Columbia Up And Left Kabul

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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72 Responses

  1. Burt Likko says:

    OT Alum Jason Kuznicki has observed on more than one occasion that there is no constituency for “Smaller and less ambitious, but simultaneously competent and effective.”

    Large and audacious inevitably also means inefficient and tolerant of mediocrity.

    Burn It All Down disregards leaving anything useful behind.Report

  2. Marchmaine says:

    Yes. My question, though, is what does this tell us about the US Military? In years past, we mostly assumed it was a self-correcting institution owing to the competition for limited commands and willingness to end one career so that another might bloom.

    If it no longer is that, the potential danger is that it sees everyone as part of the imperium and the goal is to make the imperium stronger and bigger. Who can stand-up to the imperium?

    I said at the time that this was obviously a case where more than one Senior Commander needed to have their career ended. Not necessarily ‘cashiered’ or put on trial… just publicly acknowledge as having failed to execute to the best of their abilities the orders given by the Commander-in-Chief.

    It isn’t Biden’s job to execute the withdrawal, just to set it’s date and own the strategic (not tactical) consequences.

    We both know that Biden has no interest in institutional reform (esp. the Military)… but my question remains, does anyone? And if they did, could they? And if they could, would the Military agree to it? Does a $1T economy answer to anything other than itself?Report

    • Jaybird in reply to Marchmaine says:

      Yeah. My problem with the withdrawal was that the government fell apart in a week.

      Not a couple of years, not even a couple of months.

      DAYS.

      We could have pulled out in 2003 for the exact same result and a lot less blood/treasure.

      Which means that the leadership in charge of lying to leadership had been doing that for what? A decade and a half?

      Forget keeping folks accountable, has this even been acknowledged?Report

      • North in reply to Jaybird says:

        Not widely and that is also why accountability was so incredibly hard that the whole political set shied away from it. You’d have had to fire most everyone in multiple major branches of the military, foreign service etc and neither Republicans nor Dems would have been able to avoid the mud slung by that blast of a reckoning. Neither the voters nor the politicians wanted that.Report

        • Marchmaine in reply to North says:

          Not sure you have to fire ‘most everyone’ that’s not required. The tradition of accountability is pretty good at identifying who’s accountable for what; it just seems that the tradition of accountability is becoming exceedingly lax at the flag officer levels.

          A few flags needed to be taken — publicly — for the good of the service and the country.Report

          • North in reply to Marchmaine says:

            Well, I’m just spit balling here but since Bush the lesser rolled into Afghanistan to when Biden finalized our ignominious departure was roughly 22 years. Afghanistan (and Iraq) was a festering ball of passed bucks and kicked cans stretching over multiple administrations from both parties over more than two decades. 20 years in the military is pretty much a lifetimes’ service. So, we have a festering policy that taints every command officer involved by association (anyone you blame can point up the chain to their predecessor for blame) stretching back over more than a lifetime’s service. So, if you held the various commanders responsible, we’re talking about an inquest and consequence raining down on pretty much everyone in the existing chain of command starting with the senior most officials and then working your way down until you hit officers and officials too young to be blamed. All of these people, I’d add, being people who are well connected, are desperate to keep their careers/reputations and have speed dials to media figures and books full of the names of the politicians who’re just as implicated, over the years, as the officials and officers are. That’s possibly more than an entire administrations worth of accountability and, of course, the voters would not appreciate, at all, that instead of addressing current problems the whole government is standing in a circle flamethrowing each other. It’s like the W Torture problem on steroids- Sure Obama could have tried to prosecute when he came into office, but only if he wanted it to devour his entire administration at the cost of anything else he’d hoped to do.

            I’m not saying declining to proverbially impale some heads on the Whitehouse Fence over Afghanistan was a moral decision but I’d say it’s an understandable one.Report

            • Pinky in reply to North says:

              The US military never had more than single digits percentages in Afghanistan, active duty.Report

              • North in reply to Pinky says:

                Sure, but we’re talking about their commanders and leadership cadres and they had their hands in it up to the elbows. No one’s talking about persecuting the grunts.Report

            • Marchmaine in reply to North says:

              I think there are a few things here that we’re rolling together that’s making us talk about different things:

              1. Grand Strategy: Nation building
              2. 20-yr Military Tactics on the Grand Strategy
              3. Executing the withdrawal.

