Should the West intervene again in Afghanistan?

Discussion in 'Opinion POLLS' started by Reasonablerob, Aug 14, 2021.

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Should the West militarily intervene in Afghanistan again?

  1. Yes

    7 vote(s)
    17.9%
  2. No

    21 vote(s)
    53.8%
  3. Maybe, let's see what happens?

    11 vote(s)
    28.2%
  1. HereWeGoAgain

    HereWeGoAgain Banned

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    I'm not invested in Biden but I'm not about to judge. This is far too early in the game. He stood up and took responsibility for making a bad bet. That makes him 1000 times the man and leader that trump could ever be.
     
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  2. Wynn Sayer

    Wynn Sayer Newly Registered

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    Biden has made us look like idiots and appear weak on the world stage. That's dangerous. He did a lot of finger pointing, then went back to his vacation.

    No other president has ever made the US look worse.
     
    Last edited: Aug 17, 2021
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  3. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Let's hope so.
    But you know how these things can slide back into barbaric times.
    See Turkey, for example. It was a model of modernity under Ataturk, embracing secularism, Western values, and seeking to join Europe. So they had decades of modernity. Well, it didn't take much for Erdogan to bring that edifice down.
     
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  4. MJ Davies

    MJ Davies Well-Known Member

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  5. Wynn Sayer

    Wynn Sayer Newly Registered

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    Edited BS is not reality. Actually Trump had a salient point.

    If we did that, instead of what was done, the country would be better off right now.

    No handouts, no eviction moratoriums.

    That doesn't make the US look weak on the world stage like what Biden did.
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2021
  6. Big Richard

    Big Richard Banned

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    His handlers looked at what he can say or do to shed responsibility but unfortunately no matter what they looked at it all looked like a lie, no way to wiggle out of this one so knowing Xiden and his base they said let him take responsibility as the world will look at him as a sympathetic figure. A feeble old man with diminished mental capacity. A sympathetic figure who F ed up big time and cost lives.
     
  7. modernpaladin

    modernpaladin Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Does airdropping thousands of crates of battle rifles and ammo to the people count as 'intervening'?
     
  8. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    The idea of a growing popular resistance to the Taliban, especially due to our influence there over these many years (an entire generation has practically grown up free of their rule, after all), raises the question in my mind of whether it might one day pay to lend a hand again to help them be free. They may not have been ready to fight a few days ago with so little warning of what was to come, but perhaps they will be now. In that event, maybe a limited operation could help reestablish government rule.

    However, there is also the issue of the military. I hear a lot of those soldiers were in it for a paycheck and not too enthusiastic about putting their lives on the line. If that didn't change or if they weren't replaced by fighters as motivated as the Taliban fighters, then it would be the same kind of lost cause that it was a few days ago.

    So, could this withdrawal and the sudden Taliban takeover be the motivator that Afghans need to fight for their freedom and defend the government we helped them set up? Might that be worth a relatively small and short military engagement with clearly defined goals, no matter how war-weary and discouraged we may be feeling now?
     
  9. MJ Davies

    MJ Davies Well-Known Member

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    Why do they need to live by our values? Apparently, they are happy (or tolerant) of whatever is going on because they haven't done anything about it. You can't force somebody to want something for themselves. We've been teaching these men how to fish for 20 years. Another 2,3,5 is going to make a difference? Not likely.
    Most people hate their jobs and only go because they like food and shelter. Plus, once you enlist you can't leave so you hate every minute of and watch the calendar until you can bolt.
    They haven't been motivated from the last 20 years. Why would they start now? Spoiler alert: They wont.


    Image3.jpg
     
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  10. Adfundum

    Adfundum Moderator Staff Member Donor

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    First, I hate that things happened the way they did. We spent way too long there and achieved a whole lot of nothing. Simply ducking out seemed like a pretty low class way of doing what really needed to be done. But staying there was expensive and seemed more like it was feeding a corrupt system that the people obviously did not want.

