Afghan War ending, foretold by The Onion 10 years Ago [DT thread ruined by politics]

[Scheiss Meister 8399]

4 hours ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

Something from the British, looks like it's a tit on your head helmet days of yore?

The Young British Soldier, from Rudyard Kipling's Barracks Room Ballads.  We had a Vietnam vet Staff Sergeant in my company who had every one of those poems memorized.  He would recite them while we were taking rest breaks on long marches.

[tantric superman 4667]

3 hours ago, slorch said:

The test I always use for military intervention is “would I want my own son leading a platoon of Marines in that action?” In the case of any further involvement in Afghanistan, my answer is clearly “No!”

But it would be good to have a simple test. 

I did read you post as if this Colonel in the Duality of Man scene was speaking it.

 

[Brisketexan 104628]

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains, and the women come out to cut up what remains, jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains and go to your gawd like a soldier.
 

Quoted again for the awesomeness. One of the greatest stanzas in all English writing.

Lessons we won't learn from this experience:
We shouldn't use warfare and imposing fantasies such as the easy creation of a democracy as cheap theater for the Americans watching on TV.
Warfare
We have this absurd delusion that our every effort is the same as helping liberate France from Nazi Germany. People love our boys! Well, we love watching the tanks roll and pulling our puds talking about the awesome daisy-cutter bomb or some badass Marine taking a pull on a Marlborough. We don't like hearing how the bomb didn't really achieve anything or that the Marine suffers severe PTSD; that'd be like sitting through the entire credit roll after a super-hero movie. BOR-ING.
This thread is about cost and the total cost of the conflict is actually going to be a multiple of the sum listed above. We had more than 2000 killed and more than 20,000 wounded.  More than 750,000 have served in Afghanistan (WaPost).
Roma, we know about the human cost. We thank these guys for their service!
That's all swell, but I'm sticking to dollars. A benefit is paid for soldiers who die. Soldiers who are physically wounded must be cared for for the rest of their lives in some cases. Those who served but were not physically wounded often have PTSD problems that lead to a shameful suicide rate: they require care as well. They all deserve better care and consideration than we give them.
The real cost of the the 9/11 wars? It's a multiple of the budget for combat. To wit: 

Through Fiscal Year 2020, the United States federal government has spent or obligated $6.4 trillion dollars on the post-9/11 wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, and elsewhere. This figure includes: direct Congressional war appropriations; war-related increases to the Pentagon base budget; veterans care and disability; increases in the homeland security budget; interest payments on direct war borrowing; foreign assistance spending; and estimated future obligations for veterans’ care.

But it's all fun as hell to watch. 
I first heard of these figures prior to one of the wars with Iraq. Like most people, I just thought of the cost of war as being what was spent during it. I'm guessing pro-war politicians don't want to harsh everybody's war buzz and anti-war politicians worry to much about their re-election chances.
US Grant's autobiography starts with an apt description of how a movement towards war is almost impossible to stop. I think he was talking about the Mexican war. It's the best part of the book and the only part I remember.
Freedom fantasy
The Americans show up, kill a bunch of people, set up an ad hoc government then hold an election. Next comes the self-congratulation and short period of happy delusion that we've made things better.

See? Everything worked out. Functioning democracy in place and the boys will be coming home soon. Except it never ever ever fucking ever works out that way.
This delusion is bad for us because it furthers the earlier delusion that we regularly make countries better by bombing the shit out of them, slaughtering civilians (but we don't mean to! Would that matter to you?), and then hiring Haliburton to come in for some sizable graft.
Girls will be educated now! People will be encouraged to speak up! This wonderful new government will hire a lot of people.
What happens to all of those guys now in Afghanistan? That shitty facade of government was doomed from the start. Now thousands are in mortal danger. Tens of thousands have become refugees.
Yay America!
I'll close this long ass post by telling you that I am actually hawkish when it comes to actual enemies. Use special forces or whatever to get at anybody meaning this country harm. 
Oh, I'm reminded of one more related point. We ousted the Taliban with Special Forces trained to work with locals. They made relationships and enjoyed a real trust. We pulled them out to deploy them in the Iraq fiasco. When they left so ended our best chance of a good outcome.
Sorry for the length. It's shit I've watched over and over. Finally I feel like I know something about it.

 


Right. All of it. And you know what burns me the most? I didn’t believe a whole lot of that 20 years ago. It took me way longer than it should to have all the cylinders tumble and click into place.

It’s not that warfare is never the answer. It’s that it rarely is, and when it is, that represents a lousy outcome anyway. When the best remaining option is “kill lots of people at great expense, and sacrifice American lives to do it,” then you’re in a shitty spot.

BearSchlong’s and Slorch’s sons are worth way more to me than that. They are assets of this country. We shouldn’t waste them, flushing billions down the drain with their blood as well, just for shits and giggles. They should live full lives, and die in their sleep….without ever having blown away a single Afghan shepherd, or having called in an air strike on a cluster of grass huts.

I’m sorry that I ever viewed the world in a way that I thought that would be a good choice for our country.

The Young British Soldier, from Rudyard Kipling's Barracks Room Ballads.  We had a Vietnam vet Staff Sergeant in my company who had every one of those poems memorized.  He would recite them while we were taking rest breaks on long marches.

I recently re-read Kipling’s entire poem - goddamn, what a masterpiece. Seriously, I recommend it to everyone.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, BearSchlong said:

What is your son doing now?

Mine is a month away from returning from Korea and rejoining his 82nd Airborne fellas at Bragg. He says he is in for at least 20.

