On July 8th, President Biden made his stand.
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. …
Q: Do you see any parallels between this withdrawal and what happened in Vietnam, with some people feeling ——
The President: None whatsoever. Zero … The Taliban is not the South — the North Vietnamese Army. They’re not — they’re not remotely comparable in terms of capability. There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of an embassy. …
Q: Mr. President, how serious was the corruption among the Afghanistan government to this mission failing there?
The President: Well, first of all, the mission hasn’t failed, yet. There is in Afghanistan — in all parties, there’s been corruption. The question is, can there be an agreement on unity of purpose? … That — the jury is still out. But the likelihood there’s going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely.
On Sunday, August 15th, Kabul had fallen to the Taliban, billions of dollars in American military equipment had been left behind, Afghan personnel who helped us were largely abandoned, the Embassy burned its secret papers and lowered the flag.
There have been a stunning array of reactions, from whom to blame to how this proves the other tribe is the worst ever, to the overarching failure of the “greatest nation on earth” to manage to pull this off without it devolving into total chaos and failure. Worse still, this not only squanders the lives lost to this misadventure, but leaves open the probability that terrorism will thrive, and possibly expand to consume its neighboring nuclear power, leaving the US impotent to do anything about it.
As I’m no more knowledgeable about Afghanistan or military operations than the average person, and likely less knowledgeable than some of you, my thoughts are no better than anyone else’s. Rather than use this soapbox to express my concerns, I’m going to make this an open thread for you to express yours. I have no answers. You probably don’t either. Sometimes, there isn’t an “answer.” But at least you can speak your mind.
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Biden has the blood of thousands that will be executed on his hands and is fully responsible for the horrors the women and girls of Afghanistan will suffer.
I know people that died in Afghanistan.
I’ll stand in line to piss on his grave.
But in order to temporarily save those women and girls, the US had to align itself with Afghan warlords, who’s favorite pastime was raping little boys. The entire nation-building enterprise was a failure from the start, and the fact that the Afghan government could only last a single month without our help after 20 years proves it.
But what else could you expect? Getting stability and the rule of law (and/or liberal democracy) is _hard_. Which are the oldest governments currently around?
– Canada (from 1867)
– Switzerland (from 1848)
– United States (from 1776)
– Great Britain (from 1707)
Everybody else is younger, due to wars, revolutions, coups and the like. Even GB took 500 years of strife to go from Magna Carta to the Acts of Union. What utter contempt we have for the effort involved when we expect a people to finish the project in a few decades.
Then be honest with the American people and tell them that turning Afghanistan into a liberal democracy will take centuries, ten of thousands more US dead at minimum, and trillions of our own tax dollars. How much support would a presidential or senate candidate get with that platform?
It will never happen. You can’t impose democracy from the outside, that’s not democracy – just another form of oppression. Democracy (and freedom) has to come from within a given people, they have to want it enough to fight for it on their own and bring it about. Do you really think that if the Afghan people really didn’t want the Taliban there it would have a chance of surviving? If a big enough segment of the population really wanted to see the Taliban gone it wouldn’t last six months. Maybe someday they will grow into it but it’s going to take generations, the best we can do is to continue to light the torch showing them it’s possible. Then again we are in the process of trying to throw it away even here in the US.
This was, sadly, inevitable. Afghanistan has been invaded multiple times, each time outlasting its ‘conquerors’ and eventually becoming a free nation again. I don’t think it will conquer Pakistan; the Afghanis will probably go back to a 14th Century lifestyle and sell drugs for money. It’s terrible for the people of Afghanistan, and even more terrible for those who helped us during the invasion only to be abandoned at the end (much like Vietnam). Perhaps the U.S. will finally realize that not every problem can be solved by military might. Perhaps the U.S. will start talking to people, rather than just shooting them.
On those last two sentences…don’t hold your breath.
The starting problem was to kill one guy. The invasion of an entire country to do it was nuts, but at least that mission was achievable. Shifting the mission to some nebulous effort to reconstruct Afghan society into a modern Obamastan was a commitment to a stupid goal that was not and would never be achievable. The withdrawal should have been ordered the day bin Laden was confirmed dead.
