Never suggested he could do something. I said he would have to come out and give a speech and merely reminded of his previous comments. It's now down to him, to tell us what he is going to do, he promised a hard response, I can't wait to see what jibberish he comes out with now - because as you say, what can he do though? ISIS-K have just stuck two fingers up to the Americans and the West, and laughed in the face of 9/11 victims. They can't show the images on TV, because they are too horrific, and it's going to be far far greater than 13 dead, as a reporter has said.
They're still using a lot of small arms from the 70s and 80s. They do buy a lot of their weapons though. I read somewhere that they rely heavily on taxing opium farmers and heroin chemists in their territories and they make something like $300 million a year from that alone. Like I mentioned in the thread, they also received funding from al-Qaeda's wealthy Gulf backers in exchange for giving al-Qaeda a base of operations but that probably dried up years ago after al-Qaeda's assets were frozen or seized. The weapons they've seized from the Afghan Army, however, is a completely different situation. They now have access to artillery, armoured vehicles, tanks and even aircraft. There'll be a transitioning period but the Taliban will transform from a militia-type organisation that mainly used small arms into a fully-fledged professional military with state-of-the-art equipment given to the Afghan Army from Uncle Sam. They could even become a regional power on par with Iran or Pakistan.
Loads mate. The Americans left a base full off them, I've saw the videos at the beginning of all this, guns, rockets the lot.
Probably. I always said they were fooking useless and nothing has changed my opinion of that. Now sometime tonight, Biden will try to string a sentence together for World TV.
In the videos I saw, they had at least a container load of weapons and more. Then add to all that the video of weapons that Gessa put up.
The biggest challenge for the Taliban will be how they approach urban governance. They're predominantly rural Pashtun tribals who practice a really ancient and traditional form of local governance that pre-dates even Islam called 'Pashtunwali'. Hard to imagine how they apply this to cities like Kabul.
Here's something else to consider. Iran will NOT want ISIS K or any other terrorist organisation succeeding in Afghan. They've had the U.S. on both sides of their borders (iraq and afghan) and they'll be happy now the Americans are out of Afghan, both militarily and strategically. Iran, even though they're odeologically opposed to the Taliban, will want them to provide some stability in the region. There is also an uneasy marriage of convenience between Iran and Al Qaeda. They have no shared existential aims except to use each other for their own gains, otherwise they are ideologically opposed. But part of this uneasy relationship involves Iran giving sanctuary to many of the top leaders of Al Qaeda. And whilst those leaders need Iran's cover, ironically this means that Al Qaeda won't be allowed by Iran to operate in Afghanistan.
4 US soldiers confirmed dead, Fox News reporting as many as 10. How the future came to bite him... https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-american-troops-not-die-afghanistan-year-last-us-death
It's a massive fook up mate, just been listening to a former Royal Marine who can't get out. He's had guns shoved in his face had tear gas thrown where him and the people he is trying to get out. He's dead man walking unless he can get out, he's been through endless Taliban check-points and he's saying the problem is something to do with some instruction Biden had given out regarding passports, he is firmly putting the blame on Biden. He looked exhausted but he's a Marine so he ain't going to give up. Reckons there is loads of British passport holders still there, he has physically seen them. Total of US Troops now being suggested as high as 12. Biden's shot himself well and truly in the arse.
Honestly after spending 2 trillion dollars, losing 2500 soldiers and 20000 more being injured without achieving peace in Afghanistan... Losing 12 soldiers in the withdrawal is terrible, but I don't think it's going to hurt him. Hate to make deaths about statistics, but its a small fraction of the lives wasted over there already.
No? He made a big thing of saying NO soldiers had been killed in 18 months, yet he managed to get 12 killed in the stroke of a pen. So much for saving those families heartache.
None in 18 months. That's great. 12 dead now. That's terrible. Ultimately though, like Vietnam and Korea, it's an unwinnable war. It's a never ending life-drain. Already lost 2,500 men. How many more should we lose before pulling out? Even if we didn't lose any more men for another 18months. How many would be injured, amputated, or go home with PTSD? We lost the war, cut the loses and pull out.
American's have done what they always do mate, and you've highlighted two of those ocassions, anything they touch they fook up. Probably 60 civilians dead, 100's injured, around 12 US soldiers....oh well, it's ok because Biden says it's worth it. The guy is a total spanner.
Obviously, in hindsight Afghanistan was a complete failure and we've now had four Presidents during the war and none of them have made it "better". Simple fact is, we're past the point in history where you can just go to another country and reliably set up your own puppet government there. It kinda worked in Iraq, but even that spawned ISIS. Everywhere else we've tried to set up puppet governments in the last 100 years have failed. The Soviet Union managed it in Europe for a while, but only with the constant threat of military intervention.
Septics: "let's go and occupy a country whose people can't stand us and drive them into the arms of ideologically-motivated shepherds/farmers with AKs. It will be over by Christmas once we kick these savages' asses!" Didn't work in Vietnam; didn't work in Afghanistan. You'd think they'd learn from Vietnam since US media referred to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in '79 as 'the USSR's Vietnam' but no, they decided to go in anyway.
The invasion of Afghanistan didn't even make sense, really. Their justification was that the Taliban were harbouring al-Qaeda operatives and providing a base for training and preparing attacks on the West, and after 9/11 there was widespread public support for the invasion. So what about the Saudis or the other Gulf states? The Taliban reluctantly let al-Qaeda operate in their territories in return for money but where did the money to begin with? Most of the 9/11 attackers were Saudi nationals, as was Bin Laden. Most of the funding for al-Qaeda and ISIS today come from either Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain or the UAE. I find it hard to believe the Americans didn't have adequate intel regarding the main source of funding for Sunni jihadist groups pre-9/11 and I find it even harder to believe that the governments and royal families of the Gulf states don't have links to terror-funding either. They picked Afghanistan/Taliban as the boogeyman after 9/11 because they knew public opinion demanded an armed response but they didn't want to upset the apple cart with their oil-producing 'allies' in the Gulf and thought a group of Pashtun tribals with AKs would be an easy target to satisfy the Amercan public's thirst for war.
