Say what you will about the shit job that the US military industrial complex has done in this region, but I can't help but feel that the real horror of the withdrawal is that 50% of the country's population is being condemned to what is essentially slavery.

Your concern is a valid one, but its hypocritical if the US Administration mentions that. Does not seem to be a concern when dealing with allies like Saudi Arabia as long as the oil keeps flowing.

Where is the US administration? Not a single press briefing or president communication for 48 hours...

From yesterday:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases...

I completely agree.

The most striking thing to me is the incoherence. It’s as if a bunch of sprawling, unaccountable bureaucracies —- the White House, the Pentagon, the CIA, the State Department, Congress, the DNC, the MIC —- were prosecuting essentially independent agendas that could co-exist under the fog of a forever war, but someone accidentally triggered the exit routine and rather than graceful closure you see the incoherent stuttering of a bunch of zombie processes.

My feeling is that we tried. We tried for 20 years. It didn't work.

At some point, you have to throw in the towel and cut your losses—even when those losses are really, unimaginably terrible. 20 years is certainly past that point.

There's a lot of good we could do in the world with the resources we put into Afghanistan.

Completely agree.

The problem is the population never owned the country. They didn't liberate themselves. And they're at home as conquered populace.

Someday the west will learn that Democracy can't be "gifted". People have to want it. People have to fight and die for it. And then, and only then, maybe, you'll get democracy.

The only chance that women in the article will see any freedom again, is if she take up arms start shooting the people who say "you can't".

> The only chance that women in the article will see any freedom again, is if she take up arms start shooting the people who say "you can't".

I wish Americans stopped viewing social change as a matter of shooting bad guys. The entire Afghanistan debacle is, in a sense, America giving people an endless supply of guns, saying "Can't you guys just shoot all the bad guys? Come on! We'll give you as much ammo as you want!"

Fat good it did anyone.

I think what GP meant is that the revolution needs to be initiated by the country's people. (Which, yes, would involve a lot more than a few people grabbing their guns.)

I think if you look at the history of the worlds current democracies you'll find that most came about through armed revolution.

America, for example, was armed by the French during their revolutionary war. I'd say that result was exceptional.

France's most recent armed revolution also resulted in representative state.

They could learn from the Kurds: women can fight just like men can. Hoping that someone else will fight your war for you will leave you vulnerable and disappointed.

So simple! Some people dont want to fight or see the violence.

/s

What you said is really out of touch.

Violence is real, impossible to argue with, and afterward leaves only one person standing to guide the future.

There is a reason why the most willing to employ it stay in control. If you don't believe this is the case. Think next time about the first thing a cop does when things don't go as planned.

They call for more backup. More violence.

It is the fundamental unpleasantness and unsatisfactory dissonance with the ideal of a civil society that keeps us from seeing or presenting the world as such, but when the chips are down; are you willing to make the other SOB in your way die for he believes is right is the most pertinent question.

It ain't pretty, but fail to recognize it at your own peril.

Yes and its exactly like this for our slightly less sapient animal siblings. "I'm hungry. You look like food.

"I don't want to be food. I'm running away".

The outcome is boolean. And an order emerges in form of a balance between prey and predator.

I've always wondered if the same pattern isn't also true about human societies. Yielding a spectrum: Aggressive and passive. Powerful and weak. Representative and authoritarian.

This is the kind of thing that could force a president to resign.

I highly doubt that. I think in most Americans' minds Afghanistan has been an abject failure for years. It has not been among the main talking points of this administration or the one before it. I believe most Americans will just be relieved it's done, and won't care what happens there next.

Afghanistan intervention has been popular in America. What hasn't been popular is the plan and execution of the intervention. This will continue to be the case.

To add to this administrative insult, US relationship with the collapsing Afghanistan government was ended in the most humiliating way. The collapse was not inevitable.

The US public should not stand for this.

The current mood of the US is that the public does not know what the current administration is doing domestically and abroad. Outside of a few identified 'throw money at a problem' bills the administration is not popular outside of 'at least it is not Trump'.

Vision is lacking and the US cannot legislate out of core structural problems and from this there was improper use of authority by multiple government branches. I do not think congress should have neutered presidential war authority. The US needs better stewardship by every branch and to go back to operating government like intended.

Afghanistan intervention was only popular when it was about getting "revenge" for 9/11. We've wasted a generation's worth of wealth on that place.

I think you're a little off the mark on that one. There is widespread support against demonstrable human rights abusers, particularly with marginalization of women.

The current Taliban have a very good PR person, presenting themselves as moderate. Their actions since the February 2020 agreements have been seen, and opinions have been formed.

If I were a betting man I'd say that they would pay telecom censors top dollar to prevent a further ruffling of feathers of the US public.

Sure there's widespread support. There's widespread support for a lot of things that people don't want to fund indefinitely.

It doesn't mean that there isn't also widespread support for ending indefinite funding to lost causes.

Of the two, the former is far more likely than the latter to move the needle when it is time for people to vote for political candidates.

America has been losing wars for most of my life and no one has resigned. Why is this one any different?

In a few words this is (very likely) permanent.

America hasn't so much lost a war but failed to maintain a coherent political vision.

This has enormous world shaking geopolitical implications that will continue to create a disadvantage to US interests.

If peoples votes mattered then maybe. Biden has learned from Trump that all that matters is control of the party.

Relax masking standards, drop testing, don’t collect state data just like trump and the exact same outcome. But you won’t hear a peep from democrats just like republicans never confronted trump.

Nobody on the left wanted to be involved in Afghanistan in the first place, and the continuation of Trumpian isolationism means that few on the right want anything to do with it either.

It's going to be seen as ultimately regrettable, but people of that region have long showed that their idea of what government is and should be doesn't mesh with our own.