So what if Trump was in charge? ** Title edited by GNHQ**

Well we don't know that, do we, MaizieD?

It's an impossible question.

However Biden did change the date for leaving. He wanted this 9/11 date to be his moment of glory for getting the soldiers home. But it's all gone terribly wrong and he's made an horrendous mistake.

I would assume Trump would have handled things differently. Better or worse? Nobody knows.

But I can't see how it could possibly have been any worse than this

To revert to the OP.

I think that Trump was completely stitched up by the Taliban. What was the US to get out of the deal? The Taliban got loads. Their prisoners released and plenty of time to consolidate their hold. He just wanted to be the president who 'Brought our boys home' with no thought at all about how it was achieved. I doubt if he would have made any effort to protect or bring out the Afghans who had been working for the US.

What Biden has done is bad, but Trump would have been much worse.

Nobody has ever got anywhere in Afghanistan, surely only the Chinese are left now to have a go.
I don't see how Biden is going to do anything about the bomb that has gone off, didn't the bomber blow himself up? How would he hunt down the organisers.

A lot of it is just empty rhetoric - talking about hunting down but doing FA.

So how are they going to hunt anyone down if there are no troops on the ground?

They usually do it with drones. Amazes me how they can track down individuals this way but they do and it just creates more hatred and ultimately more terrorism.

It’s easy to be an armchair general I know, but surely if they had sent many more troops and air cover this evacuation could have been organised so much better. They could have kept the Taliban out of Kabul long enough surely?

Also once the US leave our boys are sitting ducks.

GrannyGravy13

Gwyneth

Not a word from the Vice President, Harris. I wonder what she thinks?

I think she is in Asia somewhere (Vietnam?) at a LGBTQ conference

I used to follow her on Facebook. A couple of days ago she posted that they had made the right decision.

I don't follow her any more.

MayBee70

I once travelled with a friend who turned out to be the most erratic driver I’ve ever known and resolved never to get into a car with him ever again. He rode a bicycle in the same way. Never had an accident in his life though because people steered well clear of him. I likened Trump’s foreign policy to my friends driving. When you have a world leader with a questionable mentality the rest of the world treads very carefully.

Very true.
It was a relief when Trump finally quit the White House wasn’t it!
On the first part of your post, we have a cycle rider like your friend in our village, and yes, everything on the road steers well clear of him.

Gwyneth

Not a word from the Vice President, Harris. I wonder what she thinks?

I think she is in Asia somewhere (Vietnam?) at a LGBTQ conference

I once travelled with a friend who turned out to be the most erratic driver I’ve ever known and resolved never to get into a car with him ever again. He rode a bicycle in the same way. Never had an accident in his life though because people steered well clear of him. I likened Trump’s foreign policy to my friends driving. When you have a world leader with a questionable mentality the rest of the world treads very carefully.

Not a word from the Vice President, Harris. I wonder what she thinks?

We have to remember that the US didn't go into Afghanistan to bring about regime change. As Maizie's article points out, they only go out of their own country in retribution for harm done on American soil. Having said that, I can't think of a time when a country did bring about regime change successfully. It seems you can make the environment available to move faster but you cannot just superimpose a change.

M0nica

PippaZ Iwas looking at the subject holisiticsally. Where were the candidates for the Presidency of the strength and quality of George Bush, Reagon, Kennedy, even Nixon, some were crooks, but they were all men of quality and conviction.

What have the Americans chosen and voted for recently? A fantasist and narcissist, and someone whose solution to the results of a terrible war the Americans should never have started, is just to turn on his heal and leave those who suffered as a result of the war, to suffer even more withput even a glance over his shoulder. I doubt if even Obama could have been so indifferent to non-Americans.

I do see where you are coming from and I am sure there is something in what you say. Perhaps the next question is to ask why it has changed. It would probably be worth doing a bit of research on what was said about your examples before and during their Presidency.

M0nica

Zoejory Bombs and drones and rhetoric.

