The withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan

[Ken]

We forget this isn't just a US issue. The Afghan project was an international project of NATO. For example, the German government is currently coming under fire for it's actions/inactions in Afghanistan. Apparently they got their beer out, but not their people. Up until their withdrawal, Germany had over 5,000 troops stationed in Afghanistan, mostly in the north and had over 150,000 troops serve in Afghanistan during the course of the war, many doing the same training of Afghan troops that the US is criticized for having failed at.

https://www.dailysabah.com/world/asia-p ... fghanistan

The German government came under fire Tuesday for failing to evacuate Afghan support staff before the Taliban took control of Afghanistan and a transitional government was formed.

Germany's bestselling daily, Bild, sharply criticized the government with a story titled "Germany's withdrawal from Afghanistan: Beer and wine were shipped – local staff are still staying," which blamed it for abandoning local Afghan staff who risked their lives for the Germany.

The German army shipped nearly 65,000 cans of beer and 340 bottles of wine to Germany while completing its troop pullout from Afghanistan at the end of June, the daily reported.

But hundreds of Afghan staff and family members were not granted a visa and were not evacuated promptly, although the Taliban made advances across the country.

"Those who worked for many years for Germany and risked their lives are apparently worth less than cans of beer for the federal government," the daily said in a news analysis piece.

Christoph Hoffmann, a lawmaker from the opposition Free Democratic Party, slammed Foreign Minister Heiko Maas for grave mistakes and failing to prioritize the evacuation of Afghans who worked for German ministries and agencies for many years.

"It's a shame," he told Bild, adding that the federal government "has failed to accurately assess the situation" in Afghanistan in the last couple of months.

At a parliamentary meeting in June, Hoffmann asked Maas about the government's plans to bring Afghan staff who had worked for Germany.

Maas said peace negotiations between the Afghan government and Taliban were likely to continue for some time and he rejected calls by opposition lawmakers to bring more Afghan personnel to Germany, including those who did not have a work contract with the German armed forces but worked for development agencies or other institutions.

During the televised debate, Maas said granting visas to those people and their families would have been a wrong message.

"Then we would be talking about not 2,000 people, but 20,000 people," Maas said and insisted that his government does not want to provoke new refugee flows.

Germany sent three military planes to evacuate remaining diplomatic personnel and Afghan staff Monday, but only one could land because of the chaos at Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport. The other planes were diverted to neighboring countries.

In the past couple of weeks, Berlin has evacuated nearly 2,000 local staff from Afghanistan, according to the government. But more than 10,000 were still trying to flee, including Afghans who worked for German development agencies, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and media outlets, as well as human rights activists and lawyers.

[Humble Disciple]

Or teen age boys who crawled in the jet wheel wells, and later falling out to their deaths.

Yes, that boy was a member of the Afghan national youth soccer team.

[RZehr]

I think that the whole nation jumping on the Presidents outcome is perhaps jumping the gun a little in terms of the results.
I don’t remember seeing much news pundits saying it was a bad plan.
I don’t remember seeing anyone on Mennonet saying it was a bad plan.
I don’t remember anyone at all expecting the Afghan Army to fold quite so suddenly.

So if no one had could see it coming as it did, then what makes anyone think that they or their side would have done it differently?

The other thing to point out is that the story isn’t over just yet. If they are successful in evacuating everyone, then the case could be made that in the end this was actually a fantastic stroke of luck. I mean, most people supported the US leaving; most weren’t surprised that the Taliban took over; so what would a more successful alternative ending realistically entail?
A long civil war, while the US leisurely draws down its presence? They would just create more bloodshed and expense with the end still being evacuating of the country.

All I’m saying is the with a bunch of luck, the US might end up with a better hand than what they were hoping to be dealt. But yes, if it happens this way, I’d say it would be luck and Biden shouldn’t get credit. He was mistaken in his assumption - as was pretty much all of us.

As far as his decision though, it may have been the most sensible one to make considering the information at the time. We shouldn’t be judged as harshly if we act wisely with the best information available - only if we act foolishly against wisdom. Although that too can be overlooked if the end result turns out well.
But everyone now saying how dumb the plan was? I don’t know. Seemed no one was saying it was dumb at the time, and seems like most people were on board with it.

