When there was still enough time to save them and fulfil the pledge of a safe passage to Britain for them and their wives and children, people on the ground were prematurely terminating their contracts by accusing them of being petty criminals or refusing to carry out orders. Amongst the orders they are said to have disregarded are refusing to clean the toilets. For this crime they and their loved ones will die horribly.
Weeks ago, British army officers were using the media to beg the government to do the right thing and save them, let alone protect them as they had promised to do. One officer was almost in tears as he described the desolation of having to turn his back on a loyal Afghani colleague who he had been shoulder to shoulder with in many life-threatening situations during his service. He was overwhelmed with shame and impotent anger.
I have no idea why Biden staged this abrupt withdrawal of US troops (instigated by Trump), but we have our heads firmly stuck up his arse and where he leads, we must follow. After Brexit, the Special Relationship became even more special and we needed the friendship of America more than ever.
Every nation which has gone into Afghanistan to improve the feudal lot of the locals by force has failed to understand even the basics of this tribal society. We created the Taliban, as we created Al Qaida and I.S.
Biden has all but admitted that the hundreds of Americans who lost their lives serving there did so in vain. I don't believe this, but that is the message being sent out worldwide. You cannot imagine anything more insulting to their families. All he could say to Afghanistan as the handful of remaining troops left was, "You must fight!"
Was the reason to do with money? If so, the repeat of the fall of Saigon was stupid and inept. The British officer who was forced to turn his back on his interpreter had been in Afghanistan serving on the anti-narcotics team. Pretty soon the Taliban may not have to rely on funding from Pakistan and Iran so much as they peddle heroin on the streets of Britain and America. There is already another refugee crisis which will reach Europe very soon, as if it wasn't bad enough already.
Kabul will fall to the Taliban today. British foreign policy is now dictated by Washington.
That all sounds dreadful. I thought we had brought many back here to safety. I note Biden is in the same river twice having voted against bringing those who assisted the US home from Vietnam a long time ago. Sadly those who help in war time are often the ones left to rot. Now if the computer says no then the case gets even worse, as I saw yesterday on Twitter, that many who should be helped to come here had been denied because of just that, the computer said no, and nobody had the nous to say fuck the computer, just get them out.
ReplyDeleteWhen MacMillan handed over to Douglas-Home in 1963 he said whatever you do don't invade Afghanistan and you'll be fine.
DeleteLogarithms are a very convenient way of removing the personal responsibility for bad choices or decisions. They deliberately sacked a lot of Afghani helpers just before their contracts expired and entered the fact into the logarithm. I don't know how many were brought to Britain but if even a handful get thrown to the wolves it is utterly disgraceful. This is life or death, but now it is just death.
DeleteRe Macmillan, every invader has ignored that advice. It's been going on since long before Rudyard Kipling.
DeleteYes, we have an abysmal record in Afghanistan. Shame Blair didn't get to hear what Macmillan said.
DeleteHe wanted his own Great Game.
DeleteTom I have had to stopwatching the News - I just find it all too distressing.
ReplyDeleteI don't blame you Weave, but I had to mention it. If they can get away with it they should not be allowed to get away with the burden of shame attached to it. I don't think Britain has ever sunk so low in the eyes of the world as it has with BJ at the helm.
DeleteMy understanding is that Britain attempted to initiate a European coalition to provide continued support after America withdrew, but that no other countries wanted to be involved, and Britain concluded it wasn't able to do it alone. Or am I falling for one of the many pieces of misinformation no doubt circulating around?
ReplyDeleteI am sure that Boris would have wanted Europe to shoulder some of the responsibility for the crisis, but - given recent events - what are the chances of that? The big problem with Afghanistan is how you get out, not how you get in.
DeleteThe fall of Afghanistan can be attributed somewhat to the complex tribal nature of the region. American presence has been the lynch pin holding things together.
ReplyDelete... and the Russians... and the French... and the British... Any armed force is going to almost keep the lid on it for a while, but not forever.
DeleteThe Afghani interpreters have been hung out to dry by the 'honourable' men in the government. Perhaps the should have expected no better as the British involvement in their country dates back to C18.
ReplyDeleteTo while away a few hours on a Sunday afternoon, I can recommend watching Bitter Lake (2015) by Adam Curtis. This documentary takes the history of Afghanistan from roughly 1950s to the (almost) present day. It is informative to watch but a little too much padding.
Yes, I think I have seen that film. They all must be heartened to know that although Boris is not recalling Parliament to discuss the crisis, but he is holding a cabinet meeting - on Wednesday. It seems that in a crisis involving the avoidable loss of many human lives, he is very slow to get off his big, fat arse. He was two weeks late for everything to do with Covid, and when he did act positively it was as a result of pressure not only from the opposition, but his own back benches. I have lost any respect I may have started out giving him the benefit for. He is - and always has been - unfit for office.
DeleteNato withdrew from Afghanistan in 2014 and the US and British forces that were left there were for training the Afghan Army which they did. The Afghan Army when we pulled out was 350,000 strong. I don't know what is happening to it now with the Taliban taking over.
ReplyDeleteApparently they are shedding their uniforms and running for their lives. No air support.
DeleteThe news is likening it to the US withdrawal from Saigon
ReplyDeleteHow many were let down then ?
