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Fall of Saigon v2. Although I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong
by Clewza313 5y ago
Fall of Saigon v2. Although I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong level of popular support.
- godelmachine 5y agoThey just have strong level of petro-dollar support from the Gulf.
- clydethefrog 5y agoAnd America has "just" the biggest invested army world wide. I guess you need more than money to win the fight sometimes.
- hulitu 5y agoWars are not meant to be win. If you win a war quickly you don't make any profit.
- godelmachine 5y agoUS pulled out only because the general American public was bored of being in Afghanistan. Americans would had stayed there forever if they wanted to, and kept the Taliban at bay.
- neatze 5y agoKen Burns Vietnam War documentary, exemplifies really well how limited commitment to fight a war, will result in similar situation as in Korea (to a degree, I guess), Vietnam, almost in Iraq, and now in Afghanistan.
- xbmcuser 5y agopetro-dollar support from the gulf if actually exists was peanuts compared to 100s of billions from the US, Nato and India.
- godelmachine 5y agoWhat makes you think they don’t get the same amount from the Gulf? Only US and NATO provided military assistance. Others like India invested billions in constructive projects like Salma dam.
- rightbyte 5y agoWhat would the talibans do with the money? It is quite obvious the Afghan army has a more expensive operation than talibans with rifles and pickups. I guess the Afghan army should have focused more on quality than size to be able to afford talanted soldiers.
- godelmachine 5y agoI don’t think that’s a valid question. What would they do with money? Buy more weapons, I guess? Invest in training. Hire more recruits.
- vkou 5y agoBoth you and the parent poster are missing the forest through the trees. The failure is not in money, training, or conscription. The failure is in not giving the army any reason to fight. If you don't give a rat's ass about your cause, and there's a serious possibility of defeat, why would you keep fighting? The problem is that in twenty years, the coalition-supported government failed to make enough of its constituents give a rat's ass about their cause. They might not like the Taliban much, but they seem to prefer to live under them, than die for what is perceived as a corrupt, self-serving, ineffective government.
- THINkttwICE 5y agoExactly this.
- rightbyte 5y agoYe well I agree. It is still astonishing how the army could collapse in this way. I guess the general staff more or less folded in some agreement with the Talibans. There should have been plenty of reports of artillery shelling with civilian causalities otherwise. Some kind of blood bath when high ranking officers have their backs against the wall. > If you don't give a rat's ass about your cause, and there's a serious possibility of defeat, why would you keep fighting? Keep fighting? My understanding is that there was no serious effort to fight from the army's side.
- Clewza313 5y agoNot really. Most Gulf states are petrified of militant Islam, and the Taliban subscribe to a creed (Deobandi) that's not particularly popular among Arabs.
- godelmachine 5y agoNevertheless, the funding they receive is more than enough to keep them going, as such point where US pulls out and they could fight the fledgling Afghan army.
- Rerarom 5y agohttps://www.lynalden.com/fraying-petrodollar-system/ https://www.lynalden.com/fraying-petrodollar-system/
- leereeves 5y agoJust over a month ago [July 8] the President was actually arguing that the Afghan army would win: Q Is a Taliban takeover of Afghanistan now inevitable? THE PRESIDENT: No, it is not. Q Why? THE PRESIDENT: Because you — the Afghan troops have 300,000 well-equipped — as well-equipped as any army in the world — and an air force against something like 75,000 Taliban. It is not inevitable. ... I trust the capacity of the Afghan military, who is better trained, better equipped, and more re- — more competent in terms of conducting war. https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/07/08/remarks-by-president-biden-on-the-drawdown-of-u-s-forces-in-afghanistan/ https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/20...
- AdrianB1 5y agoThey have 300,000 troops that are either poorly trained, lead by incompetent officers and/or corrupt to the bone. It is expected to lose badly. This was known, that makes the speech a big lie as many speeches of most leaders of most countries.
- hutzlibu 5y agoAnd wasn't there recently something shared here, that the afghan air force cannot really fly, because the US cancelled their contracted maintainance service? Also with the sheer size of the US embassy - it rather looks to me like there never was a sovereign afghan government in the first place, so of course they don't stand a chance on its own. It was all too artificial and US dependent.
- rvense 5y agoIt's almost as though the American leadership doesn't really understand Afghanistan.
- hulitu 5y agoOf course they do. But is a nice playing ground for the army and the military industrial complex makes good profits. The lifes of milions do not matter for them.
- swang 5y agoMore like Fall of Phnom Penh v3
- EdwardDiego 5y ago...assuming you're referring to indiscriminate shelling of civilians and then mass reprisal killings... what was v2?
- numpad0 5y agoMaybe v1 is 1945/08/15 by his definition
- implements 5y agoThe locals keeping their heads down in the face of an insurgency the Afghan state is clearly unable to defeat probably shouldn’t be presented as “strong popular support” (the true level of which is supposed to be about 10%).
- Eckolnojh 5y agoIs there even such a thing as an "Afghan state"? From what little I know of their culture, they're more accurately described as tribes or clans who happens to speak similar languages and have the same religion rather than a nation-state.
