General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsBlaming Biden is ludicrous.
POTUS doesn't sit in front of a map table moving pieces around and confirming logistics.
We have people for that.
Presidents convey a theme, a message. Others pick up the message and turn it into policy and strategy.
Someone at State or DoD dropped the ball, BIG TIME.
Joe is a compassionate man who truly wanted to end this national nightmare before passing it along to another POTUS (Thanks Shrub, you fucking pos)
I'd love to be a fly on the wall for DoD meetings at the WH the last few months. But I'm 100% confident a ball was dropped... and Biden didn't drop it.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)will include 24/7 ads of Biden saying it wouldn't be like Saigon, while scared people are falling from airplanes.
Biden does seem to be taking control now, and I'm hopeful.
JohnSJ
(92,060 posts)group to actually sabotage this evacuation
Barring that, Biden will take full responsibility
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)JohnSJ
(92,060 posts)Blaming everyone but himself
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)might actually have a chance to get him.
JohnSJ
(92,060 posts)brush
(53,734 posts)and three previous presidents policies that didn't end our Afghan deployment.
And btw, the Afghan president fled his own country with as much cash he could cram into his baggage, and the fucking Afghan military folded like a three dollar suit when it was time to fight for their own country.
The Biden administration was operating in the dark too as to what trump agreed to in his secret agreement with the Taliban last year. And ya just know trump took care (bribes/kickbacks) of himself and expected to be back in office to reap the benefits and praise of withdrawal, and so did the Taliban.
Kinda hard to pull off an orderly evacuation plan when all that goes against you in a matter of days...just about impossible I'd say so fellow Dems get off the "Resign now high horse" and give Biden, Austin and Milley a break.
And while you're at it, cite an example of an orderly, chaos-free, military withdrawal. Dunkirk maybe, Dien Bien Phu, Saigon, Bull Run, the Soviets from Afghanistan, trump from Syria?
They're as rare as a republican governor admitting a mistake on banning masks.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)not be chaos.
If our military and intelligence honestly thought the Afghans could hold the line for months, they were badly mistaken.
brush
(53,734 posts)Ask the military why didn't they put off their refusal to fight. That is what caused the immediate crisis just four days ago. The Biden admin, nor anyone else could foresee all that happening withing days.
And by the way, we won the invasion years ago and chased Bin Ladin out, and then later got Bin Ladin.
Twenty years of deployment and no evacuation but Biden gets blames after seven months in office, and having to deal with a pandemic and an insurrection. Then that's dumped in his lap.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)brush
(53,734 posts)Because you're repeating republican talking points.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)read articles like Uncle Joe did not know best in the Economist or watch any news reports.
brush
(53,734 posts)then you say that. What do you think, the Taliban are, stupid? They knew what they had agreed to with corrupt ass trump. They knew they'd been making deals with the corrupt ass government and military for months. They knew Biden and the new admin didn't know what's up and the fleeing of the president and the laying down of arms by the army caught the new admin by surprise.
You don't understand that? You think Americans are supposed to know everything...about their treachery with trump, and the treachery of the cowardly president and army?
Instead of calling for resignations, call for the new admin to use the fact that Afghan funds are held back as a bargaining point with the Taliban. The country in running out of cash. Give the new admin time to use that to bargain with the Taliban to get our people and Afghan allies out.
What the fu_k good is having mass resignations and new people who have to get familiar and start all over again. Let's stop contributing the "Dems in disarray/Dems screwed up" hysteria that republican keep pushing and look for ways that the admin can succeed because if we lose in the mid-terms Democracy is over with.
Show unity for fellow Dems because all this bashing is going to lose us support and eventually votes.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)friggin walk into a trap.
Put the damn thing off a month. Bring in air support and rear guard if necessary. Dont say everything will be fine, then claim you always knew there would be chaos. Tell the truth.
The one good thing is that I think the Taliban may let us get out. They dont seem to be shooting at us now.
But as one CNN guest said, it only takes one shot in a tense situation to get a lot of people killed.
brush
(53,734 posts)Hell, the corrupt Afghan president got the fuck out too. You mean that trap?
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)brush
(53,734 posts)I'd think I was on FOX or NewMax instead of on Democratic Underground if I didn't know better.
Hoyt
(54,770 posts)Treefrog
(4,170 posts)Somebody bungled this.
I still dont think it will hurt Biden in the long run. I just dont.
Frasier Balzov
(2,639 posts)That the President did not reject clear recommendations which might have avoided this.
He could have heard plans and contingencies for so long that they seemed like dithering and ceased to be credible to him.
Most probably though, as you suggest, he was fed assumptions by people whose supposed expertise deserved reliance.
Kaleva
(36,240 posts)LetMyPeopleVote
(144,890 posts)Sympthsical
(9,029 posts)Apparently the State Department really, really dragged on evacuating Americans when the military was begging them to do it.
But, since everyone's in CYA mode, we can't say for certain who is telling the truth. I'd say this aspect rings true, simply because there were so many of our people just sitting there when Kabul fell. Tens of thousands are still there and in trouble.
We'll see what information got to the President - and more pertinently, what did not.