              In reverse order, my position is that #3 requires particular accountability as bad Military Execution.

              #2 isn’t in scope… heck, some things we did in #2 we did really well — it depends on what you’re measuring in terms of Military Tactics/Strategy vs. Grand Strategy.

              #1 a sort of ‘Vietnam’ reckoning over our entire raison d’etre for asking the Military to do things in Afghanistan? Sure, but that’s yet another thing.

              I suppose there’s even a #4 that Jay talks about… how bad was our assessment of the execution of our Strategy that it fell apart in days, not weeks, months or years?

              Doing the little thing (#3) is the bare minimum… anything after that? Well…Report

              • North in reply to Marchmaine says:

                Sure but your most excellent list is intersectional. You roll up on the General executing #3 and he says “I wasn’t told that the whole state would fold in the matter of weeks” and points at #2 and #1.
                Well, also, he probably flips you the bird behind your back because, as I mentioned previously, we got out of Afghanistan cheap.Report

              • Marchmaine in reply to North says:

                And that returns us to my original comment which is questioning whether the inability to do #3 is really a signal of the inability to ever hold the imperium accountable.Report

              • North in reply to Marchmaine says:

                Mmm yes rereading your original comment I’d say it does.

                To your original comment I’d say there’d be two ways to approach the Imperium. The first would be direct: campaign on reining it in and calling it to account, win the election and then go after it. The second, and the way we are going, is to view the claims of the Imperium’s civilian politician cheerleaders with great cynicism and suspicion and starve it of fresh conflicts. The neocons were, rightfully, turned into a punchline by Iraq. The Liberal interventionists may not have suffered the same savage fate in Libya but their sins were smaller as was the price tag and they have paid dearly for it. There’s a strong anti-interventionist streak in American politics now that wasn’t present before.Report

      • Marchmaine in reply to Jaybird says:

        I think this leads to a slightly different conclusion that might be equally troubling: we want to have Military sandboxes to test things: Men, Metal and Machines. Budgets and promotions are built on a sandbox that is ‘live’.

        ‘Fixing’ Afghanistan? Please.Report

        • InMD in reply to Marchmaine says:

          Well now we have Ukraine and maybe at some point Taiwan. My suspicion is that we could get whatever we need to get by monitoring the machines operated by someone else’s men.Report

          • North in reply to InMD says:

            Are we sending cutting edge tech to Ukraine? My understanding is it’s mostly surplus and second string gear? All the cluster munitions we sent over was slated to be destroyed for instance.Report

            • InMD in reply to North says:

              Most of it is old but my understanding is stuff like Patriot Missile batteries have never been tested in a real war or against actual Russian planes, cruise missiles, and drones, etc. We’ve also given them stuff like switch blade drones that are new. I also don’t think the modern anti tank weapons (Javelins) had ever been tested in real fighting conditions.Report

          • Marchmaine in reply to InMD says:

            I think we’re still in the market for a new Sandbox… I don’t think Ukraine quite fits the profile… too much risk. Africa, though, looks promising.Report

        • Jaybird in reply to Marchmaine says:

          I’ve mentioned before that I’ve heard that China was freaking out about how we had been in Afghanistan for decades because that meant that we had real experience doing stuff like “making sure that tires in the various vehicles didn’t blow out because of dry rot” that precious few other “superpowers” had.

          I thought that this view was less insightful before Russia invaded Ukraine than I do today.

          Now I will say that I thought that the whole “the US understands logistics” thing was a by-product of us being there. I could see how someone would wryly call it an upside.

          But as one of the primary reasons to do it? Dang man… that’s cold.Report

          • InMD in reply to Jaybird says:

            I’ve come to find exactly that as the most persuasive justification for what we were doing, even if I still disagree with it. This kind of knowledge is perishable, and don’t think China’s military planners don’t gulp thinking about an amphibious landing when they haven’t even conducted a land war since the early 60s.