Mine is leading newly minted butter bars through  BOLC. He was extremely fortunate early on in getting his people leadership and deployment knocked out in the first year & a half while a big majority of his buddies were waiting for slots as PLs and so-forth. Two of the big rocks of his experience have been addressing NATO officials on their operation as a 1st LT. One of the 'lifetime experiences' he got was training NATO troops to defend Poland( Europe) in a former concentration camp, which was beyond creepy but also extremely gratifying.  He also was in charge of the logistics of getting all of their shit back home to the States when they had completed the training. Think trains, ships, and eleventy billion opportunities for things to go wrong...and all of that stuff 's in your name.  LOL.

He loves the leadership aspect of the role and influencing others.  He doesn't necessarily enjoy the full military experience, if you will, and that is normal. You almost have to be prior service to understand this aspect, but he is ready for his life to be his, not the Army's.   He is 100% committed, and knew full well what he was asking to do, but when his 5 years is up, he will be separating from the military. We went and saw his promotion ceremony in June.  In front of everyone, and I know it was different because his mother and I were there; but his CO basically implored us to beg him to stay in while also saying it's hard to ignore the opportunities he will have in the civilian world.  You could sense it in the room, everyone was thinking, "Fuck yeah.  I'd be gone too..." 

Edited August 13, 2021 by slorch

[workswithseed 2037]

12 hours ago, LABEVO said:

Any social program.

hOw WiLl We PaY fOr IT?!

Wait, will it be ran by the system that did this? No thanks.

[Nivek 16860]

One only needs to look at the win loss record of Afghanistan to know this:  you      just        don't         go        there.  It is THE most inconquerable country in the world, followed distantly by Russia, and then Asia.

Mongols seem to have little trouble. Maybe we need some horses and bows.

[InkaUtexas 25521]

We went in on horseback, and ran on C-17's. 

Lash fell tonight and I cannot go to bed. I am thinking of all the people who worked hard to build something. I don't think people realize what Afghanistan was in 2002. There was nothing at all. A lot of hard work went into trying to make something remotely 18th century. That is going to go away. My email is full of requests for recommendations from all the professionals I worked with. If they get out they will be fine. My heart tonight is with the support people we had on our side. The interpreters, admin, drivers, etc. They are the ones who can never get out, will not fit in, and if it is found they worked for a UK NGO, they are pretty much dead. 

The Talibs are going to play this smart at first. But I expect some Killing Fields type shit come this fall when the fighting season ends but they have to keep their forces mobilized. 

 

[Born to Run 6567]

What I don't understand is how anyone with any say over the situation is at all surprised by both the results and the speed of those results.
I'm an amateur nobody, who has simply paid attention to the situation on the ground from a moderately educated perspective, and who has read a tiny bit of history (both recent and old).  This was always what was going to happen.

I got into a big fight with my old man on the eve of this bullshit. I predicted a decades long quagmire with our ultimate defeat at the end. I was only wrong about our body count - it being much lower. I expected a faster bloodier initial fight. The rest of the guerilla IED shit was to be excepted. And that part pisses me off, so many just blown up for what...
Ruined lives. Fuck.

[InkaUtexas 25521]

7 minutes ago, Born to Run said:

I got into a big fight with my old man on the eve of this bullshit. I predicted a decades long quagmire with our ultimate defeat at the end. I was only wrong about our body count - it being much lower. I expected a faster bloodier initial fight. The rest of the guerilla IED shit was to be excepted. And that part pisses me off, so many just blown up for what...
Ruined lives. Fuck.

And more to come. This is not over. If you think the non-Talibs are going to completely capitulate you are wrong. 

[956 Worldwide 34444]

14 hours ago, CooterBrown said:

To be fair, we could just keep the jobs program and have them pick up trash on highways instead of getting them killed or maimed in third world shitholes.

This. I support robust defense spending but let’s not pretend it’s an efficient way to goose the economy. One could accomplish the same with less death and destruction by flying tanks and APCs to White Sands as they roll off the line and using them for target practice.

“Wars help the economy” is the national level version of “hurricanes are awesome because of all the construction work after.”

[Guest]

We don't worry about efficient on anything on that scale this side of Wall Street run corporations, and they still have plenty of fat.  Pretty much any gov't contract is about how many sets of hands get to touch the money, and that's not remotely limited to the military.  It's just a bigger scale.

[Hefeweizen 5307]

12 hours ago, Sawbonz said:

When you're wounded and left on Afghanistan's plains, and the women come out to cut up what remains, jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains and go to your gawd like a soldier.

 

Kipling is just an amazing author.  Perfect and prescient.

[956 Worldwide 34444]

4 hours ago, InkaUtexas said:

We went in on horseback, and ran on C-17's. 

Lash fell tonight and I cannot go to bed. I am thinking of all the people who worked hard to build something. I don't think people realize what Afghanistan was in 2002. There was nothing at all. A lot of hard work went into trying to make something remotely 18th century. That is going to go away. My email is full of requests for recommendations from all the professionals I worked with. If they get out they will be fine. My heart tonight is with the support people we had on our side. The interpreters, admin, drivers, etc. They are the ones who can never get out, will not fit in, and if it is found they worked for a UK NGO, they are pretty much dead. 

The Talibs are going to play this smart at first. But I expect some Killing Fields type shit come this fall when the fighting season ends but they have to keep their forces mobilized. 

 

After the destroyed American lives and families, this is what hurts. The people who took your side, who put their trust in you, for whatever reason. 
 

 

[Dbeasy 14969]

12 hours ago, Hookah Horns said:

Lot of parallels to Nam and Korea. Stop getting in fights you don't have the plan and/or will to win. 

Why have you compared Korea to Vietnam and Afghanistan? Korea was a completely different situation. 

