Afghanistan

How a humiliating military loss proves that so much of our so-called “expertise” is fake, and the case against specialization and intellectual diversity

Imagine that the US was competing in a space race with some third world country, say Zambia, for whatever reason. Americans of course would have orders of magnitude more money to throw at the problem, and the most respected aerospace engineers in the world, with degrees from the best universities and publications in the top journals. Zambia would have none of this. What should our reaction be if, after a decade, Zambia had made more progress?

The EU is woefully unprepared for an influx of Afghans

It is remarkable that any army could occupy a country for two decades yet leave in such a hurry. The nature of the US exit from Afghanistan will, for obvious reasons, be a memory that lingers: the photos of desperate people queuing at the airport; the international dash to get their citizens out; the bombings targeted at defenceless and terrified people.

Politico has released bombshell information, obtained through a confidential source at the Pentagon, angering top military officials. The informant gave copies of detailed notes from three conference calls to Politico that showed military brass knew that a deadly attack was coming 24 hours before the suicide bomb at Kabul airport and was unable to stop it.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Taliban fighters watched the last U.S. planes disappear into the sky around midnight Monday and then fired their guns into the air, celebrating victory after a 20-year insurgency in Afghanistan that drove the world’s most powerful military out of one of the poorest countries.

The departure of the cargo planes marked the end of a massive airlift in which tens of thousands of people fled Afghanistan, fearful of the return of Taliban rule after they took over most of the country and rolled into the capital earlier this month.

“The last five aircraft have left, it’s over!” said Hemad Sherzad, a Taliban fighter stationed at Kabul’s international airport. “I cannot express my happiness in words. … Our 20 years of sacrifice worked.”

Celebratory gunfire from #Taliban fighters shooting tracer rounds into #Kabul's night sky after #US withdrawal. pic.twitter.com/4dhrHz7CNw

— Nabih (@nabihbulos) August 30, 2021

The so-called ‘special relationship’ came under further strain after the Pentagon was today accused of trying to blame Britain for making the number of people killed in Thursday’s ISIS-K suicide bombing at Kabul airport worse than it could otherwise have been.

US security sources said they begged to shut down a gate being used at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Afghanistan’s capital city before it was hit by the deadly jihadist attack – but Britain wanted it kept open to continue its evacuation campaign.

The new twist came as survivors of the deadly blast claimed panicked US troops opened fire on the crowds of evacuees in the bloody aftermath, killing their loved-ones including a British father-of-two.

A father of a U.S. Army corporal killed in Afghanistan implored President Joe Biden to take responsibility for the botched withdrawal and subsequent terror attacks in Kabul that killed 13 U.S. service members last week and offered his condolences to the new Gold Star families.

The U.S. government appears to have a closer relationship with the Taliban than with its Afghan and NATO allies.  The military withdrew from Bagram Airfield in the dead of night “without notifying the base’s new Afghan commander who discovered the Americans’ departure more than two hours after they left.”  

No one, least of all, Marine Lt. Col. Stuart Scheller, is surprised at how this ended.

Lt. Col. Matthew Lohmeier was forced out of the Space Force for his criticisms of the woke hijacking of the military. Now it looks like the only man being fired for Afghanistan is the man brave enough to criticize the disloyal brass.

A gushing press corps made Biden feel invincible

When Joe Biden selected Jake Sullivan as his National Security Advisor, he gushed that Sullivan was a “once-in-a-generation intellect with the experience and temperament for one of the toughest jobs in the world”. No Senate confirmation is required for the NSA position, and the press took Biden at his word.