Don't blame me, I voted for the other guy. (Politics General)

Afganistan has had 10+ years to build a competent government and military. They got complacent, they should have known the US would eventually pull out.
 
I’m as critical of how the drawn down took place as I was when Trump did it, but I was also never for keeping troops there indefinitely.
 
We’re out now, and that’s that I’m afraid. What happens in that tinderbox is now it’s own beast. And any US business that goes over to the middle east should be given a stern “we won’t be responsible for you” statement from the military. We don’t need a bunch of stupid corporations going over there, getting us in the shit, and dragging us back into that quagmire to bail them out for oil and money.

You failed. Very very hard.

@silbasa  
Who the fuck are you even talking to

@Background Pony #1F81
 
Me.
 
Didn’t you know? I’m actually an omnipotent God man who controls all the world’s events. And I have secretly conspired over the past few centuries to specifically annoy silb.

@Zincy  
Unfortunately, i feel like corporations won’t care, if it supports their interests.  
They’ll drag us back.
 
But i agree on the stern part.

@silbasa  
The hell are you even talking about?!

@Background Pony #1F81  
Myself I guess.
 
Taliban is now predicted to take Kabul in 30 days. This is a Vietnam style shitshow of epic proportions. Total collapse of the entire country. Taliban have been remarkably effective in their blitz campaign.
 
Here’s a whataboutism for ya:
 
Some random criminal is shot by the police and the US is up in arms and their cities burn.
 
Leaving women and children to the worst islamic regime in existence? Sorry, gotta go now!
 
I like a lot of things about the US and what they do, what they are doing here I hate.

@silbasa  

@silbasa
 
We’ve spent 10+ years there as an, incompetent at best, occupying force. Around 2300 deaths, 20,000 injured (including life altering ones such as losing limbs), and an uncounted number of military and veteran suicides. Come over here out of your frozen wasteland and walk around a VA.
 
Add to that 2 trillion dollars sunk into both of those sand pits.
 
 
Should the drawdown have been done more slowly? Yes, absolutely. I jumped Trump’s stupid plan, and I’ve been shouting about Biden’s slightly less but still stupid timetable.
 
But ultimately, we could never have propped them up enough to prevent something bad happening.

@Zincy  
The fact that it took the Taliban all of, like, five days to take over the country as soon as our backs were turned should make it rather obvious how effective our “nation-building” was.

And before the “wE Were There for 20 Years” argument, America has had folks stationed in Korea since 1957. And they will stay there in the foreseeable future. Same in Bosnia. But here they left their charges to the wolves. So much work and sacrifice for naught.
 
@Zincy  
We had people there as well, on a smaller scale ofc. Built schools, gave people opportunities outside of farming poppies. All down the shitter now. You have propped nations up before. When you do it properly it works. When you bail on them it does not work. A military stabilizing NATO presence should have been there long term. Argh, the waste. An entire people feed to the fundamentalist grinder. Don’t be surprised when this comes back to bite the west in the ass a few years down the road.

@silbasa
 
We don’t have people stationed in Korea to stabilize Korea, we have it to protect our interests there and are part of US power projection against China. Supported by local allies, expanded international interests, treaties, and the local very well equipped and funded military.
 
 
The Middle East is a powderkeg where our two closest “allies” are the worlds worst frenemie that actually financed the guys that took the towers down, and the one nation in the world that really shouldn’t be emulating the Nazis doing their damned best Nazi impersonation. We have no strong allied assets to rely on, no local supply chains, no large and well funded local armies, no advantageous local treaties, and NATO threw its arms into the air and said “fuck it” years ago.
 
Those two situations are vastly different.

@silbasa
 
Difference is the Norks are a failed nation propped up 100% by their own bluster and their proximity to China. They are quite metaphorically that fat 3rd grader hiding behind the leg of his college age neighbor sticking his tongue out and making farting noises at the rival city’s college student.
 
You don’t need to intervene. North Korea will fall under its own Juche.
 
Which is all just fancy way of saying they have no oil. So we no incentive to fight them.

There’s now gossip going around that schools are giving kids Covid vaccines and telling them to keep it a secret from their parents.
 
Google ain’t giving any credence to this, so anyone else heard of this through the grapevine?

@Zincy  
America went into Korea to stop communism. And you did. Under America’s watch South Korea flourished. But if you turn your back for one moment it’s irate neighbour will strike. America is its guardian. You leave and it’s nuclear war in a week.
 
America went into Bosnia to stop the genocide. You are still there today. Leave and they will dig up their weapons caches and start purging each other again.
 
America is a stabilizing presence.
 
America has been that in Afghanistan since you went in. Progress was being made on many fronts. Keeping Afghanistan stable was in your nation’s interest. It was the lynchpin that kept islamic terrorists in check in the region. Your bases there assured rapid responses could be launched to arising threats.
 
Now? It will once again become a safe haven for the people that struck you in 2001 and killed 2,996 people. And they will regroup and strike again.
 
Leaving Afghanistan now is shortsighted and a mistake. A massive blow to US/NATO credibility. And it leaves millions suffering. Sorry but here America has failed. Going into Afghanistan and Iraq were mistakes in the first place, leaving now after such heavy involvement just makes everything worse. I would not be surprised if you are back there in 10 years or so.
 
@Dustcan  
Maybe. They have proven to be remarkably resilient. And you don’t want to antagonize China. That’s why that hell still exists, not oil.

@silbasa  

 

 
Oh, you’re serious…

@Penguin Dragneel  
Yes. If you knew what else is lurking out there you would agree.

@silbasa  
America doesn’t stabilize s##t. It only occupies other countries for it’s own benefit.

@silbasa  
If North Korea even dared to start shit, China would flatten them themselves. They like having the Norks around as a nuisance, a thumb in America’s eye. They also like not having a nuclear friggin’ war on their doorstep.

Fun fact. The list of countries America has “Spread Freedom” is so long it broke Wikipedia’s page limit and they needed an entire new page dedicated just to America’s interventions in South America.

@Penguin Dragneel  
Wrong. You tried. You really did but you gave up.
 
@Background Human  
They are a handy buffer for China. They are potentially the end of your presence in the area. And their capability for widespread destruction have increased dramatically the last few years.

@Dustcan  
And what were the alternatives in many of these countries? Communists?

@silbasa
 
A functional country with it’s own natural resources.
 
Now many of them have neither of those.

@silbasa  
Not wrong, because the U.S. always leaves when the occupied country no longer benefits them.

@Dustcan  
Does not matter if ruled by communists.
 
@Penguin Dragneel  
You make them democracies and allies. You make them like you. That is smart. Afghanistan/Vietnam? Not smart.