[Hookah Horns 3082]

I'm trying to understand how the Talis are mowing down the govt forces this swiftly and easily. I mean God damn. People like to point to Afghanistan's historically strong home field advantage as part of the reason why we failed here, but that sure doesn't seem to extend to our proxies. 

It sure seems like whenever the mighty US military decides to invest billions in training another country's soldiers, those guys promptly end up getting their asses kicked all over the place. But why is that? 

My first thought was the Talis, being religious fanatics, are way more passionate about their cassus beli than are the govt forces upon whom we foisted this whole democracy experiment. But I have to think that imbalance in the will to fight would largely be equalized by the realization that they and their extended family are all goners if/when the Tali win.

Surely it's not money or materiel disadvantages. Is our training of these guys just shitty? And if so is it the tactics themselves that are inadequate, or our ability to teach it? 

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

5 hours ago, Nivek said:

Mongols seem to have little trouble. Maybe we need some horses and bows.

I said most unconquerable, didn't say it couldn't be done. It's interesting we have to go that far back to find an example.  Stirrups were the big advantage they had along with just being friggin animals when they attacked.

Edited August 13, 2021 by Onboard 2.0

[AnTiM 1659]

Those who do not study history...never engage in a land war in Asia...seems like we have all heard this before and it never has any effect.

[Hookah Horns 3082]

48 minutes ago, Dbeasy said:

Why have you compared Korea to Vietnam and Afghanistan? Korea was a completely different situation. 

The answer is right there in my two sentence post that you quoted. Korea, like the other two, were wars the US could have won if we had steeled our resolve and been willing to incur greater costs of all kinds. We never had sufficient resolve to go all-in on these conflicts, and our collective half-hearted appetite for the fight only further diminished as the costs mounted. 

Another similarity shared by all 3 was the terrain being an absolute bitch for the kind of war we were fighting. Oh and also the fact that in each case we led a nominal coalition with allies who really didn't give a shit and were happy to leave us holding the bag. 

Edited August 13, 2021 by Hookah Horns

[TXSG8R 3360]

53 minutes ago, Hookah Horns said:

I'm trying to understand how the Talis are mowing down the govt forces this swiftly and easily. I mean God damn. People like to point to Afghanistan's historically strong home field advantage as part of the reason why we failed here, but that sure doesn't seem to extend to our proxies. 

It sure seems like whenever the mighty US military decides to invest billions in training another country's soldiers, those guys promptly end up getting their asses kicked all over the place. But why is that? 

My first thought was the Talis, being religious fanatics, are way more passionate about their cassus beli than are the govt forces upon whom we foisted this whole democracy experiment. But I have to think that imbalance in the will to fight would largely be equalized by the realization that they and their extended family are all goners if/when the Tali win.

Surely it's not money or materiel disadvantages. Is our training of these guys just shitty? And if so is it the tactics themselves that are inadequate, or our ability to teach it? 

I think the mistake is thinking that the gov't forces are remotely cohesive.  Its more like the Mexican gov't forces, they may wear a federal hat, but they are all way more local/regional in loyalty and action.  Even when the Taliban was fairly in check, we still had to keep an eye on all the gov't forces to see who was going to turn a gun on friendlies or trainers.  A fair number of these guys blow with the wind, and right now the wind is strongly behind the Taliban again.  They will at best walk away and leave the gov't guys hanging, or more likely, brush off their old Taliban hat and use gov't training and weapons and do what they have always done.  Suck up to whoever is in power and try to survive.  The bulk of Afghans are just Macs.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

23 minutes ago, TXSG8R said:

I think the mistake is thinking that the gov't forces are remotely cohesive.  Its more like the Mexican gov't forces, they may wear a federal hat, but they are all way more local/regional in loyalty and action.  Even when the Taliban was fairly in check, we still had to keep an eye on all the gov't forces to see who was going to turn a gun on friendlies or trainers.  A fair number of these guys blow with the wind, and right now the wind is strongly behind the Taliban again.  They will at best walk away and leave the gov't guys hanging, or more likely, brush off their old Taliban hat and use gov't training and weapons and do what they have always done.  Suck up to whoever is in power and try to survive.  The bulk of Afghans are just Macs.

Their traditions make them all (not literally all of them, but a majority) pretty mercenary with allegiances. 

[Parliament 14138]

This is the only way it was gonna end, but man...  Just like Vietnam.

 

 

[SquishMitten 10401]

 
It will be an L once the Taliban resumes control of the country.
 

Depends on the goal. It started as a response to 9/11. We haven’t suffered a major attack since. That’s a W. We certainly made some new enemies/extremists with our response and occupation, but will they attack us again? If no, then I guess we can put it solidly in the W column for that. Nothing is permanent though. From a purely defensive argument, we’ve protected ourselves for the last 20 years. At what point do we call it a win if there isn’t another major attach on the homeland? 30 years? 50?

There are definitely goals that are looking like they’ll be tallied in the L column though.

[956 Worldwide 34444]

1 hour ago, Hookah Horns said:

The answer is right there in my two sentence post that you quoted. Korea, like the other two, were wars the US could have won if we had steeled our resolve and been willing to incur greater costs of all kinds. We never had sufficient resolve to go all-in on these conflicts, and our collective half-hearted appetite for the fight only further diminished as the costs mounted. 

Another similarity shared by all 3 was the terrain being an absolute bitch for the kind of war we were fighting. Oh and also the fact that in each case we led a nominal coalition with allies who really didn't give a shit and were happy to leave us holding the bag. 

Any statements like this: “we could win if we steeled ourselves/showed more resolve/fought harder” should be accompanied by a clear statement of what “victory” looks like and means. 
 

