John Oliver wades into the American-made Afghanistan refugee crisis on Last Week Tonight
We really should have been more insightful about this than a Rambo III-era Sylvester Stallone
TV News John Oliver
On last week’s Last Week Tonight, John Oliver made a veiled reference to the fact that that week’s show was taping its main story while there was something else going on he was pretty sure was going to be a bigger topic next week. Well, next week is this week, and Sunday saw Oliver attempting to tackle Afghanistan. Playing a clip from a stolidly nodding Sylvester Stallone attempting to understand just how complex and bloodily fraught is the history of that oft-invaded and exploited country, Oliver went on to show that America’s involvement in the region has been Rambo III-level wrongheaded and unnecessary, right up to and including this week’s disastrous and chaotic cessation of our two-decade war there.
As ever, Oliver tackled a wrenchingly complicated issue with a signature, three-pronged strategy of providing context, mocking the hell out of the bad actors responsible, and seeking solutions, all with the exasperated comic acidity of a guy unafraid to piss everybody off. Partway through his piece, Oliver acknowledged that there aren’t a lot of solutions to the “clusterfuck that we helped fuck into existence.” That in the face of the shockingly sudden collapse of the U.S.-buttressed Afghan government and the deeply unsettling sight of religious extremists with access to billions of dollars worth of America-supplied weaponry taking charge. He gave it a shot, though, urging viewers to, at the very least, call their representatives in order to counter the all-too-predictable rush to slam the door against the Afghan refugees now attempting flee the mess we made of their country from conservative blowhards like Fox News’ “tag-team racial panic-goblins” Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham. Oliver also gave out the government-supplied suicide-prevention phone number (1-800-273-8255) to stress to service members in crisis that the now-obvious pointlessness of their years of sacrifice isn’t their fault.
Still, there’s decades’-worth of blame to be shared all across the political spectrum, and Oliver spared exactly nobody. Naturally, bombs-away warmongers like George W. Bush (and his post-9/11 “crusade”) had unfortunate quotes thrown back at them, but every president since, including Barack Obama and Donald Trump (who negotiated a withdrawal deal with the Taliban, but not the legitimate Afghan government) got theirs, too. So did literally every member of Congress but one (the still-serving Democratic Representative Barbara Lee of California), who lockstep-leapt on the post-9/11 invasion bandwagon, with Oliver singling out the also still-employed, New York Democrat Carolyn Maloney, who made her impassioned pitch for war while infamously wearing what Oliver termed a “fuck-you burqa” on the House floor.
As Oliver noted, Maloney’s stunt was intended, theoretically, to highlight the undeniably appalling treatment of women by the Taliban, although the host questioned the theatrics of a white woman aping another culture for the publicity. Plus, as Oliver noted in his exhaustively educational trip through America’s long history of opportunistic interventionism abroad, the U.S. only seems to get really worked up about civil rights issues in other countries when there are perceived political gains to dress up in humanitarian garb. And if you thought that noted not-conservative Oliver was going to go easy on the current president in deference to similarly opportunistic partisanship, you really haven’t been watching Last Week Tonight throughout its eight, scorched-earth seasons of award-winning finger-pointing.
From now-President Joe Biden’s support of the war, to Biden’s narrow focus on protecting only Americans fleeing Afghanistan, to Biden’s 2010 citing of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger “getting away with” the equally disastrous and inept Fall of Saigon, Oliver stated that Biden’s scornful on-camera claim of having “zero responsibility” for a then-hypothetical Taliban takeover was some seriously revisionist bullshit. As Oliver put it of 2010 Biden’s choice of foreign policy role models in the face of an incompetently managed retreat from an unnecessary and costly war, “When you’re rolling with Dick and the Kiss, you know you’re on the right side of history.”
