In hindsight, suddenly everyone knows why the Afghan army collapsed

[DonViejo]

author Kevin DrumPublished onAugust 14, 2021 – 12:33 pm

Why did the Afghan army collapse so quickly? Here's the New York Times:

As positions collapsed, the complaint was almost always the same: There was no air support or they had run out of supplies and food.

But even before that, the systemic weaknesses of the Afghan security forces — which on paper numbered somewhere around 300,000 people, but in recent days have totaled around just one-sixth of that, according to U.S. officials — were apparent. These shortfalls can be traced to numerous issues that sprung from the West’s insistence on building a fully modern military with all the logistical and supply complexities one requires, and which has proved unsustainable without the United States and its NATO allies.

And here's the Times again:

Commanders [knew] that the afflictions of the Afghan forces had never been cured: the deep corruption, the failure by the government to pay many Afghan soldiers and police officers for months, the defections, the soldiers sent to the front without adequate food and water, let alone arms. In the past several days, the Afghan forces have steadily collapsed as they battled to defend ever shrinking territory, losing Mazar-i-Sharif, the country’s economic engine, to the Taliban on Saturday.

more
https://jabberwocking.com/in-hindsight-suddenly-everyone-knows-why-the-afghan-army-collapsed/

[Thunderbeast]

1. All of those "logistical and supply complecities"

depend on very expensive military contractors and external support costing millions upon millions of dollars per day; Much of it taken as corporate profits. Some going to corrupt payoffs to local officials.

The whole program was not sustainable....ever.

[Walleye]

2. Anybody can say what should've been done after it's all over.

I’ve always said that any 12-year-old can tell you what you should’ve done after the results are in.

[empedocles]

3. Famously corrupt trump signaled taliban victory by trump publicly supporting taliban.

Simple, powerful, 'signal'.

[Skittles]

4. WTF is this HINDSIGHT SHIT

in the end, some our guys WHO WEREN'T EVEN BORN WHEN 9/11 HAPPENED were "training" Afghan soldiers - IT WAS NEVER GOING TO A HAPPEN

[onetexan]

5. Follow the money

Where did tbe trillions go?