Because really, there are two binary options-

1. Your conception of victory closely matches the stated aims of successive administrations in Afghanistan. In this instance, I will argue pretty hard that there was never a battlefield solution to get us there at all. 

2. Your conception of victory is drastically different than what successive administrations hoped to achieve. In this case, maybe a battlefield solution did exist, but it’s irrelevant because it was a solution no one ever wanted to begin with. 

[Brisketexan 104628]

25 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

Any statements like this: “we could win if we steeled ourselves/showed more resolve/fought harder” should be accompanied by a clear statement of what “victory” looks like and means. 
 

Because really, there are two binary options-

1. Your conception of victory closely matches the stated aims of successive administrations in Afghanistan. In this instance, I will argue pretty hard that there was never a battlefield solution to get us there at all. 

2. Your conception of victory is drastically different than what successive administrations hoped to achieve. In this case, maybe a battlefield solution did exist, but it’s irrelevant because it was a solution no one ever wanted to begin with. 

When the "enemy" is not a nation state that can unconditionally surrender and accept occupation, with the leadership that signed that surrender largely directing the people to cooperate, there is almost never a pathway to a good outcome.

Imagine a foreign power trying to occupy the US without US leadership telling the people to cooperate (shit, even WITH the US leadership telling us to cooperate).  That occupying power would face resistance, guerilla attacks, etc., forever.

If enough of the people don't want/accept you there, there will never be peace.

And yes, there's enough conflict and resistance in Afghanistan on both sides to keep it from being a completely Taliban-run country.  Has been for a long time.  Shit, maybe you remember the assassination of Northern Alliance leader Massoud on.....September 9, 2001, by AQ and Taliban forces.  Not many people noticed.  I'm a geopolitics nerd, so I did -- when it happened, I realized that it was a big deal and a big move for AQ and the Taliban, and was bad news.  Two days later....some shit happened that eclipsed it.  When you realize that power struggle had been going on since the Soviet withdrawal (and was a vestige of centuries-old tribal struggles).....well, you realize what we were facing.

Countries/regions differ like animals do.  Some animals (horses) can be tamed, and you can have a cooperative and symbiotic relationship.  Other animals, even ones that look similar (zebras) cannot really be tamed, and the best you can do is to reach a situation where you can keep their activities within a defined (fenced) area, you provide them some measure of protection, and unless you provoke them, they don't bite or kick you.  You can spend your life trying to turn a herd of zebras into cooperative horses, but you will fail, no matter how many bodies or how much willpower you bring to the fight.  And yes, this metaphor is clumsy and compares regions/people to animals, but shit, when we're coming in as the conqueror, that dynamic is far off.  And most of us wouldn't blame the zebra (or most horses) for saying "fuck you" when a guy saunters into the corral, throws a saddle on them, and tells them what to do.

[AnTiM 1659]

 

I guess the only good news is that every citizen the Taliban kills will mean there is one less Afghan who hates us.

 

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

9 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

When the "enemy" is not a nation state that can unconditionally surrender and accept occupation, with the leadership that signed that surrender largely directing the people to cooperate, there is almost never a pathway to a good outcome.

Imagine a foreign power trying to occupy the US without US leadership telling the people to cooperate (shit, even WITH the US leadership telling us to cooperate).  That occupying power would face resistance, guerilla attacks, etc., forever.

If enough of the people don't want/accept you there, there will never be peace.

And yes, there's enough conflict and resistance in Afghanistan on both sides to keep it from being a completely Taliban-run country.  Has been for a long time.  Shit, maybe you remember the assassination of Northern Alliance leader Massoud on.....September 9, 2001, by AQ and Taliban forces.  Not many people noticed.  I'm a geopolitics nerd, so I did -- when it happened, I realized that it was a big deal and a big move for AQ and the Taliban, and was bad news.  Two days later....some shit happened that eclipsed it.  When you realize that power struggle had been going on since the Soviet withdrawal (and was a vestige of centuries-old tribal struggles).....well, you realize what we were facing.

Countries/regions differ like animals do.  Some animals (horses) can be tamed, and you can have a cooperative and symbiotic relationship.  Other animals, even ones that look similar (zebras) cannot really be tamed, and the best you can do is to reach a situation where you can keep their activities within a defined (fenced) area, you provide them some measure of protection, and unless you provoke them, they don't bite or kick you.  You can spend your life trying to turn a herd of zebras into cooperative horses, but you will fail, no matter how many bodies or how much willpower you bring to the fight.  And yes, this metaphor is clumsy and compares regions/people to animals, but shit, when we're coming in as the conqueror, that dynamic is far off.  And most of us wouldn't blame the zebra (or most horses) for saying "fuck you" when a guy saunters into the corral, throws a saddle on them, and tells them what to do.

Yep pretty much this.  For the record, I dig zebras, the real ones.

[Brisketexan 104628]

4 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

Yep pretty much this.  For the record, I dig zebras, the real ones.

Awesome, beautiful animals.  Look just like horses.  Ain't horses.  Cannot function as a beast of burden, a ride, etc.  Africa has huge herds of "horses," but they aren't useful for anything.  That presented a problem when it came to development, agriculture, etc.  Domesticable animals are a big plus for developing society.

[956 Worldwide 34444]

13 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

When the "enemy" is not a nation state that can unconditionally surrender and accept occupation, with the leadership that signed that surrender largely directing the people to cooperate, there is almost never a pathway to a good outcome.

Imagine a foreign power trying to occupy the US without US leadership telling the people to cooperate (shit, even WITH the US leadership telling us to cooperate).  That occupying power would face resistance, guerilla attacks, etc., forever.

