DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Palus Politicus Biden says US war in Afghanistan will end August 31

So admitting you were wrong about a timeline isn't admitting you were wrong about the timeline? You're hilarious.

I'll respond to whatever I want to. Your constant 24/7 practice of changing talking points doesn't make you smart or right... it merely makes you a troll and an internet bully.

Get back in your basement.

Nice post swish. At least your were honest and didn't lay blame at the previous president. This crap was gonna hit whenever we withdrew.


You, unlike a couple, aren't blaming. Neither am I.......until I deal with some that blamed trump for everything.

Let's ignore he made the deal to remove the troops. That will fix everything. It's called shared responsibility. You can't blame one and not the other.

not to send you down the rabbit hole but while america has made some god awful decisions in the middle east, i still can't even blame us for the problems.

i blame the british and french. and you learn some world history, you'd know why. they completely screwed the entire area up.

Couldn't agree more. Let's be honest though... some of this could have been prevented, but it's certainly not a responsibility that lies in Biden's lap. Part of the reason "this was ALWAYS gonna happen no matter when" is just the human nature of people not believing we'll ever really leave... ANYWHERE.

I can't speak to the total legitimacy of the notion that the Afghans were unwilling to fight for themselves, but that seems to be the pulse of the situation. You've been around, served and have witnessed our m.o. firsthand -- why is that? Is it just that once we provide the "blanket" they assume it will always be there?

Agreed- there was never an ideal time to pull out. However, I have a reasl bone to pick about the way it's been done. I'm with Eve on this one: civvies should have been evacced firdt, under military protection. Then, and orderly drawdown/pullout.

That the Taliban would reassert themselves was always a given. It's what they did to the Soviets in the 90's, and their game hasn't changed. It hasn't needed to.

Another point: this country was never a good prospect for nation building. The predominant culture in the region is tribal. They have no real national identity, so the likelihood of them banding together under a national defense policy was slim to none no matter how much training and resources we gave them. For our lesson, we didn't even have to go as far back as the Soviet occupation; all we had to do was look at ISIL in Iraq to see how quickly a power vacuum can be filled.

Taliban had a saying, "America has all the watches; we have all the time."

Now, they have America's watches (and jeeps and armaments, and...) as well.


This is sad in every measurable way.


.02

Bush sent us in after OB-L. Didn't get him. Mission not accomplished.

Obama kept us in to get OB-L Mission accomplished. We should have had an extraction plan in place for that eventuality, and had folks heading home before Bin Laden reached the ocean floor. Obama screwed the pooch with his desire to stay and "stabilize" a wild, untamable region.

Trump had his opportunities, as well. Why he negotiated only with the Taliban excluding the Afghan authorities, I'll never know, but he left the Afghan gov't with no leverage against what is happening now.

And Biden: it was a campaign promise. Why did he not have a tenable plan at least in the works? Now, he's stuck with the same post-war legacy as Nixon: fleeing diplomats and civvies in helicopters from rooftops.


s#tty optics for 20 years.
A horrible chapter of American history with plenty of blame to spread around.

Pretty much my sentiments exactly. Mistakes made over 20 years all culminate in what we're seeing now to some extent. None of them are innocent in this.

its the same reason those in central/south america choose to take the chance crossing the border to the US.

its the same reason Syrians chose to migrate instead of staying and fighting.

its the same reason African try to migrate from hell holes in certain parts of the continent to europe.

the cartels run the place. the terrorist run the place. the <insert religious org> run the place. government is virtually non-existent - if even functional - and they tend to live in countries where the economic activity is a joke.

as much as i HATE to say it, opium farms and such are the most profitable commodity in afghanistan. there's a reason why we didn't burn all of them to the ground. that crap literally helps funds their schools, cities, etc.

same in central/south america. those cartels ALSO provide local food drives and hospitals and such. same in parts of africa.

why? cause the government ain't worth a damn in those places. the Taliban, specifically, runs afghanistan. always has. its a tough pill to swallow bro but they are the main ones hiring in the country. there's so many dudes who join the taliban simply to put food on the table because THERE IS NOTHING ELSE. look at the borders of afghanistan. its hard to do anything when you're surrounded by hostiles, and then the americans come lol.

