Aug 15, 2021

Twenty years after being removed from power in a U.S.-led invasion, Taliban militiamen swept to into Afghanistan's capital, Kabul, on Sunday, facing little resistance from Afghan government forces.

Within hours, Afghanistan's Washington-backed president had left the country and the flag at the U.S. Embassy had been lowered amid a hasty evacuation of diplomatic personnel.

Ashraf Ghani, Afghanistan's president, said on Facebook that his was "a hard choice," but that he decided to leave to prevent bloodshed. He signed off his post with "Long Live Afghanistan." The Taliban released a statement saying they had entered the capital of 6 million people and were working to restore law and order.

On Saturday, the militia's fighters took the last remaining government stronghold of Mazar-e-Sharif, followed quickly on Sunday by the city of Jalalabad, which lies just east of Kabul on a major road artery.

By Sunday, Kabul was a scene eerily reminiscent of the fall of Saigon in 1975 in the wake of the Vietnam War, as helicopters circled the U.S. embassy as its diplomatic personnel were under evacuation orders. The comparison to Vietnam was one that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was keen to dismiss: "This is not Saigon. We went to Afghanistan 20 years ago with one mission, and that mission was to deal with the folks who attacked us on 9/11 and we succeeded in that mission," he told CNN's State of the Union.

alert on Sunday, the U.S. embassy cautioned of reports that Kabul's airport was "taking fire" and that "we are instructing U.S. citizens to shelter in place." A U.S. military official told NPR the airport was closed to commercial aircraft as military evacuations continue.

Earlier, the White House had ordered about 5,000 troops to be sent to Afghanistan to provide security and assist in evacuations of U.S. personnel. The Pentagon confirmed on Sunday another 1,000 would head there as well.

An ignoble end to America's longest war
The day's events were a dramatic coda to America's longest war, prompted by the Taliban's refusal to hand over Osama bin Laden in the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Within weeks of the attacks on New York and Washington, D.C., U.S.-led forces invaded the country, toppling the Taliban by year's end.

But that involvement stretched from months into years. Since then, more than 2,400 U.S. service members, some 3,800 American contractors, more than 1,100 other allied service members, and an estimated 66,000 Afghan national military and police have lost their lives due to the conflict, along with more than 47,000 civilians, according to Brown University's Costs of War Project.


ASIA
4 Reasons A Taliban Takeover In Afghanistan Matters To The World
Ultimately, the U.S. price tag for two decades in Afghanistan runs as high as $2.26 trillion, including the cost of rebuilding the Afghan government and training its military.

Blinken on Sunday sounded a note of bitterness over the rapid collapse of the 300,000-strong U.S.-trained Afghan security forces, which "proved incapable of defending the country" — an eventuality that "did happen more rapidly than we anticipated," he acknowledged.

That sentiment was echoed by the former NATO supreme allied commander, Ret. Adm. James Stavridis: "You can buy all the equipment in the world, but you can't purchase leadership or political will or in particular, battlefield will," Stavridis told NPR's Weekend Edition. "And therefore, we see this ghosting of the Afghan army. It's quite heartbreaking."



Meanwhile, on the ground in Kabul, chaos and fear were the order of the day as the Taliban — with their well-deserved reputation for repression and brutality, particularly toward women and ethnic and religious minorities — began taking charge.



People line up outside Azizi Bank to take out cash as the Taliban close in on the capital Kabul on Sunday.

Haroon Sabawoon/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
"Thieves, robbers, all the looters are out"
Many Afghans waited in long lines at banks to withdraw money, concerned about what might happen to their savings under a new regime.

One resident, who NPR is not identifying to protect from possible reprisals, described chaos in the capital.

tweeted late Sunday that he'd just returned from the western part of the capital, "where this evening there were extraordinary scenes of Taliban fighters leaving the capital in captured Humvees and police trucks, brandishing M16s, cheered on by crowds of bystanders, chased by packs of children."

In a series of tweets, former Afghan President Hamid Karzai says he, along with Abdullah Abdullah, who represented the Afghan government in earlier negotiations with the Taliban, and head of the Hezb-i-Islami party and former warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, were forming a "coordinating council" to "prevent chaos and reduce the suffering of the people and to better manage the affairs related to peace."

But with the Taliban holding virtually all the cards, it wasn't clear what, if anything, such a council or an interim government could do.

The White House and a former Trump official point fingers
As the final offensive against the capital seemed all but certain on Saturday, President Biden issued a statement that sought to distance his administration from the unfolding outcome, emphasizing that the peace agreement that promised the withdrawal of all U.S. forces from Afghanistan had been hammered out under former President Donald Trump.

"I inherited a deal cut by my predecessor," Biden said. It left the Taliban "in the strongest position militarily since 2001 and imposed a May 1, 2021 deadline on U.S. forces."

"Shortly before he left office, he also drew U.S. forces down to a bare minimum of 2,500," Biden said.

Speaking on Fox News Sunday, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who was instrumental in negotiating the Trump administration's peace deal with the Taliban, blamed the Biden White House for the debacle.

