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> IMO, "nation building" is always an impossible mission. The objective should have been to attack, destroy the enemy, and leave - immediately. They should nev

> IMO, "nation building" is always an impossible mission. The objective should have been to attack, destroy the enemy, and leave - immediately. They should never do anything that makes the lives of ordinary Afghans worse who suffered more from the Taliban than the US. You can’t just bomb a country, create a power vacuum, and nope out of there. Moral cowardice in the extreme. As a counter example see Japan and Iraq.

bitwize 5y ago
Japan was "shock and awe" done (strategically, not morally) right. The US fire-bombed Tokyo and nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, leaving no question in the Japanese mind of who was the overwhelmingly superior force. There was no honor in death fighting such a force; there was only oblivion with nothing left to remember you by. The Japanese happily accepted rule by a "gaijin shogun" rather than face that kind of defeat. And MacArthur turned out to be a rather magnanimous shogun, even arranging for the Emperor to avoid liability for his role in the war and especially Pearl Harbor so that the Japanese had something of their traditional order to cling to during the American occupation and beyond. The political will to commit to that level of destruction and rebuilding hasn't existed since then. Iraq begat ISIS. Iraq was a clusterfuck since 1990.
- Clubber 5y ago
  We were very fortunate Japan surrendered. They certainly didn't after nearly a year of fire bombing, they didn't after Hiroshima, and they almost didn't after Nagasaki. In fact there was an attempted coup when it was discovered the emperor wanted to surrender. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyūjō_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyūjō_incident
galangalalgol 5y ago
This whole post is about holding leaders accountable. The same should be true for those leaders in Afghanistan who aided the attacks on 9/11. But staying to prop up a government in a nation that had already suffered a proxy war occupation by Russia, and had sent them packing (with our help) was always a doomed effort. The culture there won't permit such a thing. So I think leaving a power vacuum would have been the lesser evil, vs prolonging it, or leaving the guilty unaccountable, as we did in SA.
- calsy 5y ago
  What connection is there with holding leaders accountable and occupying a country with millions of civilians who have no connection to any of these events and are simply trying to live? If we use this logic, then the US should be stormed and occupied for the sins of its leaders and all innocents should be held culpable for not overthrowing their evil government.
throwaway0a5e 5y ago
And this sort of thinking is exactly how we wound up stuck there for 20yr. Voter block A wants to bomb them back to the stone age and leave. Voter block B won't tolerate wrecking the place without some pretext of "helping the people" or whatever that means. So the compromise is to wreck the nation then spend 20yr pushing food around our plate as though we're actually going to rebuild it until voter block B is satisfied that we gave it the college try.
- YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
  Is it entirely unthinkable to not invade instead?
  - throwaway0a5e 5y ago
    In late September and early October of 2001 when plans were being drawn up it was.
    - YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
      Why exactly? I don't understand. I never understood what was the real reason for the war. Multiple theories have been put forward that I am aware of but they all seem (to me) to be "just so" stories trying to find a post-hoc explanation for what seemed to be an invasion completely without reason. Oil interests, heroin trade, geopolitical advantage, democracy and human rights (actually that was one of the explanations at the time I think), revenge for 9/11, none of all that makes any sense, neither not invading unthinkable. Why was not invading unthinkable, at any point? More so, why was it necessary? What did anyone gain from sendnig an already piss-poor and backwards country even further back in time towards the Stone Age? And, to clarify, are you saying that to not invade was unthinkable for US citizens, or for the US government? Or someone else?
      - koheripbal 5y ago
        > revenge for 9/11, none of all that makes any sense Attacking al-quaeda after 9/11 didn't make sense?

bitwize 5y ago

Japan was "shock and awe" done (strategically, not morally) right. The US fire-bombed Tokyo and nuked Hiroshima and Nagasaki, leaving no question in the Japanese mind of who was the overwhelmingly superior force. There was no honor in death fighting such a force; there was only oblivion with nothing left to remember you by. The Japanese happily accepted rule by a "gaijin shogun" rather than face that kind of defeat. And MacArthur turned out to be a rather magnanimous shogun, even arranging for the Emperor to avoid liability for his role in the war and especially Pearl Harbor so that the Japanese had something of their traditional order to cling to during the American occupation and beyond. The political will to commit to that level of destruction and rebuilding hasn't existed since then. Iraq begat ISIS. Iraq was a clusterfuck since 1990.

Clubber 5y ago
We were very fortunate Japan surrendered. They certainly didn't after nearly a year of fire bombing, they didn't after Hiroshima, and they almost didn't after Nagasaki. In fact there was an attempted coup when it was discovered the emperor wanted to surrender. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyūjō_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyūjō_incident

galangalalgol 5y ago

This whole post is about holding leaders accountable. The same should be true for those leaders in Afghanistan who aided the attacks on 9/11. But staying to prop up a government in a nation that had already suffered a proxy war occupation by Russia, and had sent them packing (with our help) was always a doomed effort. The culture there won't permit such a thing. So I think leaving a power vacuum would have been the lesser evil, vs prolonging it, or leaving the guilty unaccountable, as we did in SA.

calsy 5y ago
What connection is there with holding leaders accountable and occupying a country with millions of civilians who have no connection to any of these events and are simply trying to live? If we use this logic, then the US should be stormed and occupied for the sins of its leaders and all innocents should be held culpable for not overthrowing their evil government.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago

And this sort of thinking is exactly how we wound up stuck there for 20yr. Voter block A wants to bomb them back to the stone age and leave. Voter block B won't tolerate wrecking the place without some pretext of "helping the people" or whatever that means. So the compromise is to wreck the nation then spend 20yr pushing food around our plate as though we're actually going to rebuild it until voter block B is satisfied that we gave it the college try.

YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
Is it entirely unthinkable to not invade instead?
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  In late September and early October of 2001 when plans were being drawn up it was.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 5y ago
    Why exactly? I don't understand. I never understood what was the real reason for the war. Multiple theories have been put forward that I am aware of but they all seem (to me) to be "just so" stories trying to find a post-hoc explanation for what seemed to be an invasion completely without reason. Oil interests, heroin trade, geopolitical advantage, democracy and human rights (actually that was one of the explanations at the time I think), revenge for 9/11, none of all that makes any sense, neither not invading unthinkable. Why was not invading unthinkable, at any point? More so, why was it necessary? What did anyone gain from sendnig an already piss-poor and backwards country even further back in time towards the Stone Age? And, to clarify, are you saying that to not invade was unthinkable for US citizens, or for the US government? Or someone else?
    - koheripbal 5y ago
      > revenge for 9/11, none of all that makes any sense Attacking al-quaeda after 9/11 didn't make sense?