…And Nobody Saw It Coming? Really?

| October 24, 2021

This may cheer up some of you: Afghanistan’s economy depended heavily on the cash the US sank into it. Once we left, the money was cut off, and guess what? The Afghan economy is not just teetering, it is crashing into oblivion.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/afghanistan-heading-towards-collapse-faster-than-expected-swedish-minister-warns/ar-AAPRvc5?ocid=mailsignout&li=BBnbfcL

From the article:  DUBAI, Oct 23 (Reuters) – Afghanistan is heading towards economic collapse that risks spiralling the country into a new political crisis, Sweden’s minister for international development cooperation warned on Saturday.

Afghanistan has been plunged into crisis following the collapse of the Western-backed government and Taliban take over in August, which was met with an abrupt end of billions of dollars in assistance to its aid-dependent economy.

“My concern is that the country is on the brink of collapse and that collapse is coming faster than we thought,” Per Olsson Fridh told Reuters in Dubai, warning that economic freefall could provide an environment for terror groups to thrive.

The 27-country European Union, which includes Sweden, has increased humanitarian aid to Afghanistan since the Taliban swept back to power but has halted its development assistance, a measure taken by many other countries and the World Bank. – article

The rest of the article is explicit: Sweden will not give a red cent to the Taliban, and negotiations for aid will be taking place in Qatar, per the article.

Did anyone else wonder how quickly the whole thing would begin to collapse in on itself? Anyone? Bueller?

 

Category: Afghanistan, Taliban

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Jeff LPH 3, 63-66

I was under the impression that the US was going to give billions in aid to the Taliban and haven’t heard anything about it for awhile.

Sapper3307

So Stone Age,,again?

Hack Stone

Billions and billions of US dollars was enough to lift Afghanistan from the 14th Century to the 16th Century, and now it is all pissed away. Now they will revert to 15th Century if they are lucky.

Anonymous

They’re gonna party like it’s 799…

David

I am sure the US drug using community will send them billions as usual.

Sapper3307

China will get the poppy fields up and running 110%.

Thunderstixx Thunder

Actually, that is probably more than true regarding the Chicoms and their behavior over the past few years.
I can imagine that they will give tons of aid to the tangoes and help support them in their terror against the United States.

ArmyATC

“…Per Olsson Fridh told Reuters in Dubai, warning that economic freefall could provide an environment for terror groups to thrive.”

No! Really? Thank you for that CPT Obvious. It would appear that Mr. Fridh doesn’t consider the Taliban and ISIS as terrorist groups.

Atlanticcoast63

…Not a problem; I’m sure Allah will do them a solid and front them a few bucks till payday.

All kidding aside. Let them starve and freeze in the dark.

KoB

Not one (1) more Dime of American Taxpayer money!

Not one (1) more drop of American Blood! NO MORE!

A firing detail is being assembled to fire a twenty one (21) gun Salute at 1300 hrs EDT (12 noon CDT) Sacred to the Memory and in Honor of PFC Andrew Meari and the unveiling of His Memorial Highway Marker. Stand by. Denise, we’re here for you.

Hatchet

Can’t be there in person but the Missus and I are sending prayers of strength and healing for Denise and the rest of the participants of this sacrosanct event.

https://repbatinick.com/2021/05/11/batinick-joint-resolution-creating-the-pfc-andrew-meari-memorial-highway-adopted-in-the-house/

&

https://obits.postandcourier.com/us/obituaries/charleston/name/andrew-meari-obituary?pid=146529563

Hatchet

Dear Taliban, you wanted your country’s Independence – you got it!

Now you want more money to buy more ammo and gear, fund beating your women and screwing your Bacha-boys?

Plain English – FUCK OFF.

Tašakor/Dera Manana

AW1Ed

They’ll just have to fall back on their main exports- opium and terror. Seems to have worked for them since the eighteenth century or so.

Berliner

Why is it Governments, here in the US and abroad, don’t know how to stop throwing good money after bad. Maybe I should invest in pallets (hello Barrack Hu$$ein Obama!) if they’re going to keep this up.

26Limabeans

I’m surprised it took this long.
Perhaps future aid will be funneled through Sweden wink wink..cough..ahem..

timactual

The only thing that kept that clusterfuck going for 20 years was billions of dollars in cash and military support. WTF did our fearless leaders think was going to happen without it? This is why the founding fathers, in their wisdom, wanted a limited government–they knew a big government would eventually fuck up everything it touched.

Who says money can’t buy happiness? I am sure a lot of contractors and consultants and Afghan politicians are very happy with the money they made during those 20 years.

MarineDad61

… And nobody saw this coming, either?

