22 Afghan Commandos executed by the Taliban

[Epic Beard Man]

What saddens me is human beings have to die...

 

[danieldemol]

Right. Then let the Taliban take over and everything we fought and died for was for nothing. For sure, the Taliban take over will be complete. If we go with your plan the women, men, and children will be subject to the same extremism they once lived in and this time it'll be much worse.

It looks to me like they will be subject to the same extremism anyway over a pile of dead Afghan troops.

I'm all for bravery but I don't believe in suicide missions which look like they won't have any effect.

In my opinion.

 

[Jose Fly]

That's how wars like this tend to go now. We go in with a strategic objective (get Bin Laden, push the Taliban out) and a humanitarian objective (liberate the Afghan people from brutal oppression, help them build a more modern country), and while the strategic objectives are usually fairly easy because we have, by far, the most powerful military in the world, the humanitarian objective is what bogs us down.

It's a lot like Iraq, where we defeated what was billed as the 4th largest military in the world in a matter of weeks. But the nation-building and humanitarian parts are what kept us there for so long.

The days where a country would conquer another and completely take it over are gone. The days where a country would bring an entire country to its knees and force unconditional surrender are also over. Now the expectation is that you go in, only take out "the bad guys" while not harming anyone else, and then help "the good guys" build the country back the way they want it while keeping the bad guys at bay. That's nothing more than a recipe for perpetual occupation and war, especially in a place like Afghanistan.

Hopefully the US has learned its lesson, in that the "war on terror" is not best fought via large-scale military intervention, but instead via small-scale special force style actions. Sneak in, take out the terrorist targets, then sneak back out (and use intelligence to infiltrate and spy on enemies to prevent attacks before they happen).

Of course that leaves open the question of whether the US military should be used for humanitarian missions, and if so, to what degree? It's one thing to distribute food to starving people, it's something else entirely to try and modernize a country where many don't want you there in the first place.

Just spitballing more here......I also think about the concept of helping oppressed people in other parts of the world. That's a noble goal, but a fundamental issue is whether you help them by getting them out of the region, or if you try and help them while leaving them where they're at. The former is relatively easy, whereas the latter requires you to stay there and protect them as long as they need it, because if you bail on them before they're fully secure, you've likely created two enemies....the original oppressor and now the people you betrayed.

As with most things, there are no simple answers.

 

[Brickjectivity]

Yea, you put them in black sites where nobody can reach them, and torture them for years on end.

That's what a civilized, enlightened nation like the US would do, at least.

The Republicans, anyway. The nation repented of that sin recently, but the guilt is still on us. I suspect the Democrats would have done the same, but its hard to tell for sure. I don't think its something we think is civilized.

 

[Epic Beard Man]

It looks to me like they will be subject to the same extremism anyway over a pile of dead Afghan troops.

I'm all for bravery but I don't believe in suicide missions which look like they won't have any effect.

In my opinion.

And I thought you were a utilitarian.

 

[Kooky]

The Republicans, anyway. The nation repented of that sin recently, but the guilt is still on us. I suspect the Democrats would have done the same, but its hard to tell for sure. I don't think its something we think is civilized.

I strongly doubt that this is was ever a partisan issue; that was, in my opinion, the American military-intelligence complex acting as it always did. And it doesn't look like any US administration of the past 40 years has seen fit to reign them in.

 

[danieldemol]

And I thought you were a utilitarian.

I had to look up what a utilitarian is lol
From wikipedia, 'Utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for all affected individuals'.
So in light of the apparent unpopularity of the war in Afghanistan, what do you propose as the actions that maximise happiness and well-being for all concerned, would a pointless suicide mission fit the bill?

 

[Epic Beard Man]

I had to look up what a utilitarian is lol
From wikipedia, 'Utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for all affected individuals'.
So in light of the apparent unpopularity of the war in Afghanistan, what do you propose as the actions that maximise happiness and well-being for all concerned, would a pointless suicide mission fit the bill?

In a perfect warlike world, complete elimination of the Taliban. But like Vietnam, they'll just hide or blend in with the people until it rears its ugly head. This is why I call any extremely difficult terrorist organization a Hydra because you can cut off one head of the beast another will take its place. I'm against YOUR suggestion by evacuating all the troops and leaving the men, women, children, and old at the hands of the Taliban. What is the use of military if it abandons its people? I submit the following pertinent video:

Spoiler: Strong Language Viewer Discretion Advised

I chose that video because like the majority of those who serve in the military, you sign up to give your life for your country which includes the people that live within it. So I would highly doubt any Afghanistanian military men would leave their homeland for a safe haven and most would give their lives to protect the people.

 

[Brickjectivity]

I strongly doubt that this is was ever a partisan issue; that was, in my opinion, the American military-intelligence complex acting as it always did. And it doesn't look like any US administration of the past 40 years has seen fit to reign them in.

Could be. I know that president Trump fired a lot of ambassador and their staff. There was a lot of complaining when he did that. I don't know what happened behind the scenes. Each presidential candidate changes a bit when they get into office. For example Pres. Obama thought he could banish Abu Graib, until the day after he was elected. Apparently there were things he didn't know right up until he was elected. I'm inclined to agree.

 

[Kooky]

I find it frustrating how persistently people still cling to the myth that the NATO war in Afghanistan was at any point "humanitarian" in nature. We are talking about frequent air strikes against civilian populations, war crimes against civilians under suspicion of "terrorism", as well as massive atrocities committed by the Afghan warlords and gang leaders allied to and supported by NATO.

Human Rights Watch - who admittedly carry an intrinsic political bias against war crimes and human rights abuses - has documented a massive number of atrocities committed by all sides of the conflict, including NATO forces and those allied to them.

