Self-delusion on two legs: Anthony Blinken

Or maybe self-righteousness? Anthony Blinken, our Secretary of State, defended the Biden administration’s action in Afghanistan…the Washington Times says it “didn’t  go too bad.” Yep, that’s the bar we all aspire to – “Joe Biden: The Inferiorily Mediocre Administration.”

“I firmly believe the president’s decision to withdraw from Afghanistan was the right one,” he told lawmakers.

Blinken declined to take the blame for decisions that were made leading up to the exit, explaining that actions taken by the first Trump administration left the Biden administration in a weak position and intelligence assessments expected Kabul to remain the hands of the Afghan government. MSN

Seems like a common thread – “It was all Trump’s fault.” Apparently we are supposed to ignore that it happened SEVEN MONTHS after Trump left office? Nothing could be changed in over half a year? 200+ days of paralysis?  At least they did try to talk once to their President… with predictable results.

“He told me that he wanted to continue working on getting an agreement with the Taliban, but if he couldn’t, he would stay and fight to the death,” Blinken said. “And he left the next day.” MSN

There’s hat theme – Trump failed to include the Afghan government in the negotiations, and apparently the phone lines were all down for most of the year. Biden reached out to the Afghan government on this what -once? – for an average of 0.001.  Everything Trump had done before was set in stone and was unchangeable, apparently. Who knew ex-Presidents could control countries from half a world away.

Blinken also acknowledged that the Taliban was not in compliance with a deal the Trump administration struck with the group to withdraw U.S. forces from the country by May 2021. The deal, known as the Doha Agreement, laid out a series of conditions for the Taliban to fulfill in order for U.S. forces to fully leave Afghanistan.

“The Taliban was in violation of the Doha Agreement in a number of ways,” he said. “It was in violation when the previous administration drew down forces repeatedly. It was in violation during the time that we were in office before the evacuation.”  MSN

Lord knows no one could have tried to reset the agreement somehow, right? See the aforementioned ‘set in stone’.

He said al Qaeda has not been able to revive itself inside Afghanistan and worries about stranded Americans haven’t come to fruition.  Washington Times

Ever see a shell game? Try to find what’s under a shell…and please ignore that the dealer already palmed it and the shells are empty. The Afghan government collapse -one empty shell. The Taliban not cooperating – another empty shell. And al Qaeda unable to revive itself – al Qaeda hasn’t been a force in Afghanistan for years and was a non-factor. But he wants to make you LOOK for al Qaeda to distract you from the (sorry, mixed metaphor coming) fact that Emperor Biden has no clothes because he gave them all to the Taliban.

Mr. Blinken told Congress that the Biden administration has managed to blunt some of the withdrawal’s worst problems.

The U.S. has rescued hundreds of people left in Afghanistan at the end of the August 2021 pullout. Washington Times

The US Government rescued?  Most of what I have seen over the last 3+ years indicates that the government has done little but stay out of the way fof NGOs who actually are doing the work. Someone please correct me if that impression is incorrect and we have daily liberation flights leaving Kabul stuffed with refugees that I missed.

Far from frayed alliances and falling U.S. standing, he said, America emerged with firmer friends and better security on the international stage. In particular, he said, the withdrawal allowed the U.S. to be in a position to build the coalition that helped Ukraine resist Russia’s invasion in February 2022.

“It’s clear that our alliances, our partnerships, are stronger today than they have been in a generation,” he told the House Foreign Affairs Committee.Washington Times

Did he really say that with a straight face? Looked to me that we re-proved one of the major realpolitik lessons of the Vietnam War – when push comes to shove, the US’ endgame is straight out of Monty Python. “Run Away!”

He opened his appearance before the committee by turning to families of U.S. forces killed in the withdrawal and expressing condolences. Protesters repeatedly interrupted his comments, crying out “scum” and “genocide,” before security cleared the room of them.

Blinken denied Republican charges that he and others ignored warnings from lower-ranking administration officials that the U.S. withdrawal would go badly wrong, and that the U.S. had to move faster on getting out Americans and the Afghans who had worked for and allied with them.Arkansas Online

Bet all those Afghan translators and supporters would love to echo his comments…stuck in Afghanistan. By the way, the protesters were pro-Palestinians, not Afghan affiliates. They just wanted their moment on camera, it seems. It is nice that someone finally expressed condolences to the families of those killed during the withdrawal. And timely, too, only three plus years late.

Category: "The Floggings Will Continue Until Morale Improves", "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Afghanistan