The weapons left behind in Afghanistan was not Trump or Biden's fault.

People on both sides are laying blame on Trump and Biden for the Taliban taking alot of weapons we left in Afghanistan.

My question is why should they be at fault? Bush or Obama or even Trump gave the Afghan army those weapons so that they could defend themselves. It was hard to predict they would collasp so quickly.

1. Taking away those weapons would have made it look like we were weakening the Afghan army and it would have sent the wrong message.

2. Those weapons was giving to the Afghan army to protect themselves. Nobody could have predicted most of the army would surrender to the Taliban.

3. Those weapons were never even left behind because they were no longer our weapons. They were a gift to the Afghan army and as such we had no controll over what happened to them.

So why are we blaming Trump or Biden for something that's not thier fault?

The Afghan army supplied these weapons to the Taliban. Not the US.

 

The blame games will continue...Food for thought since both President Biden and former President Trump said they were bringing our troops out, how in the name of all that's holy were they supposed to collect all that equipment and get it out of the country too?

 

Even if they took the weapons they would have been seen as giving up on the Afghan army and still be blamed for it.

It was a no win situation for them. Whatever they did was going to be wrong in people's eyes.

Why build up the Afghan army and give them weapons if you don't have faith in them to fight?

 

I have been struggling with this very questions for days now. I wondered if Trump pulled most of our soldiers out and have them leave the weapons behind for the 5,000 Taliban members he released.

However, in light of your reframing how/why this played out the way it did, it makes sense. The Taliban already were "on notice" when we would be out (they had over a year notice).

Maybe the Afghani soldiers had a bit more confidence in themselves to take over the roles that had been previously supported by our (amazing, wonderful, awesome, strong, brave and kick-@ss military). That looked different in simulation than it did in real life.

Thanks for posting this. I am now *at peace* with the idea that Trump did not *intentionally* leave weapons FOR the Taliban to take over the area no matter what time frame in which that happened.

 

That does not change the result. We gained their trust and left them for the wolves.

 

The options are leave Afghanistan, or stay there forever.

 

How any more years would we have had to stay for it to not be considered "leaving them for the wolves" once we did leave? Five more? Ten more? Indefinitely? How many more American lives should have been lost? How many more billions should we have spent? Enough is enough.

 

Lets hope that Korea,VietNam,Iraq and Afghanistan have taught to stay the hell out of others business????

 

I'm not really sure there is a way to "leave" and not have it feel like "abandonment" to those left behind.

I was very frustrated when I was trying to get up to speed about this because it sounded a lot like "learned helplessness". They didn't have to take the lead when we were there. But that looks better in simulations than real life.

I really was excited that our soldiers, friends and allies would make it out safely. I deeply wanted our soldiers to just "to be home."

But now that I have a better understanding of WHY they couldn't and wouldn't put up more resistance I feel *stuck*.

@LangleyMan called it leaving them in orphanage and you essentially say abandonment.

I have no idea how we can both end this war AND NOT abandon them. Why can't we all just get along?

 

Between those 2 extremes are all levels of responsibility.

 

The other perspective is that we invaded their country under fraud, bombed hell out of it, killed thousands of innocents with our drones and midnight raids into private homes and installed yet another US puppet government.

Can you imagine how and why they hate our guts?

 

Trump made a lousy deal and Biden failed to improve it.

 

Don’t forget Syria.

 

Good point. We could have pulled our own people out first!

 

I can't argue with that.

 

What extremes? For over a decade now the US has massively failed to nation build in Afghanistan, and the only thing that propped up the Afghan government was US/NATO forces.

 

We didn't go into Afghanistan to destroy the Taliban. We went in to destroy Al Qaeda and the Taliban protected them.

 

I think that's a fair statement.

We've got a few more days to get this sorted and then we can talk about letting the chips fall where they may.

 

You are not wrong. On the subject of staying there forever or leaving people behind, perhaps there is a better strategy somewhere in between.

 

Maybe, but the chaos was all but inevitable.
I think the debate will go on for years too come how the withdrawal was handled.

 

Since we are discussing hypotheticals, the interests of the American people and the country would have been best served by not invading in the first place.

Yes, the war profiteers wouldn't be as rich as they are today, but the country would have been much better off.

 

Fair enough.

I couldn't agree more.

 

I don't know anybody that thinks we should stay there forever. The problem is with the incompetence with which we are abandoning the place. Given the relatively low cost of staying compared to the benefit of avoiding Afghanistan-based terrorist attacks for 20 years, leaving does seem to be ill advised. But since leaving is the popular position we should have done it in a manner that would get all Americans home alive and healthy.

 

Thanks for a very sensible comment.

You're right. What sort of message does it send to the Afghan army to spend so much time training them to fight with our weaponry and then taking those same weapons from them when we left.

I am only surprised at how poorly assessed the willingness of the Afghan troops to fight was.

 

Fear is a powerful motivator.

I suspect preparing to fight with the US military by your side feels good. That looks totally different when we're not.