The withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan

[Ken]

On the news this morning a story about a female Afghan interpreter who had move to Virginia a couple years ago and went back this summer to see family. She was allowed to leave yesterday through this airlift with TWENTY FIVE members of her family members in tow.

How much do you think that is happening now? One of my daughter's school friends is a girl who is the daughter of Afghan refugees that came here maybe 5 years ago or more. They added an extra floor to their suburban home to hold all the extended family living with them. I have no idea how many aunts, uncles, and cousins are there. But there are usually about 6 women wearing hijabs in the car when they swing by our house to pick up their daughter when she is hanging out here.

I don't object to Afghan refugees coming here and settling in the US. We can absorb the immigrants and it will make this a more interesting country. I'm looking forward to visiting the first Afghan restaurant that will inevitably pop up around here in a year or two. But at some point you have to dial things back to a more normal state of affairs. There are probably large populations in 100 different countries around the globe who can make compelling refugee claims.

[Ernie]

As I understand it, Former Pres. Trump planned to withdraw troops by May of 2021. Biden extended that to August 2021 in order to give Afghan forces more time to get their act together. Now Biden and his administration are getting the blame for the current chaos. Is there more to the story that I am not understanding?

Above is what I wrote in the OP.
What I learned from the posts in this thread as well as from news sources is that the Biden administration planned for most every contingency except for a massive airlift at the end of the withdrawal.

The last Afghan President requested that Biden not begin the withdrawal too prematurely or it could hinder his efforts to establish his government. I think that is a rational plea. The Biden administration then gave him a few more weeks. But then they began an abrupt withdrawal of armed forces which really weakened any remaining resolve within the Afghan army. (which may not have been very much after 20 years of war and hundreds of thousands of Afghans dead.)
So it seems to me that if the Biden administration decided to make the withdrawal quick, they should have planned for a massive airlift. That was "the mistake" from my vantage point. Alternatively they could have implemented a slow withdrawal, but that could have gone awry as well. ISIS K is already making threats. A slower withdrawal could have got them interested sooner.

Blinken said this today.
"It's hard to overstate the complexity and the danger of this effort and the very real possibility of an ISIS-K attack. We're taking every precaution but this is very high-risk."
So if they US stays to retrieve more Afghans or Americans, there could be attacks by Taliban or ISIS. From a military perspective, there is no good solution at this point. Hindsight is always better than foresight.

And as Sudsy intimated earlier, perhaps God uses satan to blind the eyes of gov't leaders because of what he wants to accomplish in the world.

And back to the numbers:
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that 82,300 people have been flown out of Kabul since August 14.
He believes less than 1,000 American citizens are still in Afghanistan and attempting to leave.

Blinken said that there were 6,000 Americans who wanted to leave Afghanistan on August 14 and 4,500 of them have been evacuated within the last 10 days. He added that 500 of the remaining number have been instructed on how to leave within the last 24 hours. That leaves roughly 1,000 Americans left in the country, but Blinken said the actual number is lower for a variety of reasons, including situations where Americans want to stay or have already left and not notified the government.
"From the list of approximately 1,000, we believe that the number of Americans actively seeking assistance to leave Afghanistan is lower, and likely significantly lower. The United States continues to be relentless in our outreach. For the remaining roughly 1,000 contacts that we had, who may be Americans seeking to leave Afghanistan, we're aggressively reaching out to them multiple times a day through multiple channels of communication, phone, email, text messaging to determine whether they still want to leave, and to get the most up to date information and instructions to them for how to do so.”

[Jess77]

It is my understanding that many of the people in charge of the global aspect of the current Biden administration, including Blinken, were the same people in charge back during the Obama era and were the ones in charge during the Benghazi debacle.

[Ken]

As I understand it, Former Pres. Trump planned to withdraw troops by May of 2021. Biden extended that to August 2021 in order to give Afghan forces more time to get their act together. Now Biden and his administration are getting the blame for the current chaos. Is there more to the story that I am not understanding?

Above is what I wrote in the OP.
What I learned from the posts in this thread as well as from news sources is that the Biden administration planned for most every contingency except for a massive airlift at the end of the withdrawal.

Also not widely reported in the news was the fact that the US State Department actually issued a do not travel and evacuation advisory for all Americans back in April. Here is the actual text: https://af.usembassy.gov/afghanistan-tr ... l-27-2021/

TRAVEL ADVISORY APRIL 21, 2021: Afghanistan Travel Advisory – Level 4: Do Not Travell

Do not travel to Afghanistan due to COVID-19, crime, terrorism, civil unrest, kidnapping, and armed conflict.

U.S. citizens wishing to depart Afghanistan should leave as soon as possible on available commercial flights.

Read the Department of State’s COVID-19 page before you plan any international travel.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued a Level 4 Travel Health Notice for Afghanistan due to COVID-19, indicating a very high level of COVID-19 in the country. Visit the Embassy’s COVID-19 page for more information on COVID-19 in Afghanistan.

On April 27, 2021, the Department ordered the departure from U.S. Embassy Kabul of U.S. government employees whose functions can be performed elsewhere.

Travel to all areas of Afghanistan is unsafe because of critical levels of kidnappings, hostage taking, suicide bombings, widespread military combat operations, landmines, and terrorist and insurgent attacks, including attacks using vehicle-borne, magnetic, or other improvised explosive devices (IEDs), suicide vests, and grenades.