“Perhaps the U.S. will finally realize that not every problem can be solved xxxxxxxxxxxxxx”
FTFY
No answers here either and I doubt there will be any political backlash unless we see an uptick of terrorism coming from that region. We’ve have been in Japan and Germany since WWII, S Korea the 50’s,. Why is it that our continued military presence there is considered our national interest while Afghanistan not? Obviously, we see the Russians, N.Koreans and China as Military and Economic threats and we need to buttress the area with air and ground troops. Is terrorism still not a continued and pervasive threat? We’ve never had a very large force in the region, yet we’re able to provide some stability(?) and a small amount to liberation to millions of women. All of that is lost and now a repressive regime lacking any humanity will have free reign. While I never expected democracy in Afghanistan, it feels we have wasted a lot of time, soldiers lives and money within a blink of an eye.
How many people were killed by insurgents in Germany and Japan after they surrendered? How many American troops and Afghan civilians were killed after the Taliban was kicked out of Kabul shortly after 9/11? The comparison of the two is utterly moronic. And as to Taliban’s repression, the reason they have so much support and little resistance from the Afghan population is because the current regime is utterly corrupt, regularly commits war crimes, and relies on warlord who ‘s favorite pastime is raping little boys.
Afghanistan, Syria, etc. are the worst of the wars that we can possibly be involved in. There’s no defined objective, no measure of success, no exit strategy. They are the true epitome of the saying that our gracious host often quotes, which begins “Something must be done.” The result we’re seeing now would have been the same if we’d withdrawn in May as Pres. Trump proposed, or at any earlier time, or if we’d never gone in at all. The only difference is that the sooner the withdrawal, the fewer lives lost or ruined and the fewer resources wasted.
This is the lesson that some presidents get and some do not. There needs to be a defined and achievable military aim before the first boots touch the ground. Adherence to that aim must be maintained throughout, and when it is accomplished, the troops come home.
…I have no answers….”
This must be the follow up to the Tolerance post then, eh?
How K-e-W-double-LL, cool, is that!?
Be careful SJ Back Pages Kidos, it’s a ” It’s a trap….
Besides all that “war machine” shit Eisenhower was spouting off about back in 1961 is not gonna be on the final anyways, even though he did use some pretty big “words”…
So don’t you worry… everything that will be on the final concerning the last 20 years of Afghanistan Land will be covered by the TeeeVeeee Generals making the ’round table’ rounds in the next few weeks.
What? You don’t have the time or the stomach, to tune in? No worries I got you covered. Just send me $500 bucks and I will hook you up to one of my upcoming Zoom Seminars.
The answers are important, so if you want ‘um as well as the play by play breakdown of the TeeeVee General speak I will see you there.
And as a bonus, because the answers are so very important, I will throw in a free 2021 SJ Fall Festival T-Shirt with your choice of three SJ Banner Post Headlines from the last decade or so emblazoned on the back, in the specialized font of your choosing.
Don’t fall into the “answer-less trap”, sign up today!!!
Damn….I was hoping for a discount coupon on the amazing SHaG! BaG!
SHaG Bags! are still under design and development and the costume folks have decided it best to contract out that “work” to a few NGO’s, because they were getting heat from the fluffers who claimed the costume folks core mission was starting to be ignored with all the SHaG Bag! hype.
But no worries…. because I just sold the distribution rights to the best and brightest military porn contractors, who specialize in crowd control, in order to have a smooth initial roll-out. And that front-loaded cash out to keep the NGO’s humming along nicely and prove to keep the guys with the Senate Decency Committee’s numbers in their rolodexes happy.
But rest assured the leather for the bags is still in the fields happily grazing in the pastures of Argentina, Montana, North Dakota, and Brazil.
So as long as the Commies and or Terrorists from other continents don’t decide to invade the Americas the leather will be there on time as promised as long as I can keep bribing the folks involved with the whole fed-lot bypass deal and nation build me some steady and consistent rain for the pastures currently in use.
Don’t worry everyone is getting “paid” so it should work out pretty smooth as long as the eestemed one doesn’t tip off the volunteers out of principle or starts-to-a- pondering aloud about the hypocrisy of me grazing the cows without a UN Security Council agreement.
Anyway, the ShaG Bags! should be ready for the evacuation of SJ Fall Festival 2031, which ought to be just about right and just about perfectly timed with how long it will take multiple states to coordinate their intra-state crown control cooperation agreements.
