Very few problematic international events are a snapshot in time – typically, there are generations of decisions, elections, sanctions, treaties, motives (some false) and actions (or non-actions) that contribute to the paths of international problematic events – we are short sighted and shamefully manipulative when we, our public servants, and the press launch attacks at a problematic international event without consideration of the totality of the greater event.
My point? I’m shocked and embarrassed for our nation as a result of the many outcries and attacks from elected officials and the press (talking heads) reference the US pull out of Afghanistan – so much outrage now, when 40+ years of disgraceful events brought only silence from those same voices – selective outrage is always hiding something – before I dive in, let me clarify my motives for transparency purposes:
- I am not a fan of either positions on the left (Biden), or the right (Trump) – I am a fan of facts, transparency and clear motives – I support good governance, equitable legal and social justice at local, state, federal and international levels – for many decades, neither the left or right have done well with these basic principles – in fact, I believe our nation’s politicians continue to stray from these basic principles.
- I WAS a fan of the war effort in Afghanistan and Iraq based on what the past 6 US presidential administrations led us to believe – tragically, history and layers of subsequent well documented disclosures tell us a much different story than what the nation was initially led to believe – I can’t decide if I’m more disappointed in our leaders, or ashamed of them.
- The tragic events associated with the US pull out of Afghanistan are horrific and inexcusable – but, that’s if we only consider one subset of the greater Afghan event, and the execution of the pull out – what’s even more horrific and inexcusable are those who fail to consider the totality of the US Afghan/Iraq war experiences, while leveraging self and political gain at the expense of tens of thousands of lost lives and countless sacrifices made in the Afghan/Iraq wars.
- Regardless of political motives and false narratives, I am very proud of the service men and women who stepped up with pure hearts and motives to answer the call as it was illustrated to us – we now know much of that illustration was false and ill advised – in the same way I am proud the service men and women who served in the Vietnam and Korean Conflicts under similar false illustrations.
So, the stage is set and my motives are laid out – but I know you’re asking yourself, “Why should my opinion be given any more consideration than those bashing the withdrawal of US Troops from Afghanistan?” Just like the talking heads often cast a light on their motives through their message and methods, a little insight about me might help – I’m a big fan of accountability, real experience, and personal responsibility:
- Accountability – I (like many others) work hard to remember and learn from the past – something like, how we got to where we are, is equally as important where we find ourselves – it’s important to hold ourselves, and those responsible accountable – many nations experienced great loss of life, resources, and national creditability in support of errors/falsehoods in US policies, intelligence, and political agendas – these errors led to, and continued the Afghan/Iraq wars – it’s important measure lost lives and resources, as well as considering who gained or profited from these efforts – there are natural laws of “cause and effect” that govern everything in the universe – the removal of US troops from Afghanistan did not happen in a vacuum – there are many public servants on the (now transparent) blame line – they should all be held accountable – 40+ years of blame, not just those caught up in the current hype around sound bites, and the click bait mentality of “The pull out of troops from Afghanistan was horrible.”
- Real experience – like tens of thousands of fellow service men and women, I’ve walked the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan – I’ve fought with, and against the people of those nations – I’ve got 5 combat deployments totaling 64 months – I’ve been deployed in combat situations longer than many of the talking heads have been in office, have been married, have held a job, or have done any real research seeking truth – my experiences earned me the right to have an opinion of these, and similar topics – I’ve earned the right to ask, and expect public servants and the press to address hard questions and tough topics regarding Iraq and Afghanistan.
- Personal responsibility – the difference between what we were told about US involvement in Afghanistan, verses what really happened is a story worthy of outrage in itself – this information is out there, if we’re willing to go and get it – researching, fact checking and leveraging the Freedom of Information Act are not efficient, but they are effective – honestly, I know most people will not do the research – this document lays out some things you may not know about what happened over the last 40+ years in Afghanistan – Why did I feel the need to research? The loss of life, the cost, and limited gain begged for a deeper look – we should demand more from ourselves, and those who pound us with political agendas – no one should ever pounce on just the low hanging (news) fruit – we all should consider all the facts, all the time – the good and the bad – we should be willing to call ourselves out as passionately and quickly as we call others out – finger pointing and name calling are the behaviors of the immature, ill-informed, and inexperienced – do the damn work – ask the hard questions – dig deep enough to know the difference between right and wrong – and when you’ve done that, you’ve earned the right to call it what it is, good or bad – never just listen to the talking heads on the left and the right – if all you do is just listen to one side of anything, you’re actually the one being manipulated.
