Afghanistan is Collapsing. Get Out: dudes in bedsheets and flip-flops is kicking Uncle Sam's ass

[C_Clayton_Jones]

The invasion of Afghanistan had nothing to do with 9/11.

And although it’s perfectly appropriate and warranted to get out the failure that is US involvement in Afghanistan, that’s not going happen any time soon – no president wants to be the president who ‘lost’ Afghanistan.

 

[Pilot1]

Obama had EIGHT YEARS to get us out, yet escalated it instead. Why?

 

[Correll]

The USA should never have got itself bogged in Afghanistan. There was no reason to attack or invade.

The USA is repeating the mistakes of the past in Afghanistan and it is possible that a major military defeat could cause the USA to cut and run leaving behind a horrific mess.

The First Coward Donald Trump is too afraid to visit either Iraq or Afghanistan.

"A bunch of dudes in bedsheets and flip-flops is kicking Uncle Sam's ass ... various nations have the economic wherewithal to spend $10s of billions each month to fund it all. And for almost 10 years we have pitted this unbelievable and unprecedented capability against: A bunch of dudes in bed sheets and flip-flops."

Afghanistan is Collapsing. Get Out: Now!

Afghanistan is Collapsing. Get Out: Now!
by BRIAN CLOUGHLEY

November has been quite a month, so far, in Afghanistan. The level of violence has been appalling and the most serious recent atrocity was yet another suicide bombing in Kabul. It killed over fifty people and injured twice that many but didn’t merit a Trump tweet, which isn’t surprising because he doesn’t seem to be interested in the place. Further, as reported by the Washington Post on November 19, he hasn’t visited a single country in which his troops are fighting.

The reason he hasn’t visited his troops in such areas is because he is a coward. He is a physical yellow-belly who lacks the courage to go anywhere near a war zone. He is below contempt, but he could gain a little bit of respect if he ordered the US and NATO to get out of Afghanistan.

Early in November the New York Times summed up the shambles in Afghanistan by stating
In the past week, the Times confirmed that 118 members of the security forces were killed, a significant increase over the previous week, but, unusually, there were no confirmed deaths of civilians. Fighting spread to nine provinces, but the emphasis shifted to the south as cold weather intensified in the north. An entire battalion of Afghan border soldiers was wiped out in western Farah Province, and the Taliban tried — unsuccessfully so far — to take over Jaghori District in Ghazni, an anti-insurgent stronghold.

On November 3 yet another US soldier was killed by a member of Afghanistan’s military forces. Major Brent Taylor of the Utah National Guard was instructing Afghan soldiers when one of them shot him dead. He left a wife and seven young children. On the same day, as reported by the New York Times, twenty Afghan soldiers were reported missing after a Taliban attack in Uruzgan Province, and on November 5, six policemen and seven soldiers were killed in Ghazni, two Afghan Humvees were blown up, 17 policemen were killed in Kandahar Province and seven soldiers in Herat.

Seven soldiers were killed on November 7, two of them in Nangarhar Province in an airstrike by United States aircraft while NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was visiting foreign troops in Herat. The following day seventeen soldiers were killed along with eight policemen.

After the NYT’s report that no civilians had been killed in the first week, the situation changed dramatically and the Taliban killed 15 civilians and 10 members of the special forces in Ghazni on November 11, then “In the western province of Farah, at least 37 members of the Afghan security forces were killed in overnight attacks by Taliban fighters on checkpoints that triggered hours of fighting, local officials said on November 12.” That was the day that a loonie of Islamic State killed at least six civilians and wounded 20 others in a suicide bombing in Kabul.

Stoltenberg told foreign soldiers in Herat they “have to remember that you are in Afghanistan because NATO is in Afghanistan to make sure that Afghanistan never again becomes a safe haven for international terrorism. So this is about helping the Afghans but also about helping ourselves. It is in our security interest to make sure that Afghanistan not once again becomes a platform, a territory, a country where terrorist organizations can prepare, plan attacks against our own countries.”

This is fallacious nonsense, but he’s got to say it because there is no real reason for the NATO presence in Afghanistan. In the words of the World War One dirge sung by British soldiers in France, “We’re here, because we’re here, because we’re here . . .”

They got there because the United States was hell-bent on war. And this war has had a most significant and disastrous spin-off that the drum-thumpers didn’t think about. It has shown the world that there has been yet another war which the US couldn’t and can’t win.

