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The venerable WSJ nails it.

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/how-freedom-has-faded-...

How Freedom Has Faded on Biden’s Watch

His successor as President will inherit a far more dangerous world.

President Biden will address the United Nations on Tuesday, in what is likely to be his last big moment on the world stage. A President’s foreign-policy legacy typically outlasts his term, so it’s worth taking a step back and considering the world Mr. Biden will leave his successor.

It is a far more dangerous world than Mr. Biden inherited, and far less congenial for U.S. interests, human freedom and democracy. The latter is tragically ironic since the President has made the global contest between democracy and authoritarians an abiding theme. Authoritarians have advanced on his watch in every part of the world—Europe, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East, Africa, and even the Americas.

• Mr. Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan was his single most damaging decision, and it has led to cascading trouble. The Taliban control the country and are reimposing feudal Islamist rule. His withdrawal has done more harm to more women than anything in decades, while jihadists have revived their terror sanctuary.

• More damaging is the message his withdrawal sent to adversaries about American will and retreat. The credibility of U.S. deterrence collapsed. Mr. Biden tried to appease Vladimir Putin by blessing the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and refusing to arm Ukraine. Mr. Putin concluded he could invade Ukraine at limited cost, especially after Mr. Biden blurted out that a “minor incursion” might not elicit the same Western opposition.

After Kyiv bravely resisted, Mr. Biden sent weapons, but too little and too delayed at every stage of the war. Even now, after 31 months and 100,000 or more dead, Mr. Biden dithers over letting Ukraine use long-range ATACMS against targets inside Russia.

• His record in the Middle East is worse. Rather than build on the Abraham Accords he inherited, he tried to ostracize Saudi Arabia and he banned offensive weapons to fight the Houthis. From the start he courted the mullahs in Iran to renew the 2015 nuclear accord that had enriched Iran before Donald Trump withdrew. He refused to enforce oil sanctions, even as Iran spread mayhem through its proxy militias.

The U.S. was caught flat-footed when Hamas, aided by Iran, invaded Israel and massacred 1,200 innocents. His national-security adviser, Jake Sullivan, had to edit an online version of a Foreign Affairs essay already published boasting that “the region is quieter than it has been for decades.”

Here’s how quiet: Our foremost regional ally is now at war on multiple fronts. Israel’s defensive campaign in Gaza isn’t finished and a new and perhaps bloodier fight is unfolding with Hezbollah. The Houthis have all but shut down Western commercial shipping around the Red Sea, while Mr. Biden makes U.S. naval commanders play whack-a-missile.

... more examples at the link

• Mr. Biden’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan was his single most damaging decision, and it has led to cascading trouble. The Taliban control the country and are reimposing feudal Islamist rule. His withdrawal has done more harm to more women than anything in decades, while jihadists have revived their terror sanctuary.

Do you believe that Trump would not have withdrawn from Afghanistan, had he won re-election? It's kind of hard to square that with his stated views on foreign policy....

bighairymike: The venerable WSJ nails it. ... The Taliban control the country and are reimposing feudal Islamist rule.

Well, perhaps we should blame the guy who negotiated directly with the Taliban in nine rounds of talks over 18 months -- at one point, he secretly invited the Taliban to the presidential retreat at Camp David on the eve of the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks -- ignoring the Afghan government, to strike the Doha Agreement: DonOLD Trump.

Trump agreed to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners.

This deal required taking the Taliban’s promises on faith since the peace agreement came with no enforcement mechanism for the Taliban to keep its word.

Overall, it was a pretty good deal for the Taliban, critics said. “Trump all but assured the future course of events would reflect the Taliban’s interests far more than the United States,” Miller writes. H.R. McMaster, Trump’s second national security adviser, has recently called it “a surrender agreement with the Taliban.” Another member of Trump’s National Security Council said it was “a very weak agreement.”

Facts are pesky things.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/08/20...

His record in the Middle East is worse. Rather than build on the Abraham Accords he inherited, he tried to ostracize Saudi Arabia and he banned offensive weapons to fight the Houthis.

Huh? With the strong involvement of the United States, Israel and Saudi Arabia were on the precipice of signing an agreement normalizing relations between the two countries before the 10/7 terrorist attack. The only ones ostracized were Hamas.

From the start he courted the mullahs in Iran to renew the 2015 nuclear accord that had enriched Iran before Donald Trump withdrew. He refused to enforce oil sanctions, even as Iran spread mayhem through its proxy militias.

How did the withdrawal from the nuclear treaty work out? Iran is funding even more terrorist groups throughout the Middle East AND they’ve continued to develop nuclear weapons.

The U.S. was caught flat-footed when Hamas, aided by Iran, invaded Israel and massacred 1,200 innocents.

