Shady Ray

I think you will be OK. The national discussion here at the moment is essentially trending towards more widespread adoption of "2G" (proof of vaccination or proof of recovery) vs the existing "3G" (vaccinated, recovered OR tested). Das Erste has a running table of the status of the most popular Christmas Markets, and it looks like only the Market in front of Schloss Charlottenburg in Berlin (which is certainly a shame) has been cancelled. On top of that, the German people are very, very opposed to cancellations of the Markets again, with over 75% planning on attending at least one market this year, so I estimate they will generaly remain open, albeit with increased masked/distancing requirements. https://www.mdr.de/brisant/weihnachtsmaerkte-corona-100.html

As a young associate fresh out of law school, I had the good fortune of working for a partner who cut his teeth prosecuting the My Lai atrocities. He had absolutely nothing positive to say about Colin Powell and his role in covering up that stain on our national reputation. In fact, his opinion of Powell is not fit to be repeated. Colin Powell may have rehabilitated his own reputation by acting as the diverse face of empire, but for many involved in the actual heroic act of defying political pressure and attempting to bring war criminals within our own ranks to justice, Powell was seen as a piece of shit all too happy to play the part. I hope he made peace with the role he played before passing away. RIP.

Al Jazeera saying that a rocket has hit a house by the airport. An Afghan police chief says a rocket has struck a neighbourhood northwest of Kabul’s international airport amid the US evacuation there, killing a child. Rashid, the Kabul police chief who goes by one name, told The Associated Press that the rocket struck on Sunday afternoon. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/8/29/afghanistan-explosion-near-kabul-airport

And not only turned a blind eye, but there are multiple documented instances of military brass actively telling soldiers NOT to report it. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/21/world/asia/us-soldiers-told-to-ignore-afghan-allies-abuse-of-boys.html

I can only speak for the current state of public discourse in Germany and Austria, but yeah, it is really bad. Some of that could be due to the fact that the Bundestag elections are four weeks away and Germany is essentially doing its best to board up Europe in anticipation of the inevitable migration influx, but the fact of the matter is that for the first time in my decade here all the major parties are openly echoing the eternally-advocated French position of a common European framework for defense and foreign policy. Yes, this is much, much easier said than done due to financial/intra-EU considerations; plus the fact that the US will certainly apply all kinds of pressure to continue the system where NATO is the cornerstone of European defense, but fact of the matter is that our frolics and detours through the Middle East have reinforced the view of many (particularly outside of the "Post War" generation) that it is possible to occupy a space somewhere between Russian authoritarianism and American hyper-militarism/defense industry subservience. While my personal belief is that this evolution in the transatlantic relationship is inevitable, what is constantly front-and-present with our constant partisan bickering and our unreliability with respect to international agreements is greatly accelerating things. Wikileaks once released a 2010 CIA memo that essentially identified the key element of continued support of the war in Western Europe as being pure electoral apathy and that any attention to the conflict here will lead to a lack of support. https://file.wikileaks.org/file/cia-afghanistan.pdf Well, there's been some attention.

Barrons: Turkey Holds First Talks with the Taliban in Kabul Turks met for almost 4 hours with Taliban leaders today. Color me skeptical of the braintrust that is the US foreign policy establishment, but I fully expect us to be supporting the Taliban covertly - if not overtly - in their civil war against ISIS-K within a year. Hell, we have already assisted them informally against ISIS-K ocassionally over the past 18 months and, quite simply, our IC can't kick its addiction to that sweet, sweet Afghanistan bloodshed. It is what we do.

Brits are essentially done evacuating. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/27/uk-minister-not-everyone-out-kabul-rescue-final-hours-afghanistan UK minister says ‘not everyone will get out’ with Kabul rescue in final hours Defence secretary says people stuck in Afghanistan will be offered advice on ‘how to look after themselves’ --- “We at 4.30 this morning, UK-time, closed the Baron’s hotel, shut the processing centre, and the gates were closed at Abbey Gate,” Wallace told Sky News, referring to the Kabul hotel where those leaving were checked, and the gate leading to the airport. “We will process those people that we’ve brought with us, the 1,000 people approximately inside the airfield now, and we will seek a way to continue to find a few people in the crowds where we can, but overall the main processing is now closed and we have a matter of hours,” he added.

