1. #8901
    Merely a Setback PACOX's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kellhound View Post
    Afghanistan would consume China as it has all the other empires that have come and gone.
    Will it? Because China is not going to get involved while trying to spread its ideology, not for a while at least. China does not care what they do. China is looking for someone they can in debt, someone who then owes them a favor when China dumps its power and influence. Same thing China has been doing in various ignored/impoverished/"too hot to work with" countries
    China's approach is different because they don't care goes on within a countries borders as long as they are getting whatever they want out of the deal. So they arent going in with tanks and guns, they are going in with tractors and paychecks.

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  2. #8902
    Void Lord Elegiac's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kellhound View Post
    My ideas are the same as shared by most people in the military.
    Yes, and this explains quite keenly why the US military keeps having to make up conflicts out of whole cloth to keep justifying the bloat required to sustain it ever since it became impossible for Russia to keep parity. Rofl.
    Quote Originally Posted by Marjane Satrapi
    The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we don't know each other, but we talk and understand each other perfectly. The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.

  3. #8903
    Banned Kellhound's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by PACOX View Post
    Will it? Because China is not going to get involved while trying to spread its ideology, not for a while at least. China does not care what they do. China is looking for someone they can in debt, someone who then owes them a favor when China dumps its power and influence. Same thing China has been doing in various ignored/impoverished/"too hot to work with" countries
    China's approach is different because they don't care goes on within a countries borders as long as they are getting whatever they want out of the deal. So they arent going in with tanks and guns, they are going in with tractors and paychecks.
    Doesn't work so well there.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Elegiac View Post
    Yes, and this explains quite keenly why the US military keeps having to make up conflicts out of whole cloth to keep justifying the bloat required to sustain it ever since it became impossible for Russia to keep parity. Rofl.
    If anything, the US military is underfunded for the jobs the politicians keep giving it.

  4. #8904
    Void Lord Elegiac's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kellhound View Post
    If anything, the US military is underfunded for the jobs the politicians keep giving it.
    Which is entirely a result of the military, and their friends in the corporations that supply them or otherwise benefit from America maintaining its imperial interests, pushing said politicians to increase the scope of the military's operations as part of a scam to perpetually plead poverty and justify appropriating huge amounts of public resources on incredibly wasteful enterprises.

    It's almost as if it's some sort of complex between the military and industrial sectors, and trying to fob the blame on politicians is wankery that ignores the politicians themselves are just tools of the industrial sector in our crony capitalist system. /yawn
    Last edited by Elegiac; 2021-07-08 at 08:31 AM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Marjane Satrapi
    The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we don't know each other, but we talk and understand each other perfectly. The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.

  5. #8905
    https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden...9f11f095a95366

    The withdrawal is a mess, but the War in Afghanistan, which has been ongoing for most of my life, will end on August 31. We need to leave, we can no longer do any good over there, if we did much good to begin with.

  6. #8906
    Quote Originally Posted by Edge- View Post
    https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden...9f11f095a95366

    The withdrawal is a mess, but the War in Afghanistan, which has been ongoing for most of my life, will end on August 31. We need to leave, we can no longer do any good over there, if we did much good to begin with.
    Don't worry according to conservatives they say the Chinese will jump right in for the magical 3 trillion in minerals that no ones been able to prove are there or cost effective to get at.....and somehow they will be able to be successful.

    The odd part is the majority of them claim its because the Chinese are brutal. umm...but the old Russian's were cuddle bears?
    Buh Byeeeeeeeeeeee !!

  7. #8907
    The Undying Breccia's Avatar
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    Eager to prove at least one Republican that's not a hypocrite exists, Graham is just as critical of Biden's Afghan exit strategy as he was of Trump's.

    So two things I'm asking President Biden to consider: providing American airpower in support of the Afghan National Security Forces and maintaining a relationship with the Afghan Air Force to make sure it can fly to create an advantage against the Taliban militarily.

    If we do not do this, I fear that al Qaeda and ISIS will reemerge from the ashes of a civil war that's brewing in Afghanistan 20 years after 9/11

  8. #8908
    Quote Originally Posted by Zan15 View Post
    Don't worry according to conservatives they say the Chinese will jump right in for the magical 3 trillion in minerals that no ones been able to prove are there or cost effective to get at.....and somehow they will be able to be successful.

    The odd part is the majority of them claim its because the Chinese are brutal. umm...but the old Russian's were cuddle bears?
    We were pretty brutal ourselves.

    China is more likely to throw infrastructure and food at them.

    If they do, it could very well show that the Chinese method of nation building is superior to the US method of military might.

  9. #8909
    Problem for the Talibs is that they cant govern the country, only make it ungovernable. I doubt AQ or ISIS will reemerge the taliban love killing them too much and dont have any real reason to get into bed with them.