Actually, the United States warned Israel about a possible terrorist attack prior to 10/7. Netanyahu ignored it. It was Netanyahu, the person responsible for Israel’s security, that was caught flat-footed.

The author of this article should see a physician immediately regarding their apparent loss of memory.

Do you believe that Trump would not have withdrawn from Afghanistan, had he won re-election? It's kind of hard to square that with his stated views on foreign policy....

That's not the right question.
Would Trump have

-Left billions$$$$ in valuable equipment behind?
-Abandoned Bagram Air Base, and ordered a chaotic evac from Kabul?
-Had Afghanis hanging on to the wheels of C-17s as they took off?

No, he wouldn't have.

But Joe Biden did.

Before 2021, the world wasn't on fire.

Now, it is.

Everything else is just wishcasting by our friends on the left.

No, he wouldn't have.

But Joe Biden did.

But that wasn't the criticism levied in the OP.

The OP was criticizing the fact that the Taliban regained control of the country. That they were re-imposing a feudal society, providing a terror sanctuary, doing more harm to more women, etc. That stuff isn't related to how we left, but the mere fact that we left.

It seems....implausible to suggest that Trump would have chosen to remain in Afghanistan and/or provide the resources to the Afghan government necessary for them to resist the Taliban. While the withdrawal might have been handled differently, it still would have happened. So blaming Biden for the fact that the Taliban is in charge is pretty bogus.

Actually, the United States warned Israel about a possible terrorist attack prior to 10/7. Netanyahu ignored it. It was Netanyahu, the person responsible for Israel’s security, that was caught flat-footed.

Yes, I don't think Netanyahu served Israel well by ignoring it and he should lose his position because of it. I think he's got a bunch of charges to contend with too.

The OP was criticizing the fact that the Taliban regained control of the country. That they were re-imposing a feudal society, providing a terror sanctuary, doing more harm to more women, etc. That stuff isn't related to how we left, but the mere fact that we left.

*How* we left feeds directly into that - the collapse of the Afghani government was well under way and the Taliban were in fact driving on Kabul during the evacuation. It was very...South Vietnam-like.

Nobody told Joe Biden to pull everyone out on the anniversary of 9/11. He did that for political optics, and left a whale of a mess behind.

It seems....implausible to suggest that Trump would have chosen to remain in Afghanistan and/or provide the resources to the Afghan government necessary for them to resist the Taliban. While the withdrawal might have been handled differently, it still would have happened. So blaming Biden for the fact that the Taliban is in charge is pretty bogus.

Do we still have troops in Iraq?
What about Syria?

Answers are yes and yes. Why do you think they're there? The world isn't black and white; there was a universe where 1,500-ish troops would have stayed there to train and buttress the ANG. But Biden pulled the plug all the way out because he wanted to be the guy who Brought All the Troops Home. But like all of his other foreign policy decisions, this one was wrong. Disastrously so.

Do you believe that Trump would not have withdrawn from Afghanistan, had he won re-election? It's kind of hard to square that with his stated views on foreign policy....

That's not the right question.

Avoiding the question because the answer is - Yes, Trump would have withdrawn.

Would Trump have

-Left billions$$$$ in valuable equipment behind?

Yes, we always leave equipment behind. SNIP According to a report in the San Diego Union-Tribune in 2012, the US left behind $5 billion worth of military equipment in 1973 when US forces were withdrawn. SNIP

-Abandoned Bagram Air Base, and ordered a chaotic evac from Kabul?

Yes, it's always chaotic and it's much easier to guard and defend one airport than two. Basic strategy.

Avoiding the question because the ans

Nobody avoided the question.

LOLOLOL:
Yes, we always leave equipment behind. Not like this.

the US left behind $5 billion worth of military equipment in 1973 when US forces were withdrawn.

You're using South Vietnam as your example of a normal withdrawal? Double LOL.


Yes, it's always chaotic and it's much easier to guard and defend one airport than two.

So you'd pick the one with the indefensible perimeter over the one that did have a defensible perimeter.

Reeeallll libbbbssss of geniuuuuuuuussssss. Love it.

*How* we left feeds directly into that - the collapse of the Afghani government was well under way and the Taliban were in fact driving on Kabul during the evacuation. It was very...South Vietnam-like.

In the specifics? Sure. But there's no plausible scenario where under a Trump Administration, the prior Afghani government would have resisted falling to the Taliban upon our withdrawal. Their armed forces and domestic security forces were utterly incapable of preventing that takeover. The same outcome would have occurred under Trump - it was baked into our decision to withdraw from the country, and Trump had already made that call.

Do we still have troops in Iraq?
What about Syria?

And in Cuba. But we have absolutely no control over the government in those countries. Merely retaining a military base or troop presence isn't enough to let us prevent domestic forces that we dislike from seizing control of the government.