In the meantime all I got-s-me is a few boxes of pre-show promo T-Shirts for the inaugural 2021 SJ Fall Festival. And seeing as our eesttemed host does not seem quite ready to commit to such an international enlightenment endeavor, regardless of me sending him photos and a video of it raining on the Festival Grounds, it looks like we will just have to go it alone and change some hearts and minds over time…
What could go wrong!? Not a damn thing because I was smart enough to ditch the pasture land, lay down the drain tile and dig me a pond for bathing….
The first night will be without an agenda other than the 50 campfires of chit-chat, and it is looking to be a pretty epic day two as I think I have the folks with them there black powder cannons to wake everyone up….
“Oh God! Pride of Man! Broken in the Dust again! . . .” – Hamilton Camp
Combat footage is hard to come by . . . there wasn’t any.
Biden could have chosen a better time of year to pull US troops. Most of combat in the region is seasonal. The pullout should have been organized and planned significantly better. For example leaving working weapons behind. These where clear failings of the Biden pullout.
Unfortunately the loss of Afghanistan to the Taliban happened under Bush, Obama, Trump, and Biden. For some reason the US military allowed the Northern Alliance (US allies) to practice Bacha Bazi. The Taliban came to power the first time by preventing this behavior.
Afghanistan was an incredibly huge boondoggle; a deluge of taxpayer dollars falling on corrupt warlords and greedy corporations for 20 years, with a terrible cost in human suffering and loss of life, military and civilian. It never should have happened, and it had to end, but the “pullout” could have been handled better. We can’t really blame Biden; he is mostly concerned with the contents of his Depends nowadays, but whoever is running him should be impeached along with their senile figurehead, and nobody should ever again believe anything that the “intelligence” community says.
Baghdad Bob, meet Kabul Joe.
..and that all goes for Vietnam, Iraq, Syria, and bits of Africa like Somalia and other places where the US Army has been handed its ass on a plate. Politics and the military don’t mix, the West never actually ‘wins’, and the politicians just line the military up on the next one.
So, who’s for throwing a few hundred billion dollars at ruining the next third-world country that has oil or drugs or something useful?? All we need is some alphabet soup intelligence department to back up the politicians and lobbyists away we go again… Put down yer books and grab a gun…
I mean, we had to do what we did in 2001. To Afghanistan that is. Should never have touched Iraq. But we’re attacked in an act of war by an organization that trained in and was acting as a proxy for the Afghan government.
And that operation went swell. We smashed the then government very quickly. The problem is the decision to stick around after and…..whatever the heck you call what we’ve been doing since then. There was never gonna be a way out once we got ingrained into the place.
Yes, the crimes of the Taliban could not be ignored. What were they?
1. They agreed to arrest Osama bin Laden, but they insisted on seeing the evidence of his involvement in 9/11 first.
CBS News: 9/11/2001:
“At a news conference in Islamabad, the Taliban ambassador said he was sorry that people had died in the suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon last week, but appealed to the United States not to endanger innocent people in a military retaliation.”
“Our position on this is that if America has proof, we are ready for the trial of Osama bin Laden in light of the evidence.”
The Guardian, October 2001:
“Afghanistan’s deputy prime minister, Haji Abdul Kabir, told reporters that the Taliban would require evidence that Bin Laden was behind the September 11 terrorist attacks in the US.
“If the Taliban is given evidence that Osama bin Laden is involved” and the bombing campaign stopped, “we would be ready to hand him over to a third country”, Mr Kabir added.”
2. They burned the poppy fields and ruined the heroin trade. The Taliban are now free to oppress women, kill infidels and harbor terrorists, but they have learned their lesson and will not interfere with the heroin trade.
NY Times, May 2000:
The first American narcotics experts to go to Afghanistan under Taliban rule have concluded that the movement’s ban on opium-poppy cultivation appears to have wiped out the world’s largest crop in less than a year, officials said today.
The American findings confirm earlier reports from the United Nations drug control program that Afghanistan, which supplied about three-quarters of the world’s opium and most of the heroin reaching Europe, had ended poppy planting in one season.”
You’re completely ignoring everything that occurred prior to 9/11, particularly the fact that AQ was allowed to openly train in the country in preparation for that and other attacks.
The Taliban in charge of the country at that time essentially participated in the attack. That’s not something you just shrug off. Eliminate and make an example of the bastards then go home and let Afghanistan run itself.
Right. This was a simple problem with a simple solution. Everything that the media said was true. Everything that the politicians said was true. No need to think for ourselves; the answer has been provided by trusted sources.
