What a failure of the US armed forces here. 20 damn years staying in the country with the only 2 goal - to help Afghans build an army and help defend themselves and to eradicate the Taliban. They failed miserably in both. Trillions spent and many lost lives. Why would we ever pour money into such a terrible, incompetent system? Of course, the cycle keeps repeating itself and we keep growing the military.
There's a sobering assessment of US performance in Afghanistan, What we got wrong in Afghanistan [1], in The Atlantic from a few days ago.
It was written by a retired veteran: Mike Jason retired in 2019 as a U.S. Army colonel, after 24 years on active duty. He commanded combat units in Germany, Kosovo, Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
It pulls no punches and, in my opinion, is worth reading.
The US played a pivotal role in saving our asses over in Europe, and we are eternally grateful, but ever since, the US has been bad at war. It's not the firepower, it's not the soldiers, and it's not the organization. These are top notch. It's the **ing politicians dragging young men and women into wars not worth fighting.
You simply can't foster a regime, for the fostered government is by definition a puppet that simply does not command enough support of its people. What's surprising to me is the US government never learns despite so many failures around the world.
And an honest question: why do American people think that it's so damn important to spread American democracy at the cost of waging wars? Pew Research said 94%+ of Afghanistan adults support Sharia laws. So why do we risk our own people's lives, kill thousands of people in a foreign nation, and throw trillions of dollars just to force other countries to buy our own ideology? Isn't it text-book definition of pure evil? Another case in point: According to the book Skin in the Game, the western countries removed Assad in the name of bringing democracy, yet triggered one of the most brutal civil war in a country, left dozens of cities in ruins, and ironically fostered the largest slave market in the world. Yeah, slave market. Isn't it ironic?
Agreed and the answer to your question of why? This is the power engine of the American economy and dream. Our economy is based on us engaged in a conflict for which we print money and hand it to government contractors to later make its way to the rest of the economy.
All the while sucking like a predator a far away land and people for every last juice they have.
This is the only way to keep the faux heaven looking as it does. Utopian.
It’s also the one topic you can have both sides of the aisle always agree on. No matter the political climate. When the military is working, it’s always at work in keeping us free.
Woodrow Wilson would have been proud at how we monetized his emotional button of American exceptionalism
This was not a failure of the Armed Forces, this was a failure of Washington policymakers. The same thing that happened in Vietnam, bureaucrats in Washington trying to run a war in Afghanistan but no clear objectives, and despite 20 years of death and destruction, no understanding of the region and its culture. Afghanistan was never going to be a democracy.
>>>Why would we ever pour money into such a terrible, incompetent system?
Not that the US DoD is in any way a model of efficiency, but I suspect you are vastly underestimating the difficulty of the problem set.
Over the past 200 years, the British, Soviet, and American empires have all failed to pacify Afghanistan. Probably the Mongols and Alexander the Great struggled too, I need to dig into the history of those campaigns for more specifics.
Can you articular which particular aspects of our nation-building and counter-insurgency techniques are distinct from our equally-failed predecessors? Have you considered that the objective may not have been to erect a fully-functional Afghan government and military, but instead to conduct a multi-decade delaying action to stymie Chinese expansion for as long as possible?
I think it shows that the US were no more than a foreign occupation force. Everyone knew how powerful their military was and how much money they had to distribute so perhaps the majority went with the flow but the current events show that this meant little to the workings of Afghanistan and its culture.
In my view there's always arrogance in thinking that GIs can literally fall from the sky and "save" the locals...
Why wasn't all this equipment repatriated or destroyed? Why were the bases just abandoned without proper transition to Afghan Control, so that in some cases they were even looted by civilians?
Possible explanations:
1. Extreme incompetence or total apathy by US Commanders/Politicians
2. There was no land/sea transport route through Pakistan to retrieve all the equipment
3. The US Military-Industrial Complex was happy for all this stuff to be lost, so it could be reordered
4. The US wanted the Taliban to reconquer the country quickly, so that any power vaccuum could not be filled by China or Russia
5. Managed decline of the US Empire, requiring deliberate humiliation and demoralization of the US forces, enabled by corrupt senior US commanders and politicians who have made deals with China.