Once Trump decided we were going to withdraw from Afghanistan, the country was going to fall to the Taliban. The assumption that Trump (and later Biden) made was that the Afghani security forces were capable of resisting the Taliban. That proved to be completely false. Since Trump would not have had any reason to revisit that assumption - nor any willingness to spend years and untold resources trying to change the readiness of the Afghan forces even if he knew it was wrong - there was no way that things would have turned out any differently.

What a steaming pile of lies and half truths. And this opinion piece is by the WSJ editorial board, not some individual.

The WSJ is a shadow of its former self, having become just another outlet for far right propaganda. It’s barely fit to line a bird cage.

—Peter

So blaming Biden for the fact that the Taliban is in charge is pretty bogus.

It not “pretty bogus.”

It’s a bald-faced, outright, GD lie, spewed forth by the rotting remains of what was once a great newspaper.

—Peter

But there's no plausible scenario where under a Trump Administration, the prior Afghani government would have resisted falling to the Taliban upon our withdrawal.

That's not a certainty. A series of A-10 strikes on a Taliban convoy of Toyota Hiluxes would have slowed them down.

The same outcome would have occurred under Trump - it was baked into our decision to withdraw from the country, and Trump had already made that call.

Facts not in evidence. It's not a binary thing "We said we would withdraw, therefore all troops would have been withdrawn".

Only Joe Biden took the "withdraw" as a pell-mell rush to the exits. That's 100% on him, not Trump. Nobody told Joe Biden to mess this up to the degree he did.

That's not a certainty. A series of A-10 strikes on a Taliban convoy of Toyota Hiluxes would have slowed them down.

But that wasn't going to happen. That's what the U.S. withdrawal meant - we were no longer going to be providing military support in defense of the Afghan government. We might have kept troops there for our own purposes, like we do in Guantanamo. But our military resources in country were no longer going to be in service of the Afghani defenses. We were no longer fighting the Taliban, no matter how many troops we kept stationed there. Which meant that the government was going to fall, and we weren't going to slow them down.

Facts not in evidence. It's not a binary thing "We said we would withdraw, therefore all troops would have been withdrawn".

Only Joe Biden took the "withdraw" as a pell-mell rush to the exits. That's 100% on him, not Trump. Nobody told Joe Biden to mess this up to the degree he did.

Withdrawal was the Trump decision - we would be withdrawing sufficient troops so that we would no longer be engaged in the mission of defending the Afghan government. We were never going to maintain troops in sufficient numbers to, or for the purpose of, defending the government from the Taliban. The withdrawal decision meant that as of that date, the Afghani government was on its own. We might have left troops in-country, but they would not be engaged in that mission.

That would not have changed had Trump been re-elected. That decision had already been made, and it was based on the mistaken readiness assessment of the Afghan forces. Both the Trump and Biden Administrations believed that the Afghan forces were both willing and capable of defending the government against Taliban forces, at least in the short- and intermediate-term. That was wrong. The Afghan forces were illusory - and unwilling to really resist the Taliban.

So there's no rational basis for concluding that the Ghani government would have avoided falling to the Taliban under a second Trump Administration. The reason they fell was because their national defense forces were incapable of resisting the Taliban - so once the U.S. military stopped defending them against the Taliban, they were certain to fall. If we're super charitable to Trump, at best we might have had a more orderly withdrawal - but again, the reason the withdrawal was so chaotic was (in part) because our readiness assessment of the Afgani forces was so completely wrong, and that was something that was also the case when Trump was in office. But there's no plausible argument that Kabul could have resisted the Taliban once we stopped defending them.

Agreed. I didn't see it at the time (i.e. that Afghani security forces would -in essence- flee the moment we left), but given that state of affairs, they were going to crumble no matter who was POTUS.

I would speculate that the convict would not have cared. He is, at his core, an isolationist. He wanted us out, and a lot of Americans agreed. What happened in Afghanistan after that, he wouldn't have (and doesn't) care. And, frankly, a lot of Americans don't care. I think at least some of the convict's popularity stems from a resurgent isolationism in this country. Which is why Putin and Xi would love another convict presidency.

Nobody avoided the question.

So we call you "Nobody" from here on out? :) Reminds me of a spaghetti western.


You're using South Vietnam as your example of a normal withdrawal? Double LOL.

It's the only one with relatively similar conditions. But that doesn't matter to you I see.

So you'd pick the one with the indefensible perimeter over the one that did have a defensible perimeter.

Reeeallll libbbbssss of geniuuuuuuuussssss. Love it

Apparently you are unaware why that choice was made by the military.

SNIP Following the U.S. departure from Afghanistan in August, some questioned the hand-over of Bagram Air Base — about 27 miles north of the capital city, Kabul — saying the move was ill-advised and had been a tactical mistake.

Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III said maintaining a presence there would have been costly, and would not have helped the U.S. mission during the waning days of the 20-year war the U.S. waged in Afghanistan.