[Bootstrap]

I mean, most people supported the US leaving; most weren’t surprised that the Taliban took over; so what would a more successful alternative ending realistically entail?
A long civil war, while the US leisurely draws down its presence? They would just create more bloodshed and expense with the end still being evacuating of the country.

I agree. There's almost nothing worse than a long civil war.

The only successful ending I can think of starts by having clear objectives that include actually rebuilding the country, with a clear plan for doing so - infrastructure, roads, schools, hospitals, electricity - like we did with the Marshall Plan. That's the only stable way I can think of to leave something better behind. Sure, even that might not have succeeded, but you don't know until you give it a very serious try, and not one president did.

We spent 20 years not doing that. Then we signed a treaty with the Taliban, the enemy of the government we said we were supporting, without getting any verifiable anything in return. The government was corrupt, the United States announced it was leaving, the Afghan army decided that fighting a civil war for the sake of this government did not make sense.

And yes, the way we withdrew was also not great. But in the big picture, that's almost a footnote compared to the damage of the last 20 years. That's 20 years of a war that was never actually declared in the first place. And purely in terms of lives lost, the cost to Afghanistan was enormous.

• American service members killed in Afghanistan through April: 2,448.
• U.S. contractors: 3,846.
• Afghan national military and police: 66,000.
• Other allied service members, including from other NATO member states: 1,144.
• Afghan civilians: 47,245.
• Taliban and other opposition fighters: 51,191.
• Aid workers: 444.
• Journalists: 72.

[Ernie]

From Wiki...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Withdrawa ... 80%932021)

On 29 February 2020, the US and the Taliban signed a peace agreement titled the Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan,[4] with provisions including the withdrawal of all regular American and NATO troops from Afghanistan, a Taliban pledge to prevent al-Qaeda from operating in areas under Taliban control, and talks between the Taliban and the government of the then Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.[5] The deal was supported by China, Pakistan, and Russia,[6] and unanimously endorsed by the United Nations Security Council.[7]

The Trump administration agreed to an initial reduction from 13,000 to 8,600 troops by July 2020, followed by a full withdrawal by 1 May 2021 if the Taliban kept its commitments.[8] The Biden administration, however, said the US would not begin withdrawing until 1 May and would complete the withdrawal before 11 September.[9][10] On 8 July, Biden specified a US withdrawal deadline of 31 August.[11]

During the withdrawal, [July 14, 2021] the US launched

Operation Allies Refuge

to airlift translators and selected Afghan citizens considered at-risk of reprisals to the United States where they will be temporarily housed by the US military while they complete their Special Immigrant Visa requirements.

I think the questions everybody has are, "Why did this wait until July 14, 2021 to begin? Why didn't this begin on a large scale in March, 2020? Well, we had Covid to deal with for a couple months, but by then the Trump administration was basically ready to go back to life as usual, so they could have begun this on a wide scale starting a year ago.

The answer being given is that they didn't want to evacuate people too quickly for fear of destabilizing the Afghan gov't.
Well... that is understandable and those are the risks that state and military leaders have to weigh... but it seems that by postponing this until the end, they didn't have a plan for evacuating 80,000 in a short amount of time.
Biden says they prepared for all contingencies but there is one they didn't prepare for.
The US has the capability of evacuating 80,000 people in a week from both the Bagram Airforce base as well as Kabul's International Airport, but they didn't have a plan for that.

This is how it looks now a week later, after having skimmed scores of articles...

[appleman2006]

I think that the whole nation jumping on the Presidents outcome is perhaps jumping the gun a little in terms of the results.
I don’t remember seeing much news pundits saying it was a bad plan.
I don’t remember seeing anyone on Mennonet saying it was a bad plan.
I don’t remember anyone at all expecting the Afghan Army to fold quite so suddenly.

So if no one had could see it coming as it did, then what makes anyone think that they or their side would have done it differently?

