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Electric_Banana On February 05, 2024




, New Zealand
#121New Post! Sep 18, 2021 @ 00:30:46
@Leon Said

Everyone knew this was going to happen once the US left. The question wasn’t “if”’ but merely “when”. The speed is the only surprising thing here.

The mistake wasn’t pulling out - had to happen at some point. The mistake was holding on to this thing for as long as we did. Osama bin Laden was killed a decade ago, probably left Afghanistan years before that.



I have absolutely nothing against what Biden did or how he did it. Had they given a couple weeks notice every Afghani and his uncle's pet monkey 'Carl' would've sabotaged every available airstrip and made it near impossible for any incoming craft to the get the soldiers out of there.

We've heard for years the other countries mocking our soldiers over there saying they were imperialist bullies and had not right to be there.

Well guess what....
4d4m On December 23, 2022




4dforum.org,
#122New Post! Sep 18, 2021 @ 06:51:13
I have been mulling something over. I don't have an answer so I'd like to hear what you think of this hypothesis.

Is it possible the Afghan Army collapsed in the face of the Taliban so rapidly because of ingrained superstition. Could it be they fear the Taliban because they can't shake the idea they are holy warriors, guided by Allah? Could it be the beliefs forced upon them from birth and probably in past lifetimes is so entrenched in their subconscious there was no possibility of them succeeding let alone trying to succeed?
Na On February 27, 2024




, Florida
#123New Post! Sep 21, 2021 @ 22:18:39
12,000 displaced Afghanis in Rammstein Germany languishing today

Media blackout
Na On February 27, 2024




, Florida
#124New Post! Sep 21, 2021 @ 22:19:48
@4d4m Said

I have been mulling something over. I don't have an answer so I'd like to hear what you think of this hypothesis.

Is it possible the Afghan Army collapsed in the face of the Taliban so rapidly because of ingrained superstition. Could it be they fear the Taliban because they can't shake the idea they are holy warriors, guided by Allah? Could it be the beliefs forced upon them from birth and probably in past lifetimes is so entrenched in their subconscious there was no possibility of them succeeding let alone trying to succeed?



They just weren’t being paid. The Afghan army went without pay for a very long time. Tell me if one army they can go for very long without any compensation.
mrmhead On about 24 hours ago




NE, Ohio
#125New Post! Sep 21, 2021 @ 23:07:24
@Na Said

12,000 displaced Afghanis in Rammstein Germany languishing today

Media blackout



Worse than being in Afghanistan?
mrmhead On about 24 hours ago




NE, Ohio
#126New Post! Sep 21, 2021 @ 23:10:13
@Na Said

They just weren’t being paid. The Afghan army went without pay for a very long time. Tell me if one army they can go for very long without any compensation.



Religious driven terrorists

Soldiers in a totalitarian regime
Darkman666 On about 23 hours ago




Saint Louis, Missouri
#127New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 00:20:06
Worse than being in Afghanistan?

an old jewish man, who is blamed the forming of the grand canyon.

because he dropped an quarter down in an gopher hole.
shadowen On March 22, 2024




Bunyip Bend, Australia
#128New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 11:44:06
@Electric_Banana Said

I have absolutely nothing against what Biden did or how he did it. Had they given a couple weeks notice every Afghani and his uncle's pet monkey 'Carl' would've sabotaged every available airstrip and made it near impossible for any incoming craft to the get the soldiers out of there.



With Biden having bizarrely given up control of BaB there was only ONE suitable airstrip, that being the one in Kabul. The airstrip controlled by allied forces. You seriously think it would have been possible for outsiders to sabotage this airstrip? To make it inoperable? 'They' would have had bloody Buckley's.
shadowen On March 22, 2024




Bunyip Bend, Australia
#129New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 12:33:33
@4d4m Said

Is it possible the Afghan Army collapsed in the face of the Taliban so rapidly because of ingrained superstition. Could it be they fear the Taliban because they can't shake the idea they are holy warriors, guided by Allah? Could it be the beliefs forced upon them from birth and probably in past lifetimes is so entrenched in their subconscious there was no possibility of them succeeding let alone trying to succeed?


Virtually everyone in Afghanistan is Muslim and hold broadly similar beliefs, so to understand why the Afghan army collapsed so quickly once western military support was withdrawn you need to look elsewhere.

