So I’m still generally not well informed about Afghanistan and I’m sure the withdrawal could have been better managed. However, what I am concluding thus far based on some de minimus research is that withdrawal was going to be a cluster fuck whenever it ultimately happened.
I watched this the other night (This Is What Winning Looks Like - Wikipedia) and while I concede that the film maker certainly has biases, there are clear indicators of just how messed up the situation was for a very long time. You can find fault in how the situation was managed in all administrations since it began.
To me, it doesn’t seem that achieving a functional democratic regime with the institutional rule of law was a realistic or achievable goal.
Don’t believe everything the press puts out.
Nor rely on governments to release all information they have transparently, completely, and accurately to the public.
There were of course weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
McMasters, our former National Security Advisor is now showing up on news shows demanding that we expand the air port perimeter. Bad idea, it would get American troops bogged down in urban warfare, when the Taliban could easily respond by shelling the airport and trapping them in place. So we would either have to grab increasing areas of Kabul to secure our access, or not escalate and pull out on August 31st.
Hate Biden all you want, but since the Army and Government of Afghanistan has collapsed there is no re-entry short of putting in what will become tens of thousands of troops.
Sometimes once you go down a certain road there is no return.
I do not know what you are arguing. If you are advocating that we enlarge the perimeter with troops please explain how we do that without starting a full scale battle with the Taiban.
If you read the Washington Post’s articles on the Afghanistan Papers, the U.S. military thought or wanted to think that things were going well when they were training up the Afghanistan Army. Quite frankly I don’t trust most of the “experts” any more.
That’s fair. I’m staying out of it. I just don’t want anyone else to get hurt. Those are our boys and I’d be amazed if it doesn’t all go straight to hell. Nothing surprises me and I’d be amazed if the Taliban/GRU/Iran/China/etc wasn’t trying to make this go as bad as possible behind the scenes for a number of reasons. Suicide bombers tell no tales. Awful hard to interrogate or confirm the actions of a corpse. American soldiers there for the killing, a little bribe for the martyr would go a long way. Saddam did that kind of shit all the time.
Talking tactics at this point is silly. It’s a shit sandwich and it’s going to be a scramble to get the rest of those troops out of there without a shit ton of additional casualties.
But Biden owns this. You don’t get to be Commander in Chief for 7+ months and blame a military fiasco on Orange Man Bad.
You?
Your trips to the supermarket are not affected.
You are not boots on ground.
You are not in planning meetings.
Sam, you are an educated man.
And there are many areas where you can throw a pebble and make a ripple.
This is not remotely one of them.
Not remotely.
No. There are right ways and wrong ways to go about things. The death of a dozen Marines was not unavoidable. It was a colossal failure by the current Commander in Chief. You can look back as far as you like if you want to lay blame for us being there in the first place. But Biden owns the withdrawal. This is on him.
The Marine deaths deserve their own Gong, forever.
There are 1,500 plus other Americans stuck there.
Sloppy.
Very sloppy.
I say this, disclaiming, hindsight is 20/20, and I am on my couch.
This was and is not an area, I have any idea what I am talking about, in practical terms.
What an educated man or woman is, and whether I fit the decription, could be argued, but certain geographic facts are undeniable. Look at the pictures of Kabul airport. What do you see? There is high ground outside the airport perimeter.
This high ground is not controlled by the US.
Airports in valleys if, and when you have artillery on the surrounding hills can be shut down rather quickly. see the French loss at Dien Bein Phu. They lost their air supply and it cost them the battle.
On the other side of the airport, the city of Kabul runs up to the gates of the airport. Urban areas are great locations to hide artillery and rockets. Just ask the Israelis about how Hamas uses such terrain in Gaza to hide their weapons they fire at Israel.
Airplanes are not particularly resistant to artillery and rockets. Kabul airport has one major runway, if you knock a transport plane down or blow one up, and it blocks the runway the US loses the use of the runway long as that obstruction remains. Or Ii you blast enough holes in the runway it becomes temporarily unusable by large aircraft.
The majority of American Air Support has to come in from outside the country. Unless the airport is currently a fully stocked ammo and fuel dump. That is a big disadvantage to the defenders if a full scale battle erupts because of delay of their air support.
The Taliban are skilled fighters who do not give up easily. If they decide to resist, you would face urban warfare when attempting to expand the airport perimeter. This would dramatically increase US military casualties. Perhaps the Taliban have suddenly decided they are afraid of the US and would fold but I doubt it based on their last 20 years of behavior on the battlefield.
Then you get to the interesting part. How much of Kabul to seize and how long to hold it in the absence of our former local allies. Any occupation would now be an almost totally US government affair considering how the old GOA army and government has come apart at the seams.
Conclusion, if you want to keep American deaths and injuries where they are, get out on August 31st and ignore the voices coming out of Washington D.C. who want to essentially restart. this war.
@SamuelBrowning is right. Putting in extra troops now is pointless and will actually make matters worse. HKIA (the airport) is a lost cause and anyone that needs to extracted after the 31st will have to be retrieved through negotiation rather than force.
It’s not so much the Taliban that’s the issue, they dont want conflict as it would cause friction and slow down their complete domination of the country. ISIS-K are the main threat now, they hate coalition forces and the Taliban alike so HKIA is an irresistible target to them, hence the bombings.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the Taliban will ask for help in dealing with the ISIS-K threat in exchange for allowing more people to leave the country.