Afghanistan

[jamil]

The Taliban is 'embarrassed heavily' by ISIS-K attack, 'overwhelmed,' girding for civil war, terrorism experts say

The latest Speed Read,/speed-reads,,speed-reads, breaking news, comment, reviews and features from the experts at The Week

theweek.com

I stopped reading at “They are trying to prove to the world they can govern responsibly.” It’s obviously not a serious article.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

That’s a new, interesting, take for me.

Kind of what I've been saying repeatedly in this thread. The Taliban is not in control of Afghanistan. They are partially in control of parts of Afghanistan...which is how Afghanistan works (or doesn't work, depending on your viewpoint.)

In a very crude analogy, they are currently the winning team in a field of other teams, some of which aren't even playing the same sport. The leadership has to leave the reigns slack or any of their players can switch teams because everyone is a free agent at all times. The media will call it an ongoing civil war, which I suppose may be correct, but it's more correctly an ongoing tribal war that well pre-dates our involvement.

 

[Hawkeye]

Majorie Taylor Greene submitted impeachment articles call your congress critters and tell them to support. Aid and comfort to the enemy is treason.

Impeachment gets Kamala in as POTUS. DO we really want that? Unfortunately, our choice is "Dumb and Dumber". I really don't want to hand the Dems the "first female(?) President...

 

[BehindBlueI's]

After careful consideration, I have a hot take:

I think this operational plan and it’s astounding failure had to have been done on purpose, with the basic purpose to continue conflict in the region and to keep the MIC cash register going. Even if it isn’t with our own troops, contractors will be raking it in.

If that were the case we could have just stayed the course. We could have babysat Afghanistan for generations. We are still in Germany, Japan, and Korea generations after the relevant wars ended, largely one would assume to check Soviet influence and then Russian and/or Chinese influence. The American people had, by and large, forgotten we were even in Afghanistan until this debacle. Seen any anti-war protests before this? Big Op-eds about "bring the boys home?" After decades of "America's military is at war, America's civilians are at the mall" there was zero reason to make this debacle if the goal was just to keep cycling money into the area.

 

[Hatin Since 87]

Impeachment gets Kamala in as POTUS. DO we really want that? Unfortunately, our choice is "Dumb and Dumber". I really don't want to hand the Dems the "first female(?) President...

That’s gonna happen regardless. If we do it soon enough she only gets 6-7 years, if we wait she can potentially have 10. Otherwise, yes, I agree, I don’t want kamala at the reigns.

 

[KellyinAvon]

but it's more correctly an ongoing tribal war that well pre-dates our involvement.

We now return you to our regularly scheduled warfare and acts of barbarism already in progress.

 

[DoggyDaddy]

If we do it soon enough

Keep in mind that impeaching him doesn't guarantee removal. With the current make up of the legislature, that's far from a sure thing.

 

[Hatin Since 87]

Keep in mind that impeaching him doesn't guarantee removal. With the current make up of the legislature, that's far from a sure thing.

It’s more likely the democrats would invoke the 25th amendment than to allow impeachment to pass in the house and senate.

 

[ditcherman]

After careful consideration, I have a hot take:

I think this operational plan and it’s astounding failure had to have been done on purpose, with the basic purpose to continue conflict in the region and to keep the MIC cash register going. Even if it isn’t with our own troops, contractors will be raking it in.

This line of thinking has some possibilities. Contrary to what the smart squirrel in the hat said above, they might have felt tremendous pressure to do something different optically, while still serving their interests, just for the sake of “different”.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

We now return you to our regularly scheduled warfare and acts of barbarism already in progress.

Everybody's an anarchist until things get anarchy. Or something. But, yes, tribalism equates to this sort of lifestyle as long as all tribes are relatively capable of resisting each other. Only through brute force are things temporarily peaceful.

 

[KellyinAvon]

That’s gonna happen regardless. If we do it soon enough she only gets 6-7 years, if we wait she can potentially have 10. Otherwise, yes, I agree, I don’t want kamala at the reigns.

Those pulling the strings have to time it right. Kamala will hide (variation on the Biden Basement Campaign.) If not, she'll lose the general election in a landslide due to her incompetence and general unlike-ability. She didn't make it to the Primaries as a POTUS candidate in 2020.