So what’s to be done? Oliver doesn’t know. The United States’ track record in learning from its violently self-interested, often blatantly racist foreign interventionism isn’t great. And propping up hand-picked kleptocratic foreign governments in the name of mumble-mumble-something-freedom has once again left 20 years’ worth of military contractor-enriching technology and weaponry in the hands of some very bad men. Oliver showed the looming nightmare for the women and civil rights campaigners of the now-abandoned Afghanistan, while wryly applauding the Taliban for adopting some America-style improved public relations techniques. (There’s apparently a WhatsApp Taliban complaints department, which, don’t call that.)
But, ultimately, what Oliver stressed was the right—and only—thing to do now is to welcome and materially assist as many Afghan refugees as possible. You know, since we blundered away their country and left them at the mercy of some now U.S.-armed, right-wing, woman-hating religious sociopaths. Plucking an unintentionally telling, typically xenophobic quote from “professional pearl-clutcher” Ingraham, Oliver suggested that the Fox News-fretting flood of terrified refugees that happens “every time we turn a country upside-down” can be avoided by not doing that quite so much. In the meantime, Oliver said, the very fucking least we can do is to launch an apologetic and helpful fleet of lifeboats to those people fleeing the horror we helped bring about.
68 Comments
Were Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham separated at birth ?
They crawled out of the same turd Satan shat out one day.
No, Carlson was always a rich heir to the Swanson frozen food business; Ingraham made money just on the strength of being terrible.
so she “pulled herself up by her bootstraps”? LOL
More importantly, can they be re-merged now? Perhaps by use of two pneumatic cannons?
It’s definitely worth trying
Maybe a brundlefly pod? They could both use more arms…
Are you saying all It’s Alive babies look alike to you?
There’s always been a component of Ingrahm’s success based in the fact she was an actual “hot” conservative woman and there not being much who existed
I’d rather fuck a rusty shovel.
Biden’s scornful on-camera claim of having “zero responsibility” for a then-hypothetical Taliban takeover I thought he said he had zero responsibility for non-American interests in Afghanistan, which made my blood run cold at the thought of those Afghan interpreters still over there who the Taliban will kill when they find them no matter how progressive or forgiving they now claim to be. Leaving them to die so cavalierly is really the only way Biden could make a shitty situation even worse.
He didn’t say either but hey you have your outrage so why let the facts get in the way
the irony of a brit trying to castigate an american for afghanistan is rich. Go ask durand about how afghanistan got where it is today john
Middle East: Obliterating the Illusion of Imperialism Since 600 AD.
Are we now defining imperialism/colonization as something only Europeans can do? I feel like that’s a pretty patronizing stance toward a number of impressive eastern empires of the last ~1500 years.
Are we now defining imperialism/colonization as something only Europeans can do? No, I am not.
I thought the same. Any minute now, Putin will weigh in on how America fucked up Afghanistan.
Certainly the Soviets have a lot to blame, but the British fought three wars there in the 19th century (they wanted to control it because they feared Tsarist Russia would invade India through it), so it was already messed up in the 20th century.
His wife served in Iraq so I think he’s coming at it more from a person view than he’s suddenly turned new-con
Afghanistan is a different country, maybe he should look at a map
He’s both a naturalised American, and has often highlighted the dark side of Britain’s history. The current story is the US fuck up in Afghanistan. In the 19th century it was the British fuck up in Afghanistan. It’s not called “The 19th Century Tonight”.
Tony Blair would like a word with your categorization of this as an american fuck up
Tony Blair can go fuck up himself.
He would, except nobody ever asked that fuckwit anything.
How about praising Biden for doing the right thing? Either you wanted them to withdraw or you didn’t, you don’t get to play both sides
Unbeknownst to you, the world isn’t binary and Biden certainly didn’t do the right thing in terms of the withdrawal in more ways than you likely are aware.
I could praise him for having the balls to accept that the mission has been a 90% failure and getting out. But the approach to pulling out has been a shambles. In the long run he’s arguably less culpable than any of his 3 predecessors, but still culpable.
That explains why I can’t find it using the search feature on my streaming services.
we really dont talk about operation cyclone do we
You must be some kind of special stupid to believe that every Brit supports the monarchy, much less British Imperialism.
