Soldato
Afghanistan - 20 years on
- Thread starter GreatAuk
- Start date
Because we should prioritise people over animals tbh... You're kind of missing the point on that one, the issue isn't flight capacity it is getting people through the airport and getting them checked etc.. There are still thousands outside, mixture of eligible people with and without visas and some chancers too, they probably won't get to process all of them in time so inevitably we could have a situation where people with legit visas, people entitled to them an/or even some nationals of Western countries get left behind because of Biden's tight deadline.
As a result the defence secretary was quite clear that he's prioritising people, however, it seems BoJo has intervened, there is an obvious PR angle here re: the animals and so we now seemingly have the rather abhorrent prospect of the UK having to spend a load of effort figuring out how to get this veteran + his staff + a bunch of dogs etc... through the checkpoints and crowds at the airport and processed and onto their private charter flight when they could be helping more eligible people who've already been waiting outside the airport for days.
He literally hasn't said anything offensive to anyone, you seem angry because he mentioned he was in the military which is utterly bizarre.
Caporegime
I’m offended because of his awful stance of just killing all the rescued animals.
Frankly I prefer dogs to people, but that’s neither here nor there.
Ok I like animals too but you realise that human life has priority? There's limited capacity at the airport and a private plane can't just fly in and land, load up a load of people and animals and take off with no impact. It's irresponsible for the media to put this guy on TV every day, they're doing it for ratings and it may very well mean human lives are impacted.
Soldato
Sadly it looks like they already have been. This 'Pen' guy needs locking up, totally irresponsible behaviour putting others lives at risk, you would have thought he would have known better.
When I said 'May not like intervening in other countries affairs...' that was my opinion and I've pretty solidly been against both ventures into Afghanistan and Iraq for corrupt purposes.
But we did go in, we uprooted lives giving many of them hope (forlorn) of improving them for the better and have some responsibility to not make the entire affair totally pointless besides providing an avenue for allied collaborators to escape, whilst that's the minimum we should be doing it does cause Afghanistan further suffering (though likely irrelevant as the Taliban want to get rid of detractors) as the brain drain is an fairly significant issue.
It's been a complete disaster.
Billions spent developing Afghanistan's forces and they effectively just hand it over to the Taliban.
Honestly, it's so bad they should send troops back in temporarily to push back the Taliban and do as much damage to them as they possibility can while they're out in the open, give themselves adequate time to process people that need to be evacuated and then destroy / recover all the weapons and equipment they left behind, and then pull out the military.
It's obvious the majority of the Afgan military never intended to fight.
Billions spent developing Afghanistan's forces and they effectively just hand it over to the Taliban.
Honestly, it's so bad they should send troops back in temporarily to push back the Taliban and do as much damage to them as they possibility can while they're out in the open, give themselves adequate time to process people that need to be evacuated and then destroy / recover all the weapons and equipment they left behind, and then pull out the military.
It's obvious the majority of the Afgan military never intended to fight.
Last edited:
People are literally brain dead though, the presenters on GMB, and idiots in the general public getting behind it. The thing is, he can probably get out with little problem after the 31st given he has contacts in the Taliban and money, it's not like they're executing people who are looking after dogs from the 1st of September and blowing up the airport, but there is a risk to translators and people who worked with ISAF.
Soldato
Its space where humans could be using (cargo hold or not ), or a flight slot where another C17 or Galaxy could evacuate up-to 800 humans. As bad as what I said was to euthanise the animals would you prefer it if the Taliban rocked up at his compound and just shot them , or worse still given the food shortage that’s about to hit them over the following weeks eat them ?
And yes I’m a dog lover as well but the media needs to stop dwelling on fluffy sob stories and show the harsh reality of what’s going on here.
If your family were stuck over there with a Western or UK passports or were Afghans that helped coalition forces it would be very sad if an animals life was put in front of them . Make no bones about it come the 1st of September god only knows what will happen to the majority of them but the harsh reality is some are going to be executed.
Sadly, it’s not quite a decision between life and death of dogs; but rather a trade of life and death of men, women & children OR dogs. It’s not the space on the plane or the hold that’s the problem, it’s the fact that this isn’t Heathrow airport with orderly queues for processing, but an airport under siege, with a terrorist threat looming with literally thousands outside (many of whom are entitled to evacuation, or likely face murder/rape/persecution at the hands of the taliban).
The bottleneck is security & logistical capacity on the ground, not the physical space in the plane.
I would love to see the animals rescued, but I think we need to prioritise the humanitarian crisis & understand this is a war zone operation.
Suspended
The animals occupy hold space that can't be filled with people.
Soldato
- Joined
- 3 Jun 2005
- Posts
- 7,613
I agree, and I find it mindboggling the resources being thrown at the obvious chancers arriving by dinghy while our own people are shoved aside.
It makes me wonder what I’ll have to vote for to get the issue addressed.
So there's a desperate evacuation but they're in a space where dogs can occupy but humans can't?
???
?
Suspended
Correct. You cannot put humans in the hold.
Soldato
Really , since when did animals breathe different air to me ? I’m sure given these are Mercy missions fly through air space in other countries will be given priority , even at 5000feet .
Isn't it more of a temperature issue?
Soldato
Irrelevant now unfortunately. Just seen the news , Foreign office are now telling any UK nationals to keep away from the airport and either sit and wait for further information or seek a border crossing.
I can see the gates of the airport being locked in the next day or so and the remaining troops leaving . Wow this really is a Saigon moment for all of us now !
Suspended
The hold has different environmental conditions - for example short-nosed dogs often aren't allowed as they won't survive the journey. Additionally the areas may already be pre-divided to accommodate crates and so people cannot physically fit in there.