The United States was inevitably linked to the abuses of its allies: In November 2001, Dostum’s forces massacred as many as 2,000 Taliban prisoners who were captured or had surrendered outside Kunduz. I visited the mass grave – littered with human hair and clothes – in February 2002, and later interviewed a survivor who had hidden, wounded, under a pile of bodies and escaped before the bulldozers came to bury the bodies. (The area, called Dasht-e Laili, has thousands of graves, including those of Hazara victims massacred by the Taliban in 1998, and Taliban prisoners killed by a Dostum rival in 1997).

War crimes against Taliban prisoners also occurred in the south. In early 2002, former Taliban wrote to the new Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, offering to lay down arms and recognize the government. Instead, Gul Agha Sherzai, a powerful tribal leader the United States embraced, later accused of corruption, had them imprisoned and tortured by the National Directorate of Security (NDS), the intelligence agency created by the CIA in the months after the Taliban’s collapse. Others accused of Taliban links – whether true or not – also died under torture in NDS prisons or at CIA black sites. Some ended up at Guantanamo Bay. A number who were released or escaped later remobilized and helped lead the Taliban resurgence.

There’s a popular perception that except for an occasional mistake, civilian casualties from U.S. airstrikes are rare. Some civilian casualties were the result of deliberate misinformation provided by Afghan leaders to target rivals, like the December 23, 2001, airstrike that killed some 65 elders traveling to Kabul for Karzai’s inauguration. Despite evidence to the contrary, U.S. officials claimed for months the elders were al-Qaeda members. But it remains publicly unclear what led to mass civilian casualties in other strikes over the years, since the U.S. military has so often refused to release complete information about its investigations, even in cases with as many as 90 dead. For example, in Gardez in December 2003, when a US A-10 Warthog aircraft gunned down nine children in broad daylight. Or the massive sustained airstrikes in 2009, in western Farah province, that killed almost 100 civilians – mostly children – some of whom were blown into unrecognizable pieces.

Air operations were only part of it. Today, Australia is grappling with the fallout of serious allegations about a pattern of potential war crimes its special forces committed during raids in Uruzgan province that included murdering children, kicking detainees off cliffs, and planting weapons on men whom they had summarily executed. The alleged crimes echo those of U.S. special forces, including the never-prosecuted 2012 murders of 17 civilians who were detained and tortured to death in Nerkh district. Afghan victims of such crimes never saw justice – which is why the International Criminal Court has sought an investigation into crimes by all parties to the conflict, including the U.S. military and CIA, as well as the Taliban and Afghan government forces. The U.S. response has been to reject the ICC’s jurisdiction and try to shut down any investigation.

 

[Alex22]

So the U.S spent 20 years there and couldn't defeat the Taliban? what exactly did they achieve there

 

[Kooky]

So the U.S spent 20 years there and couldn't defeat the Taliban? what exactly did they achieve there

They killed and tortured a whole bunch of people.

 

[Wildswanderer]

Wow they really don't know how to win. You don't execute people who surrender, because then nobody surrenders.

This is what happened to some of our troops in the second world war... When it came to the Nazi SS, they begin to realize that they were better off to die fighting then to surrender.

 

[danieldemol]

I'm against YOUR suggestion by evacuating all the troops and leaving the men, women, children, and old at the hands of the Taliban. What is the use of military if it abandons its people?

Well we are not in a "perfect" world where the Taliban can be completely eliminated.

We could vet those men, women children and old who dont believe in blasphemy and/or apostasy laws for import. The rest deserve the Taliban.

The use of a military which abandons its people is the same as the usefulness of a dead military to them. However a live military could be useful to us if they are given the opportunity to evacuate.

But we will see how it plays out. Maybe the Afghan troops will be able to hold enough ground in the metropolitan areas to give part of the Afghan people a decent life and I certainly wish them well in that. I did read this article which says "Analysts fear that as US troops withdraw the whole country may fall to the Taliban within six months" 1 So it may be better just to evacuate who we can in the time we have to do it.

1 'Heartbreaking atrocities': Embassy says videos show Afghan civilians being tortured, murdered by Taliban

 

[Alex22]

They killed and tortured a whole bunch of people.

That did not answer my question.

 

[Kooky]

That did not answer my question.

I think it did.

 

[Alex22]

I think it did.

Nope, why couldn't the U.S defeat the Taliban after 20 years of being there?

 

[Kooky]

Nope, why couldn't the U.S defeat the Taliban after 20 years of being there?

Some possible reasons:

• The US never went into Afghanistan to defeat the Taliban in the first place, and so had no idea or concrete plans for it
  
• The Taliban were - and possibly still are - supported by two major US allies in the region, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan.
• NATO anti-civilian tactics and their alliance with the Northern warlords caused outrage and resentment among the Pashtun population, which had already been a fertile ground for Taliban recruits in the late 1990s
• NATO occupation was a complete trainwreck that had no clear strategy or objective in mind and could not settle on which bloodthirsty anti-Taliban warlord they wanted to support, causing a revolving door of US puppet regimes and local allies that would be discarded once their atrocities inevitably cale to light and they became unbearable for Western media (see e.g. Dostum) and/or were too corrupt even by the standards of Afghan government (see e.g. Karzai)
• The oil pipeline project that had originally fuelled US business interest in the region was abandoned due to the endemic political instability and security issues, so there was no push from inside the US to actually put some effort into the war

 

[Alex22]

They defeated the Taliban government and then the Americans spent 20 years on their asses causing hundreds of deaths among American/European forces ? The Taliban controls like 85 percent of Afghan territory or something, I guess the old quote is right that the area is the graveyard of Empires.

 

[esmith]

As in Vietnam, when you fight a war with one hand tied behind your back you will probably lose.