It's interesting to note that DRA (the pro-Soviet Afghanistan government) has fought for 3 whole years after the Soviets have left Afghanistan. And it was with the almost complete lack of military support from the USSR (you know, the Union collapse and all) and with Taliban being actively funded by the US and Pakistan. Meanwhile, the current government probably will fall even before the US will finish its humiliating retreat and it does not look like Russia or China have substantially supported Taliban, at the very least it most certainly was not on the US scale of 30 years ago.
Worth quoting this passage from an insightful article[1]
People fought in Afghanistan, and people died, but not always in the obvious way. They had been fighting for so long, twenty-three years then, that by the time the Americans arrived the Afghans had developed an elaborate set of rules designed to spare as many fighters as they could. So the war could go on forever. Men fought, men switched sides, men lined up and fought again. War in Afghanistan often seemed like a game of pickup basketball, a contest among friends, a tournament where you never knew which team you’d be on when the next game got under way. Shirts today, skins tomorrow. On Tuesday, you might be part of a fearsome Taliban regiment, running into a minefield. And on Wednesday you might be manning a checkpoint for some gang of the Northern Alliance. By Thursday you could be back with the Talibs again, holding up your Kalashnikov and promising to wage jihad forever. War was serious in Afghanistan, but not that serious. It was part of everyday life. It was a job. Only the civilians seemed to lose.
Battles were often decided this way, not by actual fighting, but by flipping gangs of soldiers. One day, the Taliban might have four thousand soldiers, and the next, only half that, with the warlords of the Northern Alliance suddenly larger by a similar amount. The fighting began when the bargaining stopped, and the bargaining went right up until the end. The losers were the ones who were too stubborn, too stupid or too fanatical to make a deal. Suddenly, they would find themselves outnumbered, and then they would die. It was a kind of natural selection.
Sounds a lot like the Italian mercenary armies in the middle ages, where they mostly maneuvered for advantage rather than fought. Being mercenaries, they had little interest in dying for their employer's cause.
Fall of Saigon v2. Although I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong level of popular support.
In these parts of the world, 'defecting to the winning side' is a basic survival skill. As soon as the US stopped its support it was obvious who'd win (the people still getting state support from Pakistan). So why should a smart faction fight and die? To make the people who aren't there anymore look better?
The corruption is so bad soldiers in hospitals starved to death.
It's clear that in the past 30 years afganistan did not have a functioning government at all. Its not about popular support, its a failure of 'statebuilding'
> I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong level of popular support.
The explanation is very, very simple, but I don't see any Western media talking about it at all.
Basically, Afghan government fell apart when USA withdrew the pork barrel of military contracts from locals.
People forget that 20 years ago USA mounted all kinds of warlords, and other rogue elements into seats of power. The entirety of regional elites which emerged in these 20 years are a product of that system.
The only things securing their loyalty to USA, and thus to the government in Kabul were American money.
The moment they ran out, it all fell apart just like Middle Eastern, and Latin American US friendly regimes. The "Our Bastard!" theory showed extreme naivete of people following it yet again.
There is no such things as "Our Bastards!" Time to learn that after 60 years.
Henry Kisinger lured USA into a geopolitical deathtrap with his lunatical political theories. Now US has found itself in the world surrounded by backstabbing, and turncoat regimes of its own making, who nor fear, nor respect it now, and who will pounce the moment USA stops spoonfeeding them, and shows its back.
USA has less allies in the world now than at any time in the last century.
USA can't now fight half the world dominated by solidified group of corrupt regimes.
Escaping this situation will be extremely hard.
USA cannot rely on allies who are loyal only to American printing press.
