The 11th Hour: Gen. McCaffrey just on with Brian Williams saying stuff re: Afghanistan.

[sprinkleeninow]

Echoing latest remarks by shrub, the mad-cow boy.

What do you suppose we should do. Stay there ad infinitum?

Why didn't you stop shrub et al from illegally invading.

Sure, thousands are attempting to leave any way, shape or form.

The Afghani did not ask for this. IQ43 and his cohorts were the cause.

(Video segment not available as yet.)

[sprinkleeninow]

3. ЯeptiliQans don't do Яational.

[UTUSN]

2. Good "stuff"

[sprinkleeninow]

4. Who, me?

[sprinkleeninow]

6. Youngish, loud and good.

😆

[sprinkleeninow]

7. Good and loud and blondish. 🤗

[CentralMass]

5. There are lots of opinions on this. When you fuck up a region as badly

Dubya and his pack of neocons did when does your responsibility to keep the region from imploding again end ?
Home many times have we burned groups that have worked with us when we pull out etc..

[sprinkleeninow]

9. I don't know the correct answer or resolution to this.

How long has this gone on? 20 years?

I grieve for the lives lost, American and their country's. They're our brothers and sisters in humanity.

[Hoyt]

10. Bet in the end, we still have troops - though minimal - there and/or close by for

foreseeable future.

[questionseverything]

20. For the embassy and airport, right?

I think we could of drawn down with a bit more control

[captain queeg]

11. When they sent a battalion of special ops to get Osama

I was actually in favor of that. They knew where he was and had the opportunity to kill him. But Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld stopped them from pulling the trigger. They wanted to keep the checkbook open and switched priorities to attacking Iraq. Then we started building up in Afghanistan. The rethugs were so happy about 9/11. It have them carte blanch.

[sprinkleeninow]

14. That's correct! Thanks for the reminder. Wasn't Schwarzkopf the general?

They stopped him short of carrying this out.

[captain queeg]

24. I'm not sure about that, I think it was one of those joint CIA ops

[tishaLA]

12. I could have sworn he started his answer

By saying he supports Pres Biden's decision to withdraw. He then talked about some of the complications, including all the Afghanis who helped not only the US but also NATO and how important it is to prioritize them. He also IIRC talked about the danger this might expose the women of Afghanistan to, etc. Those are perfectly reasonable concerns IMO and I'm sure the administration shares them. That doesn't mean leaving is the wrong decision, though.

[elleng]

13. Yes, he DID 'saying he supports Pres Biden's decision to withdraw.'

It was a good (and dramatic) response.

[sprinkleeninow]

15. This action is a double edged sword.

And damned if we do, and damned if we don't.

[tishaLA]

16. But you ask whether we're supposed to

Stay there as infinitum when he explicitly, in the very first phrase of his very first sentence, said exactly the opposite, which is also the opposite of what bush is saying.

[elleng]

17. Right.

[sprinkleeninow]

18. Sorry, I missed that remark. I got upset with hearing him reiterating

bush's sentiments.

In a not good mood having personal mishaps and then listening to news that's 'trying'.

[BigmanPigman]

19. I've been swearing at the TV all day...

and when he came on I went off. Both Bush and he should shut the fuck up!!!!!!!!

[Bucky]

21. Remember that Afghanistan was not an illegal invasion

Iraq was sold on a bundle of deliberate lies, but there was near universal global approval of invading Afghanistan.

We obviously stayed there too long. But when we helped the Afghanis run the Soviets out in the 80s, the lack of follow through an support made it a haven and incubator for extremists.

It's an open question as to whether the invasion of Iraq 18 months later made Afghanistan harder to pacify. I know the corrupt BushCo officials took their eye off the country. Remember when Dubya announced that he didn't think about Bin Laden that much. What a shithead.

But the resistance was always gonna be bitter to the end from the Taliban and other extremists.

Going by the Powell Doctrine, we never really had a plan for either invasion. All empires fall, eventually, but the American Empire's collapse was mostly a self inflicted wound.

[sprinkleeninow]

22. Technically and historically speaking you are correct.

That mess is blurred in my recollection. I tend to call the whole ME military action 'illegal'. I'm not that well versed in things such as these. You most definitely are. Thank you for the clarification. Appreciated.

I abhor killing, bloodshed, unspeakable harming of other human beings.

[Cosmocat]

23. This is the point

IF they had a really good all around plan and focused 100% on Afganistan, it MIGHT have been successful.

But, W had the attention of a tick flee and was easily led to focus on Iraq by the cadre of insane ideologues he had around him getting him to focus on Iraq.

End of the day, it is the same as everything else with this country.

WE knew it was a REALLY bad idea and tried to let people know and fight it, but even back then the same process that exists now kicked in where us fighting it was all the morons who vote R needed to get 1000% behind it, and the "middle" just checked out cause "they both are the same" and the media did that, too, while getting into cheering on another war.

[ecstatic]

25. I'm with Biden on this one. The optics are terrible--we

occupied Afghanistan for nearly 20 years and now we're riding off into the sunset, but we should not have gone in the first place! It's just another in a long list of atrocities committed by our country, but at the same time, when you're in a ditch, at some point you have to stop digging. It's awful but the two options are to either leave or stay forever. I do hope that the Afghani translators are protected and safe.

[JI7]

26. The problem with Afghanistan is Pakistan

Without Pakistan I think we could improve things.

Maybe China will have some influence over the Islamic extremism. But recent terrorist attacks have killed Chinese in Pakistan also.

It's complicated but also mostly sad becsuse without certain outside factors much of the country does want change for better and it could be possible .

It wasn't like Vietnam or Iraq . Things did improve greatly for many people there.