If enough of the people don't want/accept you there, there will never be peace.

And yes, there's enough conflict and resistance in Afghanistan on both sides to keep it from being a completely Taliban-run country.  Has been for a long time.  Shit, maybe you remember the assassination of Northern Alliance leader Massoud on.....September 9, 2001, by AQ and Taliban forces.  Not many people noticed.  I'm a geopolitics nerd, so I did -- when it happened, I realized that it was a big deal and a big move for AQ and the Taliban, and was bad news.  Two days later....some shit happened that eclipsed it.  When you realize that power struggle had been going on since the Soviet withdrawal (and was a vestige of centuries-old tribal struggles).....well, you realize what we were facing.

Countries/regions differ like animals do.  Some animals (horses) can be tamed, and you can have a cooperative and symbiotic relationship.  Other animals, even ones that look similar (zebras) cannot really be tamed, and the best you can do is to reach a situation where you can keep their activities within a defined (fenced) area, you provide them some measure of protection, and unless you provoke them, they don't bite or kick you.  You can spend your life trying to turn a herd of zebras into cooperative horses, but you will fail, no matter how many bodies or how much willpower you bring to the fight.  And yes, this metaphor is clumsy and compares regions/people to animals, but shit, when we're coming in as the conqueror, that dynamic is far off.  And most of us wouldn't blame the zebra (or most horses) for saying "fuck you" when a guy saunters into the corral, throws a saddle on them, and tells them what to do.

An under appreciated element is the social psychological impact of being at war in a completely destroyed country for well over 40 years. Most Afghans have no memory of living anywhere but a country where various armed men spent their time making rubble bounce. 
 

In places like Germany, Japan, hell even the former Yugoslavaia, the populace had crystal clear memories of a peaceful, organized, developed, and mostly prosperous civilization. Outside invaders, occupiers, and peacekeepers/referees had a very tangible, concrete vision to sell of full shelves, paved roads, classrooms and teachers, and all the other things most normal people want badly. That creates a population willing to cooperate for the carrot, and a population less inclined to line up behind fanatical insurgents who stand in their way.

That vision couldn’t be sold to an Afghanistan population who had never seen it. You might as well sell them on moon colonies and unicorns. “Death and destruction” is your default so you might as well cast your lot with the killers you’re going to have to end up living with. 

[TwiceHorn 31283]

11 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

 

Quoted again for the awesomeness. One of the greatest stanzas in all English writing.



 


Right. All of it. And you know what burns me the most? I didn’t believe a whole lot of that 20 years ago. It took me way longer than it should to have all the cylinders tumble and click into place.

It’s not that warfare is never the answer. It’s that it rarely is, and when it is, that represents a lousy outcome anyway. When the best remaining option is “kill lots of people at great expense, and sacrifice American lives to do it,” then you’re in a shitty spot.

BearSchlong’s and Slorch’s sons are worth way more to me than that. They are assets of this country. We shouldn’t waste them, flushing billions down the drain with their blood as well, just for shits and giggles. They should live full lives, and die in their sleep….without ever having blown away a single Afghan shepherd, or having called in an air strike on a cluster of grass huts.

I’m sorry that I ever viewed the world in a way that I thought that would be a good choice for our country.



I recently re-read Kipling’s entire poem - goddamn, what a masterpiece. Seriously, I recommend it to everyone.

 

Thirds, and linky.

[Blotto 23434]

7 hours ago, InkaUtexas said:

Lash fell tonight and I cannot go to bed. I am thinking of all the people who worked hard to build something. I don't think people realize what Afghanistan was in 2002. There was nothing at all. A lot of hard work went into trying to make something remotely 18th century. That is going to go away. My email is full of requests for recommendations from all the professionals I worked with. If they get out they will be fine. My heart tonight is with the support people we had on our side. The interpreters, admin, drivers, etc. They are the ones who can never get out, will not fit in, and if it is found they worked for a UK NGO, they are pretty much dead

And why was it nothing in 2002? Why should we ever think that we could fix their issues? Lulz at anyone thinking we were gonna figure out Afghanistans shit for them. We can barely keep shit between the rails in our own country. My comment isn't a shot at our troops on the ground that we're doing the legwork, it's a shot at the stupid motherfuckers that sent us in there to nation build in the first place. That moment was always too big for W Bush, but when you elect a clown you should expect a circus.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

19 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Awesome, beautiful animals.  Look just like horses.  Ain't horses.  Cannot function as a beast of burden, a ride, etc.  Africa has huge herds of "horses," but they aren't useful for anything.  That presented a problem when it came to development, agriculture, etc.  Domesticable animals are a big plus for developing society.

That concept was covered in "Guns, Germs, and Steel" by Jared Diamond I believe.  Some animals are just not domesticable, Zebras, Water buffaloes, etc.

[InkaUtexas 25521]

1 minute ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

That concept was covered in "Guns, Germs, and Steel" by Jared Diamond I believe.  Some animals are just not domesticable, Zebras, Water buffaloes, etc.

A fun example of this is how Llamas and Alpacas can be, but their close cousin, Vicunas, says fuck you, I am not carrying a god damn thing.

[Brisketexan 104628]

4 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

That concept was covered in "Guns, Germs, and Steel" by Jared Diamond I believe.  Some animals are just not domesticable, Zebras, Water buffaloes, etc.

Yep, that's where it first clicked for me, and sent me down that particular rabbit hole.  Kind of a fascinating concept in terms of what can influence local development.

[hookemATL 11611]

5 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

That concept was covered in "Guns, Germs, and Steel" by Jared Diamond I believe.  Some animals are just not domesticable, Zebras, Water buffaloes, etc.