“Categorical humanitarian parole.” Call your congressmen and women and enlighten them about this so that we don’t end up fucking over a whole bunch of translators and their families who we promised visas to in exchange for helping us in Afghanistan.
You know, since we blundered away their country and left them at the mercy of some now U.S.-armed, right-wing, woman-hating religious sociopaths. Of course, this was true even before the invasion, as the Taliban had been armed by the US to fight the Soviets.The difference is now there has been a generation of Afghans who were educated under two decades of American occupation who might be more willing to push against the Taliban, who themselves might be more willing to temper themselves. But, really, Biden was right to withdraw (or, rather, not cancel Trump’s withdrawal). Because this would have happened as it did had they withdrawn ten years ago or ten years from now. And for everyone who was educated and aided by the US there was probably two who lost a family member or was injured in a bomb or drone strike, becoming an enemy of the US and an easy recruit for the Taliban.
The difference is now there has been a generation of Afghans who were educated under two decades of American occupation who might be more willing to push against the Taliban, who themselves might be more willing to temper themselves.Says the one who has no idea of the history of Afghanistan and considers it beneath the dignity of an American to educate themselves about other places. But, really, Biden was right to withdraw (or, rather, not cancel Trump’s withdrawal). Because this would have happened as it did had they withdrawn ten years ago or ten years from now. Certainly would, as long as bigots like you call the shots for whom anyone whose passport isn’t blue is uneducated rabble, all while declaring educashun and accountability something that’s only for others to strive for while you won’t dirty your hands with such silly things. And for everyone who was educated and aided by the US there was probably two who lost a family member or was injured in a bomb or drone strike, becoming an enemy of the US and an easy recruit for the Taliban.Especially when people like you declare that the locals should conform with your stereotypes and prejudices because you’re too drowning in self-importance to bother to learn anything about them. Yes, people certainly die when bigots like you decide that having weddings any differently than Americans do is punishable by death.Now go f*** yourself, the difference between you and the Taliban is negligible. You’re both drunk with narcissism and wilful ignorance about any facts not pandering to your prejudice.Oh, by the way, here’s an Article on Afghanistan in the 1950s and 60s – including a picture of a female professor of medicine teaching female students.https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2013/07/afghanistan-in-the-1950s-and-60s/100544/You made the same mistakes in Somalia, in Iraq and in Afghanistan. You stubbornly refuse to acknowledge there’s anything you need to learn about local dynamics or culture, expecting the entire world to be populated by people who, given the choice, will all start behaving like good Americans. And then you blame the locals for having the audacity to not act that way. America knows best!
Aww, cute, the little jingoist had their feelings hurt because someone didn’t lick their boots. It’s too bad you are too illiterate to even realize that I referenced one of my points. I guess flag-waving and anthem-singing was more important than reading comprehension in your school. Bless you, and thanks for proving my point about being allergic to having an actual clue, all while preaching “educashun” for others.
He/she at least feels better about they’s self. That’s what unanswered, self-righteous screeds are for.If not, why even have an internet?
That’s cute, coming from the self-righteous people who believe that if thousands have to die so they can pamper their ego, that’s perfectly ok, just as long as said thousands are barbarian Untermenschen somewhere in the far corners of the world.It’s cute that people so narcissistic that they demand human sacrifices on the altar of their ego call others “self-righteous”.
What the fuck are you babbling about?
Says the one who has no idea of the history of Afghanistan and considers it beneath the dignity of an American to educate themselves about other places.Not American.
And I have a pretty decent grasp of the history, thank you very much. Certainly would, as long as bigots like you call the shots for whom anyone whose passport isn’t blue is uneducated rabble, all while declaring educashun and accountability something that’s only for others to strive for while you won’t dirty your hands with such silly things.Ignoring the ad hominem, short of staying there indefinitely and making it the 51st State, there was little that your nation could have been done apart from spending a trillion (more) dollars in a country that doesn’t want hostile foreigners in their homeland.