            Of course you have to make sure the knowledge is related to what you’re actually preparing for. In light of developments in Ukraine I have to think there’s chatter in the military establishment about whether the US investment and experience in low intensity counter insurgency wasn’t preparation for the wrong war.Report

            • Philip H in reply to InMD says:

              in my early days as a fed I worked as a civilian for the Army Corps of Engineers. both the seasoned civilians, and the officers and enlisted who worked with us were forever going on about fighting the last war really well this time and responding to the last disaster really well this time. So I conclude it’s a known thing, but the culture doesn’t really allow wholesale change.Report

              • InMD in reply to Philip H says:

                That doesn’t surprise me, and really it’s a political failure as much as anything else. The W admin took us down the GWoT/Iraq mess, the Republican party as best as I can tell responded to the garbage exploding out of the sink by walking out of the room and developing some kind of fake amnesia, and in hindsight the Obama administration was simply too squeamish about cutting bait as decisively as they needed to on all of it. I know I open myself to all kinds of attacks but I actually believe Biden 100% did the right thing no matter how ugly it looked, and dodging the ugly hasn’t been prudent but cowardice. Anyone focused on the ugly has IMO just totally lost the plot.

                Anyway on the larger strategic subject it really does look like all of those trillions we spent would have been far better used fortifying our air bases in the Pacific which as I understand are now completely exposed and suffering from under investment. We did get the HIMARs out of Iraq though which look like they could be useful, though I have to think we could have figured that out without paying so much.Report

              • Philip H in reply to InMD says:

                Biden got as close to lemonade as he could with the lemons he had in Afghanistan.

                I also find it extremely interesting how no Republican has EVER wanted to investigate where that Trillion dollars actually went. Fiscal conservatives my left . . . .Report

  3. InMD says:

    I think the defeat was sealed and certain 22 years ago when we decided to try to impose an alien form of government with no popular support on a country that didn’t want it instead of simply turning the place over to the Northern Alliance in exchange for a permission slip to allow special forces and the air force to hunt bin Laden in the hinterlands. There was no possible future where the mission was a success and it’s really a testament to how different of a planet we might as well have been living on when all of the important decisions were made.Report

    • North in reply to InMD says:

      Agreed and, frankly, considering how badly Afghanistan was fished up from the get go, the butchers” bill we had to pay to get out was exceedingly slim. It seems ghoulish to say but we got lucky.Report

      • InMD in reply to North says:

        Oh yea, it’s horrible to say for those who lost their lives and the people surviving them but it’s the truth.

        Obviously I can’t speak for him but I will always remember a buddy of mine who did a tour in Afghanistan (plus 2 in Iraq) saying about the Afghanis: ‘They aren’t like us and they don’t want to be like us.’ I think any other analysis is wishful thinking, and that’s putting it charitably.Report

        • LeeEsq in reply to InMD says:

          Maybe this is because I’m a Jew and you are a White and I believe were raised Roman Catholic based on what you said previously, but many of these illiberal places had small Jewish communities in the past. They don’t anymore but the idea of potentially abandoning my fellow Jews to illiberals of various stripes while the more liberal places are basically closed to immigration strikes me with terror. Why should non-Muslim communities no matter how small have to suffer because the majority of a place finds Islamic theocracy popular. Especially if the non-Muslims don’t have an escape route to a more welcoming and liberal place because of tough immigration laws.Report

          • Jaybird in reply to LeeEsq says:

            Guys! Guys! You’re *BOTH* white!Report

          • North in reply to LeeEsq says:

            I’m not aware that Afghanistan has a Jewish community, LeeEsq, but if it did couldn’t they simply make Aliyah?Report

          • InMD in reply to LeeEsq says:

            I mean, the world sucks. Not sure what else I’m supposed to say about it or even what our respective religious backgrounds have to do with it.Report

          • Pinky in reply to LeeEsq says:

            Those countries have a lot of very old Christian communities, and also, Christians have done a lot to help Christians and Jews get out of those countries, and also,
            you’re basically accusing InMD of being a sociopath.Report

            • InMD in reply to Pinky says:

              I know people who donate to charities that focus on getting Christians (and particularly Coptics and other small sects in communion with Rome) out of Muslim majority countries. Unfortunately I think it may be the best thing possible for them in a bad situation.

