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> I was told in January this year by many gleeful people they were so happy that "competence" was coming back into the US administration. I share your frustrat

by bArray 5y ago

> I was told in January this year by many gleeful people they were so happy that "competence" was coming back into the US administration. I share your frustration - this withdrawal literally couldn't have been done worse. They were so ill prepared they left weapons for the Taliban to pick up, seemingly had zero plan for evacuation of their embassies and failed to tell allied embassies. A withdrawal was definitely on the cards though - printing money for a year whilst people don't work has had a massive effect on the US economy. It just could have been done better. After all those deaths, after all that money spent, after setting up a Democratic government - and it goes down like this. I would also take a moment to point out the fact that China is highly likely to have been involved, they literally were in talks months before this went down [1]. > What an absolute bunch of morons and their failures. I think we can quite fairly call this one a failure by the Biden administration - Trump had zero involvement in their withdrawal planning. [1] https://edition.cnn.com/2021/07/29/china/china-taliban-tianjin-afghanistan-intl-hnk/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2021/07/29/china/china-taliban-tianj...

reducesuffering 5y ago
> Trump had zero involvement in their withdrawal planning. Trump had a deal signed with the Taliban, in which a withdrawal of half the troops was already initiated, funding was cut, and 5k Taliban prisoners were released. Immediately after that deal, Taliban went on a huge offense and the end was set in motion. Biden inherited a signed deal that had US completely withdrawn in May, and he even extended it to August. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doha_Agreement_(2020) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doha_Agreement_(2020)
- bArray 5y ago
  Trump signed the deal, but he didn't plan the withdrawal. In six months, the best they could come up with is handing over military equipment to the Taliban? > Biden inherited a signed deal that had US completely withdrawn in May, and he even extended it to August. We can't in good faith argue that Biden had no power to modify, extend or even cancel the agreement. He did so with many of Trump's previous commitments for example. In the Wikipedia article: > [..] a full withdrawal within 14 months if the Taliban keeps its commitments. And then later: > Despite the peace agreement between the U.S. and the Taliban, insurgent attacks against Afghan security forces were reported to have surged in the country. Biden had every possibility to cancel the agreement.
_moof 5y ago
I'm frustrated by the withdrawal too but let's not forget we had twenty years to help build a functioning army. It's not as though things were going really great and then oops, we left too suddenly. We've been failing at this--and the Afghan army has been failing to step up--for decades.
- bArray 5y ago
  > [..] let's not forget we had twenty years to help build a functioning army. Sure, 20 years of failure - we shouldn't have been there in the first place. But accepting your losses and performing an abysmal withdrawal process is entirely different. > It's not as though things were going really great and then oops, we left too suddenly. It was better than the Taliban overrunning every major city in a week. They must have been doing something to keep them inline. They deliberately waited for the withdrawal process to be mostly complete. > [..] the Afghan army has been failing to step up [..] This was very shocking and disheartening, the majority abandoned their posts and let them overrun the cities. All of that training and investment only to have it thrown away.

by bArray 5y ago

reducesuffering 5y ago

> Trump had zero involvement in their withdrawal planning. Trump had a deal signed with the Taliban, in which a withdrawal of half the troops was already initiated, funding was cut, and 5k Taliban prisoners were released. Immediately after that deal, Taliban went on a huge offense and the end was set in motion. Biden inherited a signed deal that had US completely withdrawn in May, and he even extended it to August. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doha_Agreement_(2020) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doha_Agreement_(2020)

bArray 5y ago
Trump signed the deal, but he didn't plan the withdrawal. In six months, the best they could come up with is handing over military equipment to the Taliban? > Biden inherited a signed deal that had US completely withdrawn in May, and he even extended it to August. We can't in good faith argue that Biden had no power to modify, extend or even cancel the agreement. He did so with many of Trump's previous commitments for example. In the Wikipedia article: > [..] a full withdrawal within 14 months if the Taliban keeps its commitments. And then later: > Despite the peace agreement between the U.S. and the Taliban, insurgent attacks against Afghan security forces were reported to have surged in the country. Biden had every possibility to cancel the agreement.

_moof 5y ago

I'm frustrated by the withdrawal too but let's not forget we had twenty years to help build a functioning army. It's not as though things were going really great and then oops, we left too suddenly. We've been failing at this--and the Afghan army has been failing to step up--for decades.

bArray 5y ago
> [..] let's not forget we had twenty years to help build a functioning army. Sure, 20 years of failure - we shouldn't have been there in the first place. But accepting your losses and performing an abysmal withdrawal process is entirely different. > It's not as though things were going really great and then oops, we left too suddenly. It was better than the Taliban overrunning every major city in a week. They must have been doing something to keep them inline. They deliberately waited for the withdrawal process to be mostly complete. > [..] the Afghan army has been failing to step up [..] This was very shocking and disheartening, the majority abandoned their posts and let them overrun the cities. All of that training and investment only to have it thrown away.