There’s no colonialist solution for the problem.Your country occupied Afghanistan for twenty years and three administrations. And very little changed in the last fifteen. Especially when people like you declare that the locals should conform with your stereotypes and prejudices because you’re too drowning in self-importance to bother to learn anything about them. Yes, people certainly die when bigots like you decide that having weddings any differently than Americans do is punishable by death.Huh??? Where do I say anything like that? Of fucking course drones shouldn’t bomb their weddings. Implying anyone would think otherwise is the stawiest of strawmen.
But as long as armed Americans were on foreign soil, innocents would be caught in the crossfire. Now go f*** yourself, the difference between you and the Taliban is negligible. You’re both drunk with narcissism and wilful ignorance about any facts not pandering to your prejudice.How about facts like how the war was costing Americans $300 million each day for 20 years and showed no sign of winding down or improving. As long as the US was there, there’d always be more people willing to join the Taliban to fight them, and it would attract extremists from across the region who wanted to kill Americans. There was never an exit strategy. This was never going to end better. You made the same mistakes in Somalia, in Iraq and in Afghanistan. You stubbornly refuse to acknowledge there’s anything you need to learn about local dynamics or culture, expecting the entire world to be populated by people who, given the choice, will all start behaving like good Americans. And then you blame the locals for having the audacity to not act that way. America knows best!Still not American. And not blaming the locals. Americans shouldn’t have been in there in the first place. You can’t succeed at nation building after a military invasion; that doesn’t ever work. It’s an effort that is always doomed to fail.
Staying in Afghanistan was a horrible, bloody, and awful example of the sunk cost fallacy. Because so much money and blood and lives has been spent trying to prop up the country, there’s the urge to keep trying until you have something successful. But going in was a mistake, and staying was a bigger one, and just spending more money and blood was never going to change that.
Ignoring the ad hominem, short of staying there indefinitely and making it the 51st State, there was little that your nation could have been done apart from spending a trillion (more) dollars in a country that doesn’t want hostile foreigners in their homeland.There’s no colonialist solution for the problem.My nation?You’re hilarious.
YOU are the one who only looks at money spent and is perfectly fine with it ending up where it doesn’t help, as long as the right pockets are being filled, and you talk about “there is no colonialist solution”? You’re the one who believes that the fact that supporting corruption doesn’t change the local country for the better was proof that the country can’t be helped. Huh??? Where do I say anything like that?Where you declare that the fact that the current practice – which included mowing down everything from wedding parties to hospitals that didn’t quite conform with the expectations – hasn’t worked suggests that nothing would work. Of fucking course drones shouldn’t bomb their weddings. Implying anyone would think otherwise is the stawiest of strawmen.That’s cute, coming from someone who has nothing to offer BUT strawmen, all while cheering a situation that has Afghans falling off planes they cling to and the families of those who have already escaped being butchered by the Taliban.Implying you give a flying f*** about the lives of Afghans is laughable. But as long as armed Americans were on foreign soil, innocents would be caught in the crossfire.Funny, there’s plenty of countries where armed Americans are on foreign soil. I live an hour away from a US Airbase “on foreign soil”. Heck, I’ve visited said airbase. Seems like it’s more a matter of whether the locals are perceived as allies or as livestock where you shoot first and ask questions later. How about facts like how the war was costing Americans $300 million each day for 20 years and showed no sign of winding down or improving.If I throw money into the fireplace instead of investing it into something worthwhile, is the fact that I never end up with more money evidence that investment is a silly idea? Would it change something to throw more money into the fireplace? No. Would it change something to actually invest that money into something worthwhile? There’s a pretty good chance it would. As long as the US was there, there’d always be more people willing to join the Taliban to fight them, and it would attract extremists from across the region who wanted to kill Americans.Whereas, of course, publicly confirming Taliban propaganda that the West is corrupt, only supports the corrupt, and will backstab anyone deeming themselves allied with them at a moment’s notice isn’t going to attract extremism at all, right? There was never an exit strategy. This was never going to end better.Certainly not as long as one isn’t even trying but merely trying to fill one’s coffers at the expense of the little guy there. Perhaps listening to people who are actually familiar with the region might have helped? Staying in Afghanistan was a horrible, bloody, and awful example of the sunk cost fallacy. Because so much money and blood and lives has been spent trying to prop up the country, there’s the urge to keep trying until you have something successful. But going in was a mistake, and staying was a bigger one, and just spending more money and blood was never going to change that.How about doing something productive instead? The only fallacy here is your claim that just because the conduct of the past 20 years didn’t produce any lasting results, nothing would.And it tells us something about you that you waffle about “spending more blood”, all while cheering as Afghans are being murdered and all while cheering the creation of a breeding ground for COVID variants. Or do you believe the Taliban are going to have a stringent vaccination campaign?If there’s one thing you are arguing for, it’s more blood. More dead. That’s the number one consequence of this decision. More dead Afghans, and more dead people in the West, because your bigotted attitude that the Afghans don’t deserve help will produce both more victims of extremism AND more victims of COVID. But I’m sure you’ll come up with a conspiracy theory why you can assess the situation in terms of COVID much better than the WHO, which has warned about the consequences of the Taliban takeover for the fight against COVID, given that you can also assess the situation in Afghanistan better than anyone who actually studied the region.
