Afghanistan

[*Nately120*]

(08-19-2021, 12:57 PM)Matt_Crimson Wrote: That's the thing though, nobody really knows what Trump would have done, nor should we care. We should care about what actually happened.

There is an optimistic take on this if you're willing to look at it from the perspective of what we can't control vs what we can control.

There are two outcomes that come from withdrawing from Afghanistan but only one of them we can control. The other we cannot.

Outcome 1: Afghanistan's stability once we leave.
Outcome 2: The US getting its soldiers and allies out in as safe a manner as possible.

Outcome 1 we cannot control, therefore it is difficult to look at it optimistically.

Outcome 2 however IS what we can control, therefore we can have an optimistic outlook on it based on the fact that we have control over how safely we can get our soldiers and allies out of Afghanistan. The problem is we botched outcome 2, something we actually had control over..

Had we developed a plan to get everyone out safely and initiated it, things would have been a lot better. 

Is it really too much to ask the Taliban to let us get out safely? If it is too much to ask that, then what kind of precedent are we setting here?

It's like we're literally telling our allies that if they're ever in a situation where an armed force is coming to take over we won't do our best to make sure that everyone who will be targeted for helping us won't get out safely

If I'm an Afghan, no way in hell would I ever help the US after this..

I get it, and I understand what you are saying but we have 40+ years of history showing us that getting of there in as safe a manner as possible is impossible to define, if not actually impossible to do.  It's like healthcare reform...everyone has the perfect plan when they aren't in power and then when they are in power they just sort of shuffle their feet and kick the can down the road.

I'm also letting myself look at this in a current political manner because there has been so much talk about the danger of refugees and granting asylum, America First initiatives, the skyrocketing national debt, and the overall idea that you need to remove the safety nets from people of all types and if they fail it is on them and them alone.

How long is it going to take Americans to just convince themselves that it would be nice to protect Afghanistan from the taliban, but they need to stop failing the second western forces leave the area?