Afghanistan - 20 years on

nine_tails · 12 Aug 2021 at 23:23

Caspian report has a decent overview here :

Afghanistan is screwed , this is a sad state of affairs.

lemonkettaz · 13 Aug 2021 at 00:26

Seeing loads of footage of Taliban fighters taking ground without socially distancing. Shocking, do they not realise that will not save lives?

UK/US redeploying personnel in an effort to help nationals escape, trying to plead with the Taliban to have a cease-fire in order to get nationals out the country... totally shambolic and an embarrassment.

Edinho · 13 Aug 2021 at 03:37

So to sum up...

We invade Afghanistan to remove the Taliban in 2001 presumably to make sure they stop killing westerners.

Arrive at 2021 and we have spent £1Tn+, killed thousands, maimed thousands. Taliban reappear to resume killing westerners.

Malevolence said:
>Survive the initial impact from the ManPAD.
>Survive the catastrophic decompression and sudden drop in altitude.
>Survive what remains of the aircraft making it to terra firma.
>Survive the crash landing and stagger out of the burning wreckage, in shock but amazed and delighted that you're alive.
>Get beheaded by some angry bearded nutjob.

Just my luck tbh.

Its like something out of Monty Python.

Name · 13 Aug 2021 at 07:21

Oh look the economy is down the swannie again. Time for another war I guess.

iamtheoneneo · 13 Aug 2021 at 08:58

Name said:
Oh look the economy is down the swannie again. Time for another war I guess.

Until the US are out of the picture there will never be peace in the country. They have fumbled so many attempts of peace due to their own motives.

Johno please? · 13 Aug 2021 at 09:07

iamtheoneneo said:
Until the US are out of the picture there will never be peace in the country. They have fumbled so many attempts of peace due to their own motives.

Yea it was so peaceful before 2001 xD

iamtheoneneo · 13 Aug 2021 at 09:50

Johno please? said:
Yea it was so peaceful before 2001 xD

Well that was the Russians doing...

gettothechopper · 13 Aug 2021 at 11:16

Wont even be a civil war at this rate just collapse

[HB]Rugrat · 13 Aug 2021 at 12:03

gettothechopper said:
Wont even be a civil war at this rate just collapse

Yeah I've noticed the media saying things like "... on the verge of civil war". Does it still count as a war when the regime soldiers surrender / run away before the shooting actually starts?

alchal · 13 Aug 2021 at 12:18

iamtheoneneo said:
Well that was the Russians doing...

I'm sure the people after that loved the beatings and killings and no education etc etc etc are overjoyed right now that it is going back to the ' Peacefull Taliban era '

I bet they are overjoyed at the sight of NATO leaving, sure in the knowledge that the Taliban or even China eventually will bring them peace and freedom and basic rights like education and not being a slave to a man.

iamtheoneneo · 13 Aug 2021 at 12:44

alchal said:
I'm sure the people after that loved the beatings and killings and no education etc etc etc are overjoyed right now that it is going back to the ' Peacefull Taliban era '

I didn't say or even allude to that.

Nelly · 13 Aug 2021 at 14:54

Rilot said:
So, the main result of our 20 years in Afghanistan is that the Taliban who were previously armed with Soviet-era AKMs, AK74s, Dragunovs, PKMs, and DShKs, are now armed with M4s, M16s, M249s, HK417s, and M2s.
Great result.

I bet the Taliban get a lot from Pakistan, those metal workers can make replicas of most guns really cheap, check out all the replicas on show, some serious hardware. They even make their own customised non-replica fully automatics for $180.

Eurofighter · 13 Aug 2021 at 15:10

Heroin prices going down boys. Get on it.

lemonkettaz · 13 Aug 2021 at 15:30

Think this opens up a few questions regarding our limited role of making decisions. Pretty much how weak NATO / UK / EU is without the heavy lifting from the US.

Ultimately we didn't want to pull out this way, but we haven't the capability without massive EU or US support.

At least the US have been open in the past about this regarding NATO, basically the US run the show. Maybe we focus too much nowadays on interoperability to the point we end up paralysed in any decisive decision making

glenimp617 · 13 Aug 2021 at 15:32

lemonkettaz said:
Think this opens up a few questions regarding our limited role of making decisions. Pretty much how weak NATO / UK / EU is without the heavy lifting from the US.

Ultimately we didn't want to pull out this way, but we haven't the capability without massive EU or US support.

At least the US have been open in the past about this regarding NATO, basically the US run the show. Maybe we focus too much nowadays on interoperability to the point we end up paralysed in any decisive decision making

We're a tiny weak island though

ianh · 13 Aug 2021 at 15:33

Nelly said:
I bet the Taliban get a lot from Pakistan, those metal workers can make replicas of most guns really cheap, check out all the replicas on show, some serious hardware.

They don't need Khyber Pass knock offs when the ANA are gifting them so much genuine stuff, only dropped once!

lemonkettaz · 13 Aug 2021 at 15:55

TheOracle said:
We're a tiny weak island though

Well this proves it yet again then in the modern age.

Nasher · 13 Aug 2021 at 16:16

The UK could do an operation alone, but what's the point now. It's too costly and what exactly would it achieve? There is just no motivation for it. No one cares about oil reserves anymore, Afghans won't fight for their own freedoms, it's 500 years in the past.

We have to pull out of this one because it's US led and most of the infrastructure, logistics etc is theirs. We would need to start again from scratch.

Chuk_Chuk · 13 Aug 2021 at 16:23

Maybe I Missed this post in the discussion but how does the Taliban have the man power to take over an entire country in a few weeks?

Surely you need 10,000s of troops maybe 100,000s. Where have they been hiding? Something dodgy is going on here.

gettothechopper · 13 Aug 2021 at 16:34

Chuk_Chuk said:
Maybe I Missed this post in the discussion but how does the Taliban have the man power to take over an entire country in a few weeks?

Surely you need 10,000s of troops maybe 100,000s. Where have they been hiding? Something dodgy is going on here.

You don't need that many, just enough to start a panic which causes the ANA to flee which fuels the panic which causes more ANA to flee = collapse. Exactly like we saw in Iraq with ISIS
Once the rug is pulled out its all over

Iran
Pakistan / FATA
Afghan Provinces

The Tribals have always been a non border, the inability to secure it on both sides has been how the insurgency survived the whole time
Iran and Pakistan have armed / supported certain groups to further their influence

Plenty of Taliban were still spread throughout the country, acting as shadow governments etc, they have just not been attacking NATO forces much lately under the Trump agreement (because they knew it would hasten us leaving)
Some ANA and ANP will be defecting rather than be killed as well