People hanging from ropes under the helicopter. The British diplomats have been told they have to stay.
DeleteUpdate: People hanging onto moving fixed-wing aircraft and falling to their deaths. Can you IMAGINE how desperate you have to be to do that?
DeleteThose images I’ve just seen on tiktok will haunt me , young grinning men full of hope
DeleteTwo hundred years and more of exploitation for their resources and drawing lines on a map to make countries regardless of communities.
ReplyDeleteShame on all.
Whatever the leaders, the USA said they were pulling out in eighteen months...and that is exactly what they did...so it isn't really a surprise. Especially as it follows previous patterns.
Another job well done. 20 years of progression destroyed in a week.
DeleteTom, I will disagree with you about pulling out of Afghanistan. We needed to get out of there. We had no business there in the first place. We spent years training troops who would only fight as long as we were there. That's not progress, Tom. We poured TRILLIONS into a government and required no accounting for it. It disappeared and the lives of the people were not improved. That's not progress Tom. The Taliban were being brought back into the government even while my daughter was still there. Ghani cited the need to include them in reconciling the country. The Taliban promised to set aside war and to work with the government. We see just what their word is worth don't we? That's not progress Tom.
ReplyDeleteA woman was stoned in a street on Kabul because a merchant cheater her and she dared to speak back to him. He ran out into the street calling that she had blasphemed and the populace gathered around and stoned her right there. (Google Farkunda) Does that sound like progress?
Our behavior prolonged the suffering of the Afghani people. That's all we did. Liberty cannot be wrapped in a big bow and handed to a people. They must determine that they want it and be willing to fight for it.
This was set into place long before Biden became president. My head is not up his arse, as you would phrase it, but what was happening there was nothing more than exercise in futility.
It is horrible and I can barely stand to watch the news right now. The whole thing was a waste. A goddamn waste.
I agree with you that we should have got out and maybe we should never have gone in. Our behaviour did indeed - as it inevitably turned out - prolong the the suffering of the Afghani people.
DeleteWhat I am talking about here is the way the retreat (and it WAS a retreat) was managed - or not managed. Every nation to have ever invaded Afghanistan thinks they can solve the problem. They forget that they are dealing with a medieval situation in a modern world.
Stoning and public amputations still go on in places like rural Pakistan and urban Saudi Arabia. In Afghanistan it is all in out the country - or it has been for 20 years up until now.
There HAS been progress. Girls going to school. Musicians allowed to play non-secular music. Teachers permitted to teach modern history.
When I said our heads are up Biden's arse, I was talking about British people exclusively. This is not an insult toward American people, it is a fact.
Our young amputee vets from Afghani tours with dead friends are now asking themselves if it was worth it for anybody, as are their families.
Trump suggested an immediate and unconditional withdrawal and Biden put it into action, using some of the weakest intelligence ever given to a President of the United States. He has fucked-up so badly that the world will suffer for years to come.
The drawdown happened under tRUMP's watch. He took our numbers down to 2500. I do not see it as a retreat. We'll have to agree to disagree. My daughter lived in Kabul for 3 years, and believe me Tom I followed the news there daily and carefully. She was there during the terrorist attack. She was their during the kidnappings. Are there educated women in Afghanistan? Yes. But they are a distinct minority. There were girls at university, who could not go home because they were afraid of being locked in their homes and forced into marriage. Women were being stoned in Kabul. There were no sweeping changes. Meanwhile the bombings and killings went on and on and on. My nephew served three tours in Afghanistan. My sister believes much as you do, that we should have remained there forever, that to leave dishonored the people who had been injured or killed. I don't get that. I don't see how a bigger casualty list brings any more honor to those gone before.
DeleteI would not argue with your daughter, or anyone else who has experience of Afghanistan, and I do not think that the occupation by the Brits and US should have gone on forever. I just think that the exit strategy has left the US and UK looking like the fools we are, and boosted the moral of terrorists worldwide. We will pay for this cock-up for years to come.
DeleteSame awful conduct from Germany - I am so ashamed, so taken aback, and feeling so helpless.
ReplyDeleteWe are all ashamed.
DeleteThere is fear and panic you can almost smell it, Johnson mouths empty words and yet the inevitable will happen, we can only witness. Debby I think echoes what is felt in America and I have read a similar version in my news. I also listened to 'Any Answers' the programme devoted to Afghanistan and the British officer pleading for his translator, the woman pleading for the family of an ex-immigrant to England, it was heart-rending but in the end we have to trust to the Taliban behaving in a proper manner with all the world looking on. As for saving lives our government should be thoroughly ashamed.
ReplyDeleteNobody trusts the Taliban. Nobody.
DeleteThe Taliban maybe allowing evacuation today.
DeleteIt must be a terrible thing for Australian vets to see happening right now after 20 years on the job ... devastating.
ReplyDeleteThe fall-out is going to last for longer than we will live.
DeleteI heard an interview with a twenty something Afghan student on the radio today and was alarmed to hear that she blamed "the West" for abandoning them. So we can expect reprisals from both sides of the situation in the not too distant future methinks, those newly in power and those who feel let down. You can't win, they all hate us.
ReplyDeleteShe was right. It was the West. Who else is there to blame for these broken promises and betrayals?
Delete