"Retaining Bagram would have required putting as many as 5,000 U.S. troops in harm's way just to operate and defend it," [ME: vs 2,500 troops per memory] Austin told the House Armed Services Committee during a hearing today on Capitol Hill. "It would have contributed little to the mission that we had been assigned, and that was to protect and defend the embassy which was some 30 miles away."

Additionally, when the noncombatant evacuation operation, or NEO, began, Bagram's distance from Kabul would have offered little help. SNIP

Anyone arguing that ANYTHING could have been done to keep the Taliban out of power in Afghanistan or exit Afghanistan with pride is delusional. Such a person is claiming it is possible to un-lose a war.

AMERICA LOST ITS WAR IN AFGHANISTAN.

Period.

Full stop.

America didn't choose to get attacked by terrorists operating out of Afghanistan. But America DID choose to respond to a terrorist attack by launching a ground war in a land-locked desert country already controlled by an anti-democratic, anti-western, terrorist-like sect (the Taliban) that had established control over the country over a twenty year period dating back to 1979 when ANOTHER industrialized military power attempted to impose rule on the same country and the same cultural forces.

America had zero interest in correcting the injustices of Taliban rule in October 2021. We just wanted to track down bin Laden, kill him and destroy anything that looked like a terrorist training ground or had monkey bars visible in satelite photos.

When the US military failed to trap bin Laden amid the caves in Bora Bora and it became apparent bin Laden escaped Afghanistan, the Bush Administration had already distracted itself with exacting revenge on Saddam Hussein for having attempted an assasination on Bush I in the early 1990s by fabricating a threat of WMD to justify an invasion of Iraq. About the same time, looking for some alternate mission to justify a presence in Afghanistan, the Bush Administration and US media began pushing the need to foster democracy in Afghanistan and "rescue the girls." With the same clueless confidence exuded in so many other areas of America's "war on terror," the Bush Administration suddenly assumed toppling the Taliban, creating a democratic government that never previously existed and ensuring access to education for girls was a viable goal that could be accomplished in a couple of months and that became the new mission, despite the US government and public giving exactly zero hoots about "the girls" of Afghanistan since 1979.

The US government changed military tactics three or four times and changed political strategies to match between early 2002 and 2019 and nothing proved capable of resulting in a stable democracy, a functional professional class to operate the police, the courts, electric utilities, telecom utilities and all of the other functions required to support a modern economy and polity. Most of this was understood by roughly 2004, yet America continued to throw American lives and treasure at this folly for nearly twenty years.

Trump didn't "lose" the war in Afghanistan for American by finally setting the terms for American forces to leave (both the how and when). The war had been lost by America choosing to launch it in the first place, then doubling down every four years with another delusional strategy for winning the un-winnable. Could the Trump terms have been better? Definitely, the release of Taliban prisoners could have been structured and timed differently. Everything else? Not so much. We. Needed. To. Get. Out.

Did America leave "billions of dollars" worth of equipment behind in Afghanistan? No, America left behind millions of POUNDS of rusted-out, twenty year old worthless gear that had been in continous operation in a hostile, dusty, desert climate. Even had America WON the war, it would not have been worth attempting to drive that equipment out of the country and transporting it back to America or any other deployment for "re-use." It was scrap. Anything posing a military threat was grenaded prior to leaving. No one who knows ANYTHING about military logistics would worry about leaving equipment behind when exiting a war zone of a war in which you are the retreating loser.


WTH

Agreed. I didn't see it at the time (i.e. that Afghani security forces would -in essence- flee the moment we left), but given that state of affairs, they were going to crumble no matter who was POTUS.

I read that the Afghan government decided the US wasn't going to leave, and made no military preparations for our exit. If so, that helps explain whey they folded and fled.

But that wasn't going to happen.

You don't know that. We "withdrew" from Iraq, also. And yet, somehow there are troops on the ground with drone on station and close air support when it's needed.

We might have kept troops there for our own purposes, like we do in Guantanamo

Gitmo is there because we signed a perpetual lease with the Cuban government way back when and it's a useful outpost on Commie soil.

You guys are trying the "Super Presidents" argument in reverse again. Recall that Obama was a Super President whose exec orders should still be followed even after he left office. Now, the reversal of this is that Trump's decision was to be followed to the letter Because Reasons.

It's a stunning abdication of Joe Biden's responsibility to claim that "Well, Trump decided to pull out so I did what I did". That dog don't hunt, that bird don't fly, pick your metaphor to describe it. The facts on the ground were that yes, Trump wanted to leave but only if certain conditions were met.

One of those conditions WASN'T the collapse of the ANG. And Trump didn't say, "Let's leave flyable helicopters, loads of vehicles and ordinance behind. And while we're at it, close up the heavily fortified airfield we've been running stuff in and out of for 20 years and go use that totally unsecured airport over there".