How about doing something productive instead? The only fallacy here is your claim that just because the conduct of the past 20 years didn’t produce any lasting results, nothing would.And it tells us something about you that you waffle about “spending more blood”, all while cheering as Afghans are being murdered and all while cheering the creation of a breeding ground for COVID variants. Or do you believe the Taliban are going to have a stringent vaccination campaign?If there’s one thing you are arguing for, it’s more blood. More dead. That’s the number one consequence of this decision. More dead Afghans, and more dead people in the West, because your bigotted attitude that the Afghans don’t deserve help will produce both more victims of extremism AND more victims of COVID.And what exactly are YOU arguing for?
Nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
You have offered no alternatives. Advocated for no options. Given no suggestions. You have no position except being contrary and opposed to me. And you don’t even know ANYTHING about me and are making wild—and incorrect—assumptions based on a single comment you’re twisting to fit your assumptions of me. You have NOTHING to offer except rage and anger and hate. Which you are spewing forth undirected online at anyone who crosses your path.You are an angry, bitter individual who isn’t even worthy of calling a “troll” because at least a troll is out making people angry to entertain and amuse themselves.I have no desire to continue to be dragged down into the mud by you. Good day.
Of course, this was true even before the invasion, as the Taliban had been armed by the US to fight the Soviets.By the way, this just shows how completely ignorant about the place you are.The Taliban are not the Mujahedeen. The Taliban were armed by Pakistan and OUSTED the government created by the Mujahedeen.
Several members of what would become the founding leadership of the Taliban fought as part of the Afghan Mujahideen against the Society occupation in the 1980s, during which time they recieved money and guns from the US. This ended in a civil war amongst the Mujahideen leadership following the Soviet withdrawal in 1992, where the Taliban formed as a splinter faction that was further armed by Pakistan and its ranks increased by Pakistani extremists.But the fact many of its members studied in conservative Islamic institutions prior to joining doesn’t negate the fact the founding core of the Taliban was armed by the US. But that was several layers too complex to get into in a simple comment on how the situation was always fuck, but now, hopefully, there’s more pushback to being a hardline Islamic state than there was in 1996.
Several members of what would become the founding leadership of the Taliban fought as part of the Afghan Mujahideen against the Society occupation in the 1980s, during which time they recieved money and guns from the USPure waffling. The Taliban as an entity didn’t exist at the time. It formed after the Soviet withdrawal and only became a factor several years into the second civil war between the former Mujahideen. That a couple of individuals had previously been part of one or the other Mujahideen group says nothing about the Taliban as a group. Even Naseerullah Babar, at the time Interior Minister of Pakistan, later declared “We created the Taliban”. But that was several layers too complex to get into in a simple comment on how the situation was always fuck, but now, hopefully, there’s more pushback to being a hardline Islamic state than there was in 1996.Says the one for whom it is several layers too complex to admit that the warlords the US supported for years were one of the primary reasons for the rise of the original rise of the Taliban to begin with, and as such not the presence in principle but the specific conduct of the US entrenched the Taliban. The Taliban originally declared they were “liberating” Afghanistan from corrupt warlords and criminals. The US came in and liberated the corrupt warlords and criminals of the Taliban, but did precious little for the little guy in the countryside. Quite the contrary, the very warlords under which the people had suffered were legitimized as provincial governors. But yeah, it’s totally the fault of the Afghans that perpetuating the very situation that led to the rise of the Taliban didn’t magically make them disappear.
I continue to be massively mystified that pundits, politicians, and the general public, on both sides of the aisle, appear to be totally surprised that pulling out of a losing war is messy. Everyone said for years that if we left Afghanistan, the Taliban would take over again. And they did. Did people really think we were going to take every vulnerable Afghani with us? When has that ever happened in history?
I mean apparently leaving Vietnam was a decision on the “wrong side of history”, who knew?
Then again, have you been to Vietnam in the last decade or so? It’s basically become a capitalist country despite (like China) being led by a Communist Party. Ho Chi Minh is metaphorically rolling in his grave — even the winning side doesn’t really believe in Communism anymore.
lolwut
They are just like the vast majority everyone else in the country; Afghanistan was nothing but an afterthought to them somewhere along 05 to 08. If you could slap a yellow ribbon on your car bumper or say “thank you for your service” on Memorial Day and Vets Day, that’s about as much thought as they ever put into what was going on in Afghanistan. And the politicians went along with it because its very easy political points. Some print media has covered the details of what was going over there throughout the years, but hardly any body takes the time to read print. And often it wasn’t front page features, just smaller stories buried elsewhere in the paper. The TV news definitely didn’t cover it. So most people didn’t see the news and didn’t care. The reality on the ground there has basically been the same for about 10 years, maybe more. It wasn’t gonna change no matter what we did. It was gonna be a messy exit (this doesn’t excuse Biden for not being better prepared for it though). People would know this if they actually followed along all these years. But they don’t care. They’ll make of show of it now, sure. But deep down, they don’t. Eventually they got bored enough with it that large support (some 70% or more) was fine with leaving. They just don’t like it now because it “looks bad” and “omg, America lost?”. And in 2 months when the news cycle changes again, they won’t care again.
The problem is that none of them want to admit that getting involved in Afghanistan was an obvious mistake and that leaving is inevitable. The criticism about vulnerable people getting hurt is used as an excuse to justify further meddling. We may not like what is happening, but the US can’t fix it.
I agree with all of that. But it doesn’t give Biden a free pass for the way it has gone down.
The US never tried to “fix it”. They happily latched on to a bunch of urbanite cheerleaders in Kabul and set them up with a bunch of petty despots in the provinces who were all too happy to be promoted from “warlord” to “provincial governor”. Then they saw for it that their buddies got nice jobs in the general staff so they could reroute military equipment to their personal militias. In the meantime, the actual army had barely enough to eat, because while they’re at rerouting equipment, why stop with guns and ammo? Who gives a damn where the stuff ends up as long as US contractors get their money? And while the US contacts were all busy playing politicians, the little guys were never taken seriously by the US. No effort whatsoever to understand what’s actually going on in the country. Some “provincial governor” screams “Taliban convoy!”? Bombs away! Who cares about target identification…And when something went wrong, it’s been always the locals’ fault. A wedding party butchered? Their fault for not celebrating like good Americans. A hospital razed with people inside? Oopsie, yeah, we had a bit of a malfunction, but I’m sure it’s the locals’ fault, too!Making big talks about freedom and democracy doesn’t “fix” anything. Especially not when you don’t give an f*** about corruption and whether stuff ends up where it’s supposed to go.Heck, the whole affair was a sh*t show from the word “go”. The Taliban were asked to surrender Al Qaeda. Al Qaeda were their guests. Every single expert on the area predicted they’d never violate the duties of a host and betray their guests, no manner what the consequences and no matter how vile the guest is.And so it went on – without any sensitivities for local customs, culture and tribal dynamics, as long as someone told the US “We are happy” and “Thanks for your help” and as long as the cash kept flowing to the weapons manufacturers, everything was lovey-dovey. But that doesn’t “fix” a thing. It’s not even a best effort. It’s simply showmanship. Playing the White Knight for the cameras while having no care what the actual effect on the ground is.
Everyone knew it was going to be messy. But a month ago “the Taliban will be back in control of the country inside 6 months” was a slightly pessimistic but eminently reasonable opinion. Unspoken truth: the US would have been satisfied with that outcome. It would show that we were a stabilizing presence, but there are so many other forces that the only alternative was permanent presence. Plus we could celebrate observe the 20th anniversary of 9/11 with some closure.“The Talban will be back in control inside 6 days” on the other hand, did take a lot of people by surprise (so much that there hasn’t been sufficient communication with allies who need to extricate people) and changes the perception to the sense that the US achieved nothing and, even when there was barely holding the whole thing together with baling wire. Now the 20th anniversary of 9/11 is going to be spent in active negotiations of what terms on which to formally recognize the Taliban government.
Much like in Iraq, the US simply expected that the handful of sycophants that cheered them was representative for the whole country and made it superfluous to actually study the power dynamics, and cultural and social diversity of the country. They sunk money into those claqueurs and cared little for the rest of the population. Whether it was a wedding party that got wiped out or a hospital, it was always the locals’ fault and a mere “oopsie” for the US. In the end, the US looked at the money they spent, not at the results they achieved, and at the US lives lost, not at the lives changed on location. Accountability was something for others only. That the Afghan army wasn’t even getting food was just as irrelevant as the fact that the officer ranks were filled with nepotism. As long as the bills of US contractors were paid, nothing else mattered.
dude, i speak for everyone here. shut up. you are just going up and down this comment section spouting straight garbage.
what’s to be done? Oliver doesn’t know. So more or less everyone agrees that the U.S. should be (the fuck) out of Afghanistan—but also that the exit should be peaceful and orderly, whilst protecting vulnerable populations, and re-homing American allies? Do I have that right? I just want to make sure I don’t fuck up this last wish. I already used two (the ability to fly, winning lottery ticket).
Nope.
[Sigh]Wrong.We all agree that the troops should come home, but also America should be in charge of what goes on there, you know, by like paying someone else to deal with it, on a long term, zero interest for a generation loan, or whatever.
Duh.
Do liberals ever not whine? Good lord, you call this entertainment?
This was going to end badly, regardless or who pulled the plug or when. We just need to get the people who helped us out. “Nation-building” was never going to work in Afghanistan because Afghanistan isn’t a nation–it’s merely a place.
This was going to end badly, regardless or who pulled the plug or when. We just need to get the people who helped us out.It certainly was as long as the US had no intention to actually achieve any results for Afghanistan and merely entertain yet another “Look, we’re the White Knights riding to the rescue” show without giving a f*** about the locals. “Nation-building” was never going to work in Afghanistan because Afghanistan isn’t a nation—it’s merely a place.A meaningless argument that doesn’t excuse actively fostering corruption in any way.
We intended to wipe out Al Qaeda and kill Bin Laden. Anything else was a side benefit. You can’t be said to “foster corruption” in a place where corruption was already endemic.
