Afghanistan Open Thread

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.