Afghanistan in the rear view mirror...

Capt MJ said:
Many here are familiar with the movie “Taking Chance.” if you haven’t seen it, I recommend it, especially if you are unfamiliar with how the military returns the fallen to the family
Click to expand...
+100 to this reco. The first few minutes are incredibly poignant. The care given to our fallen is incredibly moving.
 
Here's a link to the text published by the State Department of the February 29, 2020 "Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan between the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan which is not recognized by the United States as a state and is known as the Taliban and the United States of America".


I'm embarrassed to admit I had never read it until today. Basically, we were obliged to leave all military bases and remove all our troops by May 1, 2021. There were not a lot of demands placed on the Taliban. Not only was the Afghan government, though supported by the United States, not a signatory to the agreement; it wasn't even mentioned in the agreement.
 
EDelahanty said:
Here's a link to the text published by the State Department of the February 29, 2020 "Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan between the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan which is not recognized by the United States as a state and is known as the Taliban and the United States of America".


I'm embarrassed to admit I had never read it until today. Basically, we were obliged to leave all military bases and remove all our troops by May 1, 2021. There were not a lot of demands placed on the Taliban. Not only was the Afghan government, though supported by the United States, not a signatory to the agreement; it wasn't even mentioned in the agreement.
Click to expand...
Unbelievable. Is there a page missing regarding evacuations, safe passage, etc?

Makes one wonder what the Monday morning quarterbacks were doing on Sunday.
 
cb7893 said:
Unbelievable. Is there a page missing regarding evacuations, safe passage, etc?

Makes one wonder what the Monday morning quarterbacks were doing on Sunday.
Click to expand...
It seems a given that we would have withdrawn all people and equipment and pallets of cash (why are their pallets of cash?) before we brought our troops home. Isn’t that common sense?

There is more to why we did what we did. We need to find out why.
 
Clearly, the Taliban believed The United States would not enforce violations of the agreement. I doubt that toppling provinces and taking Kabul were part of the agenda covered in Part 4:

"4. A permanent and comprehensive ceasefire will be an item on the agenda of the intra-Afghan dialogue and negotiations. The participants of intra-Afghan negotiations will discuss the date and modalities of a permanent and comprehensive ceasefire, including joint implementation mechanisms, which will be announced along with the completion and agreement over the future political roadmap of Afghanistan."
 
www.military.com

Fallen Corpsman Posthumously Promoted by Navy, Will Be Honored by Hometown

The Navy announced that Soviak, who was assigned to Camp Pendleton, was promoted to the rank of Hospital Corpsman Third Class.
www.military.com www.military.com

"His final words to his mother over FaceTime when he was telling her goodbye was after she told him to be safe, were, 'Don't worry, mom, my guys got me. They won't let anything happen to me,'" the family said.

They had you, brother. You were put in a bad place on a BS mission. Marines aren't TSA agents. You died a senseless and needless death.

RIP, Doc.
 
The subject of this thread is upsetting on so many levels that I have decided not to comment further.
 
Every time I think about the difficulties of those fighting in places like Afghanistan I am reminded of James Michener’s line: "All through history, men have had to fight the wrong war in the wrong place, but that's the one they're stuck with." Something all professional soldiers must remember.
 
Devil Doc said:
My tribute to a needlessly killed Navy Corpsman was not a political statement.
Click to expand...
No. I didn’t mean to apply that it was. I meant that the whole stinking mess of our involvement in Afghanistan - - at least for the past several years - - was a disaster caused by our political leaders who left our boys in an un-winnable situation with no exit plan.
 
NJROTC-CC said:
No. I didn’t mean to apply that it was. I meant that the whole stinking mess of our involvement in Afghanistan - - at least for the past several years - - was a disaster caused by our political leaders who left our boys in an un-winnable situation with no exit plan.
Click to expand...
Oh, I misunderstood. That's exactly the way I feel.

The Marines should have been there. That's what they do. But, the "mission" I referred to is the location and task they were assigned.

Feeding babies-OK. Checking luggage and patting down crotches at the airport-not OK.

Edit to add: On one deployment to Liberia the MAGTF commander said, "There's no killing going on. It's time for us to leave." In less than a week we were gone. I was assigned to a unit once where we, the unit and not necessarily the corpsmen, were assigned to move dead bodies. The CO was livid. We got out of there quickly.
 
Last edited:
‘Damning’ investigation by the NYT says the U.S. killed an aid worker and his family in Kabul drone strike, not an ISIS facilitator; No evidence of a secondary explosion.
 
A1Janitor said:
‘Damning’ investigation by the NYT says the U.S. killed an aid worker and his family in Kabul drone strike, not an ISIS facilitator; No evidence of a secondary explosion.
Click to expand...
www.nytimes.com

Video: How a U.S. Drone Strike Killed the Wrong Person

A week after a New York Times visual investigation, the U.S. military admitted to a tragic mistake in an Aug. 29 drone strike in Kabul that killed 10 civilians, including an aid worker and seven children.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
 
Maybe we shouldn't have used the agreement approach or seen an agreement as a tool or method to accomplish our goals there in the first place.
 
We should have determined that the Afghans were un-trainable a long time ago (remember “Vietnamization”) and then planned to get our allies out over a much longer period of withdrawal. However, not sure Congress and State Department would have been too eager to bring a couple hundred thousand Afghanis to the USA.
 
Did any of you watch or listen to Sec. of State Blinken's testimony before congress?

I found noteworthy the blame once again placed on the previous administration. Paraphrasing: "They left us a date but no plan."

In his June testimony he stated the Embassy would stand and the Embassy personnel would remain and do their jobs. It seems to me a statement like that would require a plan of their own.
 
Yes I did. The date they "left them with" was May 1st, but they couldn't come up with a plan from May 1st to when they pulled everyone out by the revised date of August 31st? That's 122 days.

I think that Secretary of State Blinken thinks that most Americans are stupid. If we buy these excuses, clearly he is right.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top