As nations understand such things, we arguably had to kill one guy, for the same reasons Rome couldn’t leave Hannibal. It was always best planned as a small unit action (which is also what eventually worked). We did not have to attack an entire country, and should not have.
George W. Bush was right that the US military can’t be used for nation building. Maybe we’ll learn that lesson for longer this time.
The older Bush understood it better. He didn’t get reelected, but he made the right call in terms of keeping to the limited scope planned for a military campaign.
This is one where I, also, do not have enough background to form a strong opinion about the overall value of staying vs. leaving. Certainly, the manner of leaving was a shameful fiasco; I think few would disagree with that.
But, the Taliban exists in the country, and has for decades. What fraction of the population has to support an in-country armed insurgent group in order for it be so militarily strong relative to the government? It seems like it has to be a pretty large fraction. What fraction of the Afghan population was willing to fight to prevent the Taliban from taking over? From the news we are seeing, it looks like a tiny fraction or less. So, really, what would be our long-term goal if we stayed? Support a small minority who prefer a liberal democracy, and hope the idea catches on, and that they will eventually grow into a majority willing to defend it? How long would that take (given how little it grew over the last 20 years)? Prevent terrorist groups from setting up camp there? OK, that’s plausible. Would that be worth it? I think that is crystal ball territory. Maybe they’ll break up into religious fundamentalist sects, drop back to a centuries-old lifestyle, and spend all of their extra energy killing each other while we ignore them. Maybe they’ll band together and launch terror attacks worldwide, and we’ll wind up doing the whole thing over again.
I can think of one policy that helps in the long run regardless of the political situation in the region – drive the price of oil as close to zero as possible, and keep it there. But that has little to do with Afghanistan, and few voters in the US would support the obvious way to do that.
This is an Audio/Video comment, and since I’m not a vid editor, try this…listen to this…
…and watch this muted, and looped.
I don’t think I can fully grasp the human cost, I’m struggling to process this from the comfort and safety of my suburban home.
But an important lesson that almost certainly won’t be learned by those that need to is that a highly mechanized army without it’s supply chain is a gun without bullets. Since Viet Nam and the switch from the M14 to the M16, the focus has been on new weapons and weapon systems with lots of ongoing maintenance revenue streams for military contractors, and the improved performance to justify them are usually based on highly controlled tests rather than field conditions.
Love and respect for the sacrifices made by the many Americans and allies who accomplished the mission objectives we sent them to Afghanistan to achieve in the aftermath of 9/11.
And those objectives were achieved by the end of 2001.
Oh, and I didn’t mention this before, but what we have done to the interpreters and others that helped us is appalling. Just unforgivable. Bush, Obama, Trump (a treaty with the Taliban? Really?) and Biden all have their fingerprints on this, but the treatment of people that helped us is all on Biden. A president with a conscience would have moved heaven and earth to get those people to safety before we left. “Sorry, we must follow our procedures that take 5 years” just don’t cut it.
Some on the left like to say they’re ashamed of America. If you want to be ashamed, THIS is a legit reason.
The US withdrawal from Afghanistan was a moronic mistake . Period. The people who pushed for this reckless and disastrous abandonment are now totally discredited. There are zero excuses and justifications for this. Zero! This only made things worse for the world and America.
for all the errors in how the USA left Afghanistan, and in particular the betrayal of the afghan translators who weren’t provided visas, Biden deserves enormous credit for ending this idiotic 20 year charade. his decisiveness is particularly impressive, given his advanced senility.
Getting us out was the right call. The ultimate outcome reemphasizes how nothing of permanence was being achieved. The withdrawal was signed by the previous administration. The mistake of shifting the original mission to misguided “nation-building” was the fault of the administration before that. The mistake of attacking a whole country to suppress one man was the fault of the administration before that. Some roads only lead to bad places, and the key is not to start down them.
All of that said, a second parallel to Vietnam is the obvious misinformation of the president by his military advisors and intelligence services. He ends up looking like a totally clueless yutz because he had no grasp of the real situation he was trying to deal with.
We didn’t attacka whole country to get one man.
We attacked in order to get Al Queda, a terrorist organization which has been
given safe harbor by the Afghani government. We attacked because Afghanistan’s
officials were dragging their feet and giving Osama time to escape. It was never
about just getting Osama, that’s revisionist history. It was about getting Al Queda
and sending a message that if you harbor terrorists, you’re fair game.
