Actually it has been that way sine WW2. Korea (1950's), Vietnam (Early 1960's -1975), Grenada/Panama (1980's).Today's US military is experienced in wars and have been in constant warfare since Bush Sr time.
Actually it has been that way sine WW2. Korea (1950's), Vietnam (Early 1960's -1975), Grenada/Panama (1980's).Today's US military is experienced in wars and have been in constant warfare since Bush Sr time.
Whether people want to accept it or not....
China will be a superpower with its vast wealth, population, manufacturing / exports, resources, stolen technologies from various advanced countries, necessary minerals from Afghanistan for advanced battery manufacturing, etc.... , etc.....
Look at the highway China built in Jamaica, some might laugh at something so ‘unimportant’.
China is building friendships and power across the globe. Notice how China is NOT evacuating their embassy ?
.
That was like 2 regime ago? I mean if US and Viet Cong can establish relationship then Russia and Taliban sure can mend. I'm sure those older guys are gone and the newer guys weren't even born yet.Neither is Russia. I wonder whether some of the senior Taliban are old enough to have fought the soviets. Hmmm
Not so sure on that."" one day both sides will run out of recruits who care about their dads' generations' war""
That was like 2 regime ago? I mean if US and Viet Cong can establish relationship then Russia and Taliban sure can mend. I'm sure those older guys are gone and the newer guys weren't even born yet.
Which is yet another long term logistic problem: one day both sides will run out of recruits who care about their dads' generations' war. These guys would look at what they have gotten themselves into, and what they are getting / not getting in return.
If Ho Chi Minh was the president of Afghanistan, not sure we would have this situation today. Soldiers of the Viet Minh movement would die for Ho Chi Minh. The Soldiers in Afghanistan appear not to want to fight for Ashraf Ghani. Comes down to leadership. Not that complex.Two regimes for whom? Not the Taliban. Who cares about the Soviets? A Rusky is a Rusky just like an American will hence forth be an untrustworthy American, right? Will Bahrain, Qatar, Oman, Jordan change how they think of us?…Will Iran or Pakistan find new reasons to undermine our influence in the region? Will other more important rivals? Who knows. No matter who is to blame, we are all Americans and you can bet how we handled this debacle will be debated for DECADES. I look forward to reading all of it.
We were stupid in both Afghanistan and Vietnam. Unlike the stan (means the people of, for those curious) we should have seen that one commie isn’t the same as another RE: Vietnam. We should have seen that building a democracy in Vietnam was a waste of time and that leveraging ties with Vietnam would have been better against the awful Chinese threat. Luckily, the relationship between Vietnam and China never changed in a way that significantly changed the trajectory that lead to our bettering relationship and normalizing relationship.
Afghanistan isn’t Vietnam, though I admit I’ll have to study the parallels before I fully commit to that statement. Afghanistan isn‘t very complicated. Going forward they’ll likely be more opportunistic and will likely rely more heavily on our adversaries outside of the region. That means I feel as if the Taliban will be too busy trying to maintain what tenuous control they have and they may have to elicit help wherever they can. Or they’ll revert to strict Shariah law, lock down the population and we’ll have years of what ifs before we know where there will be ISIS resurgence or other negative outcomes that directly affect our strategic interests.
Strategic resources? Let someone else exploit that and their associated set of land mines. If we were going see some economics gain from this wreck of a country we would have already realized it. If we really CARED about this country we would have built institutions meant to not only equip the nation to fight its own battles, but to build leadership and lower ranks that would truly fight for the country. What we did was the equivalent of giving a 4 year old an M16 and told him that he needs to fight the neighbors to save his family. We needed to grow That kid up AND ensure he was properly raised and we failed in that regard in a major way. Americans spent too much and corruption took too much of a toll. We never had a chance.