Book is a beast but a must read. Pos rep

[Blotto 23434]

2 minutes ago, hookemATL said:

Book is a beast but a must read. Pos rep

Agreed and agreed.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

Just now, hookemATL said:

Book is a beast but a must read. Pos rep

Yeah it can get a little tedious, but a fascinating look into how civilizations developed, and why they succeeded or not.  

Another really long read, but very trippy at times, "The Discoverers" by Daniel Boorstin. Pretty much a history of how everything in civilization developed from the concept of how keeping time evolved, how long a day was, to the size of the Earth, where continents actually were, how ships traveled , how Maps were developed, and by who, etc.

[RomaVicta 29794]

3 hours ago, 956 Worldwide said:

After the destroyed American lives and families, this is what hurts. The people who took your side, who put their trust in you, for whatever reason. 
 

 

Thus another part of the cycle of America's disastrous war policy. 

It is right and good that the fall of the Kabul Government be covered in all of it's horrific aspects. It's not right and good that pundits discuss it as if we've made a bad decision even if they have the actual right to do so. If they cannot offer an alternative option other than continuing a bad policy, they should be more circumspect in their emotional manipulation.

They're covering a result of the policy in place not a new policy. They are so accustomed to appealing to emotion rather than reason (there's room for both in quality journalism), that they fail in their role of keeping the electorate truly informed.

The TV press intentionally or unintentionally cheerleads invasions. Maybe it's fear of public backlash. Backlash? They also write about our boys, our military prowess, and the evil of our Nazi foreign opponent (enemy? I'm not sure all the people we attack fit that definition.) Too much questioning of military action leads to accusations of hating America and our boys.

They also like covering the story. Embedded journalists, breathless TV reports, live coverage of the rolling tanks plus all of that great Shock and Awe (did neither, of course). Profound wishes from the anchors for the field reporters to "stay safe." They have the full template and they, lazily, use it.

Impact? Americans love the show. The insecure adolescent male mentality cases that form a huge part of the electorate vicariously gets to pull triggers, fire rockets, and feel great about themselves. This emotional surge leads to calling anyone questioning the policy to be a weakling, a pussy, and not supporting our boys. Reason is shouted down.

Result?

It's easy to gin up the emotions leading up to invasion.

A GOP administration (Reagan and both Bushes) can place a small force at the edge of the future combat zone. The coverage described above begins. Any suggestion that it's a bad idea is shouted down as "you want to cut and run?"

Now the invasion is pretty much an argument between manliness (think hard core Aggies) and cowardliness with no basis in reality let alone reason.

Roll camera. Roll tanks. Annnnd, action!

Need I write it? Idiot World.

[Goredho 17349]

I'm cool with pulling the troops from Afganistan, but for the love of God, don't bring them back to this shithole country where they will be radicalized.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

2 minutes ago, Goredho said:

I'm cool with pulling the troops from Afganistan, but for the love of God, don't bring them back to this shithole country where they will be radicalized.

Huh ?

[RomaVicta 29794]

3 hours ago, Hookah Horns said:

I'm trying to understand how the Talis are mowing down the govt forces this swiftly and easily. I mean God damn. People like to point to Afghanistan's historically strong home field advantage as part of the reason why we failed here, but that sure doesn't seem to extend to our proxies. 

It sure seems like whenever the mighty US military decides to invest billions in training another country's soldiers, those guys promptly end up getting their asses kicked all over the place. But why is that? 

My first thought was the Talis, being religious fanatics, are way more passionate about their cassus beli than are the govt forces upon whom we foisted this whole democracy experiment. But I have to think that imbalance in the will to fight would largely be equalized by the realization that they and their extended family are all goners if/when the Tali win.

Surely it's not money or materiel disadvantages. Is our training of these guys just shitty? And if so is it the tactics themselves that are inadequate, or our ability to teach it? 

IMHO, you answer your bottom question in your top paragraph.

America's proxy is not a great title to have on your business card if the American military isn't there to impose our sense of their destiny on their culture.

Also, Afghanistan isn't really a country like we're accustomed to. There are at least three or four big tribal groups living within those boundaries and they have never been effectively controlled by a central government.

Through much of history they would hold conferences to appoint a central leader for a specific reason like what do we do about these guys in redcoats trying to do us the enormous favor of telling us how to live. Their borders contain people who identify more by clan/tribe than the abstract notion of an Afghani.

They are largely united by Islam as applied by backward, uneducated villagers with little knowledge or care about the world beyond their immediate region.

Imagine Fattah in his home in the hinterlands. "The Americans are here to get rid of the Taliban, Fattah!"

Fattah as four options

1. Invaders? Again. Okay back to killing them. I'll help the Taliban. I'll check with the local warlord.
2. The Americans pay a lot of money. Sounds good. I'll check with the local warlord.
3. Maybe take their money and help the Taliban. I'll check with the local warlord.
4. I love Americans and freedom's reign! This will work out great! And I get paid! Fuck the local warlord. I'll become a proxy!

Which one looks the most dangerous?

Their peoples and their army are absolutely nothing like ours or Iraq's or Iran's. 