if you know american history like you're suppose to, then you know the common reasons why people join gangs and such, right?

well, literally take ALL your knowledge and apply that to places like afghanistan, combine that with a government somehow more useless than the american government, and you have your answer.

part of the big problem here is a lot of people somehow think human beings ARENT the same universally. as if we aint gotta deal with the same crap job with crap pay, our bf/gf/wife/husband is annoying as all hell and the kids are even worse.

people in afghanistan deal with the same crap any of us deal with. the issue is that they have no government that can unite the population, no stable economy to build upon, and unfortunately, not in the most desirable places on the planet, geographically.


so guess what FATE, or swish, or clem, or Arch, or anybody else are gonna do if we were born and raised in a country like afghanistan, or syria, or honduras, etc?

we're either gonna:

A. join the taliban, the easiest source of food and money
B. start our own gang/organization and grow food/opium/etc.

or C. illegally migrate to a country where hopefully we still get deported but they keep our wives and kids in whatever country we got to.

thinking people can just stand up and fight such disorganization is such an american privilege perspective. we don't even realize how many things had to happen that we had no control over to even have the opportunity to fight for "Freedom".

and again, yall really need to learn about the Sykes-Picot agreement. look at the map, the geographic, and demographics. there's so much that went wrong that we can see TODAY because of those clowns back in the day.

i want to be clear here: we did our best to get the afghani's to stand on their own feet. but it gets to the point where we were just delaying the inevitable. and it mainly has to do with the fact that we're trying to solve problems with the wrong information. thats been american policies in the middle east for quite some time. the road to hell is paved with good intentions. we as americans have tried to do the right thing, but we go in there with little to no knowledge of the region and the people that inhabit those places.

and because of that, we end up making things worse.

so what is there really to fight for in places like that? not much.

yea i dont agree with you or eve at all.

this is real life. not a simulation. things go wrong on the ground all the time because people are unpredictable in environments like this. i learned that lesson in afghanistan at the ripe old age of 18.

you can have a plan or strategy for anything, and in a combat zone, you'll quickly realize that there plans C-Z were made up on the fly because plan A and B went to crap the moment you went outside the wire.

this aint computer programming or a symphony.

No real disagreement here.

My thinking is we should maintain a airbase in the country. It is a strategic location. We maintain air bases all over the globe.

The Taliban stayed in their caves as long as we had the air power. We should keep them there.

It isn't too late. Obviously, just our being there makes a big difference.

So you think its smart to abandon a bunch of unarmed civilians to a hostile environment full of aggressive terrorists? Pull out any protection they had and throw them to the wolves?

Thats a terrible strategy and whoever came up with it needs to be fired. Anyone with 2 braincells knows thats a bad strategy.

If it wasnt a terrible strategy then they wouldnt have to send the troops back. America looks like fools.

i specifically stated that you can plan for whatever you want, and SOMETHING is going to crap there.

if you weren't complaining about this, you'd be complaining about something else that went wrong during the withdrawal.

you're taking that as an insult when you shouldn't. im stating that SOMETHING was gonna go wrong that resulted in this very thing happening.

for the sake of future unarmed civilians in potential combat zones, please understand what that truly means.

I agree that things can go wrong with missions, but this is such an obvious oversight.

They KNEW it was going to be a chit show. They KNEW the Taliban was going to assert themselves.

Why would you abandon all the civilians and leave them in the hands of the Taliban?

This seems like military strategy 101. Withdraw the civilians before the troops.

Fire whoever screwed this up.

again i dont agree.

i need far more information than what we've been given so far, especially since withdrawing troops from a war zone isn't the same as also withdrawing embassy personnel or anyone else.

embassies have been attacked throughout history. they also tend to have their own SOPs and such. if the best thing we can complain about is a lack of coordination, than thats on everybody. but its a war zone. so....

SOMEBODY was gonna get hit. it just happened to be them. i hate to be that stone cold about it Eve but damn my mentality is just different. not better, not worse, just different.

other than the afghani's that helped the troops, for the majority of the country.....sorry man i just dont care that much. i really don't. we tried, failed, and we're bouncing. it sucks but....it happens.

We will just have to agree to disagree.

I dont disagree that we need to get out. It was long overdue.