It’s not any one fault, but it is all of our faults as Americans, the failure of this nation. ”We never went in to nation build” BS! We gave these people everything they needed, but the confidence and ability to take care of themselves. We let corruption take hold and, when we knew it, we told ourselves it was too late and insurmountable...so we let it happen and told ourselves it was cheaper that way. Cheaper. Always cheaper. If we have negative consequences based on this, be it a loss of regional clout or, worse, another attack on American soil, it will be our own fault. Forget “over the horizon” capabilities, we needed to help these people help themselves. We never did that.
/ rant.
Ho Chi Minh wouldn't have accepted anything foreign and tolerate foreign influence, and people who would die for him do so because of that. We wouldn't have sponsor anyone who wouldn't listen to us. So this argument is moot.If Ho Chi Minh was the president of Afghanistan, not sure we would have this situation today. Soldiers of the Viet Minh movement would die for Ho Chi Minh. The Soldiers in Afghanistan appear not to want to fight for Ashraf Ghani. Comes down to leadership. Not that complex.
Empire's graveyard. We should have learned from history to stay away. We did back when Soviet collapsed and that was wise, it is pointless to "nation build". Heck we won't even be able to nation build Texas in the US had it been a separate nation, what makes you think Afghan is better?Afghanistan isn’t Vietnam, though I admit I’ll have to study the parallels before I fully commit to that statement. Afghanistan isn‘t very complicated. Going forward they’ll likely be more opportunistic and will likely rely more heavily on our adversaries outside of the region. That means I feel as if the Taliban will be too busy trying to maintain what tenuous control they have and they may have to elicit help wherever they can. Or they’ll revert to strict Shariah law, lock down the population and we’ll have years of what ifs before we know where there will be ISIS resurgence or other negative outcomes that directly affect our strategic interests.
Strategic resources? Let someone else exploit that and their associated set of land mines. If we were going see some economics gain from this wreck of a country we would have already realized it. If we really CARED about this country we would have built institutions meant to not only equip the nation to fight its own battles, but to build leadership and lower ranks that would truly fight for the country. What we did was the equivalent of giving a 4 year old an M16 and told him that he needs to fight the neighbors to save his family. We needed to grow That kid up AND ensure he was properly raised and we failed in that regard in a major way. Americans spent too much and corruption took too much of a toll. We never had a chance.
If Ho Chi Minh was the president of Afghanistan, not sure we would have this situation today. Soldiers of the Viet Minh movement would die for Ho Chi Minh. The Soldiers in Afghanistan appear not to want to fight for Ashraf Ghani. Comes down to leadership. Not that complex.
Empire's graveyard. We should have learned from history to stay away. We did back when Soviet collapsed and that was wise, it is pointless to "nation build". Heck we won't even be able to nation build Texans in the US had it been a separate nation, what makes you think Afghan is better?
Let me put it this way. We've tried that in Vietnam, we've tried that with KMT in China, 1/2 of the Chicommies were from KMT defect and many graduated from the "highly trained" military academy. It doesn't matter how many we trained, as long as you don't have a guy on top that are not corrupted and have local support, you can bet they will defect to the other side if they are not getting something in return.Over 20 years we could have done better. If we had the foresight to develop military academies to produce the leaders we needed, we’d be in a helluva lot better situation than a week’s worth of mass desertions and a complete turnover of authority! Seriously, 350k ”highly trained” vs 75k roustabouts? Let’s get real. Corruption, morale, and training played a huge part in this unforeseeable collapse. I say, “unforeseeable” my butt!
I don’t have much complaint with your second paragraph; however, logistics is relative. We got them used to 1st world logistics, then left them with 3rd world capabilities. One of the many ways we failed them. Oman is the Switzerland of the Middle East. Lots of access and trade and SMART LEADERSHIP made that happen.
Pakistan is a lost cause. If they didn’t have nukes we wouldn’t deal with them at all. Pakistan sucks the big D.
I can see this coming here very soon.
View attachment 68614
But we in the US have our secret weapons too. Our enemies will quake in their boots when they see our new recruiting tool.