  10. #8910
    The Undying Breccia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by jonnysensible View Post
    Problem for the Talibs is that they cant govern the country, only make it ungovernable.
    The Taliban effectively ruled the country until around Sept 12, 2001. It just wasn't government that you or I would care for. Like, at all.

    The Taliban is a Sunni Islamist nationalist and pro-Pashtun movement founded in the early 1990s that ruled most of Afghanistan from 1996 until October 2001. The movement’s founding nucleus—the word “Taliban” is Pashto for “students”—was composed of peasant farmers and men studying Islam in Afghan and Pakistani madrasas, or religious schools. The Taliban found a foothold and consolidated their strength in southern Afghanistan.

    By 1994, the Taliban had moved their way through the south, capturing several provinces from various armed factions who had been fighting a civil war after the Soviet-backed Afghan government fell in 1992. By September 1996, the Taliban had captured Kabul, killed the country’s president, and established the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The Taliban’s first move was to institute a strict interpretation of Qur‘anic instruction and jurisprudence. In practice, this meant often merciless policies on the treatment of women, political opponents of any type, and religious minorities.

    In the years leading up to the 11 September 2001 attacks in the United States, the Taliban provided a safe haven for al-Qa‘ida. This gave al-Qa‘ida a base in which it could freely recruit, train, and deploy terrorists to other countries. The Taliban held sway in Afghanistan until October 2001, when they were routed from power by the US-led campaign against al-Qa‘ida.
    There's also the soccer field where the Taliban took women who tried to vote and...yeah.

    Don't mistake what the Taliban have been recently for what they were in the past. They can, and will, rule with a set of laws, not standard Western ones or anything a Western world would call "moderate" or even "tolerable".

    I was livid when Trump wanted to negotiate with these people. I mean, yes he worked with Putin and North Korea, but even Trump had to have some standards. I'm not thrilled with fleeing and giving them weapons either, just so we're clear. But my "ideal" situation is 20 years past possible. Of the two situations, I'll at least take the one that doesn't feel like we're legitimizing them, only that we CBA to run the country. Both options suck. One just sucks harder than the other.

    - - - Updated - - -

    A follow-up: China might swoop in and save our ass by deciding the minerals in Afghanistan are worth the hassle.

    I don't know how the Taliban would react to a Chinese "invasion" of this type, but I don't think they hate China as much as they hate US.

  11. #8911
    Quote Originally Posted by Zan15 View Post
    Don't worry according to conservatives they say the Chinese will jump right in for the magical 3 trillion in minerals that no ones been able to prove are there or cost effective to get at.....and somehow they will be able to be successful.

    The odd part is the majority of them claim its because the Chinese are brutal. umm...but the old Russian's were cuddle bears?
    The Chinese plan is basically what the US used to do in the old days refined to perfection. They want strategic assets and friends in places in the world, if they lose a few trillion doing so they don't care they have long term plans. I don't get the whole Chinese are brutal thing they don't seem to care enough to get involved in the political fights themselves they play to whoever is in power to achieve their goals.

    It's highly unlikely that the Chinese will put an invasion force in Afghanistan they aren't stupid, strategic placement of weapons and bases for their own domestic protection is likely.

  12. #8912
    Void Lord Elegiac's Avatar
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    The Biden administration will be issuing an executive order on Friday aimed at curtailing deceptive and noncompetitive practices in the US economy, including but not limited to:

    - Requiring airlines to disclose all fees for baggage and Wi-Fi services upfront as well as mandating that consumers be eligible for refunds in instances of substandard or delayed service.
    - Protecting farmers and ranchers from predatory agri-business through making it easier to file complaints or sue, as well as enabling the USDA to challenge unfair or deceptive practices by meat processors.
    - Encouraging alternatives to supermarkets and large grocery chains and increasing consumer transparency about product origins.
    - Directing the FTC to start challenging noncompete agreements in fields like the healthcare and tech industry, as well as challenging overly broad licensing requirements for healthcare professionals.
    - Establishing a process for consumers to easily access their financial data as per Dodd-Frank's mandate.
    - Rescinding Trump-era guidelines regarding how the FTC and DOJ reviews company mergers.

    Probably one of the most interesting, however, is directing the FTC to establish rules regarding consumer right to repair to curtail the noncompetitive activities of companies like John Deere and Apple.
    Quote Originally Posted by Marjane Satrapi
    The world is not divided between East and West. You are American, I am Iranian, we don't know each other, but we talk and understand each other perfectly. The difference between you and your government is much bigger than the difference between you and me. And the difference between me and my government is much bigger than the difference between me and you. And our governments are very much the same.

