Afghanistan

[mids]

I see Biden has ordered his brave troops to stand by and watch as people are fighting for their lives while Boris's brave boys bound into battle.

reaction.life/war-of-words-british-and-us-military-clash-over-kabul-airport-chaos/

[rick49]

Aug 23, 2021 11:58:51 GMT mids said:

I see Biden has ordered his brave troops to stand by and watch as people are fighting for their lives while Boris's brave boys bound into battle.

reaction.life/war-of-words-british-and-us-military-clash-over-kabul-airport-chaos/

bugout bidens Dunkirk.

[rick49]

Aug 23, 2021 11:58:51 GMT mids said:

I see Biden has ordered his brave troops to stand by and watch as people are fighting for their lives while Boris's brave boys bound into battle.

reaction.life/war-of-words-british-and-us-military-clash-over-kabul-airport-chaos/

yup. americas troops would do what the uk troops are doing without hesitation but our premier foreign policy expert won't allow it.

[perrykneeham]

Fall of Singapore.

[ootlg]

Aug 23, 2021 11:33:27 GMT perrykneeham said:

Biden's buyout bugout bye-bye had been an epoch-defining clusterfuck by and of itself. Let's not let that be confused.

How can anyone be confused by 250,000 deaths (never mind wounded and refugees) in Afghanistan since the US/British invasion 2001 compared to 16 deaths since Biden cocked up?

[perrykneeham]

A. It was all for nought.
B. The collateral geopolitical damage is immeasurable.
C. The meter's still running.

[flatandy]

Aug 23, 2021 16:16:14 GMT perrykneeham said:

A. It was all for nought.
B. The collateral geopolitical damage is immeasurable.
C. The meter's still running.

Surprisingly accurate.

What's worse is that we knew this was true 15+ years ago, yet nobody had the balls to cut the cord until now.

[voice]

It's also funny those who massively supported the war all those years, mids Baloo the idiot flipped on a tuppence last year when Trump surrendered saying how marvelous it was the war was going to end, yet once the surrender deal goes through as promised it's suddenly the worst decision since history began.

Though it'd not as amusing as seeing clips of looser boy just 3 weeks ago lauding the fact his deal was the one that brought the troops home and he'd done it in such a way, he claimed, that Biden was unable to stop it.

[mids]

I see Biden's an ignorant moron who thinks Afghanistan is in the Middle East now.

[ootlg]

Some of us knew it 20 years ago. I remember a point when Blair may have been able to stop it before it started, but he didn't, he encouraged it. And it slowly disintegrated into the same scenario as previous invasions - troops garrisoned-up while the Taliban and other tribes held the country, waiting. I'll be surprised if this doesn't turn into a bloodbath, especially now Johnson's trying to get Biden to overstay the deadline.

[perrykneeham]

Aug 23, 2021 16:49:30 GMT voice said:

It's also funny those who massively supported the war all those years, mids Baloo the idiot flipped on a tuppence last year when Trump surrendered saying how marvelous it was the war was going to end, yet once the surrender deal goes through as promised it's suddenly the worst decision since history began.

Though it'd not as amusing as seeing clips of looser boy just 3 weeks ago lauding the fact his deal was the one that brought the troops home and he'd done it in such a way, he claimed, that Biden was unable to stop it.

Pretty disingenuous that. I imagine most of us supported taking a big stick to the Taliban regime post 11/9 but I don't suppose any of us supported a piss-poor (largely Obama-era) shambles of winning the peace. Certainly we don't support the cynical, amoral and negligent stampede by you hero, Joe "Devil take the hindmost" bye-bye Biden (no forwarding address).

[voice]

Bush and his neocons with Blair cheering them on genuinely were of the idea if they just rolled in told the locals you're free now Afghanustan and a few months later Iraq would be easily transformed into Dennark.

Though those pulling Bush's strings probably knew the reality of things but also saw just how incredibly profitable a forever war was going to be for them, so much of the war was contracted out the trough was full for years. Now that Trump and Biden have between then turned off the money spigot you are seeing a massive blow back. Only the most disingenuous, or in the idiots case, slavish cultist, commentator could honestly say it would have been in anyway different had the pull out been last Christmas as Trump had originally wanted or next Christmas or 5 years from now

How this ended was just inevitable, it's why 3 other US presidents and 4 other UK PMs were persuaded to not let it happen on their shift.

[mids]

I blame Labour and the Democrats. Socialists.

