Taliban defeats America

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Taliban fighters have entered Afghanistan’s presidential palace hours after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country.

The group’s leadership, surrounded by dozens of armed fighters, addressed the media from the country’s seat of power.

The similarities to the 1970s are getting positively eerie.

They are. Pakistan or Iran might as well just annex Afghanistan now and drag them into the 21sr century.

Being annexed is the best out of a very, very bad situation and has my full support.

There’s plenty of blame to go around for the 20-year debacle in Afghanistan—enough to fill a library of books. Perhaps the effort to rebuild the country was doomed from the start. But our abandonment of the Afghans who helped us, counted on us, staked their lives on us, is a final, gratuitous shame that we could have avoided. The Biden administration failed to heed the warnings on Afghanistan, failed to act with urgency—and its failure has left tens of thousands of Afghans to a terrible fate. This betrayal will live in infamy. The burden of shame falls on President Joe Biden.

Khan, an Afghan interpreter I first wrote about in March, is on the verge of escaping from Afghanistan with his wife and small son. Three clocks are ticking. The first is his wife’s pregnancy. She’s at 34 weeks—two more weeks and she’ll no longer be allowed to board a flight out of Afghanistan. The second clock is the availability of a visa to the United States and an air ticket. After years of waiting, yesterday Khan finally received his Special Immigrant Visa as one among thousands of Afghans who worked for the U.S. military. By then, amid the general panic of Afghans trying to get out of the country, ticket prices to Europe and the U.S. had doubled, from $800 to $1,600, and seats were going fast. A travel agent told Khan that none were available until the end of August, but yesterday morning, Khan’s pro bono lawyer, Julie Kornfeld of the International Refugee Assistance Project, managed to book him seats on a Turkish Airlines flight on Tuesday.

The third clock is the Taliban. In the past week, every city except Kabul fell to the insurgents. A few days ago, U.S. intelligence sources predicted that Kabul could go as soon as next month. This morning, the Taliban are at the city gates, preparing to enter the capital and seize total power. “I think when they enter Kabul, first they will block the airport, because they do not want us to escape,” Khan told me by phone from Kabul. Just as he seems to have obtained everything he needs to save himself and his family, it might be too late.

BREAKING from #Afghanistan: While the Biden administration claims to be ramping up evacuations, military evacuations are getting cancelled.

One of our #SIV clients just had his flight to safety cancelled with the following note:

"Due to present security conditions, we are unfortunately unable to offer you relocation on this flight. Please DO NOT report to the airport. Continue to shelter in place. We will maintain your information on record and seek to offer you relocation options as soon as possible."

The security of our Afghan allies grows more dire by the hour.

The Biden administration needs to get as many people as possible on planes before it is too late. #SaveOurAllies

Few days I posted that "its gonna be Saigon 1975 all over again". It happened a little faster than I expected, and a lot faster than South Vietnam collapsed. But the same thing.

Trump paved the way, and Biden continued speeding down the same road to appeasement.

But what options were there?

The American public has been screaming for the end of the "forever war", and populists on both the right and the left have been screaming about how "we spend trillions on nation building other countries, but not a cent on our own decaying infrastructure".

Source: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/08/bidens-betrayal-of-afghans-will-live-in-infamy/619764/

The Afghanistan war is over. We lost. The Taliban is advancing. The troops Australia spent decades training are in full retreat. And China’s ready to pounce.

As the Western world “pivots” its attention to Southeast Asia and the growing aggressiveness of China, the war on terror in Afghanistan has lost its appeal.

Military analysts fear the total rout of demoralised Afghan security forces in the north of their country at the weekend is a sign of things to come.

Just days earlier, the United States cleared its main headquarters facility at Bagram Air Base. Their withdrawal is expected to be completed by September 11.

There’s a reason why the Chinese Communist Party is so determined to completely subdue the Islamic Uighur people in the western province of Xinjiang. It’s a strategically crucial fork in their “Belt and Road” trade plan with Europe.

So is neighbouring Afghanistan.

Beijing has already proposed a $US62 billion investment in Kabul. It on the arterial China-Pakistan Economic Corridor of roads, railways, pipelines and cables.

China, Afghanistan and Pakistan met via video conference last Thursday to discuss the project – and the “security situation”. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi says the three countries “needed to strengthen communication and co-operation” to advance Afghanistan’s interests.

And China’s.

It looks like the Taliban won't be the only winners here:


Source: https://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/military/how-china-stands-to-benefit-from-end-of-afghanistan-war/news-story/49b4d48def856d7b4eada4112b06f768

Yep, the Biden administration has to wear this tragedy.
Of course, they will blame it all on the orange man who started the pull-out.



Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but it should have been a very gradual phase-out.

It is interesting how Uncle Joe has been on record, a number of times, stating the collapse of Afghanistan wouldn't happen.
Does he wear a hat?

The Mexican border fiasco, and now this.
It isn't looking great for the Democratic admin.

While Biden did hold up his end of a bad agreement, pulling out was indeed Trump's plan. Still, Joe should have known better.

The criticism seems to be about the *haste* of the retreat.
Trump did the same to the Kurds in the Syrian war.

So many politicians.
So few pillows.