Well, the attack followed the Taliban’s declining to turn over Bin Laden, and W said that was what it was about. So, if there was another story later, I think the later one would be the “revisionist history.”
For all the talk of “21st Century Warfare”, winning wars still ultimately comes down to putting bodies on the ground to attack/defend against the enemy, physically occupying territory with those bodies, and troops having high morale, discipline, and willingness to die. If you don’t have that or won’t do it, no amount of billion dollar drones laying precision strikes on strategic targets and million dollar hellfire missile attacks will make up for it.
Which, like the best and brightest of 50-60 years ago that led us into Vietnam, makes me wonder what all those highly ranked and/or credentialed generals, defense analysts, and security consultants are getting boatloads of money for.
“…makes me wonder what all those highly ranked and/or credentialed generals, defense analysts, and security consultants are getting boatloads of money for.”
To get the money of course…
The topic is too big for any one person to answer completely, I’d imagine. You’re very brave for throwing a geopolitical subject for your commenters to gnaw on on your blawg.
As I’m a true believer in the idea that there is nothing new under the Sun, I look for historical precedent first. Contrary to the President’s denial, the fall of Kabul and the fall of Saigon are comparable. At a minimum every single news article I read mentioned Saigon at least indirectly, so at least some people are talking about the two events. It’s not that hard, Mr. Prez, the U.S. withdraws from a warzone and the faction they had been backing disintegrates almost immediately leaving everyone to wonder just what in the hell we were doing spending all those lives and all that material in the first place. Hell, even the USSR had its own “Vietnam” in Afghanistan. The comparison is unavoidable.
Next, look at what ISIS was able to manage in Iraq, the sister misadventure to Afghanistan. Insurgents in the Middle East apparently have the financial backing and know-how to organize, take, and hold large swaths of territory for extended periods of time. U.S. trained, foreign military units with U.S. equipment are more liabilities than they are a legitimate threat. For whatever reason that I don’t know exactly, the units lack cohesiveness or loyalty to the U.S. backed regimes they nominally serve. So when push comes to shove, they fall apart and hand over assets to the enemy. That’s how we got those wonderful pictures of ISIS cruising around the desert in U.S. provided Humvees.
Ordinarily, I’d use all this as an excuse to talk about Alexander the Great and ancient history and then draw a line from then to now, but there’s no time for all that and I don’t know enough about the specific tribes of people who settled Afghanistan to make any real comment anyway. The region is no stranger to warfare and conflict, suffice it to say.
With all that said, I can’t see what the Prez is doing as anything other than political. What politician in his right mind would want to evoke comparisons to the failure that was the Vietnam War? Who among that class would admit that we were leaving Afghanistan high and dry? No politician would admit that Afghanistan was as entirely doomed as it was. The Prez, like any politician, has to spin the situation in his favor and hope the consequences don’t come back in full force to bite him in the ass. There’s no scenario where Biden admits he made a mistake.
The quest was not a success even though we slayed the dragon. The conditions that created bin Laden persist. The Taliban are in control of a country again. I fear their success might cause other dominoes to fall in the region just like how the “Arab Spring” caught fire and spread. I bet I’ll still be around the next time we send troops in. We just can’t quit it with all the imperialism. We’re doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past because we refuse to learn anything from history at all. It’s SNAFU.
Oh and Pops, we’re anything but impotent. We’re so damn potent we have to water ourselves down by handing our excess weapons to our enemies. It’s probably part of the problem, as I’ve heard a ton about this “military-industrial complex” ever since Eisenhower named that demon. For all that we invest in “defense” we should be able to dictate terms, but alas, we’re still able to fuck it all up in the end. So why are we continuing to build all these tanks and carriers and missiles and drones? Please don’t tell me there’s a damned profit motive buried in all this shit. Please?
Buried? There’s an old saying, and it starts with “Sit down…”
Since the thread is open, I’ll indulge. So what do we do about it PGP? I feel impotent in the face of a problem that has trillions upon trillions of dollars entrenching it. As if one person can even begin to comprehend the U.S. military-industrial complex and all its tentacles. There’s too much money to be had. The comforts I had growing up are owed to it. It’s one of those things that’s best not to think about for too long, but are we really doomed to continue to kill people for profit over and over? I hope not. I’m really just a disappointed optimist. At least we’re finally out of Afghanistan.