USA will not score any real allies without changing itself first
The locals keeping their heads down in the face of an insurgency the Afghan state is clearly unable to defeat probably shouldn’t be presented as “strong popular support” (the true level of which is supposed to be about 10%).
Vietnam ultimately became a pretty nice country a few years after the US government finally gave up on trying to turn it into hell on earth, and it’s only getting better.
If this really is Saigon 2.0, 20 years from now Afghanistan will be a peaceful country with active tourism. With the Taliban seemingly making efforts to appease China for economic gain, who knows, it just might happen.
They don't have all that support from population; it's more like "if you can't beat them...". Unfortunately among those surrendering without any resistance it's the Afghan Army, with all their weapons, which means now the Talibans are much more heavily armed than a few months ago.
Just over a month ago [July 8] the President was actually arguing that the Afghan army would win:
Q Is a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan now inevitable?
THE PRESIDENT: No, it is not.
Q Why?
THE PRESIDENT: Because you — the Afghan troops have 300,000 well-equipped — as well-equipped as any army in the world — and an air force against something like 75,000 Taliban. It is not inevitable.
...
I trust the capacity of the Afghan military, who is better trained, better equipped, and more re- — more competent in terms of conducting war.
Plenty of those that helped the Americans and other troops are now facing gruesome execution by the Taliban. Translators, people working for them in any capacity, teachers, they're all on the run fearing for their lives. Turkey is overrun by a wave of people getting out of Afghanistan.
Wars are won by men willing to die for their cause. The US, Canadian and many other soldiers who helped liberate Europe in the 2nd World War were willing to die for freedom. And the Taliban are willing to die for theirs.
I wish a safe return to the very professional troops from more than 20 countries still on the ground. Once again they are victims of incompetent politicians.
But it 20 years, was it not always obvious, that a young Afghani, that just got in the Army because it was only available well paid job would not be willing to die for some very local nebulous cause? To defeat a group that embodies the cultural heritage that prevailed in the country for the last few centuries?
Afghanistan's situation is obviously as complex as it can get but at the level of day to day experience of majority of locals (not only elite city-dwellers) Taliban are hated/feared but consistent, and they generally practice what they preach.
In my brief personal encounters, and observations of what locals face: the corrupt government, its police and its army is like the "Zahhak the Snake Shoulder" (an evil figure in Persian mythology); an insatiable unstable monster better avoided at all cost. I suspect this is one of the main reasons nobody really put up a fight this time around.
Afghanistan's tragic contemporary conflicts has many winners and losers that switch places every so often but there's been one constant loser: its civilians.
Clausewitz famously said in his book On War that "War is the continuation of politics by other means." Following this logic, I don't see any reason that Afghanistan government wouldn't collapse. I mean, for what will their troops fight, and for whom will their troops fight? Most of the people there do support Sharia law per Pew Research. Afghanistan people are famous for being independent and for fighting foreign occupation to death. So, the troops were not fighting for their ideals, neither for their people. Besides, they knew they would lose. The US intelligence said the government would fall in 90 days. Then why would the troops fight their own people for a losing war, especially given that Taliban will exact bloody reprisal on those who didn't surrender?
Seems like the Taliban are holding back to allow foreign personnel to evacuate. I wonder if that is part of an explicit agreement, or just them not wanting to create problems for themselves when they've already clearly won.
Yeah I called this one in real time right as I watched the planes hit the towers. Knew we'd kill hundreds of thousands of people in the middle east before we had to pull out defeated. I didn't quite expect it to take 20 years though.
Then protested Iraq and they cheered our freedom of speech, then rolled tanks into Baghdad anyway and the WMDs weren't there, just like Scott Ritter told them. That worked out well.
Really should have listened to us when it came to Kuwait in 1991 as well. The towers might still be standing.
I eagerly await the mental tap dancing and 'splaning that results in us being the hopelessly geopolitically naive ones, when the other side of the argument has been wrong for a solid 30 years straight.