[Mahjabin Hakimi was slaughtered in Kabul as Taliban troops searched for female sports players.]

[Taliban beheaded female volleyball player,
posted photos online]
https://nypost.com/2021/10/21/taliban-beheaded-afghanistan-volleyball-player-coach/

5JC

I woke up this morning and was all out of fucks. I went by the PX to get some more but due to the port problems in LA and uh, um, eh up, some other port they were fresh out.

A Proud Infidel®™

YOU AND ME BOTH, only I ventured out to the corner of our garden where we grow fucks to give and ALAS, it was barren, so oh well!

SFC D

I didn’t even plant any fucks this year. Demand is too high. And since I didn’t have enough fucks for everybody, nobody gets any.

STSC(SW/SS)

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaawn.

Roger Borroel

The last report was that the Taliban was giving U.S. money to the families of suicide bombers, because of their service to the new government.

5JC

This isn’t new.

Groups have always paid for suicide bombers. You didn’t think they were doing it for free did you? On top of that they normally get them drunk/ high first and then place tamper proof switched on their SVEST or chain them to their VBIED just in case they decide to change their mind.

A Proud Infidel®™

Not just that, they’ll also place remote triggers for the bombs linked to radio control or a cell phone in case the hadji driving the VBIED gets cold feet.

Roger Borroel

Mr. Biden could have had an easier time of getting more people out of that country, if the Afghan army had no folded like a bag of chips! The regular people there did not fight at all too, just handing everything over to the Taliban like slaves. Wise ancient saying: ‘Those who do not fight for freedom, deserve no freedom!’ Any mistake made at the time was NOT Mr. Biden’s fault, but the people who lives in that country. Still, over 130,000 people were flown out of the country…a great feat for Mr. Biden! trump is to blame for all the chaos, since he’s the one who made the agreement with the Taliban in the first place. trump s/have been put on trial for that!

Commissioner Wretched

Donald Trump lives rent-free in your head, doesn’t he?

Roger Borroel

He had it better at his Chicago condo, where rap singer Kelly lived at…the parties they had!

UpNorth

Any mistake made at the time was Mr. Biden’s fault, like giving up a functioning, secure military airfield. That was one of the beginning fuckups of Joey the Douche. FIFY.

A Proud Infidel®™️

I see that you let the liberal media do your thinking for you!

5JC
A Proud Infidel®™

Ooh, do we once again have a turbo-butthurt flaming squirrel of a chew toy coming about?

GAME ON!!!

ChipNASA

Move over, gangway, make a hole…

ArmyATC

Sure, Trump has some blame for what happened. But that debacle called a withdrawal that caused civilian and military deaths, abandoning a strategic airfield, and turning over millions of dollars worth of military equipment is a “great feat for Mr. Biden?” Dude, I would say that I want some of what you’re smoking, but I don’t like cat turds.

AW1Ed

Roger,
Welcome to moderation jail. This isn’t to muzzle opinions, but to warn a troll.
The progressive and libertarian members who post here are, for the most part, literate and articulate their points well. They expect disagreement, and are rarely disappointed. They are not banned, or even moderated for their views.
You however are adding nothing to the discussions, and are doing that badly.
This will go one of three ways. I hope you chose to participate. Otherwise you’ll just become another chew toy, or no longer welcome at all.
AW1

Roh-Dog

As someone who’s often unacceptably hostile as a self-protection mechanism for having stunted ego formation, I REALLY need him here, Ed.

Don’t do this to me, man. I NEEDS my fix.

AW1Ed

Your chew toy has been released to comment.

KoB

Maximus “…at my signal unleash Hell.”

Have fun Roh-Dog. I try not to feed the trolls. Strength and Honor!

Roh-Dog

I’m pleasantly distracted by Salty Cracker’s ReeEEeE Stream.

I’m super grateful for Ed’s continued leadership and your attempt to elicit a response, but (Said out profound love and respect) fuck you guys.

I’m busy.
(Seriously love Salty on Sunday. Needed morale boost before Monday morn’n)

Roh-Dog

Have you noticed this turd has used ‘laff’ as a stand in for laugh 3 times now, usually in a sentence or thought with ‘Dems’…?

I’m not sure if its broken or a bot. Something about this individual don’t seem ‘right’. Concerned more than pissed at this point.

You know how to reach me.

nobunny

So are we arguing with a high tech gizmo or a low tech troll?

A Proud Infidel®™

“Your chew toy has been released to comment.”

Yeah, GAME ON!!!

Roger Borroel

I’ve added greatly to the discussions, but they were different perspectives than you guy’s conservative daily fodder. ‘Chew boy’? You cavemen always make me laff…! You guys are like living in the sticks…OK! I guess I’m outnumbered!