We intended to wipe out Al Qaeda and kill Bin Laden. Anything else was a side benefit. And Al Qaeda wasn’t wiped out and Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan, not in Afghanistan. But at least you admit that the rule of law couldn’t be further from your concern. You can’t be said to “foster corruption” in a place where corruption was already endemic.Ah, right, I forgot where every crime is automatically acceptable the moment the US of A gets involved. Certainly, I’m sure every nation on the planet has in their code of law that bribes by Americans are perfectly legal and solely and exclusively the fault of those who accept them.You certainly can be said to foster corruption when you give corrupt despots shiny new titles and pretend they are champions for freedom and democracy, all while they continue to fleece the population – and when you sell them shiny new toys supposedly meant for the army while not giving a flying f*** whether that’s where they actually end up.I guess getting an excuse to being a racist and a bigot is also a welcome side effect? After all, the very fact that half-starved soldiers weren’t willing to defend the very despots whose corruption left them without food and ammunition is already presented as a reason to smear them. And of course, you’ll also wash your hands of today’s bomb attacks, which were in that form only possible because the chaos in Kabul presented itself as a prime target. Heck, thanks to the attacks, the British also weren’t able to evacuate the Afghans who guarded their embassy anymore. But that’s a-ok, after all, Afghans should be glad the Western Herrenrasse gave their pitiful existence some meaning for a while – and now that they are no longer needed, their lives are forfeit. You are hilarious with your “wipe out Al Qaeda” – while making an active effort to prove yourself every bit as murderously corrupt as they claim you to be. You bitch and moan about Al Qaeda and Bin Laden, but thousands of Afghan deaths are par for the course to you.
I think it’s important to point out that it wasn’t just politicians who were on the invasion bandwagon post 9/11. Everyone from celebrities to the general public was mostly on board. This wasn’t like Iraq, where significant portions of the public spoke out against it. We were pretty much all in to go after Al-Qaeda. But it seems like no one gave much thought as to what we should do once we took over the country, and now, after 20 years, we’re leaving it in as big a mess as we found it, and in the hands of the same fundamentalist wackos who we toppled in the first place.It’s especially a nightmare of course for anyone in that country with a uterus, with decades of progress and hope snatched away. I read an article written by an afghan woman during the takeover of Kabul describing a scene where men were taunting women who were scrambling to get home before the Taliban showed up and started beating them. In rural areas women between the ages of 15 and 45 are being rounded up and “married” to fighters. All this bullshit about a new, more moderate Taliban is just for the cameras. When they leave, it’ll be a horror show.
More, I’ve read reports about Afghan convicts convicted by female judges already sending them letters that there will be a reckoning. Since under the Taliban concept of “law”, there cannot be any female judges, the judges will likely be deemed infidels and the sentences voided, and you can guess what the convicts will do with the judges if they get their hands on them.
The second Iraq was invaded, Afghanistan became almost an afterthought, and it only spiraled from there. 20 years of passing the buck at the top levels.
I mean, of course it’s going to happen again. We’re still hoovering up resources like crazy and de facto enslaving half the world to do it. Somebody’s going to get pissed off and throw a metaphorical shoe at our heads again, whether it be somebody with a legitimate grievance, an opportunistic middleman, or both.And, because an empire absolutely cannot admit to itself that imperialism is bad and makes them the bad guys, we will naturally succumb to an equally-opportunistic call to go make somebody pay. Again.So… are we thinking Africa? South Pacific? Middle East again? Usually the MIC tries to put the murderous boondoggles in the same contested zone as where the shoe generally came from. Better optics. Bush got away with staying in Afghanistan and also Iraq, but I’m not sure he could’ve gotten away with, say, the Congo.
It’s all playing out perfectly. Everyone knew that there would be no tidy way to back out of Afghanistan, even back in 2002, so they just had to pick between the options that served them best politically. For two decades, the general public have been moving towards an anti-colonial, anti-interference mindset. The powers on both sides knew that the harder they tried, the more it would cost and it wouldn’t make them look any better. So the plan is, knowingly, to exit in the messiest and most devastating way possible and then let the world media focus on the ‘dastardly’ and ‘extremist’ Taliban. Already, the general public have swung quite spectacularly from ‘We shouldn’t be involved in this’ to ‘Oh God, why aren’t we doing anything to stop the baddies?’. A few more weeks of racist media coverage focusing on the few extremists, and then the West will come sweeping in to play Team America World Police again, only this time with much more public support, and neatly timed to distract the public from the massive domestic unrest, the environment, the fallout from the pandemic and the incoming financial crisis. There’s nothing quite like a crusade to distract the general public from the problems at home.