The foreign soldiers killed in Afghanistan — almost 3,500 of them, including 1,892 American combatants — have died for nothing. The entire war has been a disgraceful catastrophe, and as I recorded in Counterpunch in 2012, the US-NATO fiasco was well described by US Colonel David Davis:
The United States, along with over 40 NATO and other allied nations, possesses the most sophisticated, powerful, and technologically advanced military force that has ever hit the field of combat. We have the finest and most well trained soldiers that exist anywhere; we have armored vehicles of every type, to include MIA2 Main Battle Tanks; artillery, mortars, advanced rockets, precision guided missiles, and hand-held rocket launchers; we have a wholly uncontested air force composed of NATO’s most advanced ground attack fighter jets, bombers, AWACS controllers, spy planes, signals-interception aircraft, B 1 bombers, attack helicopters, and massive transport jets to ferry our troops and critical supplies where they are needed; we have thousands of unmanned aerial drones both for intelligence collection and missile-launching; we have a helicopter fleet for personnel transport and attack support; we have an enormous constellation of spy satellites; logistics that are as limitless as the combined weight of the industrial world; we have every technological device known to the profession of arms; we are able to intercept virtually every form of insurgent communication to include cell phones, walkie-talkies, satellite phones, email, and even some ability to eavesdrop on otherwise private conversations; a remarkably capable cohort of intelligence analysts that are as educated, well trained and equipped to a degree that used to exist only in science fiction; and our various nations have the economic wherewithal to spend $10s of billions each month to fund it all. And for almost 10 years we have pitted this unbelievable and unprecedented capability against: A bunch of dudes in bed sheets and flip-flops.

Remember the idiot General Petraeus? In 2010 he declared “We must demonstrate to the people and to the Taliban that Afghan and International Security Assistance Forces are here to safeguard the Afghan people and that we are in this to win. That is our clear objective.”

But they lost. And there’s no point in reinforcing failure. US-NATO forces failed to follow almost every Principle of War, and they paid the price.

Get the hell out of Afghanistan. Now.

No reason to attack a nation supported the murder of thousand of our civilians?

YOur vileness knows no limits, TRAITOR.

Your dogma infusion has poisoned your mind.

9/11 was caused by a failure of US institutions: the FBI, CIA, NSA, GOP, Pentagon, Airforce, NORAD, Airlines.

Perhaps these instituitons need to train against "dudes in bedsheets and flip-flops".

Funny how lefties get so confused about responsibility.


Bin Laden led the mass murder of Americans, and the government of Afghanistan of the time, refused to give him to US.


And you dismissed the deaths of thousands of Americans.


You are a vile traitor.

 

[JoeB131]

Obama had EIGHT YEARS to get us out, yet escalated it instead. Why?

Because getting out was never his goal.

In fact, the real problem with Obama's policy towards Afghanistan was that he called it the "War of Necessity" that had to be won while Iraq was the 'War of choice".

But the reality- Afghanistan became unwinnable when Karzai stole the 2009 election.

 

[protectionist]

Obama had EIGHT YEARS to get us out, yet escalated it instead. Why?

Post # 19 explained why. Once again >>

George Clooney on Obama and Pakistan

US has 'snatch-and-grab' plan for Pak's nuclear weapons - Times of India

Pakistan Carts Its Nukes Around In Delivery Vans

The Ally From Hell - The Atlantic

 

[protectionist]

Because getting out was never his goal.

In fact, the real problem with Obama's policy towards Afghanistan was that he called it the "War of Necessity" that had to be won while Iraq was the 'War of choice".

But the reality- Afghanistan became unwinnable when Karzai stole the 2009 election.

Afghanistan is not a win or lose. It is a defend scenario. I could foresee US Troops in Afghanistan, and other Muslim areas of the world, 100, 200, 500, even 1000 years from now.Islamic jihad will never cease, and US need to defend against it won't either. There is no end.

Jihadists will never reform, as Christians did 500 years ago. Islam has been jihadist by the Koran for as long as it has existed. It can't reform because they only thing that could reform it is to change the words of the Koran.

Change the Koran ? In 1400 years, not one word of the Koran has ever been changed. That's because Muslims believe it to be the word of God, and the word of God can't be changed.

 

[JoeB131]

Funny how lefties get so confused about responsibility.

Bin Laden led the mass murder of Americans, and the government of Afghanistan of the time, refused to give him to US.

And you dismissed the deaths of thousands of Americans.

You are a vile traitor.

That might be a good excuse to invade then, but why are we still there NOW?

And although it’s perfectly appropriate and warranted to get out the failure that is US involvement in Afghanistan, that’s not going happen any time soon – no president wants to be the president who ‘lost’ Afghanistan.

But he might not have a choice. The Afghan government barely controls the region around Kabul. this is the same problem that South Vietnam had, where the president of the RVN was barely the mayor of Saigon.

 

[Harry Dresden]

The invasion of Afghanistan had nothing to do with 9/11.

And although it’s perfectly appropriate and warranted to get out the failure that is US involvement in Afghanistan, that’s not going happen any time soon – no president wants to be the president who ‘lost’ Afghanistan.

The invasion of Afghanistan had nothing to do with 9/11.
it didnt?....

 

[Pilot1]

Afghanistan is not a win or lose. It is a defend scenario.

So, we have to stay in Afghanistan indefinitely due to the fact that Pakistan has nukes? I don't believe that at all. Other, more hostile countries have nukes, and we aren't involved in HOT wars in neighboring countries.

 

[protectionist]

So, we have to stay in Afghanistan indefinitely due to the fact that Pakistan has nukes? I don't believe that at all. Other, more hostile countries have nukes, and we aren't involved in HOT wars in neighboring countries.

You may not believe it. The Pentagon has believed it for 20 years, and still does. Read the links in Post # 19 to get updated.

 

[Rambunctious]

Never before has a nation been so stupid and corrupt as to hold down and freeze military spending via a sequester at a time of war...if you ask me...any deaths of our troops since the sequester is on the hands of the cowards in DC...beginning with Obama....

 

[Oldstyle]

The USA should never have got itself bogged in Afghanistan. There was no reason to attack or invade.

The USA is repeating the mistakes of the past in Afghanistan and it is possible that a major military defeat could cause the USA to cut and run leaving behind a horrific mess.

The First Coward Donald Trump is too afraid to visit either Iraq or Afghanistan.

"A bunch of dudes in bedsheets and flip-flops is kicking Uncle Sam's ass ... various nations have the economic wherewithal to spend $10s of billions each month to fund it all. And for almost 10 years we have pitted this unbelievable and unprecedented capability against: A bunch of dudes in bed sheets and flip-flops."

Afghanistan is Collapsing. Get Out: Now!

Afghanistan is Collapsing. Get Out: Now!
by BRIAN CLOUGHLEY

November has been quite a month, so far, in Afghanistan. The level of violence has been appalling and the most serious recent atrocity was yet another suicide bombing in Kabul. It killed over fifty people and injured twice that many but didn’t merit a Trump tweet, which isn’t surprising because he doesn’t seem to be interested in the place. Further, as reported by the Washington Post on November 19, he hasn’t visited a single country in which his troops are fighting.

The reason he hasn’t visited his troops in such areas is because he is a coward. He is a physical yellow-belly who lacks the courage to go anywhere near a war zone. He is below contempt, but he could gain a little bit of respect if he ordered the US and NATO to get out of Afghanistan.

Early in November the New York Times summed up the shambles in Afghanistan by stating
In the past week, the Times confirmed that 118 members of the security forces were killed, a significant increase over the previous week, but, unusually, there were no confirmed deaths of civilians. Fighting spread to nine provinces, but the emphasis shifted to the south as cold weather intensified in the north. An entire battalion of Afghan border soldiers was wiped out in western Farah Province, and the Taliban tried — unsuccessfully so far — to take over Jaghori District in Ghazni, an anti-insurgent stronghold.

On November 3 yet another US soldier was killed by a member of Afghanistan’s military forces. Major Brent Taylor of the Utah National Guard was instructing Afghan soldiers when one of them shot him dead. He left a wife and seven young children. On the same day, as reported by the New York Times, twenty Afghan soldiers were reported missing after a Taliban attack in Uruzgan Province, and on November 5, six policemen and seven soldiers were killed in Ghazni, two Afghan Humvees were blown up, 17 policemen were killed in Kandahar Province and seven soldiers in Herat.

Seven soldiers were killed on November 7, two of them in Nangarhar Province in an airstrike by United States aircraft while NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was visiting foreign troops in Herat. The following day seventeen soldiers were killed along with eight policemen.

After the NYT’s report that no civilians had been killed in the first week, the situation changed dramatically and the Taliban killed 15 civilians and 10 members of the special forces in Ghazni on November 11, then “In the western province of Farah, at least 37 members of the Afghan security forces were killed in overnight attacks by Taliban fighters on checkpoints that triggered hours of fighting, local officials said on November 12.” That was the day that a loonie of Islamic State killed at least six civilians and wounded 20 others in a suicide bombing in Kabul.

Stoltenberg told foreign soldiers in Herat they “have to remember that you are in Afghanistan because NATO is in Afghanistan to make sure that Afghanistan never again becomes a safe haven for international terrorism. So this is about helping the Afghans but also about helping ourselves. It is in our security interest to make sure that Afghanistan not once again becomes a platform, a territory, a country where terrorist organizations can prepare, plan attacks against our own countries.”

This is fallacious nonsense, but he’s got to say it because there is no real reason for the NATO presence in Afghanistan. In the words of the World War One dirge sung by British soldiers in France, “We’re here, because we’re here, because we’re here . . .”

They got there because the United States was hell-bent on war. And this war has had a most significant and disastrous spin-off that the drum-thumpers didn’t think about. It has shown the world that there has been yet another war which the US couldn’t and can’t win.

The foreign soldiers killed in Afghanistan — almost 3,500 of them, including 1,892 American combatants — have died for nothing. The entire war has been a disgraceful catastrophe, and as I recorded in Counterpunch in 2012, the US-NATO fiasco was well described by US Colonel David Davis:
The United States, along with over 40 NATO and other allied nations, possesses the most sophisticated, powerful, and technologically advanced military force that has ever hit the field of combat. We have the finest and most well trained soldiers that exist anywhere; we have armored vehicles of every type, to include MIA2 Main Battle Tanks; artillery, mortars, advanced rockets, precision guided missiles, and hand-held rocket launchers; we have a wholly uncontested air force composed of NATO’s most advanced ground attack fighter jets, bombers, AWACS controllers, spy planes, signals-interception aircraft, B 1 bombers, attack helicopters, and massive transport jets to ferry our troops and critical supplies where they are needed; we have thousands of unmanned aerial drones both for intelligence collection and missile-launching; we have a helicopter fleet for personnel transport and attack support; we have an enormous constellation of spy satellites; logistics that are as limitless as the combined weight of the industrial world; we have every technological device known to the profession of arms; we are able to intercept virtually every form of insurgent communication to include cell phones, walkie-talkies, satellite phones, email, and even some ability to eavesdrop on otherwise private conversations; a remarkably capable cohort of intelligence analysts that are as educated, well trained and equipped to a degree that used to exist only in science fiction; and our various nations have the economic wherewithal to spend $10s of billions each month to fund it all. And for almost 10 years we have pitted this unbelievable and unprecedented capability against: A bunch of dudes in bed sheets and flip-flops.

Remember the idiot General Petraeus? In 2010 he declared “We must demonstrate to the people and to the Taliban that Afghan and International Security Assistance Forces are here to safeguard the Afghan people and that we are in this to win. That is our clear objective.”

But they lost. And there’s no point in reinforcing failure. US-NATO forces failed to follow almost every Principle of War, and they paid the price.

Get the hell out of Afghanistan. Now.

No reason to attack Afghanistan? Really? You mean no reason other than it was run by the Taliban who was hosting the scum bag who just masterminded flying commercial jets full of innocent people into the Twin Towers...also full of innocent people? Why don't you go f**k yourself, dude! If that wasn't a reason to invade another country then there IS no reason!

 

[Pilot1]

I always thought Iran was more a driver for our presence in Afghanistan than Pakistan. They entire region is a CLUSTER.

 

[JGalt]

Because getting out was never his goal.

In fact, the real problem with Obama's policy towards Afghanistan was that he called it the "War of Necessity" that had to be won while Iraq was the 'War of choice".

But the reality- Afghanistan became unwinnable when Karzai stole the 2009 election.

Afghanistan is not a win or lose. It is a defend scenario. I could foresee US Troops in Afghanistan, and other Muslim areas of the world, 100, 200, 500, even 1000 years from now.Islamic jihad will never cease, and US need to defend against it won't either. There is no end.

Jihadists will never reform, as Christians did 500 years ago. Islam has been jihadist by the Koran for as long as it has existed. It can't reform because they only thing that could reform it is to change the words of the Koran.

Change the Koran ? In 1400 years, not one word of the Koran has ever been changed. That's because Muslims believe it to be the word of God, and the word of God can't be changed.

I don't believe that. Japanese Imperialist soldiers and stalwart Nazi German SS units were every bit as much fanatic as your everyday average radical Islamic.

The problem is that we don't fight wars in the manner we did during WW2. We had no compunction against incinerating hundreds of thousands of civilians then, like we do now. If anything, our own "political correctness" will cause us to be shamed in the Middle East.

We no longer have the stomach to win wars, as we did during those times. Modern-day military leaders don't understand that to make an enemy not want to fight anymore, you not only have to kill them, but their wives, their children, their parents, their aunts and uncles, their grandparents, and their livestock. Then raze their dwellings and plow it all under the ground.

It's only after the enemy has been shown how brutal we are willing to be, that they lose their will to fight.

 

[JoeB131]

Afghanistan is not a win or lose. It is a defend scenario. I could foresee US Troops in Afghanistan, and other Muslim areas of the world, 100, 200, 500, even 1000 years from now.Islamic jihad will never cease, and US need to defend against it won't either. There is no end.

Or we could just mind our own fucking business... that would work, too.

Jihadists will never reform, as Christians did 500 years ago. Islam has been jihadist by the Koran for as long as it has existed. It can't reform because they only thing that could reform it is to change the words of the Koran.

Um, guy, there are 1.6 Billion Muslims in the world. If they were all "Jihadists", you would be truly and royally fucked.

Change the Koran ? In 1400 years, not one word of the Koran has ever been changed. That's because Muslims believe it to be the word of God, and the word of God can't be changed.

Okay, reality check, buddy. Most Muslims look at the more savage aspects of the Koran the way we look at the more savage aspects of the Bible... 'That was then..."

 

[protectionist]

I don't believe that. Japanese Imperialist soldiers and stalwart Nazi German SS units were every bit as much fanatic as your everyday average radical Islamic.

The problem is that we don't fight wars in the manner we did during WW2. We had no compunction against incinerating hundreds of thousands of civilians then, like we do now. If anything, our own "political correctness" will cause us to be shamed in the Middle East.

We no longer have the stomach to win wars, as we did during those times. Modern-day military leaders don't understand that to make an enemy not want to fight anymore, you not only have to kill them, but their wives, their children, their parents, their aunts and uncles, their grandparents, and their livestock. Then raze their dwellings and plow it all under the ground.

It's only after the enemy has been shown how brutal we are willing to be, that they lose their will to fight.

Jihadists will never lose their will to fight. they believe God is on their side. And the Japs and Nazis did not have a 1400 year fanaticism.

 

[JoeB131]

The problem is that we don't fight wars in the manner we did during WW2. We had no compunction against incinerating hundreds of thousands of civilians then, like we do now. If anything, our own "political correctness" will cause us to be shamed in the Middle East.

We no longer have the stomach to win wars, as we did during those times. Modern-day military leaders don't understand that to make an enemy not want to fight anymore, you not only have to kill them, but their wives, their children, their parents, their aunts and uncles, their grandparents, and their livestock. Then raze their dwellings and plow it all under the ground.

It's only after the enemy has been shown how brutal we are willing to be, that they lose their will to fight.

Okay, you realize that most of the fighting in WWII was done by Russians, not Americans.. If we took the kinds of fatalities Russia did, we'd have gotten sick of it. In fact, Americans were sick of the war by 1945.

You essentially have four years to win a war, before people get sick of it. We passed that a long time ago.

 

[Pilot1]

Military professionals know, or used to know that to win a fight, and actually minimize overall losses you need to be extreme VIOLENT. You lose more people on both sides by having ridiculous Rules of Engagement, and policy that just prolongs wars. Look at Iraq, and Afghanistan. We also saw it in Vietnam. Keep fighting with one, or both hands tied behind your back, and you will do just that, KEEP FIGHTING, and fighting, and fighting...….

 

[Manonthestreet]

Pretty sure Obama said he was going to end but somehow never got around to it. And yes I wish Trump would tell the generals to pack it in....they still have no idea what they are doing

 

[JGalt]

I don't believe that. Japanese Imperialist soldiers and stalwart Nazi German SS units were every bit as much fanatic as your everyday average radical Islamic.

The problem is that we don't fight wars in the manner we did during WW2. We had no compunction against incinerating hundreds of thousands of civilians then, like we do now. If anything, our own "political correctness" will cause us to be shamed in the Middle East.

We no longer have the stomach to win wars, as we did during those times. Modern-day military leaders don't understand that to make an enemy not want to fight anymore, you not only have to kill them, but their wives, their children, their parents, their aunts and uncles, their grandparents, and their livestock. Then raze their dwellings and plow it all under the ground.

It's only after the enemy has been shown how brutal we are willing to be, that they lose their will to fight.

Jihadists will never lose their will to fight. they believe God is on their side. And the Japs and Nazis did not have a 1400 year fanaticism.

Really? I take it then that you've probably never seen a WW1 or WW2 German belt buckle? Gott Mit Uns translates to "God is with us."

The WW2 Japanese believed that their Emperor was a god too.