From 2014 the bulk of the fighting (and dying) was being done by the Afghan army. Yes there were problems with leadership, corruption, drug use, poor discipline, tribal division and problems over pay and conditions. Despite these issues however the Afghan army was doing ok with the support of allied troops.

From 2014 onward the main role of western forces was to provide training to Afghan troops, as well as intelligence, technical and logistical support. Biden's commitment to an unconditional withdrawal date and the removal of western military support, along with the withdrawal of western funded private contractors, had a devastating effect on Afghan forces. Yes the things i mentioned earlier eg lack of pay, corruption, poor leadership etc all impacted upon morale. Now however they were suddenly alone. Indeed they were not just alone but they were now left to fight an enemy without the capacity to provide their combat forces with the technical and logistical support that they needed. This meant that they were unable to reinforce and resupply their units in the field. This supply issue extended to arms, ammunition, fuel and food.

The lack of technical and logistical support also had a huge impact on the operational efficiency of Afghanistan's best troops. Notably their special forces. The Afghan special forces had performed reasonably well against the Taliban. They however relied on being air mobile in order to have a notable impact. Biden's hurried and unconditional withdrawal left them largely without the ability to be rapidly deployed around the country. It's no use for example having Black Hawk helicopters if you don't have a sufficient number of highly trained men to fly, crew and maintain them.

With western military forces set to leave by an unmovable date (though Biden did say on at least one occasion that US forces wouldn't leave until ALL US citizens had been evacuated), and with much of their technical and logistical support suddenly removed, many Afghan soldiers felt isolated, abandoned and betrayed. Units found themselves cut off with no hope of reinforcements, and with no resupply capacity meaning that things as basic as food and ammunition quickly ran low. You can add to this the Taliban saying that those who resisted would be killed whilst those who laid down their arms would be allowed to return to their families. Feeling their cause was now hopeless many Afghan soldiers chose to return to their families.

It is worth noting that the congressionally mandated Afghanistan Study Group (ASG), way back in February, warned that if U.S. support were withdrawn the Afghan forces risked total collapse. This was a view publicly held by many observers. Indeed in Australia we had members from the ASPI, as well as Afghan veterans, saying exactly this.

The reality is that what has happened in Afghanistan was entirely predictable and entirely preventable. Afghanistan will once again provide a safe and secure base for terrorists to train, plan and recruit. With the US withdrawal looking more like a military defeat these terrorists are likely to become emboldened with all that this entails...
shadowen On March 22, 2024




Bunyip Bend, Australia
#130New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 12:51:19
@Na Said

Drone kills 10 civilians.

What? Are you suggesting those seven young kids and the aid workers weren't ISIS K members on a suicide mission? Are you suggesting it wasn't a 'righteous strike' and a great example of Biden's over the horizon policy in action?
shadowen On March 22, 2024




Bunyip Bend, Australia
#131New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 13:05:11
You know you have completely f#cked up as a democrat President when the New York Times is critising your words and actions...

Fact checking from the NYT (20th August. Updated 6th September):

What Mr. Biden said

“I have seen no question of our credibility from our allies around the world.”

This is misleading. While leaders of countries allied with the United States have been hesitant to publicly criticize the withdrawal, some members of their governments have not minced words in questioning American leadership and credibility.

In Germany, the chairman of Parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee called the withdrawal “a serious and far-reaching miscalculation by the current administration” and said it did “fundamental damage to the political and moral credibility of the West.” Armin Laschet, the head of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative party and a candidate in the election to succeed her, called it the “biggest debacle” that NATO had ever seen. Merkel also criticized it privately, according to German news media reports.

In the UK, the pullout has raised doubts among some officials about the reliability of the United States as an ally. Tom Tugendhat, a Conservative member of Parliament and the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, characterized it the “biggest foreign policy disaster” since the 1956 Suez crisis, saying that “we need to think again about how we handle friends, who matters and how we defend our interests.”

Latvia’s defense minister, Artis Pabriks, said that the withdrawal caused “chaos” and showed that the West was “weaker globally.”


What Mr. Biden said

“What interest do we have in Afghanistan at this point with Al Qaeda gone? We went to Afghanistan for the express purpose of getting rid of Al Qaeda in Afghanistan as well as, as well as getting Osama bin Laden, and we did.”