    It does seem that many, or even most, of the Afghan military had no heart for fighting the Taliban. Like you said, it's more like it was just a way to make some money. And the total lack of resistance to the Taliban take-over says much about our winning of the hearts and minds. It goes back to the origins of the Taliban and their goal of getting foreign powers out of their country.

    Yet there does seem to be a wee bit of resistance. I saw that some women are being pretty bold in their dislike of the Sharia that denies them rights. They've experienced a bit of freedom and seem to not want to give it up. I'm optimistic that those seeds have been planted and will continue to grow.

    I expect things will get bad before they get better. If the Taliban insists on maintaining its rule by using tyrannical religion, there's going to be a lot of bad stuff happening. Any hope that the Taliban has learned that ruling a nation requires more than just fear.
     
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  11. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    It's a long time since there was a serious threat to the freedom so generously offered to them by us. As long as our forces were there, the Taliban had no chance of taking Kabul and taking over the country. I figure current events might be the wakeup call that many in Afghanistan who value the freedom they had need in order to step up and fight for it. Not sure if they would fight for the same government that fell practically overnight, but they might fight to be free of the Taliban again at least.
     
  12. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    Ahhh Afghan even under Taliban rule is a sovereign country, we just can't fly our military aircraft with impunity with their borders now that's all pulled out and we don't have the support in their anyway. You think the Taliban is going to give us permission to do this? How are we going to know where to fly them with that internal intelligence we had? Where are you going to station them? What protection from the defenses the Taliban will now have?
     
  13. MJ Davies

    MJ Davies Well-Known Member

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    OK. Let's think this through.

    Americans in the United States are human, correct?
    We built a military to protect our country, correct?
    We've been pretty good at it because, ounce for ounce, we've mostly kept the bad guys off our turf, correct?

    So, we do stuff, earn money, play with our kids, blah, blah, correct?

    And, then Joe down the street calls and says he needs some help.
    You grab your weapons and head on over.
    Joe is on the couch watching the game.
    He doesn't get up to help you.
    He wants you to stand guard because he's scared of the boogey man.

    You stand outside Joe's house for 20 damn years.
    Joe still has not gotten off his butt to help you guard his house.
    You get a call from the wife telling you to come home.
    You tell Joe that you have to go.
    Joe begs you to take him with you and you tell him you can't.

    Joe starts shaking in his boots as you walk away.
    Before you make it home, rumor has it that the boogeyman is coming to the neighborhood.
    Because Joe was watching tv and drinking beer, he didn't learn a damn thing from you IN TWENTY YEARS.
    Joe is so scared that he calls a cab and goes to the airport to get the hell out of dodge.

    Joe's sister calls you crying saying that he's gone and they are scared because the boogeyman was getting close.
    Your wife tells you to have your @ss a seat and you're not going anywhere near that mess.

    What's wrong with that picture?

    We are Americans.
    We aren't superheroes.
    We aren't the World's police and protector.
    We aren't the moral authority for everybody.

    We aren't all living in the lap of luxury to the point that TRILLIONS of the money we earned is going to help people that clearly don't have problem with what's happening because they tolerate it.

    Anybody with an ounce of sense would have figured out how to deal with the boogeyman in 20 YEARS....<PAY ATTENTION>...IF IT WAS THAT DAMN IMPORTANT TO THEM.

    Right now, I guarantee you that you can call ANY domestic violence shelter in this country and tell them that your sister is being beat up by her husband and you want to help her. Do you know what they are going to say to you?

    They are going to say "She has to make the decision to fight back or leave. THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO UNTIL SHE MAKES THE FIRST MOVE."

    Yet, we are going to keep holding onto all these DV victims that won't make the first move?

    Why?

    What about the men and women who are being beaten by their partner as I type this?
    What about kids getting raped and abused in juvenile detention centers and group homes?
    What about people that sleep in the streets (not ALL of them are addicts or crazy)?
    What about our veterans we treat like crap when they come back from war broken?
    What about our kids that had to walk for at least two miles twice a day to get food from school during the lockdowns because that was the ONLY food they had?

