Biden to Announce the Full Withdrawal of U.S. Troops from Afghanistan - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#15166476
Well, it's good to see that war finally coming to a close. There wasn't much else we could in Afghanistan after we got Bin Laden.

Kevin Liptak, Jeremy Herb, Barbara Starr and Kylie Atwood of CNN wrote:
President Joe Biden, having concluded there is no military solution to the security and political problems plaguing Afghanistan and determined to focus on more pressing national security challenges, will formally announce Wednesday that US troops will withdraw from the country before the 20th anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks, a senior administration official said.

The withdrawal extends the US troop presence past a May 1 deadline set by the Trump administration in an agreement with the Taliban, but only by a matter of months.

Biden has been weighing the decision for months with his advisers and signaled he did not believe US troops should remain in the country long past the deadline.

The Washington Post was first to report the news.

The senior administration official said NATO troops would also follow the same withdrawal timeline. It's possible US troops will be withdrawn "well before" September 11, the official said, saying the date was the last possible time when remaining personnel would leave.

The official said the US had communicated to the Taliban "in no uncertain terms" that attacks on US troops during the withdrawal process would be met with retaliation.

But the withdrawal of US forces comes with risks, as Biden's last two predecessors, Presidents Barack Obama and Donald Trump, tried but were ultimately unable to untangle the US from the war in Afghanistan.

Senior military commanders have advocated keeping US troops in the country and have argued that a premature withdrawal could lead to a collapse of the Afghan government. A US intelligence community assessment released Tuesday warned that the Taliban was likely to make gains on the battlefield.

In discussions over the past month, Biden was "adamant" that a hasty withdrawal was not viable. But he judged that remaining in the country much longer did not reflect the needs of the current global threat picture. Biden asked for a policy review that would include "genuine realistic options" that would not "sugarcoat" that situation.

The official said that unlike past efforts to set a US withdrawal date, Biden's deadline was not conditions-based.

"The President has judged that a conditions-based approach, which is then the approach of the past two decades, is a recipe for staying in Afghanistan forever. And so he has reached the conclusion that the United States will complete its drawdown, will remove its forces from Afghanistan before September 11," the senior official said.

US officials say there are about 2,500 troops in Afghanistan. The US isn't planning to withdraw completely, as the senior administration official said some troops will remain in the country to provide diplomatic security, though the exact number had not yet been decided.


https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/13/politics ... index.html
#15166480
Politics_Observer wrote:There wasn't much else we could in Afghanistan after we got Bin Laden.

I thought you 'got' Bin Laden in Pakistan. And if you were that desperate to get Bin Laden, why didn't you accept the Taliban's offer, made a few days after 911, to hand him over to the ICC in the Hague?


:?:
#15166484
@ingliz

As far as I am aware of, the Taliban, following their Pashtunwali honor code, refused to hand over Bin Laden because he was their "guest." So the only logical thing to do was to go into Afghanistan to get Bin Laden. He fled to Pakistan during the course of our invasion.
#15166491
Politics_Observer wrote:if what you say is true

It is.

Before the start of the air campaign, the Taliban asked for evidence of Bin Laden's involvement in the attack and had offered to try him before an Islamic court inside Afghanistan - proposals that the US promptly rejected.

After the air campaign started, President George Bush rejected as "non-negotiable" an offer by the Taliban to discuss turning over Osama bin Laden if the United States ended the bombing in Afghanistan.

Mr Kabir urged America to halt its air campaign, now in its eighth day, and open negotiations. "If America were to step back from the current policy, then we could negotiate," he said. "Then we could discuss which third country."
#15166494
Politics_Observer wrote:Well, it's good to see that war finally coming to a close. There wasn't much else we could in Afghanistan after we got Bin Laden.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/04/13/politics ... index.html

You were telling opposite of what you say now when Trump intended to do these.

It was Secretary Pompeo and Trump administration who brokered a peace deal between Taliban and Afghan government. You have to credit previous administration for this development.
#15166497
Istanbuller wrote:
You were telling opposite of what you say now when Trump intended to do these.