- hulitu 5y agoThey are surely sick of 20 years of useless war so they will support the new leaders.
- captain_price7 5y agoTaliban is certainly more popular than they were 25 years ago. Last time there was a pretty strong grassroot movement against Taliban, particularly in the northern parts of the nation. Taliban didn't have to fire a shot in many of these places this time.
- baybal2 5y ago> I have to say the speed at which the Taliban took over once the US pulled out is pretty astonishing: it's clear they have a strong level of popular support. The explanation is very, very simple, but I don't see any Western media talking about it at all. Basically, Afghan government fell apart when USA withdrew the pork barrel of military contracts from locals. People forget that 20 years ago USA mounted all kinds of warlords, and other rogue elements into seats of power. The entirety of regional elites which emerged in these 20 years are a product of that system. The only things securing their loyalty to USA, and thus to the government in Kabul were American money. The moment they ran out, it all fell apart just like Middle Eastern, and Latin American US friendly regimes. The "Our Bastard!" theory showed extreme naivete of people following it yet again. There is no such things as "Our Bastards!" Time to learn that after 60 years. Henry Kisinger lured USA into a geopolitical deathtrap with his lunatical political theories. Now US has found itself in the world surrounded by backstabbing, and turncoat regimes of its own making, who nor fear, nor respect it now, and who will pounce the moment USA stops spoonfeeding them, and shows its back. USA has less allies in the world now than at any time in the last century. USA can't now fight half the world dominated by solidified group of corrupt regimes. Escaping this situation will be extremely hard. USA cannot rely on allies who are loyal only to American printing press. USA will not score any real allies without changing itself first
- Eckolnojh 5y ago> USA can't now fight half the world dominated by solidified group of corrupt regimes. If there is anything the past few decades have shown, it's that the pocketbook and the sword are both useless tools when it comes to any kind of Middle Eastern policy.
- hulitu 5y agoThis was always the view of Americans: Monry can buy everything. While it may be true for their democracy it is not true for other things that people value.
- yyyk 5y agoIn these parts of the world, 'defecting to the winning side' is a basic survival skill. As soon as the US stopped its support it was obvious who'd win (the people still getting state support from Pakistan). So why should a smart faction fight and die? To make the people who aren't there anymore look better?
- captain_price7 5y agoI think you're overestimating Pakistan's capability. It gave Taliban leaders shelter at their worst moment, and that is about the only leverage ISI had. The moment Taliban started to carve out territory inside Afghanistan, that leverage was gone. There's some gratitude, but also lots of resentment among Taliban leadership about the way they were treated by the Pakistani authority.
- baybal2 5y agoYep, totally right. I think you need to also tell about Afghan government itself "returning Pakistan a favour," and dispatching the Pakistani Taliban.
- erklik 5y agoThe amount of support Pakistan provides Taliban is severly overblown. Did they provide them refuge when Taliban was on the back foot? Sure, probably. Is Pakistan aiding them in this current offense? It really doesn't seem like it.
- yyyk 5y agoISI help is significantly more than refuge. That said, the Taliban didn't need help for this offensive. They've been handed the country on a platter.
- bawolff 5y agoI don't know that much about the region, but the us-supported side had 20 years and lots of money to prepare for this day. I would assume if they enjoyed more popular support in the near past they would have built something that would less obviously be the losing side today, and people wouldn't have jumped ship so quickly.
- squarefoot 5y agoThey don't have all that support from population; it's more like "if you can't beat them...". Unfortunately among those surrendering without any resistance it's the Afghan Army, with all their weapons, which means now the Talibans are much more heavily armed than a few months ago.
- ClumsyPilot 5y agoThe corruption is so bad soldiers in hospitals starved to death. It's clear that in the past 30 years afganistan did not have a functioning government at all. Its not about popular support, its a failure of 'statebuilding' https://observers.france24.com/en/20200218-afghanistan-corruption-rations-soldiers-army-eat https://observers.france24.com/en/20200218-afghanistan-corru...
- mnd999 5y agoAbsolutely the government were in it for themselves, not for the people. The average Afghan has no love for the Taliban or the government but it’s pragmatic to side with whoever is winning.
- CapricornNoble 5y agoMost of the Afghan government just pocketed as much money as possible and stashed in (and their families) in Dubai: https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2019-11-04/the-afghan-officials-families-with-luxury-pads-in-dubai https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2019-11-04/the...
- ClumsyPilot 5y agoWell Russian government also pockets the money and stashes them in foreign countries, but it is not totally dysfunctional - they can get infrastructure built and the army organised. They dont do it well, but they can defend themselves.
- captain_price7 5y agoAnd then there were "phantom soldiers"- it's the practice where officers would just create non-existent soldiers to pocket their salary.
- trainsplanes 5y agoVietnam ultimately became a pretty nice country a few years after the US government finally gave up on trying to turn it into hell on earth, and it’s only getting better. If this really is Saigon 2.0, 20 years from now Afghanistan will be a peaceful country with active tourism. With the Taliban seemingly making efforts to appease China for economic gain, who knows, it just might happen.