    If they haven't figured it out in 20 years, it is never going to sink in.
    I'm sorry their world is like that but we didn't do it.
    When a person gets TIRED enough, they make different choices.
    We can't force our values on them and they clearly don't want them.
    How long do you propose to stand outside Joe's house while he's on the couch watching the game and having beer? Remember now, you're also paying all his bills.

    There's not ONE BRAVE person in all of Afghanistan? Why not? We're just breeding all the brave men and women here? Is that what you want me to believe?
     
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  14. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    It's not that they're not brave, but that they obviously weren't feeling brave when they were rather suddenly abandoned and the Taliban was sweeping in. How would you feel if a bunch of armed thugs rolled through and you were just another civilian with no training or organization to stand up to them, or if you were a paid and trained soldier but your commanders went AWOL? You have to think of the psychology of the situation.

    I hate the idea of these thugs rolling in and taking over. They're not a legitimate government. No one elected them. They're just thugs with guns and a will to rule, and they're bound to rule through force and intimidation no matter what promises the moderates among them make to the international community because they're illegitimate as rulers and violent, murderous thugs by nature. They're already using their weapons on protesters.

    It is ultimately a wait and see game, though. We need to see whether the people of Afghanistan will work up the will to fight and make a military intervention worthwhile. We didn't have that in 2001 and apparently it never developed since, but current events may change their thinking for the better. If that doesn't happen, then I guess we'll just stay the course and abandon them to thug rule. Probably end up with another Iranian-type regime making nice with Russia and China, threatening India and Israel, chanting death to America and sponsoring violence against us and our allies in the region. Together with Pakistan, they might even give Russia a highly sought-after warm water port to play with. Mutual security and protection. I hear that's why Russia invaded Afghanistan in the 80s to begin with.
     
  15. MJ Davies

    MJ Davies Well-Known Member

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    You have the wrong perspective on this. How can you possibly think they were "taken by surprise"? Our soldiers were there because the Taliban was a threat to them. They've been a threat to them for many decades. They didn't just fall from the sky and roll through town for the first time last week.

    In fact, what you describe makes it even more ridiculous. They had trained soldiers there for help. Why didn't they avail themselves of some type of training during that time? Where are their police? Did it ever occur to you maybe the Taliban is so awful because they know these people will be intimidated? I'm sorry, but from the sound of it, it's no wonder why they got it handed to them.

    Go back and look at the videos of the Capitol riot. I'm sure some of our elected officials carry weapons (they'd be dumb not to) but do you know what happened when some trouble makers rolled through there. Our Capitol Police were on it. Officer Eugene Goodman steered the rioters AWAY from the locked offices and Senate chambers.

    Every single day, adults have to make decisions and we don't usually get a playbook before the game. We encounter crap and we deal with it. That's it. Spoiler alert: Being an adult is hard. Why are we checking underneath the bed for monsters for ADULTS??? IN ANOTHER COUNTRY?????

    I was abused by my parents quite violently. I have been held down and beaten. I was also a police officer and I have been in stand-offs with thugs. And?

    The psychology of it is the human brain is designed for self-preservation. Practically every man, woman and child can sense danger and know they have to prepare for fight or flight. These people are acting like deer in the headlights. And, this situation is NOT like the comparison you made. These people have had decades of knowledge about what they were up against. What in hell have they been doing for 20 years with our men and women and money if not learning how to handle their business?

    Have you ever heard of Erica Pratt?

    That baby was SEVEN YEARS OLD. Don't even try to come up with the psychology of it. A 7 year old is braver than X number of people in Afghanistan? And, Erica didn't have DECADES lead time and 20 years of our brave men and women protecting her.

    I'm not saying that I LIKE the idea of these thugs taking over. I'm saying that I'm disappointed in people that have been given the support, protection, finances and cooperation they needed to get their house in order and they didn't do a damn thing with it.

    What the hell did our soldiers die for?

    What the hell did our soldiers sustain permanent injuries for?


    You want to talk about psychology. How do you think this feels to our brave men and women that made it out alive to see that NOTHING they did made any kind of difference for these people. What about their mental health? These people left their friends and family to go protect other people's friends and family and this is the "thanks" they get - Yeah, thanks for covering my @ss for the past 20 years but I didn't retain anything I learned while you were here. That's BS every day including Sundays.