 

[Gatorubet 30113]

When the "enemy" is not a nation state that can unconditionally surrender and accept occupation, with the leadership that signed that surrender largely directing the people to cooperate, there is almost never a pathway to a good outcome.
Imagine a foreign power trying to occupy the US without US leadership telling the people to cooperate (shit, even WITH the US leadership telling us to cooperate).  That occupying power would face resistance, guerilla attacks, etc., forever.
If enough of the people don't want/accept you there, there will never be peace.
And yes, there's enough conflict and resistance in Afghanistan on both sides to keep it from being a completely Taliban-run country.  Has been for a long time.  Shit, maybe you remember the assassination of Northern Alliance leader Massoud on.....September 9, 2001, by AQ and Taliban forces.  Not many people noticed.  I'm a geopolitics nerd, so I did -- when it happened, I realized that it was a big deal and a big move for AQ and the Taliban, and was bad news.  Two days later....some shit happened that eclipsed it.  When you realize that power struggle had been going on since the Soviet withdrawal (and was a vestige of centuries-old tribal struggles).....well, you realize what we were facing.
Countries/regions differ like animals do.  Some animals (horses) can be tamed, and you can have a cooperative and symbiotic relationship.  Other animals, even ones that look similar (zebras) cannot really be tamed, and the best you can do is to reach a situation where you can keep their activities within a defined (fenced) area, you provide them some measure of protection, and unless you provoke them, they don't bite or kick you.  You can spend your life trying to turn a herd of zebras into cooperative horses, but you will fail, no matter how many bodies or how much willpower you bring to the fight.  And yes, this metaphor is clumsy and compares regions/people to animals, but shit, when we're coming in as the conqueror, that dynamic is far off.  And most of us wouldn't blame the zebra (or most horses) for saying "fuck you" when a guy saunters into the corral, throws a saddle on them, and tells them what to do.

Imagine if the Afghans invaded the US to help us out with our ‘rigged elections’. How many Americans (even Trump leaning Americans) would be OK with that - or OK with that once the mistaken drone strikes killed Baptist wedding parties?

Thinking we were going to drag people from 13th century Tribes into our culture was beyond stupid. Thinking they would welcome us was even stupider. It would be like going back in time and invading 16th century Spain and insisting they all accept Protestants and atheists. The Spaniards would shoot cross-bows at our Godless troops…..until they got better weapons.

[Mole 4320]

A few unrelated thoughts:

1. My military service was very insulated from most of the dangers of these stupid wars. The wars were obviously pointless and ill-conceived for so long, yet seeing the news of the past few weeks has been a bit of an existential kick in the pants. We try to conjure up some bigger meaning to a sacrifice, but seeing the plain futility is a lot to wrestle with.

2. I have friends who are recently retired or nearing retirement. They were junior enlisted when 9/11 happened or joined in the patriotic fervor of the era. The war took up pretty much their entire military career. Again, a lot to take in.

3. So much suffering: deaths, lifetimes of pain, suicides, and addiction. I tend to comprehend global issues in personal terms, so I can’t help but think of a few friends whose lives went totally off the rails thanks to their service in the war on terror. The scale of American suffering as well as all of those living in the middle of all of this is beyond my comprehension.

4.Democracy requires consent of the governed. Consent and foreign military actions seem to be in a bit of a conflict.

Edited August 13, 2021 by Mole

[MillerEP 30339]

I was

On 8/2/2021 at 12:42 PM, InkaUtexas said:

As Afghanistan collapses I just received these images from my old interpreter. We spent a lot of time running around Helmand. We got him out, but his family is still in Lash ka Gar. The city is falling. He knows as soon as the Talibs realize he worked for the Americans his family will be killed. I get the whole no endless wars, etc, but dammit, this hits me hard. I really loved his family. They were so good to me and I always enjoyed escaping the mundane day to day job and go and sit with his father and mother and enjoy an evening with an Afghan family. 

 

This street was the most secured location outside the Brit base in town. 

I was also in the same area. We were on FOB Gereshk, based out of the British base in Lash Ka Gar. HQ was in Kandahar though. So we patrolled all up and down the same roads probably. I was there in 2007, we were the ones who retook Musa Qala with the Brits.

Looks like my hope that the women and children who experienced some measure of freedom the past 2 decades would stand up was unfounded. They're being re-subjugated pretty easily. So now I expect the government will be surrounded and fall pretty quickly. A lot of people will die, the Islamic Fundamentalists will regain control, the international community will levy sanctions against them, they'll essentially be North Korea number 2 in about 5 years, and the rest of us will move on.

https://www.npr.org/2021/08/12/1027108251/taliban-afghanistan-kabul-fighting-provincial-capital-cities

The Taliban Now Control Two-Thirds Of Afghanistan
August 12, 20211:21 PM ET

As of Thursday morning, the Taliban now have control of 10 provincial capital cities — effectively putting them in control of two-thirds of Afghanistan.

NPR's Morning Edition spoke to Lynne O'Donnell, a journalist based in the capital of Kabul for Foreign Policy.

O'Donnell said things on the ground in Kabul "feel like a city under siege in a besieged country":

People are flooding into Kabul from neighboring regions.
Public parks in Kabul have become camps for displaced people.
Food and fuel prices are rising as the Taliban block off import routes.
Conditions in the Taliban-controlled parts of the country are "brutal":

The Taliban are rounding up people who have worked for the U.S. military or Afghan government.
O'Donnell said the atrocities on the battlefield are "horrific" and include bodies being mutilated and other things the journalist wouldn't go into on air.
Women are being told to stay in their homes unless accompanied by a male relative.
Women are also being told they'll be rounded up and married off to Taliban fighters.
Girls in those regions are being taken out of school, and schools for girls are closed.
O'Donnell said there's a real fear that Kabul might be the next city to fall under Taliban control. In an interview Thursday with Morning Edition, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby said what's next for Kabul is up to Afghan forces.

"It doesn't have to be that way," Kirby said. "It really depends on the kind of political and military leadership that the Afghans can muster to turn this around."

