Eminently preventable, but our military was too concerned with being woke to make adequate preparations.
“Taliban pick up billions’ worth of US weapons left for Afghan military,” AFP, August 14, 2021:
KABUL: The US spent billions supplying the Afghan military with the tools to defeat the Taliban, but the rapid capitulation of the armed forces means that weaponry is now fuelling the insurgents’ astonishing battlefield successes.
“We provided our Afghan partners with all the tools — let me emphasise: all the tools,” US President Joe Biden said when defending his decision to withdraw American forces and leave the fight to the locals.
But Afghan defence forces have shown little appetite for that fight and, in their tens of thousands, have been laying down their arms — only for the Taliban to immediately pick them up.
The Taliban’s social media is awash with videos of Taliban fighters seizing weapons caches — the majority supplied by Western powers.
Footage of Afghan soldiers surrendering in the northern city of Kunduz shows army vehicles loaded with heavy weapons and mounted with artillery guns safely in the hands of the insurgent rank and file.
In the western city of Farah, fighters patrolled in a car marked with an eagle swooping on a snake — the official insignia of the country’s intelligence service.
While US forces took the “sophisticated” equipment with them when they withdrew, the Taliban blitz has handed the group “vehicles, humvees, small arms and light weapons, as well as ammunition”, Justine Fleischner of weapons-tracking group Conflict Armament Research, told AFP….
CogitoErgoSum says
I noticed that this past Friday marked the 500th anniversary of the fall of Tenochtitlan to Cortes. If the Spanish had followed the tactics and diplomacy used by the U.S. in Afghanistan we would probably still be witnessing human sacrifice and cannibalism in all of Central America and probably North and South America too – perhaps even in Europe. Oh well, maybe there’s still a chance.
Wellington says
20 years in Afghanistan and for what?
This is what can be expected when you either don’t identify the enemy or don’t go all out to win. At least in Vietnam, America properly identified the enemy, i.e., Communism, but it still didn’t go all out to win (the politician’s fault in the case of Vietnam and not the military’s),
Now, it’s gotten worse, to wit, in Afghanistan the enemy is Islam and not properly identified and we once again never went all out to win.
Dumbing down. Big time. And made all the worse because the most powerful office in the world is now held by a one-time mediocre man who is now a mediocre man with dementia. Not lookin’ good.
Daniel Triplett says
Agreed.
From 9/11 on, our fundamental flaws in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Global Islamic War:
#1: The Oval didn’t correctly identify our enemy
#2: The Oval prohibited the strategies, tactics, and Rules of Engagement necessary to force the surrender of our enemy even if he had correctly identified our enemy
mortimer says
The enemy is political Islam, and the US government did nothing to fight the ideology.
They maintained the fiction that Islam is benign. Islam is NOT benign.
James Lincoln says
Daniel Triplett,
100% correct on both counts.
And the cost in both blood and treasure has been enormous…
gravenimage says
Grimly true.
Walter Sieruk says
This is yet another example of the outcome the terrible folly and horrible judgement of that awful man who officially but not legally the current President ofthe United States, Joe Biden.
So much so that it’s very fitting to reiterate a very important message ,which is the following.
The cruel violent murderous Taliban also engages in looting . The Taliban now has stolen much US military equipment including American Blackhawk helicopters and US Humvees ,which they will use, no doubt, to murder many ofthe people of Afghanistan in their evil Islamic quest. The rest of the people of Afghanistan they let live will have to suffer under the brutal oppression of Sharia law.
Much of this awful Taliban chaos and malicious deadly mayhem of the invading and hostile Taliban takeover of Afghanistan is the result of that very incompetent ,wisdomless and ignorant bogue president Joe Biden.
Biden is so mentally unfit to be an American President is a reality that was observed that once when giving a short lecture Biden declared “The same stable Jesus said that the biggest problem we had in the Revolutionary war is that we didn’t have enough airports.”
Wow ! The USA has a mush brain for her Chief Executive . Poor America , how I pity her now
Walter Sieruk says
That Taliban being able to steal all this United States weaponry is the result of the incompetent,bungling Biden who is a disgrace to the Office of the US Presidency and a national well as an international catastrophe.
Rufluc says
Because of the largest fraud in history that the Democrats pulled off, and the Marxist administration that has been installed with a doddering old fool as its head, allied troops were pulled out far too quick, and too much emphasis was placed on the Afghan military to take over. It was as if a child had made the decision to pull out.
Biden is an incompetent fool, blinded by political correctness and wokery! Trump needs to retake control so that some semblance of order and control is established.
The democrats have caused this debacle, and they should be severely punished for it!
gravenimage says
Taliban pick up US weaponry left for Afghan military, worth billions of dollars
…………………
Deeply foolish. It has been obvious for years now that the Afghan army could not–or would not–defend against the Taliban. Nothing should have been left there for them to seize. But the whole past 18 or so years in Afghanistan have been an exercize in futility or worse.
Infidel says
We should have taken all our weaponry w/ us, instead of leaving them in the hands of the Afghan surrender-monkeys
Goofy says
Nobody is that foolish or incompetent. My guess is that the Biden handlers have done this to ensure some appreciation from the new rulers of Afghanistan.
What they don’t realise is that all kindness is construed as weakness.
b c jain says
In 2001/2002 ,defeated Talibani fighters returned to camps , madarasa situated in Balochistan , On border of Pakistan they were welcomed by Jamiat E Ulma, extremist groups of Pakistan with fresh clothes, foods, shelter and envelopes with money .Custom officials, ISI officials , frontier constabulary guards For Pakistan they were future of Afghanistan and now Pakistan proved it…….now world will face THE RISE OF MILITANT ISLAM IN NEIGHBOUR.
OLD GUY says
Hey who care our military supply corporations already made their profit off of those weapons and equipment. They can now sell another billion dollars worth to our military at the tax payer expense. What a system. Never ending wars never ending military contracts and kick backs. And we can’t even control our own borders.