Just disagree with the order they did it.

at least we agree it was time to bounce. im good with that.

it's an adjective adverb.

at the very least, This Sucks. No, it sucks on a viet nam level how, how can I even be saying that.
Oh the humanity.
Look at the paralells.

Really Disasterous beyond disasterous, the building falling in Florida was a disaster, this is moreso a debaucle of extremely worse proportions.

I agree with you and Eve as well. My only supposition is that they didn't realize there would be this much of a swift retake and there would be more time to evac people.

That still doesn't explain why you don't take the other route anyway, though.

Sounds like he did the exact opposite... is that egg on your face?

BIDEN: I'm the President of the United States and the buck stops with me.

LMAO. So, you skipped the speech then?

Wow.

It could have been handled better.

America has looked like fools since 2016 when the MAGA movement came to power... I'm surprised Tucker isn't there to show us all how good the women are treated in a great theocracy...

I missed it live but heard the clips. Did I miss something important?

Really, how do you suppose we could have done a better job. Who knows? No one. We learned NOTHING from Vietnam. We should NEVER have stayed and tried to AMERICANIZE Afghanistan. For all the liberals or Republicans that think we should have stayed and "won"....baloney. We should have hunted Bin Landen, killed him and left immediately. Thank God we didn't kill 58,000 of ours there.....As a Vietnam Vet I'm damn glad we are leaving that hole and aren't Building Nations anymore. That didn't work and it would never work. And Trump beating his chest about how much better he'd have done it. Really, he gets credit for saying and starting the end. He just screwed up the virus and LOST the election. Again, thank God we are ending that nightmare.

Yes... Biden passing the buck.

You and I don't get paid to figure these things out. BUT we as a country do pay people for that and we spent trillions on these wars... So yea I expected it to take more than a week for the Taliban to regain full control. I mean trillions and 20 years is more than enough resources for the best and brightest to find some solution... smh

Our withdrawal from Vietnam was a total fiasco, the North Vietnamese swallowed up the country faster than we could evacuate. We all saw what mistakes were made and the political bumbling going on. Fast forward 46 years. We didn't learn a damn thing. There's enough blame to spread around. Obama should have flushed that toilet as soon as Osama got his 3rd eye socket. I think Trump should have just put his foot down and used his arrogant arsehole ego to tell them we're leaving and this is how were doing it. It seems Biden just said we're leaving by August 31st with no plan whatsoever and is blaming it on Trump for leaving him a mess. Our government sucks.

This is a complete cluster. Made up of every administration’s policy since we arrived there.

Every administration and both parties own this. The hypocrisy of anyone pointing fingers at only one is ignorant and typical for some. Hypocrisy has become the way of of behaving in this country.

I feel terribly for the suffering that will continue there. We are obviously powerless to stop it, and we don’t learn our lessons.

very well sad... we should have had a plan to pull out after OBL was killed.... we should have had a better plan to pull out with Trump... then with Biden.... now we get a cluster....

The Afghan government folded like…..

A lawn chair…

A cheap suitcase…

Or

The Afghan government crumbled like

Month old bread.

Your choice, but the US bears responsibility for upholding a puppet government..

Lambchop, Howdy Doody, King Friday, etc.

j/c

So I drop in at BookOfFace, and a friend/colleague of mine wrote this standalone post. It was a good zoom-out from the granular level we're discussing, and gives what I think is a great overview.

In several posts, I've talked about the tribal nature of the culture in that region. I've also used the quote, "The graveyard of empires" to describe Afghanistan. My Bro David took the time to flesh that out. Here's what he wrote:



His last paragraphs about American colonialism are part of his political POV. I happen to agree with his basic stance; I believe we play WorldCop too much. That said, I understand if others see it differently. I hope we don't get bogged down into that side discussion, because his overview of Afghanistan, its history and culture was the main reason I added him to the discussion.

...and yeah- he writes wordy-ass essays on message boards just like me.

Many afghan soldiers have been killed in defense of their country. It's bogus to say they didn't fight for their country.

The problem is twofold.

First, the Taliban never showed their strength until the pull out. They waited until the pullout. A serious lack of intel..or maybe more on point, a serious lack of listening to the intel.

Second, the turn over was more or less a all or nothing proposition. I don't think we should have just left. We should have maintained a airbase in country to add air support and protect our interests.

