Get our troops the hell our of there now. No matter how long we stay there we will never make them accept democracy or anything near that in their thinking.
The longer we stay, the more we become just another tribe (clan, group) and the more troops we lose.
Let them fight their own fight, let them continue to kill one another in their tribal conflicts.
Official translation: We don’t have a clue what to do
It wouldn’t worry me so much if ø wasn’t an enemy islamist pig-dog.
Active Duty ping.
Slowing the planned withdrawal? Is that what they meant by “Strategic Patience”?
Obama ridiculed Bush and called Afghanistan “the right war”. This is all his mess. He ramped up involvement, increased the war dead count, and went on to launch a war in Libya, supported ‘regime change’ in Egypt, and tried to launch a war in Syria.
Obama ONLY referred to the ‘two wars’ he ‘inherited’ from Bush in his 2015 State of the Union speech. The world as it is, is all Obama’s making. His pro-Islamist foreign policies have not been well intentioned or well considered.
Picture the Afghan Taliban joining up with the Pakistani Taliban that have signed allegiance to IS. Then picture Afghanistan as a province of IS used to try to topple Pakistan, a nuclear power. Also consider Boko Haram (operating in Nigeria, and expanding its territory) as a province of the caliphate. And the north Suez as a province of “caliphate”.
Right now I would say there are 4 main Muslim factions: the A) Sunni thug/dictator faction (Saudi Arabia, Egypt, etc) keeping the Sunnis in line; B) the Turks, C) the Shiites (Iran, Iraq, Syria... and now Yemen and potentially Bahrain in the near future), and the D) radical Sunnis (of which ISIS is the biggest).
Both C and D seem to be expanding at the expense of A.
The pattern would be that most of A gets gobbled up by D. Then B, C & D battle it out, the winner gets all Islamic territory. Expect collateral damage EVERYWHERE while they duke it out, then expect things to get worse if a clear winner emerges... they will go after the West.
I’ve spent two years in Afghanistan - ‘08-’09 and ‘11-’12.
There was hope and morale was good in ‘08.
Making progress on the mission.
There was little hope and terrible morale in ‘11.
Back sliding on mission.
Things were possible in ‘08... something that was going on in ‘08 that had possibilities was that the villages were getting satellite TV’s... the locals were seeing things on TV they didn’t believe existed and were asking how THEY could get them. Information was coming AROUND the tribal elders. It was changing the game...