Chaos at Kabul airport, US troops firing warning shots at civilians

[ansible]

There aren't enough US soldiers to secure the airport

Link to tweet

Link to tweet

[Hugh_Lebowski]

1. First off, it's THEIR country, and they chose not to fight back

There clearly was a mistake made in thinking that the Afghani army we armed and trained wouldn't just turn tail and immediately run away when the Taliban showed up and looked at them funny.

This is probably making it look like there was 'no planning', but when a fundamental underpinning of a plan spectacularly fails this is how any plan ends up looking.

It's looking more like an intelligence failure than a planning failure, as such.

[The Unmitigated Gall]

2. Exactly agree.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

4. Thanks, and to add ... getting OUR people safely the hell OUT ... is exactly what our priority

should be under these conditions.

The fact that 'we're leaving' has always meant we were leaving millions of people to fend for themselves. So, these folks on the tarmac? Those are just some of those people, not really inherently different from any of the other millions, sorry to say ...

[bluedevil4]

3. At least some of those if not all are

American citizens. They’ve been told to take shelter because there is gun fire. I’m editing this because they are Americans and it’s the diplomatic staff. They were taken from the embassy to the airport

[Hugh_Lebowski]

5. That's not what either of the tweets in the OP seem to suggest, but ... okay ...

[leftstreet]

6. You're saying US soldiers are firing on US citizens?

[bluedevil4]

8. No

I’m saying our soldiers evacuated our diplomats from the embassy to the airport to get them home. I believe that was their mission but the airport is under fire from the Afghans so they were told to take shelter.

[AkFemDem]

9. They're firing on no one...

These videos are shared on Twitter by many sources and this was the first I saw suggesting they were firing AT people, everyone else is reporting it as air fire (warning shots for crowd control) These crowds seem too calm despite all their understandable panic, to actually be sustaining bullet spray.

[bluedevil4]

12. I only know

what I’m reading. I’m not there but I’m going to watch a movie now because I can’t handle this. There’s to much inaccurate reporting

[bluedevil4]

10. Lol I just

realized you are eating popcorn 🍿 lol at least you are keeping a sense of humor. I think I lost mine

[Submariner]

13. To each individual in the so called Afghani army

this 20 years was just a monthly check from Uncle Sam. We're gone. The checks stopped. They be gone.

[Devil Child]

7. Not good. Now there is an increased chance of being unable to airlift our troops

and remaining holdouts if they are unable to maintain continued security of the tarmac and field. This right after 1000 infantry from the 82nd Airborne has landed.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

14. One of the tweets suggests there a civilian and military part of this airport

Our troops have secured the military part and from there Americans (and perhaps select others, not sure) are being evacuated.

This is the civilian part of the airfield. I suspect it's being flooded with locals looking to get on any airplane out of the country they possibly can and that's what we're seeing here.

[Deminpenn]

15. Yes, that's the situation

The pictures are of the civilian part. There was a report all commercial flights were stopped (poosibly due to reports of gunfire at the airport), thus the paniced travellers.

[Devil Child]

18. Looks like the military area is unsecured now

As evidenced by swarms if civilians clinging to the landing gear of US aircraft taking off.

[denbot]

11. We are outsiders, instantly delegitimizing any one working with us.

While this was all but preordained, another 20 years of American sacrifice and the pull out would look pretty much the same.

[lindysalsagal]

16. Engel: No fighting between US troops and Taliban yet.Tweet:

Link to tweet

?s=20

[KentuckyWoman]

17. Why

Did we not get Americans and that who have helped us and want to leave out months ago. I know little about the dynamic or logistics but still feel like we did it ass backward.

I don't think it reflects on Biden as much as the poor planning at State and Pentagon.