US, NATO Outta Afghanistan 2021

[OldSolduer]

"We didn't understand the problem," says McChrystal, who led international forces from 2009 to 2010. "The complexities of the environment, I think, weren't appreciated. We went for what we thought would work quickly over what would have likely worked over the longer term."

IMO we - the west - project our values onto people who don't share our view on life.

 

[KevinB]

Karzai still around - for now, anyway ...

Is it just me hearing a clock ticking on that guy?

I think the word I would use is "canny",



Karzai is canny.

He's a relatively moderate Pashtun - that he's a corrupt Dbag is irrelevant - he's remaining visible - and as long as he can stay visible - the TB won't go after him for turning other Pashtun's against them post 9/11.

Involving him even in a low level with the new Government gives the TB 2.0 Image a lot more credibility to foreign governments who so desperately want to believe it (and more their citizens to believe it) so they are not held to account by their voters...

 

[Halifax Tar]

"We didn't understand the problem," says McChrystal, who led international forces from 2009 to 2010. "The complexities of the environment, I think, weren't appreciated. We went for what we thought would work quickly over what would have likely worked over the longer term."

IMO we - the west - project our values onto people who don't share our view on life.

 

[The Bread Guy]

Lookit what a bit of bi-partisanism can lead to ....

Former Obama and Bush administration officials are launching, a new organization aimed to help streamline the process of resettling the roughly 65,000 Afghans forced out of their home country and now making the United States their home.

Welcome.US will bring together top refugee organizations, the government and major businesses to engage with Americans on how to help with resettlement efforts for Afghan refugees ...

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Enjoy your new country Mr Taliban, it may be harder to govern, then to overthrow

Taliban seizes US$12m from ex-officials as cash crunch hits Afghanistan – Kuala Lumpur Post

kualalumpurpost.net

 

[FJAG]

Lookit what a bit of bi-partisanism can lead to ....

Not everyone's on board:

Trump Aides Aim To Build GOP Opposition To Afghan Refugees​

The former president has insisted that the refugees are a threat. Trump adviser Stephen Miller said his focus is on convincing members of Congress.

Trump Aides Aim To Build GOP Opposition To Afghan Refugees

The former president has insisted that the refugees are a threat. Trump adviser Stephen Miller said his focus is on convincing members of Congress.

www.huffpost.com

 

[The Bread Guy]

Not everyone's on board:

With stories like this likely to help feed their narrative ....

 

[The Bread Guy]

Meanwhile, one former Canadian foreign service officer's take on at least 5 lessons to take away ....

(...)

1. Government must champion conflict management expertise.

(...)

2. The fate of Afghanistan matters to Canadians.

(...)

3. There is nothing plausible about “plausible deniability”

(...)

4. Be direct when speaking to Canadians about how tough the fight will be

(...)

5. Focus on realistic outcomes, not on making a contribution just to be involved

(...)

 

[OldSolduer]

Meanwhile, one Canadian foreign service officer's take on at least 5 lessons to take away ....

"How Canada has treated the Afghan interpreters who worked with Canadian soldiers and diplomats reveals a similar blind spot.

Those interpreters wore the Canadian flag on their shoulder and risked their lives daily. The interpreter with us at Sarpoza Prison for example, wore an oversized jumpsuit, headscarf and goggles to camouflage his or her identity. Threatening letters delivered in the middle of the night, reprisals, hangings and beheadings were real then and remain so today as the country falls once again to the Taliban."

I'll read this more carefully later but I found the above quote quite.....I'm not sure how to say it but some of our "officials" have no effing clue about anything at all..


A great article.

What we should have learned in Afghanistan - Open Canada

A former foreign service officer in Kandahar on lessons from Canada’s longest war

opencanada.org

 

[rmc_wannabe]

"How Canada has treated the Afghan interpreters who worked with Canadian soldiers and diplomats reveals a similar blind spot.

Those interpreters wore the Canadian flag on their shoulder and risked their lives daily. The interpreter with us at Sarpoza Prison for example, wore an oversized jumpsuit, headscarf and goggles to camouflage his or her identity. Threatening letters delivered in the middle of the night, reprisals, hangings and beheadings were real then and remain so today as the country falls once again to the Taliban."

I'll read this more carefully later but I found the above quote quite.....I'm not sure how to say it but some of our "officials" have no effing clue about anything at all..


A great article.

What we should have learned in Afghanistan - Open Canada

A former foreign service officer in Kandahar on lessons from Canada’s longest war

opencanada.org

The problem with a lot of our senior diplomats and bureaucrats is that they don't factor in that people "hate Canada" and thus, hate people who work for us (Canadian and LEP alike).

No one who signs on to work for GAC expects that the people they have working for them in an embassy would be the target of threats, reprisals, or violence. Every embassy is "safe" and the people "love Canada." At least they do in Brussels, Paris, London, etc.

I remember being told while in Lebanon that Hezboallah "aren't a threat, because they hate ISIS as much as we do. So don't worry too much about them." You bet your sweet bippy I had my head on a swivel, because they would love nothing more than to ransom a Canadian Soldier to get money or concessions. But no, the Embassy staff were safe in their compound in Northern Beirut, with not a care in the world about the threat picture outside those walls.

This ignorance showed especially true in Kabul, and we saw the end results of that. .

 

[Kirkhill]

The problem with a lot of our senior diplomats and bureaucrats is that they don't factor in that people "hate Canada" and thus, hate people who work for us (Canadian and LEP alike).

No one who signs on to work for GAC expects that the people they have working for them in an embassy would be the target of threats, reprisals, or violence. Every embassy is "safe" and the people "love Canada." At least they do in Brussels, Paris, London, etc.