And he REALLY didn't say "Don't secure the perimeter of that place, and be sure to leave thousands of Americans behind".

I'm sorry, but there's zero "But Trump..." for Biden supporters to cling to.

Nobody told Joe Biden to pull everyone out on the anniversary of 9/11. He did that for political optics, and left a whale of a mess behind.

From Wikipedia regarding our withdrawal from Afghanistan:

The final flight, a US Air Force C-17, departed at 11:59 p.m. (Kabul time) on 30 August.

I hope my wife is as forgiving as you when it comes to remembering our anniversary. Somehow I doubt it.

Your news source or your memory is faulty.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Kabul_airlift....

You guys are trying the "Super Presidents" argument in reverse again. Recall that Obama was a Super President whose exec orders should still be followed even after he left office. Now, the reversal of this is that Trump's decision was to be followed to the letter Because Reasons.

Not at all. This is not about whether Biden was required to make the same choice as Trump. It is simply arguing that there's no reason to believe that had he been re-elected, Trump would have made different choices than Trump did in his first term.

Trump decided that the U.S. mission of supporting the Afghan government would no longer continue. This was based in part, IMHO, on an erroneous assessment by U.S. intelligence and defense that the Afghan armed forces were capable of defending the government from the Taliban. Regardless, that was Trump's policy towards Afghanistan - and it's consistent with his desire in other theaters to draw down U.S. troop levels and reduce their overseas mission (recall that his Defense Secretary resigned over a decision to cut troop levels in Syria). Trump does not go in for formalized doctrine or precise formulations of foreign policy, but he generally felt that the U.S. was spending too much blood and treasure projecting military force in far-flung theaters. There's no reason whatsoever to believe that he wouldn't have continued the withdrawal from Afghanistan in a second term.

In a counterfactual world where Trump was re-elected, we would have still continued the withdrawal from Afghanistan. Whether orderly or chaotically, it still would have continued - because that was the decision that Trump had made in his first term, that was the agreement that Trump made with the Taliban, and that was the general direction of Trump's foreign policy. And once we withdrew, the Taliban would have taken over. Regardless of whether we left stuff behind and regardless of which airport we chose to staff. The decision to no longer defend the Afghan government was the relevant factor, not the specifics of how the withdrawal of American troops was conducted.

Biden owns the specifics of the withdrawal - but it's just flat wrong to suggest that the Ghani government would have been able to hold off the Taliban even if Trump had been re-elected. The U.S. project to build up the Afghani defense forces was a colossal failure, and the inevitable result of that failure was that the U.S.-backed government never had a chance once we decided to no longer prop it up.

<<His successor as President will inherit a far more dangerous world.>>

I pretty much agree with this statement, but not for the reasons the absurd WSJ editorial board states.

The Biden administration has been only partly successful in mitigating the enormous damage done to global security by his predecessor, whose primary foreign "policy" was to seek every opportunity to monetize his position. Trump cozied up to autocrats and dictators, hoping to curry favor for future real estate deals and out of his pathological admiration of strongmen.

The "Abraham Accords" was a PR stunt, "negotiated" by his son-in-law--who is benefiting hugely from the personal relationships he developed with Arab autocrats and murderers.

As has been amply documented, Trump's Ukraine "policy" consisted of extortion.

Trump undercut NATO and undermined the confidence of our global allies in the credibility of US commitments.

The list goes on.

I'm no fan of SoS Blinken. And I'm critical of the Biden administration regarding its posture toward the Netanyahu regime. Happily, Biden is not on the ballot, and so we have an opportunity to do better by electing Harris. I goes without saying that a Trump administration would likely bring even more massive national security disasters than it created previously.

I hope my wife is as forgiving as you when it comes to remembering our anniversary. Somehow I doubt it.

I meant "by" 9/11. My mistake.

Let's repeat this, because mistakes happen and your above line...isn't the flex you think it is:

I hope my wife is as forgiving as you when it comes to remembering our anniversary. Somehow I doubt it.

You want to re-phrase that a bit? Somehow I don't think your wife is involved....


Hahahahahahahaha

That's not the right question.
Would Trump have

-Left billions$$$$ in valuable equipment behind?
-Abandoned Bagram Air Base, and ordered a chaotic evac from Kabul?
-Had Afghanis hanging on to the wheels of C-17s as they took off?

No, he wouldn't have.

I’m certain he would. He’s the one who dropped troop levels from tens of thousands to a mere 2500. He also closed two of the three airbases, so the Taliban knew *exactly* where the extraction would be? And what do you do with 2500 troops, when most of them are support, meals, and so on?

We left behind equipment in Vietnam, in Korea, in World War II. That’s how it works. It’s ridiculous to think you bring the stuff back home with you, there’s no logistic sense in doing so.