Now we are leaving to allow a fester breeding ground for terrorist activity and safe haven.

What's it going to cost the next time we have to go in after the next 911 type incident?

I don't blame the President for pulling out. I sure as hell hold him accountable for the way it was conducted, against the advice of the military, and the untold deaths that have and will happen. It's all on him and those defending him.

(Those meaning the decision makers)

The best and brightest CAN'T find a solution. Trillions of dollars and blood of OUR citizen's don't change a CULTURE developed over thousands of years. Those people must want to change to our way- obviously, most don't want to change.

Another example of "we should be able to fix the problem"- look up operation Wet Back- Eisenhower, his fix for Mexican illegal problem/s. If the poor see a better opportunity they will come and in numbers. It is the way of the world.

That comment gave me a thought. More philosophical in nature because I don't know how the details and logistics would work.

When we go into these countries, what do we do that would make them want to change?

If we did something like build a new city, American style. Clean, nice roads, water and electrical systems into the houses. And we use their people to build it under our supervision. Those workers get paid and paid well. Now they have money to buy food and fix the roof of their house etc. Now their lives are getting better and they see what life could be like in the future.

Yes I realize this would be difficult to do in an affordable and safe way that respects their history and culture. But again, I ask you not to get lost in the minutia of the details of how to do it but to discuss the philosophical concept I am proposing

Great posts Swish and Clem.

One thing I never will understand is the advertising of the pull out, that should be started before any news gets out about it.

I am sure Taliban scouts would have seen it starting and informed their superiors, but damn, lets put up a billboard with a date, run some TV ads, maybe mail out some flyers, send the Goodyear blimp flying over the Afgan mountains with a trailer.

As a country, we really need to look inside and re-examine our military purpose. Do we really need to bring Democracy to everyone, especially when to the outside world, our government is a bumbling mess, why WOULD they want to be like us?

We really need to focus on us for a while, fix ourselves.

you can't change a country where the people want nothing to do with you in the first place.

i swear to god i've been telling you guys this for god knows how long and yall still dont get it. at best, countries like afghanistan and iraq will turn into UAE, Bahrain or Qatar. those aren't western style countries. they're still glorified monarchies based theological text like the Quran. those countries are JUST like christians here in america.

they're muslim....but not really. due to good economic activity and such. and thats fine, because it works there.

you're not gonna swap countries like that to democracies because thats not how they operate. we've been spending trillions of dollars and thousands of americans lives to try and change the mentality of people in a region that wants nothing to do with us outside of trade agreements.

and no, they haven't been like this for thousands of years like people try to claim. people out there aren't freaking savages. they're just people. but they're NOT western style people.

so you can build all the roads and bridges you want, it wont matter the moment you start trying to suggest some western style government like America's or the EU.

you don't nation build in countries like that. you go in, find the target, destroy the target, and BOUNCE. if we would've done just that, we'd actually have a better relationship with the afghani's than we currently do.

you guys HAVE to be able to put yourselves in someone elses shoes to understand that point.

if i went to Jester and go "look man, i dont have any beef with you and your people, but this trash ass dude and his gang gotta pay for what they did. we're gonna find him, kill him, and leave", there's a great chance you're gonna go "cool, need any help?".

the moment i go "look man, i dont have any problem with your people, but the the way you live bothers me so im gonna rewrite the constitution and install puppets while searching for the dude that committed a terrorist act on our soil", i GUARANTEE you and others aren't gonna be cool with that.

and then if i go "yea we found who we were looking for, buuuuuttt, guess what we aint leaving", you're gonna have an even BIGGER problem with me.

but somehow, someway, people just can't seem to put themselves in other peoples shoes, look at it from another persons perspective.

and then on top of that, yall keep trying to look at the Taliban like a conventional enemy. from THEIR perspective, we're the ones who are the invaders, and they're defending their homeland. these guys are driving around in pickup trucks and flip flops using guerilla style tactics in order to hold off the American forces. this is not a conventional military we are fighting.

we're fighting the afghani equivalent of random militias spread throughout america talking about the 'south will rise again'. thats who we're fighting.

I wrote government, not military, there is a difference.

What did you expect when the president of Afghanistan bailed.