But Seriously...

This will probably sound insanely ignorant because I don’t know much about military strikes or anything, but since they took the palace now and most all of the leaders are inside of it, why not just level it?

 

Make a plan a month ago to get our civilian personnel out of the country ASAP when the Taliban started executing it's plan. Instead he ignored all advice he was given and claimed the country was not going to collapse. And then it did and here we are.

We all knew the country was going under when we pulled out, that is not the point. Us becoming the Talibans bitch because of Biden's refusal to listen and act accordingly with American lives at stake is the problem.

 

You and Clutch have good points regarding our personnel. I assumed you were talking about the collapse of the country as a whole. In terms of how we handled it, clearly the Biden administration dropped the ball. It would have helped if the Afghanis had even a little bit of a spine.

 

Why would they? The US essentially agreed to a handover to the Taliban more than a year ago.

 

So they bear no responsibility for the future of their country. We trained and armed them for nothing. Got it.

 

What are they supposed to do? They're soldiers in a government that the entire world, both allies and enemies, are acting as if is already dissolved. Would you be willing to die for that?

 

For my family? For my country? For women and children who can't fight? Yes. Most men would, but I'm guessing their definition of "Honor" and "Man" are different than ours.

 

I know what both of things are, but That ammo doesn’t fit those rifles right? Is that the joke?

 

Like all things in that country, that would've been a shit storm extraordinaire. I don't think they would've allowed a woman within a mile of a polling station, with or without a male escort.

 

What country though? There was no national unity before the Americans arrived, and even the Americans are admitting that the national unity they tried to build is a joke. As for family, the best thing you can do for your family is avoid getting killed in a conflict you have no hope of winning.

 

This is why body counts are a worthless metric in conflict

Applying our western ideals, culture, and values is why we fuck this kind of shit up every single time. We assume what's important to us is important to them...guess what...its not.

 

Where the Taliban are Pashtuns and their power base in in the Southern Mountains of Afghanistan and extend well into Pakistan; it will be interesting to see if they use their new found "resources" to throw their weight around on the other side of the border.

 

There is plenty of blame to go around. If it had been just US instead of NATO et al, maybe they'd have just made it a parking lot from the get-go.

https://www.aa.com.tr/en/asia-pacific/9-592-troops-of-36-countries-serving-in-afghanistan/2212251

 

Chaos at Kabul airport.

 

This might be *the* defining image of this debacle, US military transport plane rolling its way thru the desperate crowds as it makes its own escape.

I wonder what went thru the minds of those who clung on til the last, getting one final birds eye view of the country they'd lost forever.
https://twitter.com/AJEnglish/status/1427233903929090055?s=20

 

You don’t have an Afghanistan situation anymore. You have a Pakistan situation, that’s ALWAYS been the scary thing and now it’s going to happen.

If the Taliban take Pakistan they will have nuclear weapons and will then start turning major cities into debris fields. This has always been the warning, now it’s happening.

If you’re going to set a country on fire for two decades, learn how to occupy it.

 

They were nothing but “cave-dwelling fucks” being made fun of by SNL anchors.

They were ALWAYS more powerful than everyone thought.