But I’m sure if Trump had been re-elected and the debacle that he caused had been exactly the same, you’d be saying “Whjat a great job, he got us out of there.”

That's not the right question.
Would Trump have

-Left billions$$$$ in valuable equipment behind?
-Abandoned Bagram Air Base, and ordered a chaotic evac from Kabul?
-Had Afghanis hanging on to the wheels of C-17s as they took off?

No, he wouldn't have.

But Joe Biden did. - Dope

--------------

The left dismisses accountability as if Biden was utterly powerless to alter the plan left to him by Trump. Too bad Biden didn't feel that way about Trump's border policy.

The left dismisses accountability as if Biden was utterly powerless to alter the plan left to him by Trump.

Again, this is not about dismissing accountability. Just dismissing the argument that there would have been any different outcome had Trump been re-elected, rather than Biden.

The Taliban rising to power was the ineluctable consequence of the U.S. withdrawing from the mission of defending the Afghan government. Once the decision was made to stop performing that mission, the Afghan government was going to inevitably fall. And since both Trump and Biden were on the same page that the withdrawal would happen (even assuming arguendo that the Trump Administration would have executed the actual withdrawal better), this is not something that Biden bears any greater responsibility for than Trump (or the other predecessors that created this situation).

I’m certain he would.

Your certainty, al's speculation, etc. are great and all...but aren't factual because you're all *guessing* in the first place. And to top it off, your guesses are being informed by how much you all despise Trump.

As al might say in a court of law, "Objection - relevance".

It’s ridiculous to think you bring the stuff back home with you, there’s no logistic sense in doing so.

Some stuff, like, say...a helicopter...might be good to bring home. Other stuff you...blow up.

We didn't do that.

The left dismisses accountability as if Biden was utterly powerless to alter the plan left to him by Trump. Too bad Biden didn't feel that way about Trump's border policy.


Yup. That's the "Super President" argument. It works like this:

Stuff that the democrats like? The Super President's orders are to be followed no matter what the next Chief Exec says.
Stuff that the democrats don't like? The current President is completely powerless - and blameless - and thus it's all the past guy's fault.

Trump said, 'let's withdraw'...but he set conditions on that statement. Nobody told Joe Biden to ignore those and pull out as fast as he could...just so he could book a political win.

Again, this is not about dismissing accountability.

Yes, it is.

Once the decision was made to stop performing that mission, the Afghan government was going to inevitably fall.

Again, this is nuanced. It's being portrayed as black and white with a healthy amount of futurecasting going on.

"Retaining Bagram would have required putting as many as 5,000 U.S. troops in harm's way just to operate and defend it," [ME: vs 2,500 troops per memory] Austin told the House Armed Services Committee during a hearing today on Capitol Hill. "It would have contributed little to the mission that we had been assigned, and that was to protect and defend the embassy which was some 30 miles away."

Additionally, when the noncombatant evacuation operation, or NEO, began, Bagram's distance from Kabul would have offered little help. SNIP - Lapsody

--------------

Bagram's importance was not in defending Kabul or the Embassy. Bagram was a strategic asset that should have been retained due to its proximity to China coupled with runways that could accommodate B-52s.

Bagram's importance was not in defending Kabul or the Embassy. Bagram was a strategic asset that should have been retained due to its proximity to China coupled with runways that could accommodate B-52s.

LOL @ his Austin quote. 5,000 troops? To defend something with a defensible perimeter?
So instead they had a handful of Marines protecting something with NO defensible perimeter.

That's called a failed Appeal to Authority. Austin is one of the worst SecDef's we've ever had.

BHMBagram's importance was not in defending Kabul or the Embassy. Bagram was a strategic asset that should have been retained due to its proximity to China coupled with runways that could accommodate B-52s.


Staying at Bagram to continue counterterrorism operations there would also not have been advisable, Austin said.

"[That] meant staying at war in Afghanistan, something that the president made clear that he would not do," Austin said.

ME: We're in the age of drones now Mike. Listen to the military.

LOL @ his Austin quote. 5,000 troops? To defend something with a defensible perimeter?
So instead they had a handful of Marines protecting something with NO defensible perimeter.

That's called a failed Appeal to Authority. Austin is one of the worst SecDef's we've ever had.

I listen to the military, not unknown people with no experience on the internet.

ME: We're in the age of drones now Mike. Listen to the military. - Lambo

-------------

LOL. Tell me how a drone can drop tons of ordinance on Chinese military targets.

I listen to the military, not unknown people with no experience on the internet.

And you engage in Logical Fallacies. The one you're using is called "Appeal To Authority".
Speaking of randos on the internet, you do know that drones you're talking about require runways, right?

Again, this is nuanced. It's being portrayed as black and white with a healthy amount of futurecasting going on.

