20 years of US-led Afghan nation-building

[frigidweirdo]

Yet no one dares say this. In a sane nation, we’d be marching on DC to stop these incessant wars. Unfortunately imperialism and arms industry profits rule the day.

The problem seems to be that the people are easily malleable. The politicians buy their votes, the arms industry buys their silence.

Talk about Proportional Representation and lots of people say they don't want it. Why? It's in their best interests. And yet they've never been told to like it, so they don't like it.

I could even go to the dollar bill as an example. Because Massachusetts has the company that makes the material for the bills, they make sure the dollar bills don't disappear. People say they don't want to lose the bills, even though it'd save them money.

Malleable people.

 

[frigidweirdo]

It's true Afghanistan has been a problem for countries that have decided to venture in, however we had for the most part already pulled out of the country. We only had between 2 - 3 thousand troops left in a supporting role.
That was hardly a problem for us considering the size of our military. SO by everyones logic here, its high time to pull out the 30,000 troops from Korea right?

Its really easy to sit there and say they should figure things out for themselves, but how are you supposed to do that when 14th century terrorists put a gun to the head of your wife and child? There are 2 societies there. One is an emerging society and the other one is retrograde and more violent and its pretty much assured now they will win. We simply needed to leave a few people there who's expertise was invaluable to a government trying to hang on. That wouldnt really be considered being a "parent" it would be more like a friend. We weren't telling them how to live their lives...... so you think its preferable now that Taliban can go from town to town forcing people to give them their 15 year old daughters? hey thats way better! And its way better now that terrorist groups can set up training camp again.

The US govt doesn't give a damn about whether 15 year old daughters get raped. The US will only go into places if US interests are important enough.

I'm not sure what your point about Korea is all about.

 

[odanny]

Can anyone find a country the US has imposed regime change on that has done well out of it?

You cannot force your will, ideology, and expertise on someone who is not interested, not motivated, and indifferent. When the opposition is battle hardened, motivated, and ideologically committed, you will ultimately face certain defeat.

 

[odanny]

There is not an American military analyst or strategic planner that did know the Afghan military would fold up like a $5 suitcase as soon as we pulled out. 20 years of training their military, and they barely put up a fight.




If there is a consistent theme over two decades of war in Afghanistan, it is the overestimation of the results of the $83 billion the United States has spent since 2001 training and equipping the Afghan security forces and an underestimation of the brutal, wily strategy of the Taliban. The Pentagon had issued dire warnings to Mr. Biden even before he took office about the potential for the Taliban to overrun the Afghan army, but intelligence estimates, now shown to have badly missed the mark, assessed it might happen in 18 months, not weeks.

Commanders did know that the afflictions of the Afghan forces had never been cured: the deep corruption, the failure by the government to pay many Afghan soldiers and police officers for months, the defections, the soldiers sent to the front without adequate food and water, let alone arms. In the past several days, the Afghan forces have steadily collapsed as they battled to defend ever shrinking territory, losing Mazar-i-Sharif, the country’s economic engine, to the Taliban on Saturday.

Mr. Biden’s aides say that the persistence of those problems reinforced his belief that the United States could not prop up the Afghan government and military in perpetuity. In Oval Office meetings this spring, he told aides that staying another year, or even five, would not make a substantial difference and was not worth the risks.

In the end, an Afghan force that did not believe in itself and a U.S. effort that Mr. Biden, and most Americans, no longer believed would alter the course of events combined to bring an ignoble close to America’s longest war. The United States kept forces in Afghanistan far longer than the British did in the 19th century, and twice as long as the Soviets — with roughly the same results.

20 Years of Defense, Erased by the Taliban in a Few Months (Published 2021)

Maps show the stunning speed of Taliban advances after the United States began to withdraw.

www.nytimes.com

Taliban Sweep in Afghanistan Follows Years of U.S. Miscalculations (Published 2021)

An Afghan military that did not believe in itself and a U.S. effort that Mr. Biden, and most Americans, no longer believed in brought an ignoble end to America’s longest war.

www.nytimes.com

 

[frigidweirdo]

You cannot force your will, ideology, and expertise on someone who is not interested, not motivated, and indifferent. When the opposition is battle hardened, motivated, and ideologically committed, you will ultimately face certain defeat.

The problem is the US govt and many Americans think the world is just America in other places.

They thought Iraq was just Americans living in a desert with lots of oil. So they assumed the Iraqis would be happy to be "liberated". Then the Iraqis weren't happy, and the US ended up mired in a bloody war and didn't know why.

 

[Yarddog]

The US govt doesn't give a damn about whether 15 year old daughters get raped. The US will only go into places if US interests are important enough.

I'm not sure what your point about Korea is all about.

Your not sure what the point about Korea is about? People complaining it was costing us too much money to keep 3,000 troops in Afghanistan..... while we have 30,000 in Korea and have had them there since the 1950s..... and we have had troops in Germany and japan since the 1940's.... how many years is that?

The US government may not care about abuses to civilians... but im pretty sure many of our soldiers do and so do some of the American people. Thats enough.

 

[frigidweirdo]

Your not sure what the point about Korea is about? People complaining it was costing us too much money to keep 3,000 troops in Afghanistan..... while we have 30,000 in Korea and have had them there since the 1950s..... and we have had troops in Germany and japan since the 1940's.... how many years is that?

The US government may not care about abuses to civilians... but im pretty sure many of our soldiers do and so do some of the American people. Thats enough.