I can’t say what we should do, but I can say what I have done, am doing and plan to do:
The first step is to recognize that I can have no impact on the actions of the “system.” It is a law unto itself and our “representatives” do not represent us. It is an evil system run by evil people for evil purposes, and trying to repair or even influence it is a waste of time. The logical solution is to withdraw .
To the best of my ability, I eliminate or reduce my participation in and support of the “system.” I don’t buy the poison that is sold in grocery stores; I buy from farmers, and I am learning to grow food. I stay away from doctors and hospitals; I take responsibility for managing my own health so that I don’t get sick. I won’t send my children to schools to be indoctrinated by people who hate me; I will home-school them or participate in “pods.” I still work because I need the money for now, but I am learning about how private associations work, and when I’ve learned enough I will start one that will support me and my family without contributing anything to the “system.”
I tell other people what I’m doing and why, and encourage them to do the same.
Video of Afghan stowaways falling to their death from a US Air Force C-17 plane after departing Kabul airport is horrifying. Simply ghastly! It is hard to believe this is happening at our very own hands. Heads should roll in Pentagon and White House, but nothing will come of it because of…..reasons. If there were ever a reason to remove a US President via 25th Amendment because he is physically or psychologically unable to lead, that would be now. Enough of the pretending that Biden is mentally competent. Not even our US allies tolerate that malarky anymore.
Honestly, how stupid do you have to be to think that you can hang on to the outside of a jet plane?
Change stupid to desperate or terrified of your certain death if you remain.
Then the answer to your question is “very”.
Blinky has his issues, but in this instance, his failure was in not seeing that people he should have been able to trust were not telling him the truth. Yes, it does make him look like an idiot, and as a long-ago predecessor recognized, the buck stops in the Oval Office.
We never should have invaded the country. Peroid. Anything related to seeking revenge against AQ could have been accomplished without sending troops to occupy the country -the very country we called Russia’s Vietnam not so long before. Then to compound the mistake, our great nation effectively abandoned the men and women who enlisted voluntarily out of a sense of patriotism. The real outrage is how our veterans are given a token “thank you for your service” while mostly left to their own devices when it comes to them coping with their very real physical and emotional scars. That’s the true national disgrace. This latest chapter to Bush’s folly was inevitable. No one should be surprised. That’s my view, although I respect everyone else’s thoughts. Thanks for the open mike.
I was in a local pub the day the invasion hit the news. W had given the Afghanis an “ultimatum,” demanding that they turn over bin Laden, but it was silly. When I looked up and saw the video footage reflecting that our forces had actually been sent in, I downed the rest of my ale and left, shaking my head. On that day, it was looking like W might go down in history as the stupidest president ever, but time wears on, and things can always get worse.
From the get go it should have been a punitive expedition with the emphasis on “punitive.”
You cannot make a nation out of people who do not want to be one.
It happened in America once. See the Wikipedia article on the Expulsion of the Loyalists.
On my Canadian grandfather’s side, I am descended from UEL – United Empire Loyalists
I guess if folks just don’t see something as worth defending, they won’t defend it.
One weeps for all the defense firms, their contractors and their families.
Oh well, on to the next grift Wonder what it’ll be – Taiwan? Egypt? Iraq round 3 (the re-re-re-iraq’ing)? Iran? Whichever one it will be, it won’t be long – can’t make the big bucks if the bullets aren’t flying.
Mistakes, then and now. Even today and here:
Afghanistan was never about Afghanistan. It was never about saving women and children from torment at the hands of the backward-thinking.
The country was to be saved from itself, or so they said. Saved from it’s 9th century way of thinking about society. The plan was to show these 9th century people how much better the world had become. If we just showed them stuff, like the Internet, they would be saved from themselves. We might as well have shown forks to the Mings. They would never get it.
It wasn’t about defense contractors. That’s simplistic non-thinking. It wasn’t really about getting the population to fend for themselves. That couldn’t happen unless they bought into what we believe is better for them and the world. That won’t happen. They’re not buying. The 9th century is what they know. It’s reality.
It was about averting something. It was about making something not happen. That something is 21st century weaponry, right next door. That weaponry in the hands of 9th century thinkers is a bad thing.
In this here Hotel, we’re mostly lawyers. We’re trained to look-back and find the trail of criminality or liability. Some spend time looking forward to avoiding one, the other, both.
Look forward–has Afghanistan been failed, or is it humanity?
Clearly Kabul only fell because we let the Patriot Act expire.