Logic. Horse before the cart.
I've been hearing for the last two days how terribly President Biden has handled the withdraw from Afghanistan. He should have been getting people out much earlier, they say.
Well sure, I guess--if he had known that the Afghan army was scheduled to suddenly collapse on August 15th (or whatever day it was). I do not believe, however, that any such memo got widely distributed.
And then there's this: How is it that we could have begun an early withdrawal of thousands of allies and civilians without telegraphing to everyone else that we really had no expectation whatsoever that the Afghan army, which we had said since the Trump administration was ready to stand on its own, would in fact stand on its own?
Do you see the fail in logic? It's all cart before horse stuff. It's all a mixture of superfluous hindsight and a belief in some sort of magical foresight.
I do not personally think that our leadership truly believed that the Afghan army could ultimately win against the Taliban. I do think, however, that they believed the army would last a whole lot longer than two days. Who didn't? They believed they would have ample time to conduct an orderly retreat. I mean, where in history has there ever been a greater, swifter collapse than that of this 300,000 man army in Afghanistan?
That said, however, retreats are rarely pretty affairs. They rarely go well. One might even say that they never go well. Do people look for someone to blame? I suppose they do. Those who are already inclined to dislike President Biden will naturally hurry forth to blame him. For my own part, I am more inclined to blame an army we had invested in and armed for the last twenty years, and a government rotten to the core with corruption and cowardice.
4 comments:
Well, what would Trump have done? Did you notice Biden did not level any criticisms of our military or intelligence or diplomats? Put the blame where it belongs, with the Afghans who melted away without firing a shot. Trump would have used this disaster as an excuse to blame his opponents, purge the ranks of detractors and move his people into power.
Anonymous--This is clear, at least, to thinking people. Trump is Trump and will never be not-Trump. Lol.
My own take on this doesn't seem to be a majority opinion, but I think Biden did rather well, given the circumstances, the sudden evaporation of an army that was supposed to stand at least for a while, for goodness sake. There are those who are absolutely itching to see this turn out as bad as it possibly can because they just want so desperately for Biden to fail. And I'm disappointed to see some of the Dems jump on the bandwagon. We have so much to do, and we're starting to get so much done. The last thing we need is an endless, pointless distraction.
Biden had the courage to rip the bandage off. The screaming is childish but so predictable in our fucked up country.
Anonymous--Agreed. And now we have to endure the pain of the Democratic party self-destructing as they criticize and investigate their own president, laying out the red carpet for Trump or a Trumpster in 2024. Time for me to turn off the TV. Can't bear it.
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