SFC D

Outnumbered, outwitted, outsmarted, the list is endless. Welcome to TAH.

rgr769

AW, I am wondering why you posted Roger Dodger’s name in the clear.

Unless the poster stole Roger’s actual name as his handle, the real Roger Borroel is all over the interwebs and has written several books, including a couple on his experiences in the Viet of the Nam. He did lie in his response to my query about his service. I asked for his MOS and he cited an officer four digit MOS for military intelligence unit commander. Whereas, the real Roger was an enlisted artilleryman, i.e., supply clerk, ammo humper, cannoneer, and supposedly an Arty. F.O’s radio humper for three months. The latter job is the subject of Roger’s litigation to try to get his Form 20 (personnel record) changed to show he was assigned to a rifle company as an F.O. RTO. He lost in that effort; but it was doomed to fail since he claimed he was on the unit’s morning reports as assigned to it. I know from my service that attached arty F.O.’s and their radio operators are not carried on the morning report as members of the unit. They are carried on the artillery battery’s morning report. To do otherwise would cause the Arty Battery’s personnel strength to be short by every F.O. team attached to an infantry rifle company. The real Roger sought to get his assignments record changed over 40 years after the fact because he wrote a book about his three months with a 101st rifle company and his Form 20 doesn’t list that company as one of his assignments. Well, I doubt my multiple F.O.’s and their radio operators have my three companies listed on their Form 20’s either. All my temporary assignments and attachments are not listed on my record of assignments either. For example, I was sent to Norway for over a month as part of a NATO operation. There is no record of that in my personnel record–DA Form 66. I also went to Holland for a week with my Bn XO to plan an airborne op; no record of that either.

rgr769

And for the benefit of those unfamiliar with how this forward observer thing works: The artillery battery has several F.O. teams, each has a trained forward artillery observer and a radio operator. The teams are temporarily attached to supported units. The infantry battalion, anyway in RVN, had four rifle companies. An F.O. team from the Arty. battery would be attached to the company to adjust artillery fire when the unit was in the bush/jungle. In my first company that I commanded for about five months, I had three different F.O.’s and about five different F.O. RTO’s. Moreover, for part of that period I served as my own F.O. because the battery didn’t have an F.O. to send me. So, F.O.’s with their radio humpers came and went. They were not considered members of the company. That was true in the other two companies I commanded in another infantry division.

AW1Ed

By the time I was on to him he had, ahh, already contributed to a several posts. Not much point in editing his name after that.

Hatchet

Roger Borroel says:
October 24, 2021 at 9:48 pm

– I’ve added greatly to the discussions, but they were different perspectives than you guy’s conservative daily fodder.

Added greatly? Nope. Your ‘opinion’ of Biden shows you as glaringly deficient of any form of comprehension and utterly absent of any literacy skills to express such. *shrug* Res ipsa loquiter aka Let a Moron be a Moron…

– ‘Chew boy’? You cavemen always make me laff…! You guys are like living in the sticks…OK! I guess I’m outnumbered!

No, Roger. AW1Ed said ‘Chew toy’. ‘Boy’? You’re digressions do seem place YOU somewhere between barely Adolescent or profoundly Infantile.
Oh and Roger? Most LITERATE adults spell it “Laugh”. “You guys are like living in the sticks”? Guess what, Roger? If you’re making fun of Country-folk, they call people like you CITIOTS(and by they way – they’ve got of LOT of guns). Yes, Roger; you’re not only completely OUTNUMBERED – you are absolutely and totally OUTCLASSED. Now Roger, please do us all the kindest favour of permanently disconnecting your computer from the internet and crawling back under the rock you came from… G’wan, off ya git and don’t let the doorknob get stuck in your ever-widening butt on the way out.

A Proud Infidel®™

Hey Bro, ease up for a moment or three and enjoy an Adult beverage or three while we wait for the dumb critter to waltz into the ambush!!!

ChipNASA

I see that ole Roger fancies himself much like Major Powers in Heartbreak Ridge, cept without the Rank.
Roger, I think you’re way out of your league but you’re just too stupid and prideful to know such.
Speaking of Roger, I *DO* hope he comes back and leaves his (skid) mark.
Someone is about to git a solid “Rogering” and it ain’t none of us, righty Mr GED?!?!? (yeah, go look at the lawsuit linky above…)


OWB

Did somebody suggest that we get GED’s? Seriously??

Yeah, well, that’s not gonna happen. Why? Because they aren’t needed.