[flatandy]

Aug 23, 2021 17:06:14 GMT perrykneeham said:

Pretty disingenuous that. I imagine most of us supported taking a big stick to the Taliban regime post 11/9 but I don't suppose any of us supported a piss-poor (largely Obama-era) shambles of winning the peace. Certainly we don't support the cynical, amoral and negligent stampede by you hero, Joe "Devil take the hindmost" bye-bye Biden (no forwarding address).

If the goal was to give the Taliban a slapping, they'd have been in and out in a couple of months.

But the whole New American Century bollocks was in full swing, and they wanted to prove that it would work. That a smallish invasion, and a smallish force on the ground, using lots of private companies, and giving jobs to a handful of the scions of the rich and famous who's only previous experience organising anything was a keg party at a frat house, would create an effective regime on the ground. And that, because everyone loved America and Americans, the locals would be delighted and would join in and support it. And then America could go off and do that in one country after another, a low cost wonderful way of changing the world, always using private contractors, always moving money to private industry. But mostly driven by the belief in "small government".

Which is one reason it was bound to fail, a reason that it was never going to be a Marshall Plan. The revival of Germany and Japan came about because it was a Big Government solution. Huge amounts of money was invested in actual fundamental infrastructure, and thousands of competent administrators were sent over and paid properly to oversee things. The political goal of the Marshall Plan was to have Germany and Japan as functioning countries, largely regardless of cost. The political goal in Afghanistan - as much as there was any over-arching plan - was to prove that America could do this everywhere over and over again, at low cost.

If the goal had been giving the Taliban a slapping they'd have done it differently.

If the goal had been dismantling Al Qaeda they'd have done it differently.

If the goal had been improving the lives of Afghans they'd have done it differently.

If the goal had been imposing proper human rights on the Afghans they'd have done it differently.

They f**k*d it up through mendaciousness and hubris, and left it in such a crappy state that nobody dared withdraw until now.

[voice]

Well obviously you do mid, taking responsibility is just not in your make up

For those of us on the rational center it's easier for us to say:
Bush going in was idiotic, sure go in briefly and slap AQ, not a few curise missiles as Clinton did, but a propper slap
Blair idiot for cheering Bush on, idiot still for wanting the war to be still going on
Obama, stupid for thinking a surge would be in anyway different. Good for not giving up the search for Binman, though that was never reliant on occupying Afghanistan.
Cameron for supporting the surge, idiot.
Trudeau, good decision to end Canads involvement despite the attacks from all involved.
Trump, wanting to get out, even if his deal handing Afghanistan over to the Taliban guaranteed the collapse of the Afghanistan army and gov, was the first step in the right direction.
Boris, idiot for not supporting the pull out and not preparing for it
Biden, keeping the Trump deal a good thing, thinking Afghanistan would not implode in 9 days, while a bit understandable, should have been a scenario they had prepared for.

[flatandy]

The weird thing with Boris is that for the first time I was almost sympathetic to him. He's fine with the withdrawal and yet he was getting abused by all the same cheerleaders-for-the-war morons who've been attacking Biden, even though - as with Biden - there was basically little alternative: stay, or withdraw, and if you withdraw this is going to be the consequence.

[perrykneeham]

Biden's mishandling of the Great Afghan Disaster reminds me of that old joke about the maternity ward doctor who delivers a baby, bounces it twice off the wall and then drop-kicks it out of the window before telling the horrified mother: "Haha! Got you. It was dead anyway."

[voice]

And Trump made his surrender deal without any of the US partners or even the Afghan gov itself. While the get out was most certainly needed, the way he did it was, as you'd expect, really all about him, him been seen alone to be the solution, him getting all praise, him him him.

Ffs he was so blinded by his inward focus he needed to be persuaded very very strongly not to have his photo opp with the Taliban at Camp David on the anniversary of the WTC attacks. Though I bet he's massively relieved he listened to Mathis and others, who told him in November not to finish off the pull out of the last few troops in December, but wait till after Biden was in office

[perrykneeham]

None of which detracts from the utter, craven, cynical shitfest that Biden chose to inflict on the World.

[voice]

Yeah tear I get it, the only bit of this whole 20 year multi presidential, military and ideological fcuk up that matters is the last 2 weeks. Though obviously had this happened last December, no one can honestly say the outcome would have been any different, but I'm sure all those saying this is all on Biden would have been singing a different tune.

Hypocracy, it's a way of life for the right.