The other thing to point out is that the story isn’t over just yet. If they are successful in evacuating everyone, then the case could be made that in the end this was actually a fantastic stroke of luck. I mean, most people supported the US leaving; most weren’t surprised that the Taliban took over; so what would a more successful alternative ending realistically entail?
A long civil war, while the US leisurely draws down its presence? They would just create more bloodshed and expense with the end still being evacuating of the country.

All I’m saying is the with a bunch of luck, the US might end up with a better hand than what they were hoping to be dealt. But yes, if it happens this way, I’d say it would be luck and Biden shouldn’t get credit. He was mistaken in his assumption - as was pretty much all of us.

As far as his decision though, it may have been the most sensible one to make considering the information at the time. We shouldn’t be judged as harshly if we act wisely with the best information available - only if we act foolishly against wisdom. Although that too can be overlooked if the end result turns out well.
But everyone now saying how dumb the plan was? I don’t know. Seemed no one was saying it was dumb at the time, and seems like most people were on board with it.

You are being kind I think. That does not explain at all though why the president literally lied to the US people multiple times in the past few days. Or at the very best was ill informed himself which brings to question the whole operation. Of course few people publicly were giving alternatives. Few people have the benefit of access to the intelligence needed to make those decisions. But I think the government does or should have had. I hope your miracle still happens. I really do. But based on all reports including what other of your allies are sayiny I would not hold my breath. At least not unless tactics change big time. There is no doubt the US has the power needed to do it successfully. But I am not sure they have the willingness to use it.

[Ernie]

I have been surprised that in a day of smart phones, very few pictures are being made public. The same few pictures are shared by many of the news anchors. Sometimes they blur faces but even that is not happening very often.

Anybody know of social media platforms or little known sites that are uploading pictures and stories from evacuees and potential evacuees?

[Soloist]

airlifting 80,000 isn't a cake walk. You need to provide security, vetting and provide the crew for repairs for the plane and an area surrounding it to prevent them from being shot down during take off. Any time a plane flies off from a warzone... its got a chance of destruction.

Now drafting civilian airliners is a recipe for disaster... one civilian plane goes down, he's toast.

[RZehr]

Oh, I’m sure Biden is lying through the teeth that he has left. I haven’t heard or read any of his comments on the matter. It’s not that I think he’s doing a great job with Afghanistan. I just don’t think anyone saw if collapsing as suddenly as it did. I don’t recall anyone wanting to drag it out longer.

[temporal1]

appleman:
You are being kind I think.

That does not explain at all though why the president literally lied to the US people multiple times in the past few days.
Or at the very best was ill informed himself which brings to question the whole operation.

Of course few people publicly were giving alternatives.
Few people have the benefit of access to the intelligence needed to make those decisions.

But I think the government does or should have had.

I hope your miracle still happens. I really do.
But based on all reports including what other of your allies are sayiny I would not hold my breath.
At least not unless tactics change big time.
There is no doubt the US has the power needed to do it successfully. But I am not sure they have the willingness to use it.

Oh, I’m sure Biden is lying through the teeth that he has left. I haven’t heard or read any of his comments on the matter.
It’s not that I think he’s doing a great job with Afghanistan.

I just don’t think anyone saw (it) collapsing as suddenly as it did.
I don’t recall anyone wanting to drag it out longer.

public opinion is MOSTLY dependent on what media and politicians allow. LIMITED. NOT FULL DETAILS.
the elected are expected to have more information and resources.
they are to be aware of public opinion, but not restricted to mob rule. we can pray.

on this forum, it can be expected that most or all want all violence to end, never started, to begin.
it’s entirely possible to want to end conflicts while respecting order to accomplish it.
chaos is not constructive.

for me, this is another time of NOT knowing, and, grieving. for many, blaming is part of the grieving process.
for me, i’m sorry DJT didn’t get a second term. we’ll never know how it would have been different. but he did often surprise.

as it is, no matter POTUS, i would not have predicted how it would go. i pray for peace.
i can’t say the present situation is a surprise. if it happened under DJT, i believe i would have felt the same.

(but the media and his opposers would be blowing up 1000 times more than the present.) i think that’s a fact.