Typical actuary answer. Way to completely miss the point. The main point is that your statement is a well-known fact on this board sounds like more of a /r/iamverysmart statement than a helpful one.
I would ask what your point is, but since you seem to want to couch your comments in code I donāt have time to decipher what youāre trying to say.
If you really think everyone here knows thereās a difference between ISIS-X and the Taliban, see my comment which you cheerfully quoted.
If you were being sarcastic with your remark, see the first sentence in this post.
Either way, as long as you think being rude is a way to carry on a conversation, the actuarials on me caring about engaging in further discussion with you are nil.
My point is obvious - itās my posts that are concise and to the point, not yours. Virtually all of us on here know this is more complicated than just āTERRORISTS BADā.
The Taliban has been gaining strength for years. Areas have changed hands but itās basically been a standoff for, I donāt know how long. Boots on the ground have mostly just been keeping areas safe and defusing IEDs with occasional skirmishes as we drone strike areas that we believed to have enough Taliban to accept collateral casualties. Plus we were doing a poor job of training Afghanis. Obviously thatās a little simplified, but we werenāt making any progress without a new full-scale invasion.
(Also, a note that weāve been fomenting more Taliban resistance with our drone-strike program.)
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Interestingly, I saw someone point out that the Soviet Union pulled out of Afghanistan, the Graveyard of Empires, and ājust over 3 years later, on December 25, 1991, the red Soviet flag with the gold hammer and sickle flew for the last time over the Kremlin.ā
I thought we would leave behind an embassy to be set up somewhere, but for now, no diplomatic relations between the two countries.
I saw that civilians, including children, may have been killed in the Sunday drone strike. It looks like that isnāt confirmed yet, but if itās true, I donāt know if those were collateral casualties, or if the terrorists were attempting to use children and civilians as shields.
A tragic end to a tragic war.
A description of ISIS-K from 2018. Islamic State Khorasan (IS-K) | Terrorism Backgrounders | CSIS
Snip
All in all, while IS-Kās goal of establishing an Islamic state in Central Asia remains improbable, its propensity for exploiting grievances, catalyzing instability, and taking advantage of ungoverned spaces will make peaceful reconciliation and nation-building in Afghanistan difficult for the foreseeable future.
Getting and maintaining local control and stability is now the Talibanās headache.
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The people with the guns are drinking horse dewormer instead of getting vaccines in order to own the libs, and they already showed up once to try and take the Capitol. How much dumber can we really survive?
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Thought I saw an article that said the Taliban had actually asked us to keep our Embassy open.
I can understand why they wouldnāt want to do that. With the way things were going, I donāt think many Americans, especially those working for the government, would feel very safe in Afghanistan.
I think it has more to do with whether or not they want to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan. I thought I read today that Britain was asking that other countries not recognize the government but maybe I saw that wrong.
I think thatās correct. also agree itās the right policy. I donāt think we should legitimize these guys unless they are willing to play nice. Very skeptical.
I read several days ago that the EU was not planning on recognizing the new government, FWIW.
I wonder how much of the motivation was economic related. Afghanistan has a minuscule economy and relies on foreign aid to feed the people, have drinkable water, and generate power. From 2020>
Reuters link
GENEVA (Reuters) - Foreign donors pledged a projected $12 billion in civilian aid to Afghanistan over the next four years at a conference on Tuesday, but many made it conditional on protecting human rights and making progress on peace talks in a major shake-up for the countryās economy.
If the Taliban wants even a small chance to govern, they will be desperate to continue this.
For reference, the GDP there is just under $20bn. Not sure if that includes the foreign aid or not.
On a humanitarian scale, the world should help. From a political perspective, that may not be possible.
Maybe. US Intelligence thinks itās suicide bombers about to retaliate and some local Afghan claims it was a family with 7 children. Early days to make any big conclusions but it sure smells like propaganda (although arguably either way).
Is there an Afghanistan exclusion for k&r lines?
McKenzie said he also had believed āfor quite a whileā that if the United States reduced the number of its military advisers in Afghanistan below 2,500, the Kabul government inevitably would collapse āand that the military would follow.ā He said in addition to the morale-depleting effects of the Doha agreement, the troop reduction ordered by Biden in April was āthe other nail in the coffinā for the 20-year war effort because it blinded the U.S. military to conditions inside the Afghan army, ābecause our advisers were no longer down there with those units.ā
In a blunt assessment of a war that cost 2,461 American lives, Milley said the result was years in the making.
āOutcomes in a war like this, an outcome that is a strategic failure ā the enemy is in charge in Kabul, thereās no way else to describe that ā that is a cumulative effect of 20 years,ā he said Tuesday, adding that lessons need to be learned, including whether the U.S. military made the Afghans overly dependent on American technology in a mistaken effort to make the Afghan army look like the American army.
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