 

[BehindBlueI's]

This line of thinking has some possibilities. Contrary to what the smart squirrel in the hat said above, they might have felt tremendous pressure to do something different optically, while still serving their interests.

Let's say Afghanistan suddenly became a western style representative democracy and sent us a flower basket every mother's day. That's the only place we've got to spend money on? The only conflict?

"To counter China's increasing influence, the US will be increasing their naval capabilities by...."
"US begins construction of X surface ships"
"US begins upgrade of submarine fleet"
"US begins research and deployment of (everything) for a near peer sea conflict in the event of..."

There you go. In 15 seconds of brainstorming I've redirected all of that defense spending to something that would be both pricey and likely have widespread support among the US population.

Let's not spin incompetence and apathy into some sinister genius. They screwed the pooch by thinking Afghanistan "government" would take months to years to collapse vs minutes.

 

[ditcherman]

I stopped reading at “They are trying to prove to the world they can govern responsibly.” It’s obviously not a serious article.

That’s a quote from a retired US General. It’s in the article, not what the article is. And maybe he’s overstated it, but those boneheads do seem to think they can run something. And ISIS-k is about to show them otherwise.

I think it’s just as embarrassing that we struck a deal with taliban to guard the perimeter.

 

[NKBJ]

After careful consideration, I have a hot take:

I think this operational plan and it’s astounding failure had to have been done on purpose, with the basic purpose to continue conflict in the region and to keep the MIC cash register going. Even if it isn’t with our own troops, contractors will be raking it in.

Absolutely it's been done on purpose. The sweeping changes this initiates in the political structure of planet Earth is breath taking.

 

[ditcherman]

Let's say Afghanistan suddenly became a western style representative democracy and sent us a flower basket every mother's day. That's the only place we've got to spend money on? The only conflict?

"To counter China's increasing influence, the US will be increasing their naval capabilities by...."
"US begins construction of X surface ships"
"US begins upgrade of submarine fleet"
"US begins research and deployment of (everything) for a near peer sea conflict in the event of..."

There you go. In 15 seconds of brainstorming I've redirected all of that defense spending to something that would be both pricey and likely have widespread support among the US population.

Let's not spin incompetence and apathy into some sinister genius. They screwed the pooch by thinking Afghanistan "government" would take months to years to collapse vs minutes.

I said some possibilities, not sinister genius. I don’t think jsx’s thought meant that Afghanistan would be a representative democracy, it can still be a tribal poophole, (but it’s my tribal poophole!) I took his thought to mean the US leadership knew pretty much how this would go, and chose to do it so they could show their base they did something different.
Not completely stupid like we want to make them out to be, but certainly not genius. Just self serving.

I think the highly effective drone strike against a high value target kind of backs this thinking up as well. The men that can get things done are still looking over his shoulder, they are still there. How are we “pulled out” if they are still operating?

 

[ditcherman]

Absolutely it's been done on purpose. The sweeping changes this initiates in the political structure of planet Earth is breath taking.

Yes, as noted above, NATO has to rewrite their plans since the US has gone wimpy.

 

[ditcherman]

Everybody's an anarchist until things get anarchy. Or something. But, yes, tribalism equates to this sort of lifestyle as long as all tribes are relatively capable of resisting each other. Only through brute force are things temporarily peaceful.

Just for the record, I intend to never be a hypocrite.
That is all.

#morelikebigred

 

[BehindBlueI's]

I took his thought to mean the US leadership knew pretty much how this would go, and chose to do it so they could show their base they did something different.

Oh, they knew it would collapse into a tribal poo hole again. They did not know it would happen overnight. I think they really believed they had months to years to evac.

In a zero defect mentality world, do you think anyone is risking not putting the best spin possible on the situation on the ground? "Yes Sir, I've completely failed in my mission and the instant we pick up and leave, the very instant, everything will go to pot" is not something many men are going to admit to themselves, let alone to their superiors. Especially not anyone who's made or is looking to make general or attained high level civilian positions.

 

[foszoe]

Surely we can all agree that those tweets were really hurtful and made people cry.

Some say hurtful, some say mean.

Never heard too much argument against my word of choice.

They were stupid

 

[ditcherman]

Some say hurtful, some say mean.

Never heard too much argument against my word of choice.

They were stupid

Wait, you’re not willing to trade stupid tweets for dead marines too, are you?