Afghanistan Withdraw: Podcast Discussion, 12 Years Worth of OT Writing, and Discussion

Andrew Donaldson

Born and raised in West Virginia, Andrew has been the Managing Editor of Ordinary Times since 2018, is a widely published opinion writer, and appears in media, radio, and occasionally as a talking head on TV. He can usually be found misspelling/misusing words on Twitter@four4thefire. Andrew is the host of Heard Tell podcast. Subscribe to Andrew'sHeard Tell Substack for free here:

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11 Responses

  1. Jaybird says:

    Part of the problem is the eternal Spider-man doctrine.

    We have great power.
    Therefore: We have great responsibility.

    And from there it follows that we’re on the side of the angels, we know things, and that what we want to do is possible.

    Easy-peasy.Report

  2. Dark Matter says:

    Will be interesting to see how much the Taliban has learned and whether our own expectations for what happens when we leave are realistic. They’re going to take over. Presumably that means a lot less for gay/religious/women’s rights, might be total and might not. The big question is whether they go back to letting their country be a haven for groups attacking the US. If that happens it will just be a matter of time before we go back.Report

  3. Michael Drew says:

    Biden is risking a Saigon moment. He is placing an ideal prized by the left over the considerations of the foreign policy establishment. In effect, Biden is taking the responsibility for ending America’s longest war entirely on himself.

    I’m not sure this decision is as admirable as Eric Medlin says it is here, and the execution of it certainly hasn’t been.

    But I do agree that however critical you might be of the decision to follow through on this policy commitment and of how it was implemented, you do have to give Biden credit for being willing to take the full weight of this decision and result, which was now clearly inevitable in broad strokes, fully onto his back as a political matter. That’s his job, a job he had no need to seek; you don’t have to praise him too highly for doing it. But it is something two previous presidents who wanted to get out of Afghanistan were never willing to do. You at least have to acknowledge that Biden was.Report

  4. Chris says:

    Ah, looking back at some of those comment sections, good to remember the knock-down, drag-out arguments I used to have with BlaiseP.

    Back then, I think there were two regulars (maybe more, but I only see Kazzy and me) who opposed the Afghan war from the start. I think that really shaped the pieces here for the worse. I wonder how many people who supported the war back then now think they were in the wrong.Report

    • North in reply to Chris says:

      Man oh man I miss Blaise P. He could write amazing comments, holy heck. I am dubious that I was around OT when the Afghanistan war was launched. Was OT even around then??Report

    • Jaybird in reply to Chris says:

      I’d be willing to say that the Afghan War should have been started and we should have “toppled” (however temporarily) the Taliban for “harboring” OBL.

      AND THEN WE SHOULD HAVE LEFT.

      Like, no nation building. No feminism. No trying to take over Kabul and make sure that it was safe for McDonald’s.

      The second OBL was confirmed to have been killed in someplace that wasn’t Afghanistan should have been the hard date for a “we’re leaving next month” announcement.

      But I agree that “nothing” would have been better than what we ended up doing.Report

      • North in reply to Jaybird says:

        Well OBL wasn’t killed until Obama’s term so you’re saying they should have stayed that long?
        I’ve read, somewhere, that the Taliban offered a deal right after they got initially routed to basically stop fighting if the Americans would guarantee the safety of the Talibans leadership cadre. Rumsfield said “no dice, we don’t cut deals with terrorists” and Bush W. issued the Axis of Evil speech instead and commenced the nation building. IIRC Iran was sending out feelers for a détente too right around then too.Report

        • Jaybird in reply to North says:

          Remember when Bush said that he doesn’t care about OBL anymore? Well, I do. I remember that he was hammered for saying that.

          I agree that that would have been a good point to pull out. But I also understand that it’s also a good enough point that you can make political hay from it, thus keeping us there for another decade.

          If the people who are hammering Bush for saying that were right, the killing of OBL would have been the next reasonable point to pull out entirely.Report

          • InMD in reply to Jaybird says:

            This is where you get into that complicated question of Iraq. IIRC we also allegedly had OBL cornered early on in Tora Bora, but then Iraq took priority. I hate doing counter-histories because you really don’t know what would have happened. However it’s plausible this could have been dealt with and over with a better outcome long, long ago.Report

  5. Kevin Cattenhead says:

    The removal from Afghanastan was way past due. If they won’t fight for their own land why should America lose lives any longer. Let the people fight their own war. They had 20 years to build up armed forces but were to scared to defend the country. Let those complaining send their children, men and women, to die in a foreign country.Report