Americans weren’t dying, continuously, in those countries. That’s a pretty big difference. There are many others.
But thank you for identifying yourself, with this post, as an advocate of the forever war. Of course such advocates will be sad about the end of this war! Those of us oppose forever wars are unlikely to be swayed by forever war advocacy.
In 1945 it wasnt different at all. We believed that Naziism and Nazi partisans would be active in our part of Germany in the foreseeable future. Also, our troops are in Germany to safeguard Germany against the Russians. No one knew what to expect in Japan. In Korea our troops are a nuclear tripwire that will launch a nuclear holocaust if the North crosses the 38th parallel.
Last I checked, it wasn’t 1945 anymore.
If you think the US is going to launch a nuclear first strike in response to a land invasion of South Korea, you’ve got another thing coming.
That’s on the OP, though. Isn’t the usual purpose of citing a source to use the sources to support an argument? ISTM citing an op-ed isn’t really doing much to support an argument and is instead just revealing poster bias.
Ahh, an advocate of human rights only when it is easy and costs us nothing. Also, such binary thinking. As if our disorganized and incompetent withdrawal from Afghanistan was the only option to forever war. Now please get to work on putting those Afghanis being raped and tortured because we left them behind out of your mind.
It is not the purpose of the US military to protect the lives of everyone in every nation all over the world. We are not the World Police.
The op-ed quoted AP reportage and Angela Merkel. It wasnt just a polemical piece.
If that makes it easy for you to go about your life good for you.
I’m not going to lose a minute of sleep tonight worrying that the US military isn’t Dr. Manhattan.
And FoxNews is very upset about it:
“How dare they refuse to push our preferred narrative about how badly Biden screwed up Afghanistan? They’re just trying to distract from it by reporting on the Republicans imposing horrific abortion laws or Republicans undermining democracy in America or Republicans threatening to abuse their power to punish any companies complying with subpoenas and providing evidence that the same Republicans were complicit in a violent insurrection! Why aren’t they just repeating ‘BIDEN BAD!’ over and over like we are?”
Biden made some significant mistakes with regard to the Afghanistan withdrawal but these have been grossly exaggerated by those with an agenda, often combined with ignoring or minimizing the extent to which other options were limited and what the consequences of choosing them would be. The same people harping about the Americans killed in Afghanistan under Biden were often strangely quiet about the ones killed under previous adminstrations (other than to fill their Facebook pages with pictures of flag-draped coffins and exhortations to “Share To Honor These Heroes!”) and are pointedly ignoring that there would definitely had been an upsurge in attacks on US troops - and deaths - had Biden chosen to break the agreement Trump made with the Taliban.
Pulling troops out according to the long-agreed deadline was the least-worst option. The withdrawal could have been done much better, but lingering on would have been far worse.
And if senselessly throwing away the lives of American troops for no benefit does the same for you, hey, you do you, man. Enjoy your armchair.
I’m not suggesting that the withdrawal couldn’t have been better - it could have, and I think some of the criticism is warranted.
But the damage to America’s and the West’s political and moral capability is the product of years of decision-making and policy, not the withdrawal itself.
We weren’t accomplishing any actual human rights protection on Afghanistan. It was all a mirage, propped up by the forever war advocates. It’s very clear now that we didn’t accomplish anything at all, and weren’t helping anyone except the military contractors and other war profiteers. This was a colossal waste of lives and money with no benefit, and that the warmongers disagree tells us absolutely nothing.
Getting out was the only way to get out. Such chaos was inevitable and entirely unavoidable.
I like your take.
Weve had a nice discussion and I apologize if I got a little too heated. Its 330am here and I need a little sleep before tomorrow morning.
No worries
It’s almost as if you believe The Kaiser has been keeping himself in check these past decades.
More time was spent incorrectly claiming you can’t access the site than would have taken to Google how to get around wapo’s fake paywall. Everyone has been able to access this newspaper for the past decade+.
Here’s how things looked as of earlier this summer. Too early for post-withdrawal data:
I think the withdrawal could have gone better, but I don’t think there was a third option in the long-term.
If we had handled the withdrawal perfectly we would have rescued a more people but the Taliban would still be in control oppressing women. If we had delayed it would be happening next month instead of this.
If we actually wanted to remain in and somehow conclude this war, you need some realistic idea that has never been presented by anyone.
If you’re really using Germany as a model you have to make a case that indefinite troop presence would actually result in effectively eradicating the Taliban and turning people with similar islamist ideologies into groups of ineffective idiots who are handled by local police. Our troops in Germany haven’t been shooting at nazis for half a century.
I haven’t been able to, and I’m part of “everyone”, therefore I refute your claim.
The difference is that we’ve clearly gained something by remaining in these countries. It was possible to incorporate them as part of a broader US political and economic alliance against Russia/USSR (and now China). This is not true in Afghanistan. No question, there are impending human rights horrors that will now become a reality but this outcome was likely inevitable. The cost/benefit quotient of trying to maintain Afghanistan makes it clear that we’re wasting our resources there, and this is probably true for much of the Middle East. We can remain politically and economically involved in other ways, but our military concerns would probably be better positioned in Asia.