Weapon seizures ‘massive boon’ for Taliban as cities fall
The Taliban on Saturday captured Mazar-e-Sharif, a large, supposedly heavily defended city in northern Afghanistan. They are approaching the capital of Kabul.
The fall of the country’s fourth largest city hands them control over all of northern Afghanistan.
The Taliban have made major advances in recent days, capturing the country’s second- and third-largest cities, Herat and Kandahar. They now are in control of about 24 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, leaving the Western-backed government with provinces scattered in the center and east, and Kabul.
They are also seizing Western funded weapons and other equipment abandoned by the Afghan military and using them to further their attacks.
David sends.
Weapon seizures ‘massive boon’ for Taliban as cities fall
The United States spent billions supplying the Afghan military with the tools to defeat the Taliban, but the rapid capitulation of the armed forces means that weaponry is now fuelling the insurgents’ astonishing battlefield successes.
“We provided our Afghan partners with all the tools — let me emphasize: all the tools,” US President Joe Biden said when defending his decision to withdraw American forces and leave the fight to the locals.
But Afghan defense forces have shown little appetite for that fight and, in their tens of thousands, have been laying down their arms — only for the Taliban to immediately pick them up.
The Taliban’s social media is awash with videos of Taliban fighters seizing weapons caches — the majority supplied by Western powers.
Footage of Afghan soldiers surrendering in the northern city of Kunduz shows army vehicles loaded with heavy weapons and mounted with artillery guns safely in the hands of the insurgent rank and file.
Any resemblance to the fall of South Viet Nam is purely coincidental.
Category: Afghanistan, Biden, Foreign Policy, Guest Link
Boots on the ground doesn’t work outside of western hemisphere. Democracy cannot be bought by the nineth century. We wasted our sweat, our treasure and our lives where cruise missiles would have sufficed.
As Ripley said… otherwise, it doesn’t make an impression there:
The idea of Afghanistan being the graveyard of empires is simply not supported by history.
Alexander won it through diplomatic means. The Mongols took it more directly. It’s hard fought and hard won, but it’s been won on many different occasions.
We fought our war there poorly. We should have, and could have, fought differently. We fought well, but we fought stupid.
Task Force Dagger did it right. The moment the GCCs and senior conventional leadership wanted a patch, shit went sideways.
This is on us.
It’s been won on several occasions, but never kept. I’d say there’s a few holes in your argument.
Even if you do win, what is the prize? A bag of burning dog shit, not much incentive to compete for it. Just contain them in their own borders, and let them destroy themselves. An occasional missile dropped on them will remind them to keep their violence to themselves.
It was kept just fine by many of those empires, and rarely did they fall to internal factors within Afghanistan.
The Achaemenid empire held it definitively right up until Alexander handed them their asses at Gaugamela.
Macedonian control continued through the Seleucid and Diodotid kingdoms.
Mongol dominance carried consistently through the Timurid and Moghul dynasties, long after their influence had faded in many other parts of the world.
The only renowned Empire to get so famously bogged down in that “graveyard” was the British.
We never really defined a feasible end state. The issue was with what we were trying to do more than where we were trying to do it.
Exactly. What was it we intended to do there?
We went in to get some terrorists, and to punish the “government” folks that were aiding them! We stayed because we couldn’t find them all. [Side note: Probably because some politician stood on the steps of our capital and told them how we were tracking them to the world press! And never lost his clearance, his job on the Intel committee, or even faced censure!)
We decided to Nation build, but never let the nation decide what it wanted! We made them elect people that were appealing to us in our Western norms, but gave them no power to decide. Then they appointed corrupt local leaders instead of electing them, and moved them around the country as they got caught stealing. We built them an Army, but that Army had no leaders willing to lead. Its Soldiers did not understand how to lead, so they left when their leadership sold them out! We built schools, drilled water wells, and built roads to make them interlinked and could support a capitalist economy…which they did not understand!
All the while, our chief rival in the world, came in and offered to help them extract many of the valuable minerals that lay beneath…all free of charge!
We would be better off, going in to Mexico to arrest all the drug cartels, and restore law and order there…but no one sees it as a requirement!
This sickens me as I think back to the end of Vietnam. Washinton said the South Vietnamese would fight, yet they could not wait to shed those uniforms, throw down those weapons, and hand multi-millions of dollars of US assets over to the NVA.
Now, it is happening in this shit hole. We’ll be damned lucky to get our people out without casualties. The worst would be American hostages and the thought of Joe Biden attempting to fix that. God be with those there now and the relief forces being sent.
Deja vu in action… today in Kabul:
https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/1426712820729659392
“This sickens me”
I’m finding it difficult to not cry.
Me too Brother, Me too.
I did my time over there, and what I saw convinced me that the vast majority of the people there cannot be made civilized. All they care about is their tribe and locality, and they change allegiances at the drop of a hat. We did our job right, and that dump isn’t worth any more American lives, the equipment we left behind? IF they can keep it functioning, my bet is that they’ll be using it against the Chinese when they come in, let the Chicoms have that tar baby!
A Proud Infidel@,
15 years ago, I called them “friends for rent”.
And the USA has now stopped paying rent.
MarineDad61, I truly think that they’ll whack each other first, it’ll be Tribe versus Tribe, one muzzie militia versus another with many members switching sides until another Foreign Entity invades, China this time and they’ll go apeshit on them, thus I look forward to seeing China getting their asses handed to them.
I was in 7th grade when Saigon fell, I really didn’t understand or even care. I understand it very well now. And it’s painful to watch.