"It looks like the Biden administration has just failed in its execution of its own plan," Pompeo said.

As recently as Friday, State Department spokesperson Ned Price told NPR that the White House was still counting on Afghan security forces to stand up and fight against the Taliban.

"What we know, what we're confident in is that the Afghan National Security Forces do have a sizeable force. What we need to see now is that put to use in an effective way," he said.

The Taliban victory and the evacuation of the U.S. embassy cut short a special immigrant visa program for Afghan interpreters and others who had assisted the American effort in the country and might now face reprisals from the Taliban.

Price said on Friday that the U.S. had been "dramatically scaling up that operation."

"We have been able to bring to their new lives here in the United States 1,200 Afghans to date," he told NPR.

Even so, he said: "We realize that is insufficient given the scale of the number of Afghans who have put themselves, potentially put their families, at risk to help us."

 

Aug 15, 2021

*Nelson munt*
Ha - ha

 

Aug 16, 2021

we lost this war on March 20th 2003.

 

Aug 16, 2021

this is terrible man

 

Aug 16, 2021

This outcome would've happened at some point regardless. Whether we left years ago. Or now. Or 10 years from now. Or 20 years from now.

 

Aug 16, 2021

People not understanding the concept of Sunk Cost Fallacy

 

Aug 16, 2021

Fantastic now they all go to germany f--- you

 

Aug 16, 2021

Very much a d---ed if you do, dammed if you don’t situation. If the U.S. remains a military presence, they’re greedy imperialists fighting endless wars in the Middle East with no real end game—not to mention the financial cost/American death toll. If they leave, they’re throwing away 20 years of attempted nation building & numerous human rights advancements in Afghanistan + a strategic geopolitical ally in the Middle East/Asia.

Like I’ve said previously about other foreign policy issues: there’s no silver bullet or correct answer. This is all about damage control. These issues are extremely complicated. It’s hard to say whether pulling out of Afghanistan was the correct decision at this point. I was skeptical of the decision but understood, politically, it was one Biden felt comfortable with making. Perhaps hitting a hard reset, even if it worsens the U.S.‘s influence/position in the region, is what’s needed for a more feasible pathway forward in the future.

 

Aug 16, 2021

There are a lot of generalizations/oversimplifications in here but sure, it’s undoubtedly true the U.S. has made some very bad foreign policy decisions that have contributed to major issues/conflicts now. I don’t dispute that at all.

Just to be clear though: the U.S. invaded Afghanistan because they were harboring the terrorist organization responsible for 9/11. Now, I think a lot of people agree, myself included, that the invasion was short sighted & reactionary. It was a horrid decision made by a country that was hurting & looking for vengeance (both in terms of public opinion & political elites). That context can’t be lost in the trees.

 

Aug 16, 2021

Um pretty sure there were like 100 9ther factors involved, not just 9/11

 

Aug 16, 2021

sry guys @Enigma is right

 

Aug 16, 2021

I was alive and politically active pre-9/11.

The Republican Party, Neo Cons, George W. Bush and the Military Industrial Complex didn't really want a war with Afghanistan.

During the summer of 2001 before September Fox News and Talk Radio was pushing for a war with China... with little traction. In April China forced down one of our spy planes and kept the crew of 25 Americans for 10 days. That was the biggest talking point for a war with China... and it was weak... but they pushed for it.


When 9/11 happened it was shown that Americans couldn't tell Arabs from Persians, Saudi's from Afghans, Shiites from Sunnis and Muslims from Sikhs.

Bush never really wanted to invade Afghanistan and take on the Taliban... h---, just a couple years before 9/11 he invited the Taliban to Texas as governor to discuss giving Texas companies some oil Pipelining and Processing work... the only time they had been to America... even though W. never left the North American continent before his Presidency (except to go to Israel) he was very familiar with all the Saudi Arabian Royals and his dad was business partners with Usama bin Laden's father.

Who he didn't like was Saddam... and the country he thought he could turn into a pro-america ally was Iraq.

He didn't want to invade Afghanistan... but he thought it was necessary to start a war in Iraq since Afghanistan was harboring AL Qaeda and Usama bin Laden.

But honestly he could have just gone to Iraq and let Usama bin Laden and AL Qaeda stay in Afghanistan... and not lose any Republican votes or the hero worship he recieved from them in the 2000s.

 

Aug 16, 2021

If the Biden administration deserves any criticism, it’s for the plans to evacuate Afghans who assisted the U.S. military & U.S. officials in the country. Kabul falling was inevitable. A lot of these people should have been taken out of the country weeks if not months ago.

 

Aug 16, 2021

If not now... when would it be a good time to leave Afghanistan?


Republicans are going back to being useless NeoCons.

Bush43 was asleep at the wheel during 9/11.
He started 2 forever wars.

He let bin Laden get away.

Obama got bin Laden and ended the War in Iraq.

Trump released 5,000 Taliban fighters.

Biden ended the War in Afghanistan.