Afghan "train, advise and assist" 1984 style

[Loren Pechtel]

Unless one is a crazed anti-Muslim xenophobe these pictures don't have much meaning.

Believe it or not the Taliban are just humans.

They are humans that are doing what many crazed US Christian fundamentalists would love to do, if they had the power to do it. Christian fundamentalists that say a women must obey her husband.

Right now crazed and deluded US Christians are trying to amass the power to send the government into the wombs of women and force women to keep unwanted pregnancies.

Look at what the guy in the second picture is carrying. That guy is nuts. Same as the nuts in the Christian right.

 

[untermensche]

Unless one is a crazed anti-Muslim xenophobe these pictures don't have much meaning.

Believe it or not the Taliban are just humans.

They are humans that are doing what many crazed US Christian fundamentalists would love to do, if they had the power to do it. Christian fundamentalists that say a women must obey her husband.

Right now crazed and deluded US Christians are trying to amass the power to send the government into the wombs of women and force women to keep unwanted pregnancies.

I'm not sure what you are saying here? Are you saying that we shouldn't mock crazy religious people acting looney?

How exactly is that picture mocking anybody?

If some Americans in shorts and tee shirts were in those little boats would that be mocking the Americans?

 

[untermensche]

Look at what the guy in the second picture is carrying. That guy is nuts. Same as the nuts in the Christian right.

How is carrying something evidence somebody is nuts?

Trump supporters are nuts.

60% of Republican primary voters think Biden won the election with fraud.

Being nuts is as American as apple pie.

 

[Derec]

And whether violent American people want to accept it or not, the Taliban was fighting for their home.

A lot of them are actually Pakistani.

Their culture.

Backward, 7th century culture.

They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower,

Doesn't say much when US is not willing to use any nukes, not even tactical ones.
Even with conventional weapons, our rules of engagement were severely restricted. One of the reasons US failed in Afghanistan was that it was a long series of half measures. No president from Dubya to Biden actually committed to winning the war by destroying the Taliban.

with far more money than sense.

True that.

 

[barbos]

These guys have been fighting a 20 year war under harsh conditions,

And whether violent American people want to accept it or not, the Taliban was fighting for their home. Their culture. They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower, with far more money than sense.
Tom

Yeah, Taliban are the good guys, got it.

 

[untermensche]

These guys have been fighting a 20 year war under harsh conditions,

And whether violent American people want to accept it or not, the Taliban was fighting for their home. Their culture. They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower, with far more money than sense.
Tom

Yeah, Taliban are the good guys, got it.

No good guys in that war.

 

[TomC]

These guys have been fighting a 20 year war under harsh conditions,

And whether violent American people want to accept it or not, the Taliban was fighting for their home. Their culture. They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower, with far more money than sense.
Tom

Yeah, Taliban are the good guys, got it.

I said no such thing.

But if you think that a violent invasion makes the USA the good guys you've got a typically American warped moral code.
Tom

 

[untermensche]

This is from 2013. The year Obama said we would be out of Afghanistan.



There were no good guys in Afghanistan.

 

[funinspace]

A lot of them are actually Pakistani.

Backward, 7th century culture.

They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower,

Doesn't say much when US is not willing to use any nukes, not even tactical ones.
Even with conventional weapons, our rules of engagement were severely restricted. One of the reasons US failed in Afghanistan was that it was a long series of half measures. No president from Dubya to Biden actually committed to winning the war by destroying the Taliban.

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

 

[TomC]

A lot of them are actually Pakistani.

Backward, 7th century culture.

They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower,

Doesn't say much when US is not willing to use any nukes, not even tactical ones.
Even with conventional weapons, our rules of engagement were severely restricted. One of the reasons US failed in Afghanistan was that it was a long series of half measures. No president from Dubya to Biden actually committed to winning the war by destroying the Taliban.

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

It's kinda bizarre.
The number of people who think that if we kill enough home town heroes, everyone left will be on our side.
Tom

 

[Patooka]

A lot of them are actually Pakistani.

Backward, 7th century culture.

They were fighting a violent, nuclear tipped, superpower,

Doesn't say much when US is not willing to use any nukes, not even tactical ones.
Even with conventional weapons, our rules of engagement were severely restricted. One of the reasons US failed in Afghanistan was that it was a long series of half measures. No president from Dubya to Biden actually committed to winning the war by destroying the Taliban.

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

Has there ever been a counter insurgent expert who has claimed going all out on civilians like Derec is advocating ever produced productive results? Pretty certain conventional wisdom says the exact opposite.

 

[barbos]

Yeah, Taliban are the good guys, got it.

I said no such thing.

But if you think that a violent invasion makes the USA the good guys you've got a typically American warped moral code.
Tom

Invasion yes, violent.....no. And you are forgetting why US invaded.

 

[barbos]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

It's kinda bizarre.
The number of people who think that if we kill enough home town heroes, everyone left will be on our side.
Tom

How do you know they are town heroes and not town thugs?
Do you have some polling data?
And even if they are town heroes so what? Hitler was a town hero too.

 

[Derec]

Has there ever been a counter insurgent expert who has claimed going all out on civilians like Derec is advocating ever produced productive results?

'Destroying the Taliban" != 'going all out on civilians'. Now of course, in war, civilians die. They died in WWII. Do you think we could have won against Hitler and Tojo with Afghanistan level of half measures?