              Anyway having the US invade to try to create a more tolerant government and society for them to live under would be insane. I’d also feel comfortable saying that the death and destruction it would necessarily cause would be on balance far worse than the abuse they suffer by virtue of being religious minorities.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to InMD says:

                Copts are between 10 to 15% of the Egyptian population. Evacuating that many people as refugees will not be popular politically even if they are Christians.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to InMD says:

                This is why I mentioned “Realpolitik”.
                There is a vast territory of options between “Do Nothing” and “Invade And Occupy”.Report

              • North in reply to InMD says:

                I’ll do you one better. In some nightmare world where the west invaded Egypt, for example, on behalf of the Copts we’d be looking at a decade or so of bleeding, terror and ruin followed by the west withdrawing in disgust and unholy hell descending on the Copts that remained such that the Copts would look back on the pre-invasion days as halcyon paradise in comparison.Report

    • LeeEsq in reply to InMD says:

      Its a really complicated problem. Liberal thought basically holds that things like separation of religion and state, rights for racial, religious, and sexual minorities and equality between women and men are universal goods, the ability to live as you please, and other things are universal goods. Liberalism also holds that imposing these by force is bad and won’t work. There are plenty of places in the world and plenty of people even within developed democracies that deny this outright. Various forms of illiberalism are genuinely popular in these places. There is no good solution for this conundrum that doesn’t make a mockery of liberalism in one way or another. Either we impose it by force or just ignore a lot of human rights violations with cold cynicism.Report

      • InMD in reply to LeeEsq says:

        I think you’re right that illiberalism has popular support (including in liberal countries) but I still see liberalism as objectively superior. The nuance is that I think in order for it to work every nation, people, and/or country need to find their own way to it on their own terms. That’s going to involve some accomodation of conservative and illiberal forces and balancing that no outsider is ever going to be able to do with force. It’s a potentially very long process, not a switch. Liberalism is never going to look exactly the same in 2 places and some may never get there at all.Report

        • LeeEsq in reply to InMD says:

          This is probably the realistic solution but letting the Taliban Taliban doesn’t seem that great in the long term either. For one thing illiberal groups, whether they are a minority in a liberal country, or an illiberal country tend to not adopt a live and live strategy. They really want to impose themselves on the rest of us and make us conform. So they are going to lash out a lot whether we like it or not.Report

          • Chip Daniels in reply to LeeEsq says:

            Guys, if you want an invasion and occupation of Florida, just come out and say so.Report

            • LeeEsq in reply to Chip Daniels says:

              Very funny but illiberal places and people within a liberal society is another problem without much of a solution.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to LeeEsq says:

                Humor aside, I agree with your comments here in full.

                If “Bomb ’em into the Stone Age” is the reactionary drunk at the end of the bar comment, “Just pull out everywhere” is its isolationist counterpart.

                I have lived and worked with expat refugees from Communist countries like the Baltic states, rightwing dictatorships in Latin America and Jewish expats from Iran, and their anguish and trauma is very real and its hard to just shrug indifferently.

                I think the Cold War concept of Realpolitik can be useful in balancing the things we can do to affect the outcome in these countries, with the desire to simply wish it away with some magical instant solution.

                Because as you note, there really aren’t any countries in the world without a democracy movement, and no country in the world “was always like this.”

                Afghanistan and Iran had very modern, very cosmopolitan cities with a vibrant culture of liberal tolerance until just a few decades ago.

                The quip about Florida was meant to be double edged. Just as in Iran, where the culture of tolerance was attacked and defeated by illiberal forces, so here in America democracy and tolerance isn’t something we can just take for granted.Report

              • InMD in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I hear your sentiment but I think you’re letting the government and military off way too lightly with respect to their actual responsibilities. Part of the reason we can have tolerance in America is because the state is at least nominally responsive to popular will and exists for the benefit of the people. If you can’t explain why an American’s son or daughter had to die in some civil war in Africa or the ME in a convincing way then what you’re doing isn’t anymore legitimate than what happens when a dictator sends a conscript to die for some vanity project, no matter how noble you might be able to characterize the cause. And that’s without even getting to the part where 9 times out of 10 our intervention leads to more carnage, death, and evil, not less.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                I get what you are saying but there is a certain sort of liberal that basically holds the position that ” because of Islamophobia in the West and India, we can’t say anything bad about Muslim majority countries as they enforce blasphemