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[FunkMiller]

We built them a country. All they had to do is fight for it. Instead they would much prefer to risk their life’s hanging onto a plane

Because some are moderate. Mainly the young. They want to move away from the rhetoric and dogma of Islam. Sadly, their elders and betters don’t want that. They are the ones who rolled over and let the Taliban back in, because they are just as indoctrinated.

 

[SF Kosmo]

Over 60k Afghan have died fighting with us for their country.

that’s not including the Afghans who helped us but weren’t necessarily soldiers.

What about the Kurds we betrayed? You seemed pretty cool with that IIRC.

This all or nothing mindset doesn’t make any sense. Keeping a base in Afghanistan until everyone is evacuated would not have been the end of the world.

It would have violated the agreement Trump signed with the Taliban and led to a bloody civil war instead of the relatively bloodless transition we're seeing.

I like how everyone has amnesia now that Trump is out of office.

 

[Punished Miku]

What about the Kurds we betrayed? You seemed pretty cool with that IIRC.

Or South / Central Americans fleeing the cartels. That's much closer to home and literally right on our border.

Situations like this are exactly what the UN should be fixing. If the entire world feels like this is a crime against humanity, then the entire world needs to chip in and help stabilize the country.

 

[SF Kosmo]

Or South / Central Americans fleeing the cartels.

What we did to the Kurds was far worse because it was us. They were our allies and we pulled out literally overnight as a favor to a brutal dictator who asked if he could kill them.

That's literally the actual story. We got nothing in return. Just "Hey, Trump buddy, can I kill your allies?" And he says "Sure thing."

 

[FunkMiller]

It would have violated the agreement Trump signed with the Taliban and led to a bloody civil war instead of the relatively bloodless transition we're seeing.

I like how everyone has amnesia now that Trump is out of office.

It should be pretty easy to keep politics out of this topic, because all sides have equally fucked up.

….guess it won’t stop some people though, and this thread will get locked.

 

[SF Kosmo]

It should be pretty easy to keep politics out of this topic, because all sides have equally fucked up.

….guess it won’t stop some people though, and this thread will get locked.

I mean it's inherently political but it isn't partisan.

The fact is I'm not "blaming" Trump, I actually think it was the right thing to do, and I give Biden and Trump all the credit in the world for doing what their precursors wouldn't. And it was messy and there's always that temptation to say well this or that could have been different but we spent 20 years chasing our tails thinking a little longer might help, and it never has.

 

[Haint]

Did your everyday Afghan actually support the westernization of the country, or did they just grin and bear it out of necessity?

 

[FunkMiller]

I mean it's inherently political but it isn't partisan.

The fact is I'm not "blaming" Trump, I actually think it was the right thing to do, and I give Biden and Trump all the credit in the world for doing what their precursors wouldn't. And it was messy and there's always that temptation to say well this or that could have been different but we spent 20 years chasing our tails thinking a little longer might help, and it never has.

Yeah, the rot set in on this long before Trump or Biden came along. That won’t stop both camps tearing strips off each other, though.

 

[MilkyJoe]

They stoned a female pilot to death today, some of you need to change your votes

 

[haxan7]

Yeah, the rot set in on this long before Trump or Biden came along. That won’t stop both camps tearing strips off each other, though.

there should be enough common ground here that we don't have to tear strips off each other

 

[MilkyJoe]

Did your everyday Afghan actually support the westernization of the country, or did they just grin and bear it?

Ask those mothers throwing their babies 6 ft across razor wire to soldiers at Kabal Airport

 

[Punished Miku]

They stoned a female pilot to death today, some of you need to change your votes

Change to what? Are we starting the invasion again?

 

[ÆMNE22A!C]

I feel immensely sad for the people that have to deal with this terror..and indirect for our whole species; we can accomplish so much otherwise.. =(

*Huge IRL sigh*

 

[Lunarorbit]

Someone made the point that lots of afghans that were involved with aid organizations have just been stealing money the last 2 decades and have houses in Saudi Arabia or quatar. The amount of corruption has been off the chain ever since we got involved.

Ordinary afghans.... Man, fuck. I was optimistic 15 years ago that maybe a functional government would survive but now I have a horrible feeling for everyone that lives there. Maybe the taliban won't invite terrorist groups to headquarter there cause they won't want a repeat of this last war. That way they can brutalize the country without interference

 

[Prison Mike]

i figured the humane side of the conversation deserved a shot

 

[MightySquirrel]

Helis, humvees even some old jets were all left up for grabs for some mysterious reason, not to mention immense amount of firearms.

@18:40

 

[RAL1992]

The situation is screwed on all sides, some of the stories coming out of there in the press are deplorable but I think the major things are being swept under the rug whilst the Taliban aren't pushing/controlling the airport to not cause further tension, everything that has been worked towards in terms of women's rights and education will be gone once they have complete control.

What a way to waste the progress that was made and potentially cause another mass migration event for the news to vilify and jump on.

But hey, all in all at least the Taliban are having a jolly good time.

 

[GamingKaiju]

Over 60k Afghan have died fighting with us for their country.

that’s not including the Afghans who helped us but weren’t necessarily soldiers.

Idk man… it feels like NATO went above and beyond was what expected of us in 2003 and invested heavily into this Country and for them not even put up a fight and just roll over at the sight just feels a sucker punch to the west. Like no matter what we do what we offer these countries will always have Stockholm syndrome with the taliban.

Because some are moderate. Mainly the young. They want to move away from the rhetoric and dogma of Islam. Sadly, their elders and betters don’t want that. They are the ones who rolled over and let the Taliban back in, because they are just as indoctrinated.

I hate to sound crass but I have little empthany for these people fleeing now.

 

[lukilladog]

Over 60k Afghan have died fighting with us for their country.

that’s not including the Afghans who helped us but weren’t necessarily soldiers.

And 70k pakistanis.

 

[NinjaBoiX]

Unfortunately enough for me, I’m not educated enough on this subject to “place blame” as it were.

But as I see it, the “good guys” probably had ulterior motives to occupy the region, that’s how war works. Money talks and all that. But at the same time, I feel like there was genuine concern for the Afghan people, I’d like to believe our ruling powers aren’t so unscrupulous that they didn’t always have that as a genuine consideration.

But on the other side, was the alternate option to just occupy the region with troops indefinitely because we always knew that the alternative was oppressive rule? There’s no denying that occupation of coalition troops was always going to be a band-aid rather than a cure, without more substantial effort to change the regime.

TLDR - Honestly, I really don’t know how to feel about the situation. I just hope that we didn’t leave those poor people in a worse position than if we’d never got involved at all.

 

[12Goblins]

I feel really good about what we've done to the Afghanis, so I voted option #1.

 

[oagboghi2]

It would have violated the agreement Trump signed with the Taliban and led to a bloody civil war instead of the relatively bloodless transition we're seeing.

I like how everyone has amnesia now that Trump is out of office.

No it wouldn’t. The agreement always held that Americans would have a presence in the area while the forces were drawn down

Amnesia? Dude, you are straight trying to rewrite history.

Idk man… it feels like NATO went above and beyond was what expected of us in 2003 and invested heavily into this Country and for them not even put up a fight and just roll over at the sight just feels a sucker punch to the west. Like no matter what we do what we offer these countries will always have Stockholm syndrome with the taliban.

They have been fighting for years. They have seen far more deaths than NATO soldiers.

there is no reason to dismiss that and pretend it didn’t happen

 

[Kazza]

Muslim Beliefs About Sharia | Pew Research Center (pewforum.org)


This survey is from 2013, so after around a decade of occupation. It would be interesting to see another survey done today to see if there has been any change. A likely explanation as to why the Taliban managed to pretty much reconquer the country so quickly without barely firing a shot is that they have popular support throughout the country. Sharia law is just popular in Afghanistan (and that country is hardly an outlier in that respect, if you look at other countries in the survey).

Lots of countries with some form of sharia in their law system (many of them US allies):

I could see the US and Taliban being allies 10 years from now, as the former tries to stir up some kind of holy war/terrorism against China for what's happening in Xinjiang. It wouldn't be the first time they allied with the Islamist forces there to fight communists.

 

[Kazza]

After a few weeks of this, I wonder how many American soldiers just thought "fuck it" and just decided to spend their time drinking tea and smoking hashish along with their trainees:

 

[Sub_Level]

People confuse stable with ethical. Saddam Hussein was stable.

Yes I absolutely believe Afghanistan governed by a fundamentalist Sharia group will be more stable than a corrupt puppet government. They'll remain a largely rural, illiterate collection of tribes who oppress their own women but they'll have self determination & can leverage their natural resources for their own interests.

 

[Raven117]

People confuse stable with ethical. Saddam Hussein was stable.

Yes I absolutely believe Afghanistan governed by a fundamentalist Sharia group will be more stable than a corrupt puppet government. They'll remain a largely rural, illiterate collection of tribes who oppress their own women but they'll have self determination & can leverage their natural resources for their own interests.

Just like they did from 1996 to 2001....

 

[kiunchbb]

I only feel disappointed, and nothing else.

We spent billions and sacrificed a lot of life helping them for 20 years. If they couldn't use that chance to fix their country, it is time to cut our losts.

 

[haxan7]

Taliban took control of Afghanistan in 1996; 5 years later 9/11 happened due to the safe haven Bin Laden and his crew found under Afghanistan rule.

Now there's billions of dollars of American equipment under Taliban control, including sophisticated weaponry, and classified information. It doesn't take a genius to see what's coming.

 

[MightySquirrel]

This was always destined for failure.
Little long but interesting watch.

This is about the most hilarious shit I've seen all year.

 

[nush]

7. But the most egregious mistake: military doctrine is to destroy any equipment you can't bring back so that the enemy can't get it... instead we fucking left everything for them. The Taliban is running around with tricked out JSOC M4s, HMMVs, M249s, Drones, you name it - they got it. We armed the worst terrorist group in the world with the best weapons in the world... for free.

Best Loot Drop Evah!

 

[Schattenjäger]

I’ll only say this one piece as I’m done with this thread

It’s the same bullshit that this administration does with everything.. whether it’s the border, Afghan exit, energy policy or any other policies ..
It’s more important to rush through the undoing of the previous administration than it is to take a step back, observe what works/doesn’t work and be strategic with your execution

that is just extremely poor leadership

 

[belmarduk]

I’ll only say this one piece as I’m done with this thread

It’s the same bullshit that this administration does with everything.. whether it’s the border, Afghan exit, energy policy or any other policies ..
It’s more important to rush through the undoing of the previous administration than it is to take a step back, observe what works/doesn’t work and be strategic with your execution

that is just extremely poor leadership

The Trump administration wanted to do the same thing. Earlier. Even met with the Taliban to the exclusion of the then Afghan government.

The gentleman on the left is Mike Pompeo, former Secretary of State under the Trump regime. You won't hear much about him in the future, the guy on the right, however, is Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who is widely expected to lead the Taliban government.

 

[SireSmogMurk]

A collapse like this so quickly means the afghan people welcomed the taliban in with open arms. They didn't perform near well enough for us to accept any of them as refugees, not by a long shot. They all chose the taliban, they should all stay with the taliban.

 

[Chankoras]

But hey, all in all at least the Taliban are having a jolly good time.

At least for a little bit.
I don't know about this source, but seems like park was burned

Taliban 'burn down amusement park over idolatrous statues'

The jihadists torched the recreation grounds in the northern city of Sheberghan which are also used for holding sports and cultural events for children.

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[xellos2099alpha]

All i have to say Biden execution of the withdraw suck. If you got someone like Burcock or Yang from LOGH in charge, you always evac the civilian FIRST then the military. Now we got 10k americanm behind enemy limt and Sec def essentially say we don't have the capability to send troops back in to get us citizen out.

 

[Tschumi]

People are gleefully ignoring the point of this thread now,i don't mind if it gets locked

 

[nush]

People are gleefully ignoring the point of this thread now,i don't mind if it gets locked

As if this topic is going to play out any different.

That was post#4

 

[GeorgioCostanzaX]

I mean it's inherently political but it isn't partisan.

The fact is I'm not "blaming" Trump, I actually think it was the right thing to do, and I give Biden and Trump all the credit in the world for doing what their precursors wouldn't. And it was messy and there's always that temptation to say well this or that could have been different but we spent 20 years chasing our tails thinking a little longer might help, and it never has.

It’s kind of hard to imagine how worse this could have been handled which also leads me to believe it’s just flat out crazy to let one elected official call the shots as commander in chief. It’s super clear that Air Force contractors should have stayed to protect the ANA and we should have committed to getting all of our allies out: that’s a one person call the commander and chief made the decision and our entire military and government bureaucracy just goes along with it because the buck stops at the Oval Office. Who cares if Trump would have done the exact same thing bad decisions are not exclusive to one political party but only one persons decision matters here and that is Joe Biden’s.

 

[Tschumi]

That was post#4

 

[haxan7]

Thought I would post this here before AAAAHHCHOOOmi gets his thread locked.

There’s a small pocket of resistance in Afghanistan, led by the son of the anti-Soviet resistance leader, known as the Lion of Panjshir (who the Taliban exploded a couple months before 9/11). Not everyone in that shit hole country wants it to be a shit hole. Some are willing to fight and die for freedom.

Son of slain Afghan hero Massoud vows resistance, seeks support

The son of Ahmad Shah Massoud, one of the main leaders of Afghanistan's anti-Soviet resistance in the 1980s, has pledged to hold out against the Taliban from his stronghold in the Panjshir valley.

www.reuters.com

 

[SF Kosmo]

It’s kind of hard to imagine how worse this could have been handled which also leads me to believe it’s just flat out crazy to let one elected official call the shots as commander in chief. It’s super clear that Air Force contractors should have stayed to protect the ANA and we should have committed to getting all of our allies out: that’s a one person call the commander and chief made the decision and our entire military and government bureaucracy just goes along with it because the buck stops at the Oval Office. Who cares if Trump would have done the exact same thing bad decisions are not exclusive to one political party but only one persons decision matters here and that is Joe Biden’s.

It's also really clear that the military and intelligence officials advising the president were blowing smoke up his ass, as they had been for the last three presidents. And all of this just proves why no one should liaten to their bullshit anymore.

 

[NeoLed]

Poor OP. Even when you called them earlier... they just can't hold it. The abstinence are killing them. Anyway, I can't trust a fundamentalist group to change. They are deeply entrenched

 

[CGiRanger]

Nothing

While China says they want to go there, as soon as they go there and look at the infrastructure, it will all fall apart.

They don't want to invest 50 billion to build roads and mines to maybe get access to the resources.

Clans rule Afghanistan and what we call the Taliban are clans and without the US as the big enemy to unite them, they will have many infights for power.

There is not even close the stability for long-term investments. Without that, nothing will happen. The graveyard of empires will stay the graveyard of empires at the end of the world.

This is also why the whole concept of "Nation Building" doesn't work in places like Afghanistan.

People often bring up the successes of the idea with places like post-WW2 Germany and Japan. But the reality is the comparison is fundamentally flawed because the nations, peoples and especially cultures are nothing alike.

Both Germany and Japan for the most part were/are homogenous cultures and have had fully functioning stable governments over long periods of time. They also have shared identities and values across their own individual cultures. Not to mention after the war, both countries were literally nothing but embers and rubble that could be literally rebuilt from the ground up.

Afghanistan, once again, is a country that has for the most part through history been Tribally run. Factions and identities are a mishmash of different harsh religious ideologies. Most of which do not have shared identities or values (even if we in the West might think they do). Afghanistan itself is also harsh terrain with not much capability to quickly and efficiently build infrastructure.

Basically, it's a chaotic place, and could only be brought to heel by a power willing to use whatever means necessary to rule over it. So the idea that it could be achieved through "nation building" was a delusion from the start. China may likely try to do something with them to acquire the resources, but I agree that it won't be as easy as some might think. As has been shown, the people in charge of Afghanistan can not be trusted, and bribing them will only go so far (and usually they'll be tray you and take the money).

Even if a group is "in charge", it also seems like that control is very shoddy. Local tribes and groups will likely just do their own thing even if a Taliban commander in Kabul says otherwise.

 

[FunkMiller]

Muslim Beliefs About Sharia | Pew Research Center (pewforum.org)


This survey is from 2013, so after around a decade of occupation. It would be interesting to see another survey done today to see if there has been any change. A likely explanation as to why the Taliban managed to pretty much reconquer the country so quickly without barely firing a shot is that they have popular support throughout the country. Sharia law is just popular in Afghanistan (and that country is hardly an outlier in that respect, if you look at other countries in the survey).

Lots of countries with some form of sharia in their law system (many of them US allies):

I could see the US and Taliban being allies 10 years from now, as the former tries to stir up some kind of holy war/terrorism against China for what's happening in Xinjiang. It wouldn't be the first time they allied with the Islamist forces there to fight communists.

And yet... most commentators still surprisingly silent on the fact this is all being driven by religion.

If no one in the west is prepared to actually confront and talk about the actual issues at stake here, then it really is better that we have nothing to do with that part of the world again.

 

[HellforLeather]

After a few weeks of this, I wonder how many American soldiers just thought "fuck it" and just decided to spend their time drinking tea and smoking hashish along with their trainees:

 

[FunkMiller]

Basically, it's a chaotic place, and could only be brought to heel by a power willing to use whatever means necessary to rule over it. So the idea that it could be achieved through "nation building" was a delusion from the start. China may likely try to do something with them to acquire the resources, but I agree that it won't be as easy as some might think. As has been shown, the people in charge of Afghanistan can not be trusted, and bribing them will only go so far (and usually they'll be tray you and take the money).

Even if a group is "in charge", it also seems like that control is very shoddy. Local tribes and groups will likely just do their own thing even if a Taliban commander in Kabul says otherwise.

Even that doesn't work. The Soviet Union tried it's hardest. Still failed (with Afghans helped massively by US of course).

 

[Raven117]

This is also why the whole concept of "Nation Building" doesn't work in places like Afghanistan.

People often bring up the successes of the idea with places like post-WW2 Germany and Japan. But the reality is the comparison is fundamentally flawed because the nations, peoples and especially cultures are nothing alike.

Both Germany and Japan for the most part were/are homogenous cultures and have had fully functioning stable governments over long periods of time. They also have shared identities and values across their own individual cultures. Not to mention after the war, both countries were literally nothing but embers and rubble that could be literally rebuilt from the ground up.

Afghanistan, once again, is a country that has for the most part through history been Tribally run. Factions and identities are a mishmash of different harsh religious ideologies. Most of which do not have shared identities or values (even if we in the West might think they do). Afghanistan itself is also harsh terrain with not much capability to quickly and efficiently build infrastructure.

Basically, it's a chaotic place, and could only be brought to heel by a power willing to use whatever means necessary to rule over it. So the idea that it could be achieved through "nation building" was a delusion from the start. China may likely try to do something with them to acquire the resources, but I agree that it won't be as easy as some might think. As has been shown, the people in charge of Afghanistan can not be trusted, and bribing them will only go so far (and usually they'll be tray you and take the money).

Even if a group is "in charge", it also seems like that control is very shoddy. Local tribes and groups will likely just do their own thing even if a Taliban commander in Kabul says otherwise.

You can make it simpler than that.

Germany and Japan were much more advanced cultures in terms of not only technology but also through the evolution of human thought (think the Enlightenment type stuff). I firmly, FIRMLY believe that if a culture cannot naturally and organically come to a certain point regarding cultural evolution that mixes technology, finance, the rule of law, and the philosophy behind all of it, then the culture cannot be "nation built." Not in the way that the world has tried anyway. It must be slow...then faster.

In other words, your can't just plop 21st century tech and culture onto them and expect them to be able to understand how it works and why.

 

[FunkMiller]

You can make it simpler than that.

Germany and Japan were much more advanced cultures in terms of not only technology but also through the evolution of human thought (think the Enlightenment type stuff). I firmly, FIRMLY believe that if a culture cannot naturally and organically come to a certain point regarding cultural evolution that mixes technology, finance, the rule of law, and the philosophy behind all of it, then the culture cannot be "nation built." Not in the way that the world has tried anyway. It must be slow...then faster.

In other words, your can't just plop 21st century tech and culture onto them and expect them to be able to understand how it works and why.

...and here in the west, we live under this constant offence culture that precludes anyone coming out straight and telling it like it is in Afghanistan: it's a backwards bloody country, full of religious zealots, both in The Taliban and out of it.

They have to sort their own shit out, the same way we all did hundreds of years ago.

 

[Ulysses 31]

 

[QuantumZebra]

We are still at war with North Korea.

This all or nothing mindset doesn’t make any sense. Keeping a base in Afghanistan until everyone is evacuated would not have been the end of the world.

Precisely.

We could have maintained a presence there like we do w/ countries all over the world - especially ones at which we took part in battles/war.

Now Sleepy Joe just handed top-grade military weaponry and entire country to the most organized terrorist force on the planet.

...and here in the west, we live under this constant offence culture that precludes anyone coming out straight and telling it like it is in Afghanistan: it's a backwards bloody country, full of religious zealots, both in The Taliban and out of it.

They have to sort their own shit out, the same way we all did hundreds of years ago.

From the other thread I know your wrists are a bit limp... but hang with me here:

What happens when you take a country full of those people you described, whom already committed terrorist attacks around the globe, and give them the best weapons (US taxpayer) money can buy?