Surprise, panic, and fateful choices: The day America lost its longest war.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Dave Weigel Retweeted

NEW: A vivid recounting of the day Kabul fell with scenes from Afghanistan's capital, the corridors of Washington and a hastily-arranged meeting in Doha. A major
@washingtonpost
team effort captures the day America's longest war ended.

Link to tweet

Asia

Surprise, panic and fateful choices: The day America lost its longest war

By Susannah George, Missy Ryan, Tyler Pager, Pamela Constable, John Hudson and Griff Witte
Yesterday at 3:53 p.m. EDT

KABUL — On the day that Afghanistan’s capital fell to the Taliban, delivering the definitive verdict on a war that had lumbered on ambiguously for nearly 20 years, one of the city’s top security officials woke up preparing for battle.

The day before, government forces in the north’s largest city — Mazar-e Sharif, a notorious anti-Taliban stronghold — had surrendered with barely a fight. The same had happened overnight in Jalalabad, the traditional winter home of Afghanistan’s kings and the country’s main gateway to the east.

As dawn broke over the misty mountains that ring the city on Aug. 15, Kabul had suddenly become an island — the last bastion of a government that the United States had supported at a cost of trillions of dollars and thousands of lives. But it was an island that some were still prepared to defend.

{snip}

Ryan, Pager, Constable, Hudson and Witte reported from Washington. Anne Gearan in Washington contributed to this report.

[Scrivener7]

1. Oh, please. America lost that war before we even went in. It was designed as a money

making scheme for people like Eric Prince and Cheney's Halliburton pals. It was never about anything else.

Then we lost it again when TFG "negotiated" to lose it to please Vlad.

August 15 was not the day we lost that war. August 15 was the day we grew the hell up and understood that it was way past time to get out, and getting out was never going to be anything other than a painful and violent process.