On the contrary. Taliban increased poppy fields by 50 percent in 2020 and they are also pushing meth through their channels. Taliban budget estimated at 2 bilion dollars is supported chiefly by opium trade...
Very mixed feeling about this. The implications for minorities, women and progress are now obviously dire. Though I can't help feel somewhat pleased to see Dubya/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Wolfo's legacy ground to dust and all their supporters/apologists with pie on their face. I couldn't believe Dubya prancing around like an elder statesman while Trump was in office. There's an element of their m.o. that has overflown from the military to other branches of US life as the military got less stretched in recent years. The mistakes made haven't been as educational as they should've been.
[+] [-] yalogin|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] samizdis|4 years ago|reply
It was written by a retired veteran: Mike Jason retired in 2019 as a U.S. Army colonel, after 24 years on active duty. He commanded combat units in Germany, Kosovo, Kuwait, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
It pulls no punches and, in my opinion, is worth reading.
[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/how-americ...
[+] [-] BasDirks|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hintymad|4 years ago|reply
And an honest question: why do American people think that it's so damn important to spread American democracy at the cost of waging wars? Pew Research said 94%+ of Afghanistan adults support Sharia laws. So why do we risk our own people's lives, kill thousands of people in a foreign nation, and throw trillions of dollars just to force other countries to buy our own ideology? Isn't it text-book definition of pure evil? Another case in point: According to the book Skin in the Game, the western countries removed Assad in the name of bringing democracy, yet triggered one of the most brutal civil war in a country, left dozens of cities in ruins, and ironically fostered the largest slave market in the world. Yeah, slave market. Isn't it ironic?
[+] [-] danielschonfeld|4 years ago|reply
This is the only way to keep the faux heaven looking as it does. Utopian.
It’s also the one topic you can have both sides of the aisle always agree on. No matter the political climate. When the military is working, it’s always at work in keeping us free.
Woodrow Wilson would have been proud at how we monetized his emotional button of American exceptionalism
[+] [-] underseacables|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bjourne|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sneak|4 years ago|reply
This is a management issue. For all of the failings of the current US president, getting the hell out of an endless, unnecessary war is a good thing.
[+] [-] CapricornNoble|4 years ago|reply
Not that the US DoD is in any way a model of efficiency, but I suspect you are vastly underestimating the difficulty of the problem set.
Over the past 200 years, the British, Soviet, and American empires have all failed to pacify Afghanistan. Probably the Mongols and Alexander the Great struggled too, I need to dig into the history of those campaigns for more specifics.
Can you articular which particular aspects of our nation-building and counter-insurgency techniques are distinct from our equally-failed predecessors? Have you considered that the objective may not have been to erect a fully-functional Afghan government and military, but instead to conduct a multi-decade delaying action to stymie Chinese expansion for as long as possible?
[+] [-] a0-prw|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mytailorisrich|4 years ago|reply
In my view there's always arrogance in thinking that GIs can literally fall from the sky and "save" the locals...
[+] [-] NonContro|4 years ago|reply
https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20210814-weapon-seizur...
Why wasn't all this equipment repatriated or destroyed? Why were the bases just abandoned without proper transition to Afghan Control, so that in some cases they were even looted by civilians?
Possible explanations:
1. Extreme incompetence or total apathy by US Commanders/Politicians
2. There was no land/sea transport route through Pakistan to retrieve all the equipment
3. The US Military-Industrial Complex was happy for all this stuff to be lost, so it could be reordered
4. The US wanted the Taliban to reconquer the country quickly, so that any power vaccuum could not be filled by China or Russia
5. Managed decline of the US Empire, requiring deliberate humiliation and demoralization of the US forces, enabled by corrupt senior US commanders and politicians who have made deals with China.
[+] [-] fuoqi|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vishnugupta|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WalterBright|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Clewza313|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yyyk|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ClumsyPilot|4 years ago|reply
It's clear that in the past 30 years afganistan did not have a functioning government at all. Its not about popular support, its a failure of 'statebuilding'
https://observers.france24.com/en/20200218-afghanistan-corru...