We could point to all the places the US has troops. But if the US pulls out of Korea, North Korea isn't going to invade tomorrow. In fact the US has more troops in Japan and Germany. The US has something like 200,000 troops abroad. Yes, you can talk about this, I just don't get why South Korea is different.

Yes, citizens might care, citizens seem to care when the media paints things in a certain light. They care about Muslims in Afghanistan, they care about Muslims in Xinjiang, but they don't care about Muslims in Somalia, Iraq, Libya etc etc.

Amazing.

 

[Yarddog]

We could point to all the places the US has troops. But if the US pulls out of Korea, North Korea isn't going to invade tomorrow. In fact the US has more troops in Japan and Germany. The US has something like 200,000 troops abroad. Yes, you can talk about this, I just don't get why South Korea is different.

Yes, citizens might care, citizens seem to care when the media paints things in a certain light. They care about Muslims in Afghanistan, they care about Muslims in Xinjiang, but they don't care about Muslims in Somalia, Iraq, Libya etc etc.

Amazing.

You don't get the point do you? It wasn't really hurting us to keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan if it meant keeping some peace. Pull 2,500 troops out of Afghanistan and there are still U.S. troops being sent all over the world anyway.

As it is now... the way Biden and Harris decided to vacate Bahgram Air force base in the middle of the night, even catching the Afghan army off guard... was idiotic. But I know you will defend that, even as we have thousands of U.S citizens still trapped in country being told to check in to some website.

The only airstrip is surrounded... if the Taliban chose to mortar the tarmac there wouldnt be any flights leaving or coming. Our U.S. embassy? also gone, and all this could have been avoided
if Biden and Harris were able to coordinate a withdrawal with the Active Afghan troops.
Secondly... this pull out of Afghanistan was an Agreement with the Taliban... They had some obligations in this agreement..like not invading. There should have been consequences or else... forever our word will mean NOTHING. You think China is afraid of taking Taiwan? they are laughing their asses of at our weak pres, vice pres and national security advisors.
And they called Trump the J.V. team? this current bunch is making Jimmy Carter look like a military genius.

 

[frigidweirdo]

You don't get the point do you? It wasn't really hurting us to keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan if it meant keeping some peace. Pull 2,500 troops out of Afghanistan and there are still U.S. troops being sent all over the world anyway.

As it is now... the way Biden and Harris decided to vacate Bahgram Air force base in the middle of the night, even catching the Afghan army off guard... was idiotic. But I know you will defend that, even as we have thousands of U.S citizens still trapped in country being told to check in to some website.

The only airstrip is surrounded... if the Taliban chose to mortar the tarmac there wouldnt be any flights leaving or coming. Our U.S. embassy? also gone, and all this could have been avoided
if Biden and Harris were able to coordinate a withdrawal with the Active Afghan troops.
Secondly... this pull out of Afghanistan was an Agreement with the Taliban... They had some obligations in this agreement..like not invading. There should have been consequences or else... forever our word will mean NOTHING. You think China is afraid of taking Taiwan? they are laughing their asses of at our weak pres, vice pres and national security advisors.
And they called Trump the J.V. team? this current bunch is making Jimmy Carter look like a military genius.

The question here is, how did the US benefit from being in Afghanistan?

As far as I can see, the main benefit was that Afghanistan sits next to Iran, and the US isn't going to invade Iran any time soon. So, why should the US care?

AND the US was still paying a lot of money for the Afghan security forces who should have been able to hold back the Taliban.

The reality is they couldn't, and they couldn't because of the way the past three presidents have dealt with the situation. Was Biden going to change this? No. So then pulling out was for the best. Does it matter to the US is Afghanistan is in Taliban hands? No.

 

[Yarddog]

What did we gain by maintaining a small presence in Taliban? While I agree the draw downs of the last few years where we pulled out most of our troops were a good thing, I thought that leaving just a few special units to keep the dam from breaking was also a wise move for as long as it seemed necessary
SO, what benefit???? we will know what that benefit was in a couple years after more radical nut jobs travel to Afghanistan to join the Taliban as we saw happen once before. Now that this "new" Taliban controls infrastructure and weapons left behind by the U.S. they will once again become a terrorist training center to export terrorism.

Also, not all regular civilian Afghanis support the Taliban. Actually right now you can see they are being beaten.. shot and tortured already to keep them in line. The U.S. should be able to help people who long to see a little freedom. Yeah yeah, and you will say its not our place to go all over the world... but the thing is We were already there, so all we had to do was maintain.

Again... this was not an "endless war" we were no longer in WAR mode IN AFGHANISTAN for quite a number of years now.
But the thing is... the real endless war of radical islam against the west DOES continue and that is not going away, and now we have handed those people a huge advantage.

When China takes over Taiwan, because now the message is clear we stand up for no one who wants freedom.... then we will also see what benefit for keeping a presence there was. All of our enemies around the world will now actually gain from this move.

Anyway, its done now and is what it is but still IMO I believe keeping that small force was less costly compared to what we will no face coming up. I hope I'm wrong.

Also it was completely IDIOTIC for the Biden admin to evacuate Baghram airforce base first.... no they are limited to one air strip in Kabul which can be easily surrounded and controlled by the Taliban. These clowns in Washington actually did not have a plan other than pull out troops on a specific date....that is not a plan. I'm sorry, but what fucking idiots.