So, here we go – was the pull out a mistake? In my judgement, no – its years past time for us to have left Afghanistan – knowing what we know now, there are many easily made cases for not ever deploying thousands of service men and women in the first place – there are also many cases for not spending two trillion US tax payer dollars there – I think we agree ending US involvement in Afghanistan was overdue.
Could the pull out of US troops have been executed better? In my judgement, 100% yes – of course it could have been executed better – but, that can be said about most problematic international events – none of these problematic events are simple, clear, or without harsh and demanding factors to consider – but this is not my point.
Remember my point? I’m shocked and embarrassed for our nation as a result of the many outcries and attacks from elected officials and the press regarding the US pull out of Afghanistan – for those who are quick to judge in order to leverage political agendas at the cost of lives and sacrifices made in Afghanistan, where were you – where was your outrage over the last 40+ years? Selective outrage is always hiding something.
The short sighted manipulative agendas the talking heads bombarded the nation with low hanging (news) fruit that they chose to leverage, and spoke little about what they should have mentioned – those on the right, and the left selectively point to their respective agendas – all the while failing to seek accountably, or taking any personal responsibility for their rants – basically a child’s playground blame game when something failed to go their way – all for their own personal and political self-serving agendas.
So, Talking heads (politicians, press, military/civil leaders)? Where was your outrage over the past 40+ years? I’ve looked, and you were very quiet until now.
Where is your personal responsibility as a public servant or member of the press? Your motives seem to have little to do with actual events associated with the Afghan/Iraq wars.
Did you do any of the work required to validate any of the positions you inundated us with? It appears that you sat safely in the security of someone else’s (the military) efforts while selectively picking and launching self-serving politically charged narratives – again, this actually means you’ve allowed yourself to be manipulated.
The great thing about history is the facts will always come to light – these facts are available to all of us, if we’re willing to do the work – over the weeks since the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, thousands of angry voices from the talking heads sprang to life, but also failed to consider the facts outlining the 42 years that lead to the recent US forces pull out from Afghanistan.
Here is a list of chronological key events formatted in easy to read bullets – these events illustrate decades of failed US policy, agendas and eventually abuse of power and position that brought little outrage from the talking heads.
Feb 1979 – Operation Cyclone – the CIA began funding Afghan rebels (Mujahedeen) who were fighting off a Russian military intervention – these rebels had deep ties with many jihadist groups within Afghanistan and surrounding nations – at a glance, our support of these rebels seemed like a good idea – but as it turned out, our real motive was only our anti-Russian agenda – we really didn’t have any legitimate nation building, freedom fighting, or common ideology linked to our support with these extremist groups – but at the time, the talking heads, public servants and press falsely told us there were links.
Parallel to these events, in 1979 Osama bin Laden left Saudi Arabia and joined the Mujahedeen in Afghanistan.
Oct 1981 – CIA funding was accelerated for the Mujahedeen – training and supplying military equipment was added and rapidly increased as the scope of operations grew – bin Laden actually claims to have reaped indirect benefits from this increased US resources and support.
Mar 1988 – bin Laden formed al-Qaeda and continued to recruit, fund and strengthen anti-US sentiment among Islamic extremist groups.
Feb 1989 – following the Soviet Union’s withdrawal from Afghanistan, bin Laden returned to Saudi Arabia as a hero of the jihad – Dec 1991 the Soviet Union dissolved which reduced their efforts in Afghanistan and subsequently lead the US to end its funding, training, supplying Afghan rebels.