It's not, really. There is absolutely no dispute that the Afghan armed and security forces were utterly incapable of defending the government from the Taliban - both in terms of their capabilities and their willingness to fight, rather than join, the enemy.

That was the core condition of their armed and security forces. This was not a contingent situation - one where the tide of battle was turned by chance or happenstance or a particularly unexpected or cunning strategy. Their forces were completely and utterly unable to prevent the Taliban from taking over. They were wholly unprepared to even materially delay the Taliban from rising, let alone actually prevent it from happening.

So no, there's no real doubt. This is not really futurecasting - the actual state of operational readiness of their forces at the time of the withdrawal and for years prior was far, far, FAR worse than anyone in the U.S. recognized. There is no way that they could have stopped the Taliban under even an ideal withdrawal - they were completely overmatched.

The only thing that kept the Taliban from ever taking over was the U.S. defense commitment to the government, our mission and rules of engagement that had our military forces interposing themselves between the Taliban and the Ghani regime. Once that was removed, their defeat was unavoidable. And Trump had already resolved to remove it, so had he been re-elected it would have ended the same way.

And you engage in Logical Fallacies. The one you're using is called "Appeal To Authority"


Insisting that a claim is true simply because a valid authority or expert on the issue said it was true, without any other supporting evidence offered.

Not in this case, and here's why.

For an appeal to authority to be legitimate, the authority must be qualified to speak on the subject being discussed, and their statement must be directly relevant to that subject. -and-

Legitimate Appeal to Authority. Legitimate appeals to authority involve testimony from individuals who are truly experts in their fields and are giving advice that is within the realm of their expertise, such as a real estate lawyer giving advice about real estate law, or a physician giving a patient medical advice.

It is indisputable that Austin is qualified - but you are welcome to try. All both you and Mike have done is make unsupported statements, and you dismissed it the ad hominem remarks.

Ad Hominem

(Attacking the person): This fallacy occurs when, instead of addressing someone's argument or position, you irrelevantly attack the person or some aspect of the person who is making the argument. The fallacious attack can also be direct to membership in a group or institution

So you committed a logical fallacy.

Here, in this instance, it is offered to support that your completely unsupported assertions were considered at the time, and these are the reasons that the military said they didn't do it.

You can, if you wish, support your assertions by showing, but are not limited to:

1. taking 5000 troops to defend it is incorrect, and have a reputable source, and/or
2. we would not have had to stay at war with Afghanistan to retain it, and /or
3. it actually was worth retaining even if 1. or 2. are true,

I have shown you the military thinking at the time, and you have shown nothing but statements. Given that it is evident that this was criticized, it should be easy for you to find some - adios.

Insisting that a claim is true simply because a valid authority or expert on the issue said it was true, without any other supporting evidence offered.

A2A is a bad faith argument, meant to discredit another because so-and-so said something the attacker likes and wants to use. Doesn't let you off the hook for making an argument.

What you've replaced an argument with is a series of statements made by the guy who's ass is on the line for a series of really bad decisions...conveniently forgetting that OF COURSE he's going to cover his arse.

The guy also said this
https://news.usni.org/2021/08/18/secdef-austin-u-s....

The U.S. doesn’t have enough troops in Kabul to secure safe passage for tens of thousands of Americans and Afghan allies seeking to leave the country, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said in a press conference on Wednesday.

You know who has the power to order troops to a region to carry out the President's orders? This guy, the Secretary of Defense.

I have shown you the military thinking at the time, and you have shown nothing but statements.

So all you're doing is fronting the excuses he would end up making for himself later.

Thanks for playing, and go learn some logic. Toodles!

And Trump had already resolved to remove it,

Not only had Trump resolved to remove the military from Afghanistan, he had taken concrete steps toward doing so. I believe the troop count was down to about 2500 before Biden was inaugurated. (Down from somewhere in the high 10s to low 20 thousands a year or two earlier.)

And let's not forget that Biden actually delayed the withdrawal from the plans laid out by Trump. He did so to better insure safety during the withdrawal and to get more cooperating Afghan civilians out of the country before the last troops left.

--Peter

You are still welcome to refute anything Austin has said with support, but it seems you have none.

From your link:
SNIP Now, there are a mix of 4,500 Marines, soldiers and airmen securing the Hamid Karzai International Airport to the north of the city and assisting in processing U.S. citizens and Afghans with Special Immigrant Visas for military flights out of the country.

The White Hose authorized up to 6,000 U.S. troops to support Operation Allied Rescue – the mission to evacuate Afghans who worked with the U.S. – and the parallel non-combatant evacuation operation that has yet to be named publicly. SNIP

So you failed to mention we upped the troops from the inadequate 2500 left under Trump and authorized up to 6000 for the evacuation. This is why he said there were insufficient troops at 2500. You either misunderstood or omitted it.