Translation of an absolutely outstanding long-form article in Der Spiegel from highly-esteemed and award-winning German war correspondent, Christoph Reuter, who lived in Afghanistan for years during the war. Trillion Dollar Illusion: The Entirely Predictable Failure of the West's Mission in Afghanistan There isn't any petty political point-scoring for Team D or Team R since it is written from a foreign perspective, but it is a brutal and thorough look into how poorly this entire thing was managed by political, civilian and military leadership for essentially the entirety of the war. And to echo @InkaUtexas great post on the other thread, it is all too easy for the decision-makers (and ultimately responsible parties) in the Government/Military to lay this debacle completely at the feet of Afghan "incompetence" or "will to fight", but truth be told this was clearly institutional failure across the board, comprised of equal parts institutional incompetence and institutional deceit. One can only dream that once the dust settles from the urgent issue of safely evacuating our people and allies that the country can at least attempt to hold some of these institutions and individuals accountable for this debacle.

Significant appointment there. We turned Zakir over to the Afghan Government from Gitmo in late 2007, and he was released from prison in Afghanistan a whole 5 months later via direct intervention of the shitbag-extraordinaire, Hamid Karzai, who was acting on behalf of opium druglord/Helmand Governor Sher Mohammed Akhundzada, who helped throw the election to Karzai in 2009. Zakir is a hardliner amongst hardliners...opposed to any reconciliation within Afg and is one of the few Taliban with close ties with Iran. https://jamestown.org/brief/irans-taliban-connection-mullah-abdul-qayyum-zakir/

Speaking of commercial aircraft, this is a weird fucking story coming out of the JPost.

Iran providing fuel to the Taliban, which certainly seems to be one of the bigger short-term issues they were going to face. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/iran-resumes-fuel-exports-afghanistan-after-taliban-request-union-says-2021-08-23/

I can't speak to the numbers as a whole, but the major influx of Afghans into Germany occurred in 2015-16 as part of the larger "Refugee Crisis" that arose out of the Syrian Civil War. Once the migrant streams started, people from all over the region poured in here. And as a side note...Germany's Federal Elections are next month and it is neck-and-neck at the moment for the Chancellorship. Neither of the two centrist parties (Christian Democrats and Social Democrats, which are the two leading in the polls) want this topic to be on the front burner...the loss of control over refugee flows in 2015 didn't sit well with the voters AT ALL and, unfortunately, Afghan migrants have been a particularly difficult group to integrate when compared with the Syrians. There were quite a few particularly ugly, high-profile incidents involving rapes and murders over the past few years. Austria already came out yesterday and said, "nope. not this time." Could have a big impact on the race here if things start to get out of control.

SIAP. Watched this last night and hooooooolllly fuck. I knew that much of the rank-and-file of the ANA were poorly disciplined, unmotivated and generally apathetic about defending territory from the Taliban, but I guess I never knew the extent to which a significant percentage of them appear to be quite literally functionally regarded. It is from 2013, but it truly is prescient in light of current events. Bill Steuber, the Marine who was responsible for checking in/liaising with local leadership in Helmand, should be sainted. I don't know how he kept his shit together dealing with such bullshittery day after day. If he wasn't dealing with ANA soldiers stealing fuel, kidnapping innocents for ransom or regularly being strung out on opium, it was local commanders shaking down citizens or sexually abusing chai boys and then murdering them. And this poor guy couldn't do shit about it because his hands were tied by his superiors who prioritized a particular narrative of ANA=good guys.

Because some of you motherfuckers need some soul. And some of you motherfuckers need Jesus. And all of us motherfuckers need a Hammond B3 with a Leslie speaker on a Sunday morning.