July 1992 bin Laden shifted his al-Qaeda base to Sudan, until US diplomatic pressure forced him to leave in 1996 – he reestablished a base in Afghanistan – motivated by a belief that US foreign policy oppressed, killed, and harmed Muslims in the Middle East, he declared a war against the United States – this initiated a series of bombings and related attacks – bin Laden declared the complete restoration of Sharia law as the only way to set things right in the Muslim world.
Spring of 1994 many of these same Mujahedeen rebels, which were trained and funded by the CIA formed the Taliban and then engaged in a two year civil war in Afghanistan taking charge of Afghanistan in 1996 using CIA training and resources.
Oct 1999 – motivated by the US, the United Nations Security Council adopted a resolution creating an al-Qaeda and Taliban Sanctions Committee, which sanctioned funding, travel, and arms shipments to both groups – this move by the UN follows a period of dominance and growth for al-Qaeda.
11 Sep 2001 – a group of mostly Saudi Arabian terrorist with strong ties to al-Qaeda launched an unprecedented horrific attack on the US World Trade Center, the Pentagon and US citizens.
18 Sep 2001 – US adopted a joint resolution authorizing the use of force against those believed to be associated with the 9/11 attack – the joint resolution was cited by the presidential administration as legal leverage to take sweeping measures to combat terrorism, from invading Afghanistan, to eavesdropping on U.S. citizens without a court order, and standing up detention camps around the world – this would be a good place for all talking heads to be outraged by government overreach, and compromised civil and human rights – only a few were heard.
7 Oct 2001, the US kicked off Operation Enduring Freedom bombing al-Qaeda and Taliban sites and subsequently invading Afghanistan for 20+ years – in the following years, these initiatives caused the Taliban to form smaller groups and disperse throughout Afghanistan and many other nations – NOTE: to this day, there are no connections between the Taliban and the 9/11 attacks on the US.
16 Oct 2001 The Taliban offered to turn bin Laden over to a neutral country (perhaps Turkey) in an effort to negotiate the end of bombing and influx of US forces into Afghanistan – US leaders refused to take the offer for bin-Laden if any form of negations were involved – so, to reiterate… US forces were bombing Afghanistan in an effort to find/recover bin Laden, but wouldn’t consider stopping the bombing (and subsequent invasion) if bin Laden was turned over to a third country – could this have been the end of combat actions in Afghanistan? Not a lot of outrage was heard from the talking heads during this time.
19 Oct 2001 – US ground forces enter Afghanistan – 1000 U.S. Special Forces linked up with ethnic Pashtuns and Northern Alliances – US forces begin ground combat actions – this move locked the US into an alliance with anti-Taliban forces and set the stage for exponential “mission creep” to come.
5 Dec 2001 – at the bidding of the US presidential administration, the UN invited Afghan Northern Alliance and major factions, but not the Taliban to a conference in Germany – the factions signed an agreement, endorsed by the UN – the agreement installed Karzai as interim administration head, and created an international peacekeeping force to maintain security – this agreement deepened the divide between the Taliban and Northern Alliance – it was basically a repeat of the 1994 Afghan civil war, except western nations now “owned” the Northern Alliance and associated factions.
3-17 Dec 2001 – bin Laden was believed to be at a well-equipped cave complex southeast of Kabul – a two-week battle with al-Qaeda resulting in a few hundred deaths and the eventual escape of bin Laden to Pakistan.
9 Dec 2001 – the Taliban unofficially fell and disbanded with the surrender of Kandahar – Taliban leaders fled – despite the fall of the Taliban, al-Qaeda remained strong and hidden in mountain encampments.
Mar 2002 – US shifted military and intelligence resources away from Afghanistan toward Iraq – US intelligence claims Iraq is the chief threat in the “war on terror” – these intelligence claims have been proven to be saturated in faulty intelligence – the presidential administration pitched the invasion of Iraq to Americans by manipulating narratives and presenting incomplete facts, weaponizing the cracks between possibilities and probabilities – all these secrets have now been turned over to the public – where is your outrage?