I remember being told while in Lebanon that Hezboallah "aren't a threat, because they hate ISIS as much as we do. So don't worry too much about them." You bet your sweet bippy I had my head on a swivel, because they would love nothing more than to ransom a Canadian Soldier to get money or concessions. But no, the Embassy staff were safe in their compound in Northern Beirut, with not a care in the world about the threat picture outside those walls.

This ignorance showed especially true in Kabul, and we saw the end results of that. .

Not that that has ever happened before

 

[Jarnhamar]

Pretty good video of US Sen. Rand Paul

The US apparently doesn't know if they assassinated an ISIS-K operative (that planned the 26 Aug airport attack) or if they killed an aid worker.
The US is sending $64 million in humanitarian aid to Afghanistan i.e the Taliban.
The US may still send billions of dollars to the Taliban for "good behavior"
Question being asked why did the US, who can bomb anyone from anywhere in the world, bomb the abandoned weapons and vehicles.


This whole thing seems like an arms deal.

 

[The Bread Guy]

#KarzaiClockTicking?

The former Afghan president Hamid Karzai in his recent interview said that the Taliban have pledged education of girls, women’s rights, the national flag, and other national values but no implementation of the promises has been seen yet.

Hamid Karzai said that during his interactions with the Taliban, he has focused mainly on three things which are girls’ education, women’s prestige in the Afghan society, and an all-inclusive government.

The former president has added that the people of Afghanistan need a government in which they can live without intimidation, fear, have good relations with the world, work for development, and let people live in joy.

“We need a cabinet that represents the entire Afghanistan, women and people from all ethnicities are seen in that, but what the Taliban has declared does not meet the definition.” Said Karzai.

On the closure of girls’ schools, the former president said that there is no way for the development of the country except for the education of girls ...

 

[daftandbarmy]

The problem with a lot of our senior diplomats and bureaucrats is that they don't factor in that people "hate Canada" and thus, hate people who work for us (Canadian and LEP alike).

No one who signs on to work for GAC expects that the people they have working for them in an embassy would be the target of threats, reprisals, or violence. Every embassy is "safe" and the people "love Canada." At least they do in Brussels, Paris, London, etc.

I remember being told while in Lebanon that Hezboallah "aren't a threat, because they hate ISIS as much as we do. So don't worry too much about them." You bet your sweet bippy I had my head on a swivel, because they would love nothing more than to ransom a Canadian Soldier to get money or concessions. But no, the Embassy staff were safe in their compound in Northern Beirut, with not a care in the world about the threat picture outside those walls.

This ignorance showed especially true in Kabul, and we saw the end results of that. .

To survive a war....

 

[dimsum]

This ignorance showed especially true in Kabul, and we saw the end results of that. .

Well, I hope that the events that transpired have given GAC, etc a collective dose of reality.

I doubt it though.

 

[OldSolduer]

Well, I hope that the events that transpired have given GAC, etc a collective dose of reality.

I doubt it though.

You should capitalize that last statement. The elites that breath the rarified air can't be bothered to learn anything as they know it all. Fools.

 

[The Bread Guy]

This is worth reading - and where "U.S.", read "most other Western nations in the fight" ...

... After the US and its allies threw out the Taliban there were some critical choices. One choice was the extent to which the USA was going to engage in “nation building” and attempt to create a capable and legitimate state before leaving. The USA could have said “We are not in the business of nation-building, we are militarily out of here when our narrow 9/11 related objectives and met, full stop, plan on it.” Or, they could have said “Given the consequences of our regime change we are here with an open-ended commitment until Afghanistan has a capable and legitimate state (on some clear(ish) criteria.” But it was politically expedient, and the height of unconstrained hubris, to say both. The USA said that they were both going to leave only when Afghanistan had a capable and legitimate state and that, don’t worry, that won’t take us very long, we are not making an open ended commitment.

Well, if you announce a distance and a time, you have announced a speed. The USA announced was the equivalent of saying they were going to run a Marathon distance (26.2 miles) in an hour. And when they were told, hey, people having been running Marathons since, well, Marathon, and no one has run one in anything like that time (and it is probably physiologically impossible as no one has run even one single mile at the pace 26.2 would have to be run) the response was some mix of i) hubris that the US military can achieve anything; ii) real or feigned inability to understand that the speed was wildly unrealistic; iii) resignation to political interests setting the goal and timeframe) ...

... if one is told to do nation building on an unrealistic time deadline one is driven towards tactics and strategies that can at least appear to produce rapid success ...

... I just had surgical repair of my ruptured Achilles tendon. My leg is in a hard, non-weightbearing cast for two weeks. If I took that cast off on the second day after surgery and tried to run around I would immediately undo whatever benefit the surgery had been. Asking political and governance mechanisms to do too much, too soon, with too little merely creates repeated failures ...

... If one feels very strongly that something needs to be done and one knows that the existing national mechanisms are to weak to do it, there is a temptation to bring in foreign contractors and import the capability ...

 

[brihard]

So that USMC colonel who made the increasingly crazy videos? Apparently he’s in the brig now. I guess you can’t resign via YouTube… Dude needs help. I hope he gets it.

Marine officer who blasted leaders over Afghanistan withdrawal now in the brig

“All our son did is ask the questions that everybody was asking themselves, but they were too scared to speak out loud.”

taskandpurpose.com

 

[Brad Sallows]

"One choice was the extent to which the USA was going to engage in “nation building” and attempt to create a capable and legitimate state before leaving."

That choice was already made. That was the era during which the neo-cons had a lot of influence and they were all-in on their underpants gnome plan for "nation building":

1. Throw out old regime.
2. ????
3. Democracy!

 

[dimsum]

So that USMC colonel who made the increasingly crazy videos?

Wait, he did more than one?