    Spoiler alert: Skip ahead. They aren't going to do anything different than what they are doing and have been doing - NOTHING. Not one move toward developing their own independence, own police and own government.

    If you taught school for 20 years and your students came back for a visit and were still dumb as hell...would you KEEP teaching them?

    If we have TRILLIONS of dollars to spend on other people's kids...why can't we spend it on ours?

    At least there would be a return on the investment.
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2021
  16. Durandal

    Durandal Well-Known Member Donor

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    People are fundamentally the same everywhere, including in Afghanistan. The way they think and behave now is based on what they have been through, and it has hardly been an easy situation for them.
     
  17. MJ Davies

    MJ Davies Well-Known Member

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    Is that your final answer or do you want to phone a friend?

    NEW FLASH * EXTRA * EXTRA * READ ALL ABOUT IT

    If people are the same everywhere, why do we have a strong military and police force and they don't? Who came here with trillions of dollars, twenty years and thousands of soldiers? Apparently that chapter was missing from my history books.
     
  18. Injeun

    Injeun Well-Known Member

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    It should be noted that we trained the Afghan military for twenty years. They outnumbered the Taliban by four to one and were much better armed. They could have handily defeated the Taliban. The only way the Taliban could have beaten them is if they did not fight. Consequently this tells me that Afghans in general prefer the Taliban to rule them, than they to rule themselves. We have done everything humanly possible for them, including shedding our own blood, defeating AL Qaeda and the Taliban and driving the remainder into caves. We have given the Afghan people and military every advantage over their adversaries. What remained was theirs to do and they did not. So be it. But we should have removed all civilians and friendly's before departing with our teeth bared.
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2021
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  19. Sallyally

    Sallyally Well-Known Member Donor

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    A thought provoking article from The Week.
    “Just one member of Congress, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) voted against the authorization for the use of military force in Afghanistan. In an essay published a few days after her lonely vote (the measure passed the House 420-1), she wrote, "I do not dispute the president's intent to rid the world of terrorism — but we have many means to reach that goal, and measures that spawn further acts of terror or that do not address the sources of hatred do not increase our security." Lee, alone among her esteemed colleagues, grasped the concept of blowback. Alone among her colleagues, she recognized that the wars she was being asked to authorize could not possibly achieve their lofty goals. Every other elected member of Congress, on the other hand, gave in to the grandiose and obviously hollow demands of the GWOT, a preview of two decades of handing U.S. presidents blank checks to fight wars that were lost before the troops set foot on the ground.”
    https://theweek.com/politics/100378...=email&refid=81084FB40A0D6A96FE560E28CF1671F3
     
  20. Pollycy

    Pollycy Well-Known Member

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    I voted 'maybe' for only one reason -- that it is mandatory that we can evacuate all American citizens.

    If the Taliban don't allow that with no obstruction or bullshit, then we should tell them flat-out that if they don't, we'll give them another demonstration of our military AIR POWER, like we did in 2001. End of story....
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2021
  21. Pollycy

    Pollycy Well-Known Member

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    Yes, this is FAR worse than even that execrable "Red Line" idiocy that Obama tried to pull in Syria. They still laugh behind the "Messiah's" back over that humiliating debacle....
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2021
  22. Wynn Sayer

    Wynn Sayer Newly Registered

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    Exponentially worse. Although ISIS isn't laughing anymore.
     
    Last edited: Aug 18, 2021
  23. Pollycy

    Pollycy Well-Known Member

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    Quite correct... ISIS isn't happy, but, that certainly wasn't because of anything "Messiah" Obama accomplished....
     
  24. Reasonablerob

    Reasonablerob Well-Known Member

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    And that's why we have mercenaries. We did it to the Sovs, why not the Taliban?
     
  25. Bluesguy

    Bluesguy Well-Known Member Donor

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    When did we send mercenaries into Russia to blow things up and kill the Russian leadership?
     

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