Let's be clear about Afghanistan: If after 20 years, and 832,000 American troops serving there...

[Drunken Irishman]

...areas of the country are this quick to fall to the Taliban, there was nothing we ever could have done to salvage that situation. This does not mean pulling troops from Afghanistan was the wrong decision. In fact, it validates the decision of both Trump and Biden (as much as I hate to say it for Trump).

Here's the reality: The US military has consistently said they need at least 14,000 troops in Afghanistan to keep any semblance of stability. A huge number of those troops were brought home even before Biden won the election.

The Taliban also agreed to a ceasefire with US forces contingent on the US leaving Afghanistan in 2021. If Biden had opted to go back on Trump's agreement, the ceasefire would have ended and we would have been woefully underequipped at these troop levels to maintain any level of peace in Afghanistan.

So, don't let the narrative get out that it was a decision between withdrawing and the status quo. That absolutely is not the option.

The real option facing Biden was withdrawing completely or committing at least 14,000 more troops to the country because remaining with the amount they had at the beginning of Biden's presidency would have been a fruitless endeavor.

Are we wiling to do yet another surge knowing that the surge Obama oversaw, and that Trump oversaw in his first year as president, essentially failed?

Afghanistan has absolutely turned into the definition of insanity. It is an unwinnable situation. This is not like Germany or even Korea where we have an active presence - this is a combat zone. If there was a radical sect of Germans attempting to overthrow the German government, that might be a little bit better of a comparison but that's not the situation in most these areas of the world where the United States is still active.

It's unfortunate what is going on there but we have to concede as a nation that we've done everything we can to turn that country around and to bring a democratic government that is sustainable - and it hasn't happened. The only way we can seem to bring democracy to Afghanistan is by gunpoint and that is not sustainable.

We spent 20 years there and we still haven't defined what the goal of objective is. What's the endgame for these conservatives?

Biden did the right move withdrawing from Afghanistan - at least compared to the other options.

[JohnSJ]

1. Absolutely

[Kaleva]

2. I agree.

[Effete Snob]

3. We should have evacuated our friends first

There are a lot of people who are going to die as a result of their decision to help us. We have mishandled our responsibility to them.

[Rustyeye77]

4. Yes ...but...

The innocent young girls I feel bad about especially.( Yes I feel bad for all the innocents.)

No school-no learning
Burkas
Sex Slaves
treated like shit

I'm not into prayers but I pray they can escape somehow.

[Dream Girl]

8. That's the lot of women all over the world.

[Rustyeye77]

10. Maybe but Afghanistan is one of the worst.

No sane person would want their daughter to be there.

I hope some of the girls get out of there in one piece.

[Dream Girl]

13. Yes it probably is one of the worst.

[IronLionZion]

29. It's not that great for girls in Saudi Arabia or other mid-east countries either

and it was hell for them in Iraq and Syria during ISIS. Life is relatively good for girls in the Kurdish areas, but Trump easily let them be slaughtered by our Turkish allies.

[Polybius]

60. It's not great for little boys in Afghanistan either

I've read horror stories about rape.

[Sympthsical]

48. Boys, too

Bacha bazi.

American troops tried to put a lid on it. Didn't really work.

It's shitty for children in that country all around.

[Polybius]

61. Yeah, one soldier knocked out an Afghani soldier for raping a boy

He was reprimanded!

[Deuxcents]

6. I believe I read somewhere

That not one “army” in history has even been successful in Afghanistan. I, too, worry about the children..especially the girls who need education n could help change their lives. They’re in the Stone Age with 21st century arms n ammunition. Just nutz

[Rustyeye77]

12. Thank you.

[mcar]

26. One of the reasons the USSR collapsed

[EX500rider]

42. Actually it has been conquered successfully many times in history.

By the Achaemenid Persians, by Alexander, by the Saffarid Muslims, by the Mauryan Indians, by the Mongols, by the Timurid Empire, by the Mughals, etc.
The issue was always it was too poor a country to bother keeping enough troops in it to hold it long term.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Afghanistan

[Drum]

7. I welcome this perspective, on the topic.

[Xolodno]

9. As I wrote in another post.

Afghanistan is not a nation and never will be again.

It's kind of like a modern day Sparta without the glitz, glamor and whitewashing of a Hollywood movie.

I say partition what can be kept by nationality and let rest rot until it collapses on itself in a century. Eventually they will find a cure for opium addiction and the Taliban's economy will tank.

[A HERETIC I AM]

11. Economy?

They don’t have an economy.

They have a religious ideology stuck in the 12th century.

The only thing that will change their hold on that culture is the education of women, and the men KNOW that. And that’s why they will never allow girls and women to get a proper, modern, western style education.

[Xolodno]

14. Even a small village that trades with rocks has an economy.

How do you think they purchased their weapons and ammo on the black market....they traded the opium they were selling.

And its not the lack of education of women, its the lack of education on everyone. For them, one part of the year is growing and harvesting poppies. Make opium. Sell Opium. Buy weapons and ammo. The rest is shoot at foreigners or raid a rival village.

That's it. And yes, they are stuck in the dark ages and everyone who didn't want to be left a long time ago. For those who are there now and don't like it, well, they see it as their opportunity to get out the shit hole.

If history tells us anything, their society won't last. Just that its going to be a very long time before their way of life finally collapses. Probably not in our life times for sure.

[Rustyeye77]

16. The young girls and boys will never have a future.

[BannonsLiver]

15. I think Afghanistan is the country it wants to be.

And I concur with your excellent analysis.

[former9thward]

17. All good points

I was in Afghanistan in 2002 and I can't believe we are still there 19 years later.

[AverageOldGuy]

18. Well . . .

I was there in 1976 and I could not believe we were still there after 45 years -- with a few interruptions -- Al Qaeda, Russians . . . .

[joetheman]

19. All we had to do was ask Russia about fighting a long war in Afghanistan...we never learn from

history.

[Shanti Shanti Shanti]

20. Not done "President Biden sending in B-52s and C 130 gunships to stop Taliban.." ..bounce the rubble

[Amishman]

21. Democracy and liberty not appear to be compatible with the prevailing culture

Nation building there is a waste of time, lives, and money.

We should focus on fixing our own broken country

[Chainfire]

22. The question we need to ask ourselves is

after 20 years are we any safer and are the Afghans any better off. All of our sacrifices of blood and treasure, not to mention the blood of the Afghans, were for nothing. WAR, huh, good God y'all, what it is good for? Absolutely nothing! (unless of course, you build weapons)

It only remains to be seen to where we take our war show on the road to next time. We have been to the jungles, the mountains and the deserts, what is left? The far right wants to bring it to a city near you.

[EX500rider]

43. "..and are the Afghans any better off."

They are yes,
In early 2001 only a million children were in school, all of them boys. Now there are over eight million in school and 40 percent are girls. Back then there were only 10,000 phones in the country, all very expensive landlines in cities. Now there are over 22 million inexpensive cell phones with access even in remote rural areas. Back then less than ten percent of the population had access to any health care, now a least 80 percent do and life expectancy has risen from 47 years (the lowest in Eurasia) to 62 (leaving Bangladesh to occupy last place). This is apparently the highest life expectancy has ever been in Afghanistan and the UN noted it was the highest one decade increase ever recorded. Afghans have noticed this even if the rest of the world has not.
GDP has grown continuously since 2001 with average family income increasing noticeably each year.

[Chainfire]

44. And, now, that the country is going to revert to the Taliban, how long will it last?

We have tried to Americanize a lot of people since WWII. Our success rate is not stunning.

[EX500rider]

55. Trying to drag Afghanistan into the last century is hardly "Americanizing" them

Unless you think every other democracy with human rights in the world has been "Americanized"

[mcar]

23. I feel so badly for Afghan women

but the country has had 20 years of help to get its act together.

[Warpy]

24. If we had committed 24,000 troops and our treasury to the stability of that country

for another 20 years, we'd only have postponed the inevitable. Afghanistan is going to be what it is as soon as we get out of their way.

In the short term, that means the Taliban, the only group well enough organized to oust what is widely seen as a western puppet government and maintain order in the country. We can hope that 20 years of our presence has softened their ideas about ruling over women and girl children, but I'm not going to make any bets on that.

They do have a chance of moderating after an initial period of de-westernization I hope that happens, they were progressing before the USSR came in and initially fucked things up. I just hope we can keep war hawks and other jackasses from making the same dumb blunders we've been making with Iran.

[SouthernDem4ever]

25. You can add any religious/fascist run country to this

They are impossible to change. If they don't do it themselves, it will never happen.

[Richard D]

27. It's called . . .

. . . The Graveyard of Empires for a reason.

[Klaralven]

28. The US just doesn't have the stomach for killing enough people to pacify a country

We need to leave that to the Stalins and Maos. (Or maybe Putin in the case of Chechnya.)

[harumph]

36. Yes, for better or worse, spot on.

You know, the educated class in Afghanistan just wanted us to
cut the Taliban grass very very low - so to speak. We should have
pressed Pakistan who gave the Taliban shelter and arms.
I know this seems illiberal of me - but one should kill terrorists.

The US also appears to lack the stomach to face domestic reality.
The reality of climate change, food scarcity, etc..., inequities in educational opportunity and
institute policies for the common good to mitigate our dire problems.

[orangecrush]

30. Can we send Trump and his family and followers there?

They'll fit right in.

[BobTheSubgenius]

31. The only alternative to withdrawing is going all-in.

Bolster the troop contingent, build more robust outposts and prepare for generations of occupation.

There is no reasonable alternative to withdrawing.

[Tetrachloride]

32. I am 5000 miles closer to Afghanistan than nearly all DU members

The majority of the Americans in the region this past 100 years carried weapons. Some had oil dollars. Then there is tourist dollars. Lastly are any kind of social aid without guns or oil.

I see at least one Old Hand who may have met a member of my extended family while in South Asia. it’s possible.

About once a week, people tell me, sorry i didn’t know you were American. On the other hand, dozens of people know me as The American.

The fact is there are not enough First Worlders to be on the same level as the people who need help.

Try to not think of guns and bribes as the first thing to use.

[Hulk]

33. Lets make EVERY effort to get our allies out of there now....

We have the time. We can at least get them out of Afghanistan...and to a holding country until we can evacuate all of them to safety. We owe it to them. Let's not let what happened to the Kurds happen to these poor souls.

[RANDYWILDMAN]

34. Endgame engame endgame

There is no endgame and their never was. The problem was, people jumped in without much planning and just went from there...the people who benefitted were the MIC and the oil and gas industry.

[albacore]

35. Speaking as a veteran of the Southeast Asia War Games....(We got the Silver Medal for 2nd place)

Can anybody tell me a war that we have won since 1945?

You'd think we'd learn to cut our losses earlier than 20 years into a war with no hope in hell of our winning.

(All that blood... all that treasure. For nothing.)

[Klaralven]

37. United States invasion of Grenada

Codenamed Operation Urgent Fury by the U.S. military, it resulted in military occupation within a few days.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_invasion_of_Grenada

[albacore]

40. From your source.... hardly a victory.. a political/diplomatic disaster, actually.

1500 Grenadian "troops" equipped with small arms, 64 Cuban troops equipped with small arms....

vs...

"The invading force consisted of the US Army's 1st and 2nd battalions of the 75th Ranger Regiment, the 82nd Airborne and the Army's rapid deployment force, Marines, Army Delta Force, Navy SEALs, and ancillary forces totaling 7,600 troops, together with Jamaican forces and troops of the Regional Security System (RSS).

The United Nations General Assembly condemned it as "a flagrant violation of international law" on 2 November 1983 with a vote of 108 to 9."

Nothing against the troops who were there... and the 18 Americans killed... but there were more medals given out than troops in the fight. Cuban forces sustained 25 killed. Grenadian forces suffered 45 dead. At least 24 civilians were also killed, 18 of whom died in the accidental bombing of a Grenadian mental hospital.

Not a victory.... a shameful clusterfuck. Like the rest of them.

[Klaralven]

58. If you don't like Grenada, how about Panama?

United States invasion of Panama

The United States Invasion of Panama, codenamed Operation Just Cause, lasted over a month between mid-December 1989 and late January 1990.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_invasion_of_Panama#Legality

[Lancero]

47. Big strong US military, kicking the shit out a nation with 111k people.

Great proof that we can only beat up on little nations these days.

If thats the only military 'accomplishment' that we can take pride in these days, then our military truly is useless and good for only pissing away money.

[marie999]

38. Can anybody tell me a war we fought since 1945 that should even have been fought.

The only reason there was a Korean war was that Russia and the US decided to split the country in 2 just like we tried to keep Vietnam split in 2. We did not invade Grenada to protect American students there, we could have found a better way to keep them from lengthening their runways.

[albacore]

46. War against world hunger and disease... maybe?

Air Force B-52 loads of food and clothing and drinkable water. Paratroops carrying medicine and medics. US Navy vessels choking ports with needed supplies for starving/hurting people. Marines guarding shipments. Big US flags on all the supplies....that would satisfy the US nationalists.


I've always advocated bombing the Taliban with DVD players pre-loaded with soft porn... big-titted blondes running on beaches and like that.
Bomb 'em with Big Macs.
Distract and co-opt the bad guys. Shit... buy them off. How much did it cost to kill one Taliban fighter? We could bomb them with Benjamins...get that money spread out to the people. It's worth a try. The other way ain't workin'.

[marie999]

49. Those are wars worth fighting.

[EX500rider]

51. "Can anybody tell me a war that we have won since 1945?"

Well WWII was Total War with the goal being the unconditional surrender of the enemy country. The wars since then have have more limited goals and thus the question is did we meet the goal we had when the war started.

N Korea tried to conquer the South...the US & UN forces defeated that attempt which was the goal. That's a win.
The goal in Iraq 2 was to take Saddam out of power and it was achieved which is a win of that goal.
Kicking Iraq out of Kuwait was the goal in the 1st Gulf War and that was achieved, also a win.
The US did not surrender or lose to the North in Vietnam, the goal there was to help the S resist the N which we did, them losing after we gave up helping them is on them. Same in Afghanistan, neither country should have expected the US to help them forever. Them falling after the US leaves is on them. Totally defeating a outside supported insurgency with out going medieval and committing extreme war crimes is most likely not going to happen.

[albacore]

52. Wow... my head is spinning... just like your explanations.

Make all the excuses you want, but the US lost!
Paraphrasing Springstein.... "...they're still there and we're all gone...".
Our goal as a country is to intervene where we can to make the area more peaceful and prosperous and the little birdies can come out to sing.
Seriously, stability is our goal... with "good guys" (whatever that means) in charge. We haven't achieved that in any of our wars since 1945.

Korea..? Kim is more dangerous by the day. Unstable. Dangerous.
Afghanistan is FAR worse off today. Unstable. A human rights nightmare made worse by our ham-fisted meddling.
Iraq is a disaster. All the factions are at each others' throats. Saddam had them all cowed with his brutality. Another nightmare made worse by our meddling.

You said: "Them falling after the US leaves is on them."
Sorry.... we put our chips down in all those places, said we were going to win, and when the game was over, we didn't win. We left. We even left our bases and gear and weapons behind. We left our local allies holding the bag, too. That's called losing.

You said: "The US did not surrender or lose to the North in Vietnam". The US embassy in Saigon ... whoops, Ho Chi Minh City... was captured, with the choppers taking our people out in 1975. Don't you remember the pictures of the choppers on the roof? Hardly a victory.

If we don't learn from our losses... we're bound to do it again. And again.

[EX500rider]

53. Lets see..

Korea...the US was there as part of a UN operation to repel the N with 22 other countries, eliminating the N was not on the table and the US operated under the mandates of UN Security Council Resolutions 82, 83, and 84.

The US Embassy in S Vietnam being evacuated years after the US troops pulled out is not losing a war unless you think we lost a war to Iran when the Embassy fell in Tehran.

Afghanistan is FAR worse off today
Hardly worse then when the Taliban were the government and held mass execution's in the stadium in Kabul. It may get that way again but not while the US was in country. Unreasonable to expect the US to help S Vietnam or Afghanistan forever.

[albacore]

54. Believe what you want. I'm already against the next pointless war. nt

[Polybius]

62. Panama

First Iraq war too. The mission was to get them out of Kuwait.

[albacore]

64. "Mission" is different from "winning". Americans seem incapable of understanding that. nt

Beating the shit out of a tiny country and killing their civilians is not winning, either. (Panama)
And if you need to feel that Iraq was any kind of win...at any time... you go ahead. I don't see it.
Ever read any of Col. Andrew Bacevich's books?

[NickB79]

39. We need to allow as many Afghan refugees as possible into the US, especially women

Properly vetted, of course, for radical beliefs and Taliban sympathies.

[albacore]

41. I've thought about the vetting.

Does anybody really think a Taliban sympathizer is going to be able to hide his/her political views from watchers here?
Does anybody really think a Taliban sympathizer is going to be able to withstand the barrage of Goodies that American life has to offer.
Get those guys some spending cash, some good weed, a couple of blonde hookers, and a couple of Big Macs, and in two months they'll have forgotten who Mr. Taliban is. (OK... I'm being a little hyperbolic, but you gotta admit our culture is seductive...after all, most of us are the bitches of that Murikan consumer culture.)

[twin_ghost]

45. Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan are America's failed wars.

[EX500rider]

56. How was Korea a failure?

The US was there as part of a UN operation to repel the N with 22 other countries, eliminating the N was not on the table and the US operated under the mandates of UN Security Council Resolutions 82, 83, and 84.
The N was sent packing, mission accomplished.
We weren't even officially at war with them as it was a UN "Police Action".

[twin_ghost]

57. The US very much wanted to eliminate the North

and China counter attacked to drive the Americans back to the 38th parallel.

[EX500rider]

59. The US was there to enforce UN resolutions, not do regime change. nt

[maxsolomon]

50. We divided our attentions by invading Iraq,

and never were willing to have troop levels sufficient to pacify Afghanistan.

There's some sort of formula for troop-per-capita to pacify a country, but you've got to be willing to kill, and there would need to be something worth kiling for beyond poppies.

Like oil.

[andym]

63. It's the world's problem when an area will be subject to widespread serious human rights violations

The women in Afghanistan territory stand to suffer the most: sex slaves, denial of education etc. Most inhabitants of both sexes will be denied right to self-determination and other basic rights etc.

What should exist in post Cold War world is a United Nations that takes maintenance of human rights across the world seriously. Will that ever happen? Well it would take the willpower and resources of the existing superpowers to enforce it. The US would have a role to play as would others like China.