Yes, I think you're right, MOnica. It's all rather frightening.

Taking a step back - this cycle had been going on in Afghanistan for the last forty years.

A lot longer than that, SaraC. There was an Anglo-Afghan war in the 1830s/40s.

A chaplain wrote this in 1843 ... it could have been written yesterday

a war begun for no wise purpose, carried on with a strange mixture of rashness and timidity, brought to a close after suffering and disaster, without much glory attached either to the government which directed, or the great body of troops which waged it. Not one benefit, political or military, was acquired with this war. Our eventual evacuation of the country resembled the retreat of an army defeated”

Maiziethank you for the link, it’s certainly a very interesting article, and worth the read.

Taking a step back - this cycle had been going on in Afghanistan for the last forty years. It seems to be imagined that, somehow or another, Afghanistan will in time become a place where democracy and equality will flourish. I heard a reporter who had been in Kabul for many years (who did a great brief analysis of situation) describe the most likely outcome, and best case scenario, to be one of ‘managed savagery’. Chilling, but apposite?

MaizieD

Interesting article from the Washington Post (if you can access it, only a limited amount of 'free' articles allowed)

www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/08/26/robert-kagan-afghanistan-americans-forget/

Interesting article and, it seems to me, an accurate reflection. It reminds me that the US did not enter WWII until they were hit on their own territory by the attack on Pearl Harbour.

Zoejory Bombs and drones and rhetoric.

What I'm interested in is the mixed message from Biden's press conference yesterday.

Obviously they are continuing with their mission to leave Afghanistan and I doubt that's going to change.

However, what's this comment about?

Know this; We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay

So how are they going to hunt anyone down if there are no troops on the ground?

American friends who were thrilled to see Biden elected are devastated right now. He's not the man they thought he was.

PippaZ Iwas looking at the subject holisiticsally. Where were the candidates for the Presidency of the strength and quality of George Bush, Reagon, Kennedy, even Nixon, some were crooks, but they were all men of quality and conviction.

What have the Americans chosen and voted for recently? A fantasist and narcissist, and someone whose solution to the results of a terrible war the Americans should never have started, is just to turn on his heal and leave those who suffered as a result of the war, to suffer even more withput even a glance over his shoulder. I doubt if even Obama could have been so indifferent to non-Americans.

My above post was in reply to M0nica Fri 27-Aug-21 12:55:19

I don't think he is weak M0nica. I think the contrast between those who use unsubstantiated tropes and those who take their time to think things through does not make the first "strong" and the second "weak". If anything it is more likely to be the reverse. Unreflective people, those who want an instant and unsubstantiated opinion on everything, will probably see the first as strong and the second as weak though. Our media, who have become more and more like those reporting on a reality TV programme, are much to blame.

I would agree with your first two paragraphs, and I would agree to some extent with your third.

I think you all think that the US is much less further down the slippery slope than it is.

If we get some decent candidates for both parties in the next election, I will beleive the decline can be stopped. Yes, thebUS can run a few bombng raids, but its refusal to get involved with Syria and Libya, other than from the air and some money tells us all we need to know about the Yanks.

MaizieD

maddyone

Biden said that America will not forgive or forget those horrendous killings yesterday, and they (America) will ‘hunt them down.’ I’m wondering how he thinks they will do that as obviously they are withdrawing from Afghanistan.

I think they'll just go back in. American's won't forgive their personnel being killed.

They’ll bomb the crap out of someone. Just hope they get the right someone. They are not a country you want to cross, they will get their revenge. First they will choose someone to focus on like they did before with Bin Laden. Won’t matter who, just some figurehead..

Maizie I had dismissed that as a solution as I know Biden has long wanted to withdraw from Afghanistan, but you might be right because unless they go back in I don’t see how they can hunt anyone down.

Interesting article from the Washington Post (if you can access it, only a limited amount of 'free' articles allowed)

www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/08/26/robert-kagan-afghanistan-americans-forget/