Terrorist and insurgent groups continue planning and executing attacks in Afghanistan. These attacks occur with little or no warning, and have targeted official Afghan and U.S. government convoys and facilities, local government buildings, foreign embassies, military installations, commercial entities, non-governmental organization (NGO) offices, hospitals, residential compounds, tourist locations, transportation hubs, public gatherings, markets and shopping areas, places of worship, restaurants, hotels, universities, airports, schools, gymnasiums, and other locations frequented by U.S. citizens and other foreign nationals.

The U.S. Embassy’s ability to provide routine and emergency services to U.S. citizens in Afghanistan is severely limited, particularly outside of Kabul. Evacuation options from Afghanistan are extremely limited due to the lack of infrastructure, geographic constraints, and the volatile security situation.

Family members cannot accompany U.S. government employees who work in Afghanistan. Unofficial travel to Afghanistan by U.S. government employees and their family members is restricted and requires prior approval from the Department of State. U.S. Embassy personnel are restricted from traveling to all locations in Kabul except the U.S. Embassy and other U.S. government facilities unless there is a compelling U.S. government interest in permitting such travel that outweighs the risk. Additional security measures are needed for any U.S. government employee travel and movement through Afghanistan.

Due to risks to civil aviation operating within or in the vicinity of Afghanistan, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has issued a Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) and/or a Special Federal Aviation Regulation (SFAR). For more information, U.S. citizens should consult the Federal Aviation Administration’s Prohibitions, Restrictions and Notices.

[ohio jones]

I would note that China seems to be kicking our butts in terms of engagement in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. But they aren't doing it by sending troops and building military bases. They are doing things like building dams, highways, and even light rail transit systems in places like Ethiopia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Addis_Ababa_Light_Rail Which seems a lot more useful than things like massive multi-billion dollar military air bases in places like Bagram Afghanistan.

Some of us find the economic takeover of the eastern hemisphere by the CCP through the Belt and Road Initiative nearly as concerning as a military takeover.

[ohio jones]

Also not widely reported in the news was the fact that the US State Department actually issued a do not travel and evacuation advisory for all Americans back in April. Here is the actual text: https://af.usembassy.gov/afghanistan-tr ... l-27-2021/

TRAVEL ADVISORY APRIL 21, 2021: Afghanistan Travel Advisory – Level 4: Do Not Travell

There are Level 4 travel advisories in effect for 99 (out of 211) countries. At some point they tend to lose their urgency.

[Ken]

Also not widely reported in the news was the fact that the US State Department actually issued a do not travel and evacuation advisory for all Americans back in April. Here is the actual text: https://af.usembassy.gov/afghanistan-tr ... l-27-2021/

TRAVEL ADVISORY APRIL 21, 2021: Afghanistan Travel Advisory – Level 4: Do Not Travell

There are Level 4 travel advisories in effect for 99 (out of 211) countries. At some point they tend to lose their urgency.

Level 4 is the highest level. But you still have to read the text. But it would not surprise me that there are 99 countries that are dangerous to visit. I could think of 10 off the top of my head right now without looking anything up (Burma, Honduras, Haiti, Belorussia, Ethiopia, Syria, Sudan, Ethiopia, Iraq, Libya). The point is, a lot of people are criticizing Biden for not starting evacuations earlier. When in point of fact, the US Embassy actually ordered out all non-essential personnel back in April when commercial flights were still available and recommended that all Americans also depart. And they also recommended that people not visit. Yet we now hear all these stories about high school exchange groups going to Afghanistan as late as last month.

I'm not sure what else the US government really could have done last spring. They were pretty clear that it was time to depart. Are they supposed to go around and round up people at gunpoint?

[Ernie]

Yep.
Many American's don't want the government telling them what to do, but then blame the government if things don't work out in their favor.

The folks who don't pay much attention to federal travel advisory, are often the ones who don't pay attention to a lot of other things the government advises. I'm not saying that people should follow federal advice, but they should not expect the federal government to help them out when they go against that advise. They certainly shouldn't criticize the government.

[Ken]

And it starts again already: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-paci ... 021-08-25/

Four Russian military planes evacuated Russian and other nationals from Kabul on Wednesday on the orders of President Vladimir Putin, as Moscow held military exercises involving its tank forces in neighbouring Tajikistan.

The flights mark a shift in Russia’s stance on Afghanistan. Its ambassador to Kabul had previously praised the Taliban’s conduct and said the group, still officially designated a terrorist organisation in Russia, had made Kabul safer in the first 24 hours than it had been under the previous authorities. read more

But the Kremlin said on Wednesday that the situation was very tense and, citing the presence of Islamic State in Afghanistan as well as the Taliban, said that the terrorist threat was “very high.”

The Russian defence ministry said it was evacuating more than 500 people from Afghanistan, including Russians and citizens of Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine.

The U.S. exit from Afghanistan is a security headache for Moscow, which sees former Soviet Central Asia as part of its southern defensive flank and fears the spread of radical Islamism.

Moscow has reinforced its base in Tajikistan where it is holding a month of exercises.

Russians evacuating their staff from Afghanistan and Russian tanks engaged in exercises on the Afghan border? That seems rather significant.

IN any event, let the Putin and the Chinese deal with Afghanistan.

[justme]

I would note that China seems to be kicking our butts in terms of engagement in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. But they aren't doing it by sending troops and building military bases. They are doing things like building dams, highways, and even light rail transit systems in places like Ethiopia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Addis_Ababa_Light_Rail Which seems a lot more useful than things like massive multi-billion dollar military air bases in places like Bagram Afghanistan.

Some of us find the economic takeover of the eastern hemisphere by the CCP through the Belt and Road Initiative nearly as concerning as a military takeover.

isn't it interesting tho, how helping people become better, is getting more accomplished than fighting?