17 April 2002 – US presidential administration called for, and eventually receives approval and funding for reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan to the tune of an additional $38 billion – this effort is now widely known for its poor application, administration and lack of accountability leading to wide spread corruption, embezzlement, lack of oversight, fraud schemes, ineffective/inefficient use of resources related to budgets, dispersing of funds and lack of basic measures to ensure responsible use of resources – the outraged voices today seem to have been silent then.
Spring of 2003 – with renewed support from jihadist groups and other Arab nations, the Taliban reformed and regained influence in Afghanistan as US forces experience hit or miss success with combat operations in Afghanistan.
1 May 2003 – Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld declares an “end to major combat” – this declaration proved to be categorically untrue within a year of Rumsfeld’s remarks.
29 Oct 2004 – bin Laden launched a video – he taunted the US presidential administration and takes responsibility for the attacks of September 11, 2001. “We want to restore freedom to our nation, just as you lay waste to our nation,” bin Laden says.
July 2006 – violence increases across Afghanistan during the summer months – suicide attacks quintupled from 27 in 2005 to 139 in 2006 – remotely detonated bombings more than double, to 1,677 – progress and stability flounder 5 years into the “war on terrorism” efforts.
Sept 2006 – DOJ investigated US forces and CIA interrogation, imprisonment, and personnel collection practices – DOJ determined these practices to be illegal if carried out by US forces – this initiated talks and lead to the passing of the Anti-Torture Act in 2017.
From Sept 2006 to Apr 2010 – the CIA covertly continued these interrogation, imprisonment, and collection practices under a legal disclaimer issued by the Whitehouse’s legal team – legal teams were brought in to interpret early versions of what would eventually become the Anti-Torture Act – these teams broadened definitions and descriptions of interrogation practices, and introduced changing locations as a way of legalizing the interrogation practices.
August 2008 – Afghan and UN investigations find systemic false collateral damage (killings) reported from coalition forces – US officials dispute the death toll findings, but also orders an overhaul of US kinetic combat procedures – Gen McChrystal stated, “We must avoid the trap of winning tactical victories, but suffering strategic defeats, by causing civilian casualties or excessive damage and thus alienating the people,” – this is another example of what should have spurred outrage from the talking heads, but little was heard.
Sep 2008 – US Gallup/Harris Polls and the Pew Research Center reported a seven year systematic decline in US citizen’s approval of the Afghan/Iraq wars.
17 Feb 2009 – US presidential administration recommits to the Afghanistan war effort – plans were announced to send 17,000 more troops – US leaders affirm they will stick to a timetable to draw down most combat forces by the end of 2011 – a resurgent Taliban proved that draw down to be impossible – two years later the failed 2011 milestone marks ten years in Afghanistan largely fighting the Taliban who have no connection to the attack on 9/11 – perhaps this news should have caused some outrage equal to the outrage we hear about US forces being pulled out of Afghanistan in Aug 2021….. it did not.
March 2010 – four CIA whistle blowers released internal reports between the Pentagon and Langley defining the Afghan/Iraq wars as “without definable basis or end state” and proposed a plan to use Afghan women to create a public relations feminist campaign to aid and justify attacks on the Taliban and continued war the effort in Afghanistan – this policy diversionary tactic kicked off hundreds of philanthropic and government aid organizations for Afghan women – many of these efforts were effective and successful at providing aid to Afghan women– but a larger numbers of these organizations proved to be ineffective corruption laced money-pits – for me, this is in the top 5 most shocking and outrageous – the plight of Afghan women is leveraged to “gin up” more reasons to stay and fight in Afghanistan – and to make unscrupulous organizations rich.
May 2011 bin Laden was killed by US forces in Pakistan – US and Pakistan leaders have not successfully addressed the topic of why Pakistan was harboring bin Laden – truth be told, a great deal of outrage WAS heard about Pakistan’s possible participation in harboring bin Laden.
27 May 2014 – US announced troop withdrawal – a timetable for withdrawing most U.S. forces from Afghanistan by 2016 – ultimately, achievements and prerequisites were not met by Afghan or US forces to allow the full withdrawal plan to be carried out – a partial plan was eventually implemented.