I was in high school when Saigon fell and the TV pictures were grainy. Now we can watch the fall of Kabul in high definition.
I was a grade School Yard Ape when that happened and like I just said, we’ll see China stick their arms into that great big tar baby!
Long-time lurker here. A lot of us who served there knew this was coming. Some of us were fortunate enough to try alternatives to army and nation building. However, it was too little, too late and not sexy enough.
Unfortunately, some of the Afghans we worked with, at a local level, are at risk. We are trying to assist them as the clock rapidly runs out.
If interested in helping, please see below. Thanks. DJ
https://gofund.me/cbe81f1a
Thanks. Sent what I could.
The rush for free stuff (shiny and subdued) in on.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GROAXwiPuEw
Maybe President Dementia can send the Taliban a request and a pallet of cash as an incentive to melt the weapons and armored vehicles down to make playground equipment for all the 12 year old girls being turned into “war brides”.
“There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people lifted off the roof of an Embassy of the United States of America from Afghanistan”
– Joe Biden, July 8, 2021
That didn’t age well.
“The Taliban on Saturday captured Mazar-e-Sharif, a large, >>>heavily defended<<< city in northern Afghanistan."
TPB: "I do not think that means what you think it means…"
Point taken. I’ll fire the editor tomorrow.
This as I read the headlines in FOX News: The Blood Thirsty Taliban storm the gates of Kabul…
But the story states, they simply entered and wished a peaceful transition to the capital…firing no shots!
John Ringo discussed, in some depth, why that area, culture, and society is not conducive to Western-style Democracy/Republics in the book ‘The Last Centurion’.
Apparently, Kabul’s gone faster than expected:
https://twitter.com/Murvel2015/status/1426726618727391232
Here, as happened in ’75, is probably about what’s also just happened now:
Well, perhaps not quite yet, but getting close:
“How Did the Taliban Defeat the Afghan Army After Driving Off the US Forces,” by The Eastern Herald, 15 Aug 2021
https://www.easternherald.com/2021/08/15/taliban-defeat-afghan-army/
Taliban seven (7) miles from Kabul.
Talibastards move fast– in Kabul suburbs.
Afghan president has left the country…
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/bryan-preston/2021/08/15/afghan-meltdown-afghanistans-president-flees-as-the-taliban-swiftly-moves-into-kabul-n1469623
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/taliban-kabul-afghan-president-ashraf-ghani-flees-country-b950726.html
He’s just avoiding having his head hacked off, I’m sure that he has enough money siphoned away into Swiss Bank Accounts by now.
All of those third-world “leaders” do it… gotta get that golden parachute when things go to shit!
Yep!
Flag down, ambassador going to airport?
https://redstate.com/streiff/2021/08/15/report-us-ambassador-afghanistan-has-taken-down-our-flag-from-embassy-fled-country-n426711
He’s headed for Kharzai’s house with his share of the loot.
https://www.easternherald.com/2021/08/15/kabul-fallen-afghanistan-taliban/
They have every entry point under there control
I’m not surprised at what’s going on here
“No more Vietnams” became “hold my beer!”
Once again, we learn that War is not “nation building”. It is nation destroying. It is not about “hearts and minds” it is about Victory, the destruction of the enemy’s will and ability to fight.
Either our Victory, or the enemy’s Victory.
There is -no- other. None.
Is it just me….
Or does John Kirby’s shit eating grin
coupled with that awful John Waters Pink Flamingos ‘stache…
(fill in the conclusion here)?
Gonna look like ChiCongo any day now,
At least the Vietnamese refugees brought us some good food and attractive women. There are only so many ways that you can serve goat.
I think we should leave but not like this.
The USA will not be viewed by allies as reliable
China is watching this.
The smart move for Taiwan, South Korea, Australia and Japan would be to nuke up now.
Good point…
https://thebulletin.org/2019/10/dont-be-surprised-when-south-korea-wants-nuclear-weapons/
Anyone who thnks the US IS a reliable ally to any third world country hasn’t been paying attention for a half-century.
Of course, cue the America hating, liberal “intellectual” types , who’ll write articles in the coming months/years for Vox and The Atlantic on how the Taliban “defeated” the greatest military power in the world.
Still waiting for a retarded seagull to show up on this thread and tell us how this is all part of dementia joes grand plan.. and how any negative aspects are all due to “orange man bad”..
I wonder how many of the Talibums involved are ex-ANA and ANP who swapped sides as soon as we started pulling out?
Most of them.
I have NO doubt about that whatsoever. I honestly wonder how many will suddenly swap sides as soon as the Chicoms get themselves mired in over there?
Well it will save the CIA time and money next time around.
With all the vehicles we left behind we won’t have to spend money on Toyota Hi-Luxes either
Apparently the ANA was too corrupt to pay its Troops, thus there were desertions and they lacked the will to fight, no surprise to me..
https://www.businessinsider.com/afghan-forces-havent-been-able-to-hold-off-the-taliban-2021-8?op=1&fbclid=IwAR3vOow_6rnQGwzrscBc_OoT6u7yVS6NwGQN39N0yqWFOc87dBKtSQTjU_c
Did we not notice that epic corruption, like about month two?
Same as we didn’t notice the boy-buggering?
It’s always been rampant as hell in that entire part of the world.
Prediction: We will soon learn about -epic- corruption on our side.
We did not make them become like us. They, however…
And “corruption” is going to be more than just diversion of money and stuff.
I pray am wrong about “more”.
ANA weapons for sale. Never fired and only dropped once.
Too soon?
Nope.
Not at all. If only those weapons were little boys. Did I say that out loud?