Pretty certain conventional wisdom says the exact opposite.

Conventional wisdom is usually much more conventional than wise.

 

[Derec]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

Who said anything about "genocide"? Did the Allies engage in "genocide" during WWII by waging a "no more half measures, Walter" kind of war on Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan?

 

[Jayjay]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

Who said anything about "genocide"? Did the Allies engage in "genocide" during WWII by waging a "no more half measures, Walter" kind of war on Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan?

What non-half measures did the allies do in WW2 that the US didn't try in Vietnam?

The different outcome of WW2 compared to Vietnam or Afghanistan is not that the United States went the extra mile, but that the opposition surrendered. I don't see the likes of Taliban ever surrendering, and if they do, there are other groups like ISIS-K taking their place and continuing the fight.

 

[bilby]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

Who said anything about "genocide"? Did the Allies engage in "genocide" during WWII by waging a "no more half measures, Walter" kind of war on Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan?

Yes.

The bombing of Axis cities was clearly genocidal.

The Allies didn't do it first, or worst, but they didn't resile from it, and many of those directly responsible (such as "Bomber" Harris) didn't even pretend particularly hard that that wasn't the plan. 'Worker's housing' was an explicit target, with nobody labouring under the illusion that the workers were not at home at the time.

Genocide doesn't stop being genocide when it's done by people on the right side of a war. And strategic bombing of civilians did little or nothing to help the war effort. All parties held the absurd idea that when we bomb them, it will terrify them into suing for peace; While recognising that when they bomb us, it only hardens our resolve to never surrender.

Some still cling to this insane and internally contradictory doctrine, as demonstrated by Americans responding to 9-11 with both a determination never to let the terrorists win, and calls for retaliatory military action against the nation(s) that were imagined to have produced the terrorists.

 

[Jayjay]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

Who said anything about "genocide"? Did the Allies engage in "genocide" during WWII by waging a "no more half measures, Walter" kind of war on Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan?

Yes.

The bombing of Axis cities was clearly genocidal.

The Allies didn't do it first, or worst, but they didn't resile from it, and many of those directly responsible (such as "Bomber" Harris) didn't even pretend particularly hard that that wasn't the plan. 'Worker's housing' was an explicit target, with nobody labouring under the illusion that the workers were not at home at the time.

Genocide doesn't stop being genocide when it's done by people on the right side of a war. And strategic bombing of civilians did little or nothing to help the war effort. All parties held the absurd idea that when we bomb them, it will terrify them into suing for peace; While recognising that when they bomb us, it only hardens our resolve to never surrender.

Some still cling to this insane and internally contradictory doctrine, as demonstrated by Americans responding to 9-11 with both a determination never to let the terrorists win, and calls for retaliatory military action against the nation(s) that were imagined to have produced the terrorists.

You are either using a non-standard definition of "genocide", or merely exaggerating. Killing a lot of people alone isn't genocide. Killing a lot of people with the intent to destroy them as a people is genocide. The allies were never into that sort of thing with Germany, they just wanted to demoralize Germany so it'd surrender.

One way to "win" the war in Afghanistan would indeed have been to actually carry out a genocide of the Pashtun people. Obviously that would not have been politically possible.

 

[Bomb#20]

Yes.

The bombing of Axis cities was clearly genocidal.

The Allies didn't do it first, or worst, but they didn't resile from it, and many of those directly responsible (such as "Bomber" Harris) didn't even pretend particularly hard that that wasn't the plan. 'Worker's housing' was an explicit target, with nobody labouring under the illusion that the workers were not at home at the time.

Genocide doesn't stop being genocide when it's done by people on the right side of a war. And strategic bombing of civilians did little or nothing to help the war effort. All parties held the absurd idea that when we bomb them, it will terrify them into suing for peace; While recognising that when they bomb us, it only hardens our resolve to never surrender.

Oh, good, so you do understand the purpose of strategic bombing. Now let's look at that again...

The bombing of Axis cities was clearly genocidal.

I.e., the Nazis' purpose in rounding up six million Jews and Roma and putting them on trains and telling them they were being deported to work camps, but unloading them at death camps and herding them into gas chambers, was to terrify them into surrendering. Got it.

Some still cling to this insane and internally contradictory doctrine, as demonstrated by Americans responding to 9-11 with both a determination never to let the terrorists win, and calls for retaliatory military action against the nation(s) that were imagined to have produced the terrorists.

Well, it's "internally" contradictory provided the people you're impugning share your premise that there's no difference between a civilian and a combatant, no difference between a war and a war crime.

 

[barbos]

Yeah, there's nothing quite like genocide to win over the hearts and minds when nation building...

Who said anything about "genocide"? Did the Allies engage in "genocide" during WWII by waging a "no more half measures, Walter" kind of war on Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan?

What non-half measures did the allies do in WW2 that the US didn't try in Vietnam?

The different outcome of WW2 compared to Vietnam or Afghanistan is not that the United States went the extra mile, but that the opposition surrendered. I don't see the likes of Taliban ever surrendering, and if they do, there are other groups like ISIS-K taking their place and continuing the fight.

Yes, and you exterminate them, instead of catch and release. The reason US lost is because people looked and realized that US is not gonna do what is necessary and that taliban would be back eventually. What was the point of that invasion?