21 Aug 2017 – US presidential administration outlines a renewed Afghanistan policy saying that though the “original instinct was to pull out,” they will instead press ahead with an open-ended military commitment – the administration differentiated this policy from other presidential administrations, saying decisions about withdrawal will be based on “conditions on the ground,” rather than arbitrary timelines – these remarks were similarly echoed across all four presidential administrations responsible for the prolonged war in Afghanistan.
January 2018 – Taliban launched major attacks as US efforts escalate – the Taliban carried out a series of bold terror attacks – the attacks come as the US presidential administration implements its new Afghanistan plan, deploying troops across rural Afghanistan to advise Afghan brigades, and launch air strikes against opium labs to try to compromise Taliban finances.
7 September 2019 – US presidential administration abruptly calls off peace talks with Taliban, after a top U.S. negotiator announced that an agreement had been reached “in principle” – the administration tweeted the death of a US Soldier caused the talks to be called off.
Aug 2019-June 2020 – US forces were reduced in Afghanistan from 15500 to 2500.
Feb 2020 US presidential administration formed a treaty with the Taliban, part of which declared 5000 Taliban prisoners would be released and US forces would leave Afghanistan by May 2021.
March 2020 – the US State Department ramped up official notifications for US citizens to leave Afghanistan in Feb 2021 – over the next 18 months, there were continuous state department notifications to US Citizens in Afghanistan across both Trump and Biden Administrations – these notifications, calling for US Citizens to leave Afghanistan are easily referenced for those willing to do the work – why is this an important factor?
One would have to wonder why more US Citizens did not leave ahead of the pull out of US troops, putting themselves and US forces at risk – each of those US citizens have a unique story and it’s theirs to tell, even though the state department ramped up its notifications in Feb 2021 – some factors to consider might be: many of them may not have had the means to leave – perhaps safe travel to the airport was not possible – maybe their missions needed more time – I’m sure there is a long list of reasons why they did not leave – but the large number of US Citizen remaining in country after 18 months of state department notifications to leave was a major factor.
NOTE: Many will say that I am “victim blaming” – this is not victim blaming – these are the facts – facts speak for themselves.
March 2021 – US watchdog government agency from the US Special Inspector General’s Office (SIGAR and ANDSF) reported to Congress the increased cuts of aid to Afghan infrastructure, government services, and army would further erode Afghan’s ability to combat the Taliban – IN FACT, twice a year (every year) since 2012 these same reports sent to congress reverberated the same ominous message; despite enormous training efforts and massive funding the Afghan government and military forces were riddled with:
-wide spread corruption,
-embezzlement at multiple levels,
-lack of professional functional oversight,
-substandard accountability/tractability practices,
-internal investment fraud schemes that paid itself with US government and aid organization funds collected from ongoing and new investors (like a ponzi scheme),
-failed incentive visa programs,
-ineffective education, training and professional development programs,
-inefficient use of resources related to budgets, dispersing of funds and culpability.
Where was your outrage as ten years of these reports were sent to Congress? You had none.
Apr to June 2021 – most US contractors depart Afghanistan.
July 2021 US presidential administration pulled US forces out of Bagram, leaving 650 troops in Kabul
May 2021 the Taliban launched an offensive – by end of July 2021 they took more than half of Afghanistan – Aug, they took over Bagram Airfield.
31 Aug 2021 – US forces ended their occupation in Afghanistan – again, to this day there are no connections between the Taliban and the 9/11 attacks on the US – so, why did we fight them for nearly 20 years?
