US Politics Mega-thread - Page 3292

On August 21 2021 09:33 JimmiC wrote:
Its gone very wrong for the vast majority of Afganastan.

It also has made all the Americans who lost loved ones feel like it was a complete waste and farce. It is a bad look when all the training support and $$$ amounted to nothing.

Biden Assured Allies in June U.S. Would Ensure Kabul’s Stability

President Joe Biden told key allies in June that he would maintain enough of a security presence in Afghanistan to ensure they could continue to operate in the capital following the main U.S. withdrawal, a vow made before the Taliban’s rapid final push across the country, according to a British diplomatic memo seen by Bloomberg.

Biden promised U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson and other leaders at the Group of Seven summit in Cornwall, England, that “critical U.S. enablers” would remain in place to keep Kabul safe following the drawdown of NATO forces, the note said. British officials determined the U.S. would provide enough personnel to ensure that the U.K. embassy in Kabul could continue operating.

...

During the same period, the European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, was warning U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken that withdrawing troops from Afghanistan risked giving the Taliban the upper hand and such a shift could pose a direct threat to European security. After dealing with more than a million refugees reaching the EU in 2015, the bloc’s leaders are anxious that a broader collapse in Afghanistan could lead to similar problems.

NATO members agreed in May that they would maintain a civilian presence in Afghanistan after the military withdrawal to support the Afghan government, facilitate training for the Afghan military and work on contracts for Kabul’s airport as well as hospitals and communications infrastructure.

On August 21 2021 09:28 Mohdoo wrote:
Can someone clarify for me what exactly went wrong so far? Have Americans died? From my perspective, nothing has actually gone wrong in Afghanistan yet.

On August 21 2021 09:36 Mohdoo wrote:


I would argue it went exactly how it would have if the US was never there to begin with. The Taliban is the dominant ideology in Afghanistan. The US didn't make that happen.

Sunk cost fallacy is reason for someone to feel like something is bad, but it doesn't make it bad.

On August 21 2021 11:02 LegalLord wrote:

The seemingly overnight victory of the Taliban really puts into perspective how badly the entire occupation went. Makes it look like 20 years and 2 trillion dollars went down the drain, and Biden is in the driver’s seat when it happens.

It’s not entirely Biden’s fault; there’s 20 years worth of often questionable decisions that can be litigated, and both parties deserve portions of the blame. But there’s no good look here for the president in charge when the entire operation falls apart in record time.

On August 21 2021 12:28 Introvert wrote:
Given all the Americans who need to get out, the Afghan helpers that we need to get out, all the equipment we left behind, and the surprise of our allies, it's pretty hard to say it was just "pulling the bandaid off" or in any way a correctly executed strategy. This wasn't an act of courage or a soberly accepted trade-off. It was a failure and one they did not intend.

On August 21 2021 11:58 LegalLord wrote:

I remember reading that some of Biden’s advisors recommended a much slower withdrawal because they were afraid this would happen, and he decided against it because they couldn’t come up with a good answer to, “what would materially change to make for a more graceful withdrawal?” Which suggests that this was inevitable for a long time - IMO at least for the last six years - so it was probably best to fold exactly like this despite the bad optics.

On August 21 2021 12:31 Mohdoo wrote:


Americans were told to leave a long time ago. Bunch of dummies. No sympathy here. Afghan helpers are unfortunate. It is unfortunate that they lost the war. There's nothing we can do about that. They surrendered. They were incompetent and didn't wanna fight. Only so much you can do. As for equipment, we were too optimistic. We should have just brought everything back if they weren't gonna fight anyway. I agree with you there. I am glad we tried to have faith, kind of, I guess.



I view this as particularly admirable. How many past presidents got conned into "just a little longer"? Biden was around for the Obama years. He knows this shit is just an endless charade. Telling everyone to fuck off was the right call and an example of actual leadership.

On August 21 2021 14:10 Liquid`Drone wrote:
The withdrawal has been poorly executed. The problem is not that the Taliban is retaking control (of course not ideal, but basically unavoidable), but that people who have collaborated with western forces are, to varying degrees, being executed. Whether you are a realist or a idealist, this is shitty from a precedence-perspective (gonna be harder to find local allies in the future), and from a be a decent human perspective, as many of these have no doubt been given assurances in the past. Had the Taliban spent 180 days instead for 180 hours retaking control, a lot more people could have been safely evacuated, thus this embarrassing miscalculation has had dire consequences.

However the main mistake happened in like 2003 or whatever, when it was decided that we should try to export democracy to Afghanistan without planning to stay for at least two generations. Ousting Al queda was mostly accomplished in a few years. Everything since then basically feels pretty wasted.

On August 21 2021 15:34 Liquid`Drone wrote:
Really struggling to politely convey that I think you seem to lack empathy in a way that makes me feel like it is impossible for us to see eye to eye on this, or many other issues. I do not want America to act as world police. But I also do not value American lives more than I value afghan lives (nor Norwegian lives, for that matter, unless I actually know them). No real interest in going further than this with you, tbh.

On August 21 2021 09:41 Introvert wrote:
Nevermind how it's roiled our allies, here's another story from a little bit ago. It would appear that the Brits are particularly angry. I could imagine it is even worse if it's true that Biden didn't call Johnson back for 36 hours.

On August 21 2021 15:47 LegalLord wrote:

The precedent has long been set that alliance with the US is generally a one-way street. It’s just one more data point, but far from the first.

What kind of evacuation did you have in mind here? Airlifting of key individuals, or a more general level of support for the larger displaced population? The former definitely happened, and the latter seems very much to be precluded by the fact that the Taliban went for the borders much sooner than it went for the cities. I find it hard to think up a realistic scenario in which US presence allows, say, a million Afghans to leave the country safely, without extending troop deployment for another year.

As for being in there for two decades: that reminds me an awful lot of the 2008 presidential campaign, where Bush said 40 years in Iraq, and McCain said 100. The population at large was definitely not on board, and has only become less interested over time in that kind of thing. It’d be a political non-starter.