  13. #8913
    1. why are we leaving afghan other than a president making a questionable decision and the military simply being obligated

    2. with china buddying with the taliban, what happens if they nuke the US when they feel ready

  14. #8914
    Herald of the Titans CostinR's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by YUPPIE View Post
    1. why are we leaving afghan other than a president making a questionable decision and the military simply being obligated
    Because it's a waste of money. The US was spending billions, if not tens of billions, each year on maintaining a military force over there. That's more money then a lot of countries, even NATO ones, spend on their overall defense budgets and the US military needs the money in other areas. So what's the point in staying really? To keep a corrupt badly run government from falling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Breccia View Post
    I was livid when Trump wanted to negotiate with these people.
    Obama also negotiated with these people because unlike you with "legitimizing" crap he realized, like Trump did and Biden as well that this is the real world and not some Wonderland fanfiction you dream off. A reality where the US spending billions each year on a war they cannot win is idiotic beyond measure.

    https://www.newyorker.com/news/daily...as-longest-war

    Obama authorized secret peace talks with the Taliban later that year, and, ever since, the United States has essentially followed Gorbachev’s approach, albeit slowly, through policies laced with contradictions, and at a very high cost in expenditure and lives—more than twenty-two hundred American troops. The American presence in Afghanistan peaked at about a hundred thousand troops, in August, 2010, and fell to a little less than ten thousand by the end of Obama’s Presidency. The Obama Administration’s talks with the Taliban failed, but when Donald Trump became President he revived the negotiations.
    This was President Joe Biden’s inheritance: a decade of unsuccessful negotiations, a flawed Trump deal that increasingly advantaged the Taliban, a U.S. troop deployment too small to change the war’s stalemate, and a looming deadline to depart the country entirely or else invite renewed Taliban assaults. Biden faced no good choices, only a menu of risky options. At the White House, on Wednesday, following a policy review, consultations with nato allies, and a last push to accelerate stalled peace talks between the nato-backed government in Kabul, led by President Ashraf Ghani, and the Taliban, Biden announced his decision: America would end the longest war in its history, and all U.S. and nato troops would withdraw by September 11th.
    So I've got a reality shock for you @Breccia: The US does not have the resources or willpower to fight and win in Afghanistan or in many other places. Obama realized this when he, thankfully, did not bomb Assad to try and push regime change and when he pushed hard to disengage the US from a lot of stupid conflicts.
    Last edited by CostinR; 2021-07-09 at 05:27 AM.
    "Life is one long series of problems to solve. The more you solve, the better a man you become.... Tribulations spawn in life and over and over again we must stand our ground and face them."

  15. #8915
    The Lightbringer bladeXcrasher's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by YUPPIE View Post
    2. with china buddying with the taliban, what happens if they nuke the US when they feel ready
    Lol what the fuck is this?

  16. #8916
    Quote Originally Posted by CostinR View Post
    Because it's a waste of money. The US was spending billions, if not tens of billions, each year on maintaining a military force over there. That's more money then a lot of countries, even NATO ones, spend on their overall defense budgets and the US military needs the money in other areas. So what's the point in staying really? To keep a corrupt badly run government from falling?
    what if the taliban bomb all our cities as previously stated. I mean, now no one is left to control them as evident by their orgy of carnage ongoing
    Last edited by YUPPIE; 2021-07-09 at 05:27 AM.

  17. #8917
    Over 9000! PhaelixWW's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by YUPPIE View Post
    what if the taliban bomb all our cities as previously stated. I mean, now no one is left to control them as evident by their orgy of carnage ongoing
    I dunno. What if Luxembourg invades us? What if Antarctica wages biological warfare upon us?


    "The difference between stupidity
    and genius is that genius has its limits."

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  18. #8918
    The Undying Breccia's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by CostinR View Post
    A reality where the US spending billions each year on a war they cannot win is idiotic beyond measure.
    I agree.

    We should have made our feelings about people who harbor bin Laden excessively clear, searched the country without asking permission from what's left of them, probably not found bin Laden because he'd have already fled, and then left and continued the search elsewhere.

    We went to Afghanistan for two reasons. Taking the country for ourselves was neither of them.

  19. #8919
    The Unstoppable Force Belize's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by YUPPIE View Post
    what if the taliban bomb all our cities as previously stated. I mean, now no one is left to control them as evident by their orgy of carnage ongoing
    The Taliban bombing ever city in the U.S. is as realistic as you not posting every nonsensical comment that goes through your head.

  20. #8920
    Scarab Lord downnola's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by YUPPIE View Post
    what if the taliban bomb all our cities as previously stated. I mean, now no one is left to control them as evident by their orgy of carnage ongoing
    This is bait.
    Populists (and "national socialists") look at the supposedly secret deals that run the world "behind the scenes". Child's play. Except that childishness is sinister in adults.
    - Christopher Hitchens

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