False. Al Qaeda’s presence in Afghanistan has certainly been reduced since the United States invaded, but Mr. Biden is wrong to say that the terrorist group is no longer in the country.

A United Nations Security Council report released in June estimated that Al Qaeda still had a presence in at least 15 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces. The Defense Department’s Office of Inspector General said in a report released on Wednesday that “the Taliban continued to maintain its relationship with Al Qaeda, providing safe haven for the terrorist group in Afghanistan.”

After Mr. Biden spoke, John F. Kirby, a Pentagon spokesman, confirmed in a news conference that Al Qaeda had a presence in Afghanistan.


What Mr. Biden said

“We have no indication that they haven’t been able to get — in Kabul — through the airport. We’ve made an agreement with the, with the Taliban. Thus far, they’ve allowed them to go through. It’s in their interest for them to go through. So, we know of no circumstance where American citizens are — carrying an American passport — are trying to get through to the airport.”

This is misleading. Reports from Afghanistan contradict this statement, and other government officials have been more cautious when describing the conditions for American citizens traveling to the airport.

The United States Embassy in Kabul sent a security alert on Wednesday warning American citizens, legal residents and their families that the “United States government cannot ensure safe passage to the Hamid Karzai International Airport.”

Asked about Mr. Biden’s claim that no American had been denied access to the airport, Ned Price, a spokesman for the State Department, said in a news conference on Friday that the department “has received only a small number of reports from American citizens that their access has been impeded in some way, that they have faced any sort of hardship or resistance, getting to the airport.”

Mr. Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman, also said in the news conference that he was aware of “sporadic reports of some Americans not being able to get through checkpoints,” but that they were able to get through “by and large.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd J. Austin III told Congress on Friday that some Americans trying to leave Afghanistan had been harassed and beaten by Taliban fighters.

An unnamed American resident in Afghanistan told ABC News that he had witnessed people holding U.S. passports not being allowed through Taliban checkpoints. Clarissa Ward, a CNN reporter in Kabul, said after Mr. Biden’s remarks that she had difficulty reaching the airport.

“Working how to get to this airport is like a Rubik’s Cube,” Miss Ward said on CNN on Friday. “Anyone who says that any American can get in here is — yes, I mean, technically, it’s possible. But it’s extremely difficult, and it is dangerous.”
shadowen On March 22, 2024




Bunyip Bend, Australia
#132New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 13:13:11
"The likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely."
- Biden
8th July, 2021

"I need not tell you the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things are not going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban and there is a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture."
- Biden to Afghan President
23rd July, 2021
Na On February 27, 2024




, Florida
#133New Post! Sep 22, 2021 @ 15:54:44
@shadowen Said

What? Are you suggesting those seven young kids and the aid workers weren't ISIS K members on a suicide mission? Are you suggesting it wasn't a 'righteous strike' and a great example of Biden's over the horizon policy in action?



Nailed it.

Not righteous.

Wreckless.

Careless.

Thoughtless.

But, this is as good as it gets.
4d4m On December 23, 2022




4dforum.org,
#134New Post! Sep 23, 2021 @ 03:00:09
@shadowen Said

Virtually everyone in Afghanistan is Muslim and hold broadly similar beliefs, so to understand why the Afghan army collapsed so quickly once western military support was withdrawn you need to look elsewhere.



The fact they are all Muslim was my point. Muslim Afghans fighting against what they may perceive as "more righteous" Muslim Taliban, or possibly Mujaheedin Taliban might have led to a failure of will.

This perception may be subconscious rather than on a conscious level.

The Taliban have support but it is limited. They are getting money for weapons and ammunition from somewhere. They do not have air or artillery support either.

If the two forces, now on a more equal footing, fight then it is the side with the will to win that will succeed. I think it's fairly obvious the Afghan government forces did not have the will. The Taliban did.

I also disagreed with pulling out of Afghanistan.
Na On February 27, 2024




, Florida
#135New Post! Sep 23, 2021 @ 19:42:47
CNN has to remind us of priorities

rainbow flags away ya'll

Good ole CNN gets us back into the horse race of eKKKwal rytes.

Who's gon run the pride parade? Who's gon wave the rainbow flags now?

If only the mericans were left back in Afghanistan.

oh well
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