Now that we have outlined the series of events that got us to where we are today, let’s take a look at where we really stand in relation to costs:
Lost lives in the Afghan War
US Forces – 2,448
Contractors – 3,846
Reporters – 72
Aid Workers – 444
Taliban Fighters – 54,191
Allied Forces – 1,144
Afghan Forces – 66,352
Afghan Civilians – 47,223
TOTAL – 175,720
Just like the troop removal from Afghanistan did not happen in a vacuum, the overall conflict in the Middle East, post 9/11 didn’t happen in a vacuum either – while this rant is not specific to Iraq, the most recent Iraq war has to be mentioned – the justifications we were told required us to go back to Iraq in 2003, turned out to be false – lies – fake narratives – US interest in Iraq begins in the early ’90s with Ahmed Chalabi, a Iraqi exile who had been waging a campaign to depose Saddam Hussein long before the 9/11 attacks – this behind the scenes, cloak and dagger story is a national embarrassment – add the evolving stories from Dick Gephardt, Dick Armey, Dick Durbin, and Dick Lugar – their own stories, in their own words are now available for those willing to dig a little – the road to the Iraq war, and the conditions that led the US to invade a country that ultimately had little to do with the 9/11 attacks is shameful – we now know that the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) narrative turned out to be largely fabricated – I can write volumes about the Iraq wars, but that’s all common low hanging fruit now – most of it has been declassified and easy accessible – again, where was the outrage? Where were the talking heads? We are seeing history repeating itself with Afghanistan – we went in under false pretenses and without clear objectives or pure motives – our impact caused more harm than good and we left without anything constructive to show for all lives, time and resources lost.
In addition to lives lost and trillions cost, there is another group of Afghan people who we manipulated, took advantage of, and who’s lives and families we placed in incredible danger – as you read these words, there are tens of thousands of Afghan citizens who worked for US forces in 18 specific capacities – their primary roles were to assist US forces manage unique tasks we were not able to manage ourselves – the United States promised them and their immediate families VISAs (SIV or P2) – each agreement involved the Afghan citizen working faithfully for US forces for 1 to 5 years (specific to agreements) – 22K Afghan citizens are eligible for these VISAs – 16 years later, less than 4K have received their promised VISA – 13K have been approved but have been waiting years for their promised VISA – 5K are still waiting the multiple year approval process – most have waited for years after their service to US forces was completed – many continued their service as a means of security against the Taliban – an unknown number have already been killed – all the while, congress voted 5 times over past 11 years not to accelerate the labored SIV and P2 VISA process for 22K Afghan citizen who trusted us, took us for our word, and whose lives are in danger every day because they helped the USA – why are you not outraged? Does our word mean nothing? The talking heads have been primarily quiet about these 16 years of broken promises.
Finally, a great many DoD and Government contractors got very, very rich as a result of these wars (prongs of the military-industrial complex) – I know firsthand, from several years in deployed conditions all the crooked habits, abusive practices, and underhanded methods of government contractors – not all of them, but certainly most of them – DoD spending is a heartbeat away from criminal, and everybody knows it – but we don’t talk about it, or bring attention to it – it makes us feel unpatriotic if we do – truth be told, its unpatriotic if we don’t talk about it, or bring attention to it – not a lot of outrage from the talking heads about this mess either.
The “active” war in Afghanistan continued through four US presidential administrations for 20+ years – all administrations promised to pull US forces out of Afghanistan – history has not, and will not continue to be kind to these administrations – history has already illustrated, and will continue to illustrate (as disclosures continue to come forth) that the Afghan/Iraq wars were falsely represented, poorly managed, and grossly over funded – especially when measured against the lack of quantifiable gain as a result of the war efforts – this point alone is worthy of outrage by both political parties, all press agencies and US citizens – but, because we’re so politically divided, we’re pretending like the “execution of the pull out” is the worst of it – it’s shameful.
Instead of only questioning the execution of the troop removal and the way America’s longest war was concluded, here are some other things to consider:
Who (or what) benefited from the military efforts as a result of the Afghan/Iraq wars?
Were we successful at the nation building we set out to accomplish?
Did we increase or decrease the threat to our democracy and our Freedom? What about the democracy and freedom of the Afghan people?
Did 20 years of war and 40 years of involvement help or harm the US reputation on a global scale?
Who paid the biggest price for a conflict that yielded such a messy and disappointing outcome?
And finally, I believe it’s important to ask what withdrawal options we really had at this point – a withdrawal already promised and a failed compromise (the so call, peace treaty with the Taliban) with those who have taken control of the Afghan government – if you’re not outraged by every mistake we made along the way, you’ve got no business being outraged by a messy withdrawal from the messier problem we never should have had in the first place.
Kevin's Thoughts 