What an absolutely stupid decision, among many, to give up Bagram, a secure air base, and conduct evacuations from a one runway city airport. Biden should be impeached.
At least TEN service members now dead in Afghanistan
- Thread starter Orangeclad
- Start date
And this is why it would’ve been better just to leave 2500 US troops there with AirPower at a SECURE airbase supporting the Afghan army. No casualties for 18 months prior to this.
Then if you want to evacuate you can evacuate out of the secure air base pulling the perimeter of the last second through helicopter flights with air support covering it withdrawl if that’s what you really want to do.
Like the Taliban and ISIS etc. aren't on the same page.
yup.
get all the Americans, Afghans who helped us, equipment then the military and blow the hell out of the the all military installations
This should be the last US plane flying over Afghanistan.
They're not, and failure to understand the complex dynamics in Afghanistan is what caused our failures there in the first place.
The Taliban first and foremost is a political entity, and their primary goal is control of Afghanistan. They'll play fast and loose with terror groups if it suits them, but their goal is not international Jihad. This is no different than the US supporting al-Qaeda to fight the Soviets, or Iran supporting the Hezbollah against the Israelis.
I know they have problems with the Taliban now but these ISIS people there are just former Pakistan Taliban I think. I doubt they are any threat to overtake the Taliban and probably have still worked with them some in recent years.
I get what you are saying but there's obviously a decent amount of overlap between ISIS and the Taliban.
And you made the point yesterday that Afghanistan, and therefore the Taliban, are sovereign. They need to make sure ISIS doesn't have a free hand to do what they've done today.
Certainly there'll be overlap, as there is with just about every group in Afghanistan. Yesterday you were in the ANA, today you're in the Taliban, and tomorrow you'll be in ISIS. The Taliban absolutely needs to reign in the terrorists in their country. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised that's how they got past the Taliban outer perimeter.
The Taliban can't afford to keep antagonizing all their neighbors. Whether they succeed in holding onto power will depend on whether they can fight off the resistance while at the same time squash the terror groups. If they continue their sponsorship of terror as they did during their first rule, then they'll have to face Russia (via the CARs) and China next, with tacit support of the US. That'll just be the reverse of of 2001, when they faced the US head on with the tacit support of China and Russia.
I have some hope that they've learned their lessons. Keep in mind that the Taliban was only formed in '94, and took power in '96. When we toppled them they were only a 7 years old organization. They must have grown quite a bit more mature after a 20 years war with America, or else they would've never survived. At least publicly, they've been quite a bit more savvy than before. I don't expect them to become angels overnight, or ever really, but I do expect to see more responsible actions from them. Now that they're the sovereign, they need to do more than just not attacking others, they need to start protecting international interests within their own territory.
That's incredibly optimistic. I don't share your optimism. They're still slaughtering people for not adhering to strict Islamofacist ideals. There's very little centralized control. It's the wild west with a great deal more vitriol and violence. In short, it's a veritable tinderbox of well armed and incredibly uneducated and hateful people with sovereign power.
I don't see a reasonable avenue for success or peace.
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