Just a idea concerning the Taliban

[creed 1,629]

The entire take over by the Taliban is bizarre and the aspects of if scream (to me) there's more to it than meets the eye. So a question, has our government (CIA) gone into partnership with the Taliban? Was anyone suspicious when Biden just went along with the Trump agreement with the Taliban? When I see functioning U.S. equipment, even a blackhawk helicopter flying around, which I doubt one could climb into a just start it up and drive it like a tractor, something just tells me we (citizens) don't know the entire story. 

Thoughts?

 

[TitanTiger 20,471]

I think the problem is, there were no good options.  There weren't really any ok options.  There were just choices between "more s***ty" and "less s***ty."  And working with the Taliban was just part of that.

I think Biden should have pushed back on the timeline more and sent in more troops temporarily to facilitate a more orderly withdrawal of all Americans and Afghans who helped us.  But there wasn't a scenario where it wasn't going to be messy, where there wouldn't be attacks, where we didn't lose some equipment.  It ended up on the "more s***ty" end of things as a result of a framework Trump put in place and that Biden did little to try and make better, but it was always going to be a shitshow to some degree.

[wdefromtx 3,159]

Any withdrawal was going to be a mess. This mess started decades ago. People can blame Trump for the exit strategy, but the end mess falls on Biden for not re-evaluating the exit. Instead he moved it forward essentially agreeing with the plan. But honestly, no exit strategy would have work I don’t think. Having a strong military presence there long term is the only way to really make it work like in Germany and Japan. But unfortunately there was a huge miscalculation that our cultures would mesh. Instead we were viewed as the enemy by many. Which I can see why. The only winners in this whole ordeal was government contractors snd suppliers. 

[I_M4_AU 7,773]

Biden signed EO after EO getting rid of Trump’s policies when he first took office, there wasn’t a Trump policy that Biden liked.  Biden states that he had no choice but to go along with the withdrawal of troops because of an agreement with the Taliban that Trump made.  Does a true leader go along with an agreement that does not align with his agenda?  No he doesn’t, so he modifies that agreement ot suit his agenda.

Why did Trump pick May 1st?  Interestingly enough Ramadan in 2021 was from April 12th to May 12th which means the troop withdrawal would have stated and ended within that time frame when the Muslim faithful are practicing their faith.  Why go away from that strategy?  Biden, I believe, wanted to make the withdrawal his own, an ego driven emotional decision that was not fully thought out.  As soon as he did this, his options were limited to (as mentioned above) *more s***y and less s***y* but that was his own making.

Biden seemed to want a withdrawal by Sept 11th on the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers.  This doesn’t seem to be a good strategy to base a withdrawal.  Biden limited his own options as time went on.

The first option Biden eliminated was abandoning Bagram Airbase in the middle of the night on July 5th:

US left Afghan airfield at night, didn’t tell new commander

https://apnews.com/article/bagram-afghanistan-airfield-us-troops-f3614828364f567593251aaaa167e623

This act really limited his options as to how to proceed with the withdrawal.  It limited the effectiveness of the Afghan troops by not having air support when engaging the Taliban and limited the withdrawal to the Kabul airport only.

WASHINGTON – President Joe Biden announced Thursday the rapid withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan would conclude by Aug. 31, bringing America's longest war to a swift end weeks before the Sept. 11 deadline he set this year

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/07/08/biden-says-u-s-withdrawal-afghanistan-conclude-august-31/7900297002/

This article was written on July 8th, three days after the abandonment of Bagram Airbase.  As soon as the Taliban realized the air support was gone, they started their push to take over Afghanistan and Joe sat on his hands.  The world saw the push in real time.  It was in the news every day while Biden proclaimed the Afghan forces were up to the task.  Now the options were only *more s***y and God awful* again by his own making.

If Joe was not the weak leader he is, he could have told the Taliban we will depart on our own schedule and delayed the withdrawal until the winter when, typically, the Taliban doesn’t fight, but Joe wanted the photo op on 9-11.  Instead he let the Taliban use his own words against him as they demand the US stick to the arbitrary date of August 31st to leave and painted Joe into only one option and that was to trust the Taliban and leave on that date.

He was out smarted by 8th century goat herders only because he allowed the goat herders the leverage while diminishing our own.  A leader puts other people’s interest before his/her own.

Biden owns this one and I hope Americans can see through his propaganda machine.

[DKW 86 7,411]

6 hours ago, TitanTiger said:

I think the problem is, there were no good options.  There weren't really any ok options.  There were just choices between "more s***ty" and "less s***ty."  And working with the Taliban was just part of that.

I think Biden should have pushed back on the timeline more and sent in more troops temporarily to facilitate a more orderly withdrawal of all Americans and Afghans who helped us.  But there wasn't a scenario where it wasn't going to be messy, where there wouldn't be attacks, where we lost some equipment.  It ended up on the "more s***ty" end of things as a result of a framework Trump put in place and that Biden did little to try and make better, but it was always going to be a shitshow to some degree.

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