It was Secretary Pompeo and Trump administration who brokered a peace deal between Taliban and Afghan government. You have to credit previous administration for this development.



The Afghan government, from the president on down, is sh*tting bricks right now.

Did that peace deal come with unicorns?
#15166500
@ingliz

Well the goal of invading Afghanistan wasn't just simply getting Bin Laden, it was also to destroy an entire terrorist network that threatened the U.S. homeland too. Even if Bin Laden were tried and executed by the Taliban or the ICC, Al-Queda still had a safe haven in Afghanistan and would continue to operate to attack the U.S. Due to our invasion and our strikes against Al-queda in various parts of the globe, they have been significantly weakened and are not as serious a threat to the U.S. as they once were.

So, even if the U.S. never invaded Afghanistan and Bin Laden were tried and executed by the Taliban or the ICC, there would still be a serious threat coming from Afghanistan. Besides, I have serious doubts that the Taliban would have tried and executed Bin Laden even if they were given proof knowing our enemy, the Taliban. Heck, Pakistan was giving Bin Laden safe haven when our special forces troops snuck in and got him. We certainly didn't trust telling the Pakistanis were coming to get Bin Laden because they would have moved him to a different location if we did. You can't trust too many people in that part of the world. There is a lot of double dealing that goes on in that part of the world.
#15166512
Politics_Observer wrote:
@ingliz

Well the goal of invading Afghanistan wasn't just simply getting Bin Laden, it was also to destroy an entire terrorist network that threatened the U.S. homeland too. Even if Bin Laden were tried and executed by the Taliban or the ICC, Al-Queda still had a safe haven in Afghanistan and would continue to operate to attack the U.S. Due to our invasion and our strikes against Al-queda in various parts of the globe, they have been significantly weakened and are not as serious a threat to the U.S. as they once were.

So, even if the U.S. never invaded Afghanistan and Bin Laden were tried and executed by the Taliban or the ICC, there would still be a serious threat coming from Afghanistan. Besides, I have serious doubts that the Taliban would have tried and executed Bin Laden even if they were given proof knowing our enemy, the Taliban. Heck, Pakistan was giving Bin Laden safe haven when our special forces troops snuck in and got him. We certainly didn't trust telling the Pakistanis were coming to get Bin Laden because they would have moved him to a different location if we did. You can't trust too many people in that part of the world. There is a lot of double dealing that goes on in that part of the world.



With friends like Pakistan, you don't need enemies.
#15166525
Politics_Observer wrote:
@ingliz

As far as I am aware of, the Taliban, following their Pashtunwali honor code, refused to hand over Bin Laden because he was their "guest." So the only logical thing to do was to go into Afghanistan to get Bin Laden. He fled to Pakistan during the course of our invasion.



We had intel on how and where he was fleeing. We could have gotten him years earlier, Bush chickened out.
#15166528
@ingliz

Sometimes I think the Russians misread our intentions (not necessarily all the time). For example, in 1983, we conducted a series of exercises called "Able Archer" and the Soviets/Russians believed we were using it as a cover to launch a surprise nuclear strike on the Soviet Union when that was not the case at all. It was just a simple military exercise. But the Soviets/Russians went through all this trouble, unknown to us at the time, to prepare for war and was ready for World War 3 during the Able Archer exercises because they felt sure we were about to launch a surprise nuclear strike on the Soviet Union. Such an attack never took place and we were totally unaware of any Soviet preparations at the time.

I think this paranoid mindset was due, not so much because the leaders of the Soviet Union were Russians per se or that the Russian mindset is paranoid per se, but because of the left over trauma of World War II when the Soviet Union was hit by a surprise attack by the Nazis and lost about 20 million Soviet troops. The rhetoric from Ronald Reagan at the time wasn't very reassuring either. But in our case, the intent was simply to carry out a military exercise at the time due to Cold War tensions to ensure our forces were ready in the event that at some future point in time the Soviets decided to strike or invade Western Europe. But it seems the Russians have misread our intentions (our meaning the United States) on several occasions in the past.

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