#180 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Wednesday October 27)
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Good morning, I thought I would provide a few quotes and comments on a few topics: AFGHANISTAN, REDUX Afghanistan feels like a bad TV series that went on too long. While not as costly in lives lost, it feels a bit like Viet Nam, but its own tragedy. It started out promising—removing the Taliban from power. It continued until Osama bin Laden was killed and Al Qaeda’s ability to project violence seriously crippled. Yet we remained. And the whole time it was to secure a government that was corrupt and could not stand on its own. The whole time we tried to train an army with loyalty only to tribe—not country—to defend and protect a country that is at best a collection of tribal governments. And that collection of decentralized authority was ripe for another rise by the Taliban. Who was willing to die to stop them? Only we were supplying the military support and funding for a government that didn’t want to fight. Meanwhile, the Taliban was on the ground, well-armed, with a philosophy and a long-term presence and mission. They would always outlast us. It was an exercise in futility for the United States to believe it could subdue this nation, when the Russians and, before that, the British, had failed. and again demonstrates the folly of trying to make a country what it is not and what its people are unwilling to defend.
#180 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Wednesday October 27)
#180 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Wednesday…
#180 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Wednesday October 27)
Good morning, I thought I would provide a few quotes and comments on a few topics: AFGHANISTAN, REDUX Afghanistan feels like a bad TV series that went on too long. While not as costly in lives lost, it feels a bit like Viet Nam, but its own tragedy. It started out promising—removing the Taliban from power. It continued until Osama bin Laden was killed and Al Qaeda’s ability to project violence seriously crippled. Yet we remained. And the whole time it was to secure a government that was corrupt and could not stand on its own. The whole time we tried to train an army with loyalty only to tribe—not country—to defend and protect a country that is at best a collection of tribal governments. And that collection of decentralized authority was ripe for another rise by the Taliban. Who was willing to die to stop them? Only we were supplying the military support and funding for a government that didn’t want to fight. Meanwhile, the Taliban was on the ground, well-armed, with a philosophy and a long-term presence and mission. They would always outlast us. It was an exercise in futility for the United States to believe it could subdue this nation, when the Russians and, before that, the British, had failed. and again demonstrates the folly of trying to make a country what it is not and what its people are unwilling to defend.