[+] [-] baybal2|4 years ago|reply
The explanation is very, very simple, but I don't see any Western media talking about it at all.
Basically, Afghan government fell apart when USA withdrew the pork barrel of military contracts from locals.
People forget that 20 years ago USA mounted all kinds of warlords, and other rogue elements into seats of power. The entirety of regional elites which emerged in these 20 years are a product of that system.
The only things securing their loyalty to USA, and thus to the government in Kabul were American money.
The moment they ran out, it all fell apart just like Middle Eastern, and Latin American US friendly regimes. The "Our Bastard!" theory showed extreme naivete of people following it yet again.
There is no such things as "Our Bastards!" Time to learn that after 60 years.
Henry Kisinger lured USA into a geopolitical deathtrap with his lunatical political theories. Now US has found itself in the world surrounded by backstabbing, and turncoat regimes of its own making, who nor fear, nor respect it now, and who will pounce the moment USA stops spoonfeeding them, and shows its back.
USA has less allies in the world now than at any time in the last century.
USA can't now fight half the world dominated by solidified group of corrupt regimes.
Escaping this situation will be extremely hard.
USA cannot rely on allies who are loyal only to American printing press.
USA will not score any real allies without changing itself first
[+] [-] implements|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] trainsplanes|4 years ago|reply
If this really is Saigon 2.0, 20 years from now Afghanistan will be a peaceful country with active tourism. With the Taliban seemingly making efforts to appease China for economic gain, who knows, it just might happen.
[+] [-] squarefoot|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] leereeves|4 years ago|reply
Q Is a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan now inevitable?
THE PRESIDENT: No, it is not.
Q Why?
THE PRESIDENT: Because you — the Afghan troops have 300,000 well-equipped — as well-equipped as any army in the world — and an air force against something like 75,000 Taliban. It is not inevitable.
...
I trust the capacity of the Afghan military, who is better trained, better equipped, and more re- — more competent in terms of conducting war.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/20...
[+] [-] swang|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] godelmachine|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pjmlp|4 years ago|reply
I guess we will be getting an Hollywood version of the facts in 10 years timeframe.
My heart goes to those that died for nothing, and those that will now face the revenge of Talibans.
[+] [-] jacquesm|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] belter|4 years ago|reply
I wish a safe return to the very professional troops from more than 20 countries still on the ground. Once again they are victims of incompetent politicians.
But it 20 years, was it not always obvious, that a young Afghani, that just got in the Army because it was only available well paid job would not be willing to die for some very local nebulous cause? To defeat a group that embodies the cultural heritage that prevailed in the country for the last few centuries?
[+] [-] THINkttwICE|4 years ago|reply
Afghanistan's tragic contemporary conflicts has many winners and losers that switch places every so often but there's been one constant loser: its civilians.
[+] [-] a3n|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sorokod|4 years ago|reply
This Is What Winning Looks Like (2013?): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja5Q75hf6QI
[+] [-] hintymad|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jacksonkmarley|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rootsudo|4 years ago|reply
When did terrorist groups get spokespeople, geez.
[+] [-] megous|4 years ago|reply
Apparently they also have a English website: http://alemarahenglish.net/?p=48412
[+] [-] CodeGlitch|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _moof|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lamontcg|4 years ago|reply
Then protested Iraq and they cheered our freedom of speech, then rolled tanks into Baghdad anyway and the WMDs weren't there, just like Scott Ritter told them. That worked out well.
Really should have listened to us when it came to Kuwait in 1991 as well. The towers might still be standing.
I eagerly await the mental tap dancing and 'splaning that results in us being the hopelessly geopolitically naive ones, when the other side of the argument has been wrong for a solid 30 years straight.
[+] [-] croes|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chewz|4 years ago|reply
https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/07/19/taliban-expanding-drug-...
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
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