So you make unsupported statements, can't refute Austin - though it should be easy, and you make ad hominum attacks (a logical fallacy) while you accuse others of logical fallacies.

Insisting that a claim is true simply because a valid authority

Did you notice that I didn't *insist* it's true? That's why it isn't a logical fallacy also. I showed it to you and invited you to show otherwise.

You also do cavalier mocking and derision, possibly because of lack of substance. You aren't dumb Dope, you can do better.

So you failed to mention we upped the troops from the inadequate 2500 left under Trump and authorized up to 6000 for the evacuation. This is why he said there were insufficient troops at 2500. You either misunderstood or omitted it.


I used the article to support a point I made, you know - the process of arguing.
You merely use them as blunt instruments to hammer away at points you don't care to address...and to support bad/unsupported claims of your own, such as:

So you failed to mention we upped the troops from the inadequate 2500 left under Trump and authorized up to 6000 for the evacuation

Were the 2,500 that were there for the evacuation? I don't think so. You're forgetting the premise of the entire thread, that Biden fracked it all up.

You also sit back and take potshots at other posters, then get all stampy-foot when somebody offers you some pushback. LOL.

Did you notice that I didn't *insist* it's true? Oh, please. Sleight of hand isn't a skill you possess.

You also do cavalier mocking and derision

I practice Game Theory here: I mirror what I get.
If you folks want serious discussion, then you will get serious discussion. But in 99% of threads Team lib offers up snark, personal insults, sarcasm and loads of bad faith. Game Theory dictates that in such scenarios the proper response is to fire back until the other side stops.

There's only really 1 exception to that rule; one poster in particular will never get a serious reply owing to multiple decades of bullying and bad behavior. But everyone else? No problem.

I used the article to support a point I made,

Yes, and I showed you the article didn't support your point.

Were the 2,500 that were there for the evacuation? I don't think so

So you think they took 2500 troops out and then brought up to 6000 new troops in? Fascinating.


You also do cavalier mocking and derision

I practice Game Theory here: I mirror what I get.

Not true. I've never mocked you and have stated I don't think you are dumb.

You simply never addressed Austin's thinking, and use the excuse it's appeal to authority to avoid addressing it. This argument has jumped the shark. Have a good evening.

End

The WSJ is a shadow of its former self, having become just another outlet for far right propaganda. It’s barely fit to line a bird cage.


No surprise. Murdoch owns the WSJ. So, it is just another propaganda machine.

Dope1: Were the 2,500 that were there for the evacuation? I don't think so.

Well, think again.

Along with the embassy personnel, 5,000 US troops and some NATO troops remained in the city. The US government later authorized the deployment of 1,000 more troops from the 82nd Airborne Division to the airport, bolstering troop presence in Kabul to 6,000 to facilitate the evacuations.

Also, lost in all this Monday Morning Quarterbacking blather is the fact that contrary to claims made in this thread about the value of Bagram Airfield and the strategic error of closing the base is the fact that almost everyone fleeing Afghanistan was in Kabul, about an hour drive from Bagram under ideal conditions -- and the last days of the evacuation were far less than ideal. Getting the 122,000 individuals who were safely airlifted from Kabul instead to Bagram would have been logistically impossible.

And, of course, relocating to Bagram also would have made it impossible to protect the embassy in Kabul.

Dope1: LOL @ his Austin quote. 5,000 troops? To defend something with a defensible perimeter?

bighairymike: Bagram's importance was not in defending Kabul or the Embassy. Bagram was a strategic asset that should have been retained due to its proximity to China coupled with runways that could accommodate B-52s.

Austin wasn't speaking only of the number of troops necessary for 'defending' the base. When fully operational, the infrastructure needed to support Bagram -- which covered 6 square miles -- employed about 40,000 people.

And the U.S. was no longer 'defending' Kabul. The war was over. This was a noncombatant evacuation operation. Period. Runways that could "accommodate B-52s" were useless if the 122,000 evacuees couldn't safely travel to the airport.

But, sure, do go on with this nonsense.


https://thehill.com/policy/defense/567952-pentagon...

bighairymike: Bagram's importance was not in defending Kabul or the Embassy. Bagram was a strategic asset that should have been retained due to its proximity to China coupled with runways that could accommodate B-52s.

Austin wasn't speaking only of the number of troops necessary for 'defending' the base. When fully operational, the infrastructure needed to support Bagram -- which covered 6 square miles -- employed about 40,000 people.

And the U.S. was no longer 'defending' Kabul. The war was over. This was a noncombatant evacuation operation. Period. Runways that could "accommodate B-52s" were useless if the 122,000 evacuees couldn't safely travel to the airport.

I don't like the whole idea of defending a base in the middle of hostile territory. It doesn't seem like a good idea. We've done it before, but it seems precarious.

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