I made the big, permanent jump over ten years ago to Munich after some extended stretches in Eastern Europe/Russia and the UK and I haven’t once regretted it…but fuck if I didn’t have flashbacks of local bureaucratic waiting rooms reading the earlier posts from @956 Worldwide, @Grimas and @staboner. So much truth in these…particularly with respect to early-stage Government/Banking red tape bullshittery and the general social tendencies of the ex-pat community. And empty suitcases going back to the US to be filled with OTC medicines, spray-and-wash, rubbing alcohol for the return trip. God, is that shit true. And lint rollers... the 3M rollers are like gold for my wife and mother-in-law. As staboner said, you will never be fully prepared for the change until you do it…but the key to it all is to just recognize going in that - at least in Europe - the absolute bullshit you are going to deal with at the local City Hall, bank accounts, taxes, driver licenses, etc. is inevitable and is just part of the deal (and in the greater scheme, a very small part). Unfortunately, they tend to dominate the same exciting period of time prior to “the new wearing off” and I have known of multiple Americans who came here and let these early-stage obstacles impact their experiences negatively. But if you just accept it and do your best to find humor/value in getting these things resolved after you land, you will appreciate the time after getting settled in even more. One other thing in addition to the great advice from the others: If your planned time abroad is long(ish)-term outside of the Anglosphere, I can’t stress the value of putting in some time on the local language…of course, if heading to Asia that's a lot tougher, but there is no excuse not to if in Europe, where you won't be starting from scratch linguistically (alphabet, basic pronunciation, etc.) Can you get by with just English throughout much of Europe? Yes, but your experience is going to be greatly diminished/limited. I am always surprised at people who have been here for years and are content to only speak the most basic level of German because they don't "need" it to get around in Munich or Berlin or in their office. No need to be perfect, but try to get functional to some degree beyond just asking for directions and ordering food. Try to get to the point where you are able to communicate basic thoughts and concepts and read/follow local news/events, etc. In my experience, the ability to small talk about local events is invaluable in developing actual, substantive relationships with locals, which is a really, really fulfilling experience. As the others said, ex-pat social circles can be fun, but can also be a beating after a while, and the more options that you have socially the better if its a long-term deal. And 956 Worldwide is right, you are always going to be a foreigner to the locals and it will never be "home", but it is much more enjoyable to be considered as someone in that space between pure ex-pat and a local, and some knowledge of the language is the only way to truly get there, IMO.

In case anyone is interested in a straight-forward, long-form, apolitical, objective set of interviews about the entire situation on the ground in Afghanistan, I highly recommend the Podcast series "Afghanistan After America" from Aussie photojournalist/freelance journalist Andrew Quilty. He has been on the ground living in Kabul for years now and has a series of interviews with really interesting people living there. He interviews an active Taliban commander, an ANA general, a pro-government media baron, various members of the Afghan intelligentsia, and a few more. I listened to the one with Taliban expert Rahmatullah Amiri and then binged the rest over the next few days. The interviews are from late 2020, so a bit dated, but all discussions occur under the shadow of the Doha negotiations between the Afghan Govt and the Taliban. And while Quilty is somewhat outspoken against the US and how the war was conducted in some of his published writings, the interviews themselves are really fascinating and it really gives the listener an insight into just how deeply unchangeable the place really is at every level and facet of society.

Definitely not as viciously as the English media…more along the lines of “let’s all be realistic and accept that the boys just don’t have it this year and it’s time for the post-Jogi era…we must now look forward to more consistency and less booger-picking.”

If judging by the measured cynicism of the national media here in Germany over the past couple of days, you may be right. General consensus here is that England is going to finally stare down their demons and pull out a victory over the less-than-consistent Germans. I hope all y’all are wrong, but I fear you aren’t.

Daaamn. I live about 3 miles from Allianz Arena, and it’s fucking thundering and lightning Central Texas style at the moment, with hail on the way. This Hungary game might be delayed if shit doesn’t blow over.

Wow.

In my opinion, the answer to that is "hell no, they aren't reliable." Absent a clear act of unilateral aggression such as Russia rolling into the Baltics (as opposed to a buildup of tensions over some localized issue like a border dispute between Russia and a member-state that went hot, for example), you'd have a really hard time galvanizing the Germans and French populations to supporting military action against Russia. The governments would honor Article 5, but it would be grudgingly accepted as fulfilling a duty to NATO, and not out of any genuine empathy/camaraderie with another Nato member. The French, of course, have always been the most "NATO skeptical" of the bunch, and, well, the Germans IMO are simply still traumatized by even the idea of war in the East. Not that this is by any means conclusive, put purely anecdotally...on certain days of the year, Germans are expected to tend to the graves of deceased family members...so every Christmas Eve and Easter (yeah, they're a bunch of morbid fuckers) and a couple of other days here and there, we, along with my in-laws, head to the cemeteries of my wife's maternal and paternal sides here in Munich and tidy up family graves, including three which are inscribed with "Missing in Stalingrad" (and pass a dozen more of the same while walking through). I often wonder how much of those constant reminders impact the German view of potential confrontation in that part of the world, so I would guess that a lot of those survey results from Germany are not solely based on the new-found German pacifism, but also pant-shitting anxiety due to history.