Afghan forces just appointed a new army chief and a new head of the special operations command. O'Donnell said it's difficult to know now what will come from these appointments.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

11 minutes ago, Mole said:

A few unrelated thoughts:

1. My military service was very insulated from most of the dangers of these stupid wars. The wars were obviously pointless and ill-conceived for so long, yet seeing the news of the past few weeks has been a bit of an existential kick in the pants. We try to conjure up some bigger meaning to a sacrifice, but seeing the plain futility is a lot to wrestle with.

2. I have friends who are recently retired or nearing retirement. They were junior enlisted when 9/11 happened or joined in the patriotic fervor of the era. The war took up pretty much their entire military career. Again, a lot to take in.

3. So much suffering: deaths, lifetimes of pain, suicides, and addiction. I tend to comprehend global issues in personal terms, so I can’t help but think of a few friends whose lives went totally off the rails thanks to their service in the war on terror. The scale of American suffering as well as all of those living in the middle of all of this is beyond my comprehension.

4.Democracy requires consent of the governed. Consent and foreign military actions seem to be in a bit of a conflict.

We have to stop being the worlds police-man....  You can't be isolationist, but the shit we gotten involved in has done nothing but make the world less stable the last 10 years or more.

[Brisketexan 104628]

1 minute ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

We have to stop being the worlds police-man....  You can't be isolationist, but the shit we gotten involved in has done nothing but make the world less stable the last 10 years or more.

I actually don't have a problem with us being the world's policeman, to some extent (if not us, someone will fill the vacuum, likely several different someones in different locations, and we won't like the outcome of a LOT of those).  BUT.....my thoughts on that are much like my thoughts on actual American policing: use of force is a last resort, and represents a failure because that means all the other tools you had to get a decent outcome failed, and they often shouldn't have failed.

We need to have realistic goals, and we need to be more adept at using the other tools that we have (diplomacy, economic forces (both negative and positive).  That means we need to have some strategy, creativity, and skill.  We have gotten way too used to being the big powerful gorilla, and we just default to throwing our weight around in all of those respects, leading up to the use of force.   Come to think of it, our failures as a world policeman echo many of the same failures of modern American internal policing.

[Onboard 2.0 9083]

5 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

I actually don't have a problem with us being the world's policeman, to some extent (if not us, someone will fill the vacuum, likely several different someones in different locations, and we won't like the outcome of a LOT of those).  BUT.....my thoughts on that are much like my thoughts on actual American policing: use of force is a last resort, and represents a failure because that means all the other tools you had to get a decent outcome failed, and they often shouldn't have failed.

We need to have realistic goals, and we need to be more adept at using the other tools that we have (diplomacy, economic forces (both negative and positive).  That means we need to have some strategy, creativity, and skill.  We have gotten way too used to being the big powerful gorilla, and we just default to throwing our weight around in all of those respects, leading up to the use of force.   Come to think of it, our failures as a world policeman echo many of the same failures of modern American internal policing.

The reality is we have to be in some form, but I think we do it very poorly.

[SquishMitten 10401]

^^^ That business infuriates me. It’s not like we haven’t been doing this for decades and have an entire game plan in place for pulling out supporting personnel and their families when we eventually bail.

Why anyone would work with us on the ground is beyond me. Lie to get us there, lie about the situation on the ground in perpetuity and lie to those who trusted us as we vanish into the night.

It’s cowardly and pathetic, especially given our vast resources.

Agreed. It’s entirely fucked up, and it makes it so much harder for us to get local allies in the future. Not like everyone in Afghanistan is on Twitter, but it’s not the olden days where stories only got around by word of mouth and nobody knew if they were true. Now it’s clearly out there that we won’t ensure your safety when we leave. On the other hand, I don’t know what those folks were incentivized by. Did they help us because they were told they’d receive US citizenship? Or were they doing it because they wanted us to win, and they intended to remain in Afghanistan? Maybe Inka can shed some light on that based on the relationship with his interpreter. The government officials were surely doing it to make their country better, and a lot of them are going to die, but we don’t have an obligation to get them out. We spent a long time training them for this, and they basically fell within weeks. We either really suck as teachers, or the Afghan people just don’t want to be changed.

[Brisketexan 104628]

7 minutes ago, Onboard 2.0 said:

The reality is we have to be in some form, but I think we do it very poorly.

When you're an 800 lb gorilla, it's very, very easy - natural, even - to think the default response to any negative situation is "SMASH!"

Again, echoes of many of our criticisms of US internal policing: we've turned them into "hero combat soldiers!," given them functionally blanket immunity (meaning no negative repercussions for their actions), so what did we expect?  Of course there's an outsized ethos of "I'll kick your fuckin' ass/shoot you!"

We need to start using our brains to move the chess pieces on the board instead of punching our opponent in the face to try to prevent him from moving his knight.

[crash_davis 23084]

Is Afghan better off today than it was before we invaded? Right now, fuck no because every one who helped us is getting massacred. 

In a year, I will say prob the same. Taliban owned the country before. They will own the country again in 10 years.

Maybe the only "win" is that they won't harbor anotehr terrorist mastermind/leader who will plan attacks on US assets because we'll at the very least launch airstrikes killing a bunch of high ranking dudes and then may invade again but maybe go scorched earth this time and fuck the nation building.

But yea this is beyond fucked up, no way to treat partners. Not sure this was gonna end another way unless the people and culture embraced democracy, which they prob won't ever will. Some people just want to continue living in the 19th century.

[Bateshorn 9905]

After about 2004, it was always going to end this way.  Biden was just the first President to nut up and take the L. 
 

I think he could have handled the withdrawal more effectively, but regardless, it was going to be Saigon in 75, no matter what we did.  It could have been 2007, 2010, 2019, whatever.  But us abandoning the embassy and leaving our allies behind was the guaranteed part.