Would guess that whatever the top 25 or so universities in the country might be, few, if any, are not represented among the commenters here. Probably with undergrad as well as advanced degrees.

Could be wrong, of course. (Not that we need to do an actual roll call on that. I won’t but could name quite a few just among folks I know personally.)

Others don’t have formal degrees but have a wealth of life experience beyond most libs’ ability to imagine.

Formal education has little to do with one’s peace, happiness, and often financial security. Except in a negative way when you look at the amount of debt so many grads accumulate with their degrees in subject matter of no value in the real world.

A Proud Infidel®™

Me not college grad, but I have job skills that make me earn more than a lot of jobs that require maters Degrees, I bet that “Roger” is yet another perpetual underachiever that projects his own feelings onto everyone else like whatshisface from UC Berzerkely!

rgr769

DuckDuckgo him and you will find all about the real Roger, assuming he is our poster. But based upon comments posted on the web, I am reasonably certain, our commenter is him.

rgr769

I have a B.S. in political science, but not from a top 25 university, and a law degree, but also not from one of those ivy league law schools. I attended the evening division of my law school and worked at a private law firm during law school. But I had no student debt.

I went to law school to learn a way to make a living to support my family, as there weren’t any lucrative civilian jobs for an ex-infantry/special forces officer back in the 1970’s.

SFC D

I’m a high school grad. Bottom of my class. Not because I’m stupid, because I was lazy. If you get mostly A’s on exams but turn in no assignments, your grades suck. My college career was short but spectacular. I’m lucky in that I grew up working around and with some quality people. Farmers, ranchers, cowboys, men that could do whatever they set their mind to and could fix anything. Later on I had some great NCO’s and more than few officers that taught me even more. Some would cal this the school of hard knocks. Yes, there were hard knocks. I prefer to call it the school of life. I’m 58 and still learning. I make 6 figures a year, still no degree, but MRS D and I live a damn fine life.

AW1Ed

Living well is the best revenge.

ChipNASA

Mid-March baby here SFC D
Now I’ll remember that we’re the end of the Kennedy generation as well as “Boomers”.
I got paper that said I’m good as BS but it’s really a checkbox added to my same AFSC/MOS x2, from the Air Force, 602 Traffic Management and 605/2T2, Air Transportation, Port DAWG. I’ve loved being a box 📦 kicker and label licker, pax herder. Problem solver and general “Go To” guy on so many levels for so many folks. Nukes, bullets, blood and tanks, to leaky toilets 🚽, and lightbulbs 💡, Presidential belongings, limos and comm gear to astronauts gloves and tools that have orbited the Earth, I’m “That guy”… “Go see Chip…” they say,
of that, I’m proud.
I’m extremely fortunate to have been able to do that for about 3 decades.
Still learning? Fuck yeah, ask me later about having to work my first civil servant’s travel package ahead. TBD and a whole bunch of other shit with 1/2 a new job and customer.
I have never claimed to singlehandedly save the world but, I have had my fingers in the cook pot, as it were, for a lot of things that will go down in history and for many who’s names will be better remembered 😁

Hatchet

I’m a high school graduate and like SFC D, was also bottom of my class. Got completely fuct off with school after grade eleven so I left and got a job with a decent-paying moving company. Despised working weekends so I saved a for while and decided to sign up for a few college-level night classes to prepare for technical school(like Dad, eventually a Radio College of Canada grad). Shortly afterwards, signed up for a stint the Reserves and left after I started working full time for IBM Canada(SoftLayer server tech). Unfortunately, the commute to and from IBM was brutal – 3 hrs each day, each way. So when a former RCC classmate got his ‘Linux-on-a-Chip’ business going, I ended up working for him and his partners for six great years – spent almost all of that time, working over a microscope with a pair of tweezers building prototype testing boards, reprogramming or repairing defective uCsimm’s, uCdimms that the company sold and other geeky fun. Whether it was developing or working on a through-hole or surface-mount board, my bench was never empty but somehow, some way – at the end of each and every lengthy day, my work-bench was always clean and tidy and ready for the next day’s work-cycle. By year six, our company had been bought out and as my friend and boss was leaving to start up another company, I decided to follow suit but work at something else. In the convening months, I put in a lot of applications with a number of different companies but received no call-backs or responses of any kind. Approximately two months after that, saw an online advertisement for ‘hardware technicians needed – apply to the Canadian Government, technical directorate’. Figured I’d put in application and see what happens. A week later, got the ‘we’d like to interview you’ call and was interviewed the following week. Two weeks after that, got an email inviting me to show up for a second interview with a follow-up call for appointment confirmation. When I showed up, I was asked if I’d ever taken a… Read more »