sin in this world to justify 200,000 lives as collateral damage if you can change things for the better. No one blinks at the German or Japanese construction crews getting blown up by ww2 bombs.
But as I said in the BLM thread, people like Lindsey Graham and mitch McConnell will sabotage any effort made for the greater good, resulting in America's forces arriving a day late and a billion short.
"strategic bombing" has been widely admonish by historian both military and otherwise, it's pretty much agreed upon it was criminal.
Were we at war with the nation of Afghanistan?
I'm saying this as a snide comment, but I literally can't remember our process anymore. As far as I remember, we went there to kill a saudi terrorist in retribution who ended up being in Pakistan the whole time and also we killed him like 10 years ago.
I think that those of us who are fortunate have a moral responsibility to help the less fortunate. The sticking point is that I fundamentally believe that the United States Military is a tool that literally cannot due that due to the interests it serves, and any benefits it grants are accidental at best.
At best, they can protect people actually working on stuff. But a sword is always a sword.
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.
The withdrawal date was already set, he extended it to September 11 for political *jerking off motion* I mean to create an orderly transition period that...apparently left a bunch of ANA soldiers in the literal dark while US forces fucked off.
Then he started catching heat about bringing Afghans back here and there was a collective “oh shit” because no on had thought about that, or it had been dismissed if it had and because of said fucking off they only have a single lane runway.
I think that those of us who are fortunate have a moral responsibility to help the less fortunate. The sticking point is that I fundamentally believe that the United States Military is a tool that literally cannot due that due to the interests it serves, and any benefits it grants are accidental at best.
The US military also isn't designed as a peacekeeping or occupation force. John Q Public demanded that square pegs fit round holes.
Note that the "war" for Iraq lasted about a month and US troops fucking steamrolled the Saddam's military. After that, though...?
It’s entirely too much to quote fucking white mans burden
It’s twenty times entirely too much to quote it directly at a person who fled Mogadishu
I mean, its only been, what 150ish years? But No No, this time it'll work. WE HAVE TO DO IT!
America only cares about Africa when they can blame the problem on colonization and absolve themselves of white guilt.
Your words prove it
It seems like you're arguing for indefinite occupation of every destabilized part of Africa and the Middle East to maintain order? And isn't that just recolonization?
Self-righteousness is incompatible with coalition building.
I think at this point its pretty clear that whatever the viability of nation building is on its own, its not what we did in Afghanistan
+15
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
Biden pulled the band aid off, and it's terrible, it sucks, my heart and sympathy goes out to everyone who can't get out and I do hope we do as much as possible to help those people....but the band aid had to come off. You can't just casually occupy a country for 20 years and force democracy on them. Especially when you hear the reports from commanders on the ground about how corrupt the entire local political system was. It was always going to come crumbling down the second the might of the US military was not there.
As much as I love him, I hold Obama more accountable for this than Biden. Certainly Trump who tried to court the Taliban. The ultimate blame is of course Bush and Cheney, but we had ample opportunities over the year to rip off the bandage and we didn't. It just got kicked down the road. Now Biden is left holding the bag.
Maybe this time we'll learn our lesson about forced regime change through military action...but probably not.
Dumping blame on the Afghan government seems like a smart move politically.
I think for all the hubbub in the news right now, ending the war will end up being better for him in the end.
I think the U.S. gov probably thought the Afghan forces could fight on for three or six months, by which time they could safely say it wasn’t their problem anymore.
That they were still so desperately wrong tells you everything you need to know about our effort there, really
it was the smallest on the list but
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
There is enough sin in this world to justify 200,000 lives as collateral damage if you can change things for the better. No one blinks at the German or Japanese construction crews getting blown up by ww2 bombs.
But as I said in the BLM thread, people like Lindsey Graham and mitch McConnell will sabotage any effort made for the greater good, resulting in America's forces arriving a day late and a billion short.
"strategic bombing" has been widely admonish by historian both military and otherwise, it's pretty much agreed upon it was criminal.
Were we at war with the nation of Afghanistan?
I'm saying this as a snide comment, but I literally can't remember our process anymore. As far as I remember, we went there to kill a saudi terrorist in retribution who ended up being in Pakistan the whole time and also we killed him like 10 years ago.
Bin Laden was in Afghanistan when we invaded and we almost captured / killed him at Tora Bora.
I wonder how different things would have gone if we got him there and were able to pull Mission Accomplished and fuck off out of Afghanistan.
+9
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ButtersA glass of some milksRegistered 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.
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.
Sounds good let's do it.
If there were a non-zero chance of a solution like this, Biden wouldn't be President of the United States.
By all means hold Biden accountable for his misdeeds but relocating 4M Afghanis to a New Kabul in the US is comic book level fantasy.
From its inception in 2001 to its ignominious end, the U.S. war in Afghanistan has been defined by lies. It was a lie when, in 2001, President George W. Bush told service members that “your mission is defined, your objectives are clear.... We will not fail.” It was a lie when President Barack Obama proclaimed in 2016 that America had successfully “trained Afghan forces to take responsibility for their own security.” And it was a lie every time pundits and officials insisted that victory was around the corner.
Manifold elites are now lying about the fall of Afghanistan “under Biden’s watch.” In The New York Times, the American Enterprise Institute’s Frederick Kagan claims that “a disastrous Taliban takeover wasn’t inevitable,” though it has been obvious for years that the Taliban was winning and that the Afghan government would fall eventually without overwhelming U.S. support. In The Wall Street Journal, former National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster and Bradley Bowman of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies assert that “the refusal to provide the Afghan people the support necessary to stem a humanitarian catastrophe emboldens China, Russia and other adversaries eager to proclaim the U.S. an unreliable partner and a declining power,” though the U.S. has proved time and again that it is already those things. And in The New York Times, Bret Stephens perplexingly affirms that “Disaster in Afghanistan Will Follow Us Home,” as if the militarization of U.S. policing that occurred in the War on Terror’s wake hasn’t already done significant damage to the country.
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Dumping blame on the Afghan government seems like a smart move politically.
I think for all the hubbub in the news right now, ending the war will end up being better for him in the end.
I think the U.S. gov probably thought the Afghan forces could fight on for three or six months, by which time they could safely say it wasn’t their problem anymore.
That they were still so desperately wrong tells you everything you need to know about our effort there, really
All the estimates were that they'd last longer. I doubt the estimates the White House was seeing from the military were any different. I wouldn't be shocked if the estimates the Pentagon believed were any different either. This whole thing collapsed so much faster then any estimate I saw anywhere.
Dumping blame on the Afghan government seems like a smart move politically.
I think for all the hubbub in the news right now, ending the war will end up being better for him in the end.
He's taking an enormous amount of heat for it right now though, from all directions.
Americans in general don't seem to give two shits about international stuff, but they will remember "Biden's Saigon" even if they are happy that the war is over.
There is enough sin in this world to justify 200,000 lives as collateral damage if you can change things for the better. No one blinks at the German or Japanese construction crews getting blown up by ww2 bombs.
But as I said in the BLM thread, people like Lindsey Graham and mitch McConnell will sabotage any effort made for the greater good, resulting in America's forces arriving a day late and a billion short.
"strategic bombing" has been widely admonish by historian both military and otherwise, it's pretty much agreed upon it was criminal.
Were we at war with the nation of Afghanistan?
I'm saying this as a snide comment, but I literally can't remember our process anymore. As far as I remember, we went there to kill a saudi terrorist in retribution who ended up being in Pakistan the whole time and also we killed him like 10 years ago.
Bin Laden was in Afghanistan when we invaded and we almost captured / killed him at Tora Bora.
I wonder how different things would have gone if we got him there and were able to pull Mission Accomplished and fuck off out of Afghanistan.
Given they literally pulled the Iraq War out of their asses and then just stopped caring about the search for Bin Laden, I don't think it would have gone terribly different.
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I'm willing to bet good odds he got pushed into it by the Taliban and it wasn't entirely his timeline.
I wonder if the people of Afghanistan who benefited during the time period, particularly the women and girls aged 20 and younger, would agree.
Would you strike the same tone if it was your people forgotten by America except when Activision needs a new place to shoot brown people?
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
I wonder if the people murdered by our death squads would agree
Dumb game.
I’m not sympathetic to the idea that there was or is a military solution to that problem. That doesn’t mean we get to walk away now that the military portion of this is ‘over.’ If you want to fight for better conditions for people the world over, this is a learning opportunity on how not to do that, and on what to push back against in the future when somebody inevitably suggests we occupy some other country under the pretense of preserving human rights.
I believe the estimates for the Rwandan genocide are at over a million. Which is also one of the incidents often used to argue for the need for international awareness and intervention in human rights issues in foreign countries.
It’s twenty times entirely too much to quote it directly at a person who fled Mogadishu
He should call on Congress to repeal the AUF.
This is the moment Biden became president
Yeah this sucks dog shit but what do you want? Another 20 years of occupation? Maybe the government would actually make it all the way to the withdrawal date then.
I mean, its only been, what 150ish years? But No No, this time it'll work. WE HAVE TO DO IT!
But as I said in the BLM thread, people like Lindsey Graham and mitch McConnell will sabotage any effort made for the greater good, resulting in America's forces arriving a day late and a billion short.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
The Afghan government who we knew was a house of cards, and multiple inside reports say our military knew they were fucking worthless.
Sorry Joe you still fucked up. At best you overestimated them.
There was no way to change afghanistan for the better before changing america for the better. America failed the afghan people, but continuing on like this would only continue those failings.
during the Carter years, Brzezinski should have been told to shut the fuck up when he floated the idea of destabilizing the duly elected Afghani government. if you must start in 2001, they should have set up an apparatus to allow anyone who could get into a neighboring country to immigrate to the US.
There won’t be any of that with Biden but don’t worry Cilizza will be back with a new flavor of his incredible irrelevant stupidity just as soon as all the warlusty ghouls are done getting their pasty faces all over the cable news split screens
As much as I enjoy kicking dirt on the bush administration, re-litigating what the country should have done 10 or 15 or 20 years ago is navel gazing at best. The question is what we ought to do today.
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
On the question of the war itself, which was the largest portion of his speech, he was appropriately honest and non-apologetic about the decision to end the war, and more or less invited anyone who disagreed to come out and say that they’d send troops to Afghanistan again.
"strategic bombing" has been widely admonish by historian both military and otherwise, it's pretty much agreed upon it was criminal.
Were we at war with the nation of Afghanistan?
I'm saying this as a snide comment, but I literally can't remember our process anymore. As far as I remember, we went there to kill a saudi terrorist in retribution who ended up being in Pakistan the whole time and also we killed him like 10 years ago.
At best, they can protect people actually working on stuff. But a sword is always a sword.
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I think for all the hubbub in the news right now, ending the war will end up being better for him in the end.
America only cares about Africa when they can blame the problem on colonization and absolve themselves of white guilt.
Your words prove it
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
The withdrawal date was already set, he extended it to September 11 for political *jerking off motion* I mean to create an orderly transition period that...apparently left a bunch of ANA soldiers in the literal dark while US forces fucked off.
Then he started catching heat about bringing Afghans back here and there was a collective “oh shit” because no on had thought about that, or it had been dismissed if it had and because of said fucking off they only have a single lane runway.
The US military also isn't designed as a peacekeeping or occupation force. John Q Public demanded that square pegs fit round holes.
Note that the "war" for Iraq lasted about a month and US troops fucking steamrolled the Saddam's military. After that, though...?
It seems like you're arguing for indefinite occupation of every destabilized part of Africa and the Middle East to maintain order? And isn't that just recolonization?
As much as I love him, I hold Obama more accountable for this than Biden. Certainly Trump who tried to court the Taliban. The ultimate blame is of course Bush and Cheney, but we had ample opportunities over the year to rip off the bandage and we didn't. It just got kicked down the road. Now Biden is left holding the bag.
Maybe this time we'll learn our lesson about forced regime change through military action...but probably not.
I think the U.S. gov probably thought the Afghan forces could fight on for three or six months, by which time they could safely say it wasn’t their problem anymore.
That they were still so desperately wrong tells you everything you need to know about our effort there, really
Pluto was a planet and I'll never forget
Bin Laden was in Afghanistan when we invaded and we almost captured / killed him at Tora Bora.
I wonder how different things would have gone if we got him there and were able to pull Mission Accomplished and fuck off out of Afghanistan.
If there were a non-zero chance of a solution like this, Biden wouldn't be President of the United States.
By all means hold Biden accountable for his misdeeds but relocating 4M Afghanis to a New Kabul in the US is comic book level fantasy.
https://newrepublic.com/article/163291/afghanistan-war-founded-lies-people-still-telling-them
Many thoughts I had, but he wrote them better.
That hasn't been possible for about.... 17 to 18 years. I mean that.
All the estimates were that they'd last longer. I doubt the estimates the White House was seeing from the military were any different. I wouldn't be shocked if the estimates the Pentagon believed were any different either. This whole thing collapsed so much faster then any estimate I saw anywhere.
He's taking an enormous amount of heat for it right now though, from all directions.
Americans in general don't seem to give two shits about international stuff, but they will remember "Biden's Saigon" even if they are happy that the war is over.
Given they literally pulled the Iraq War out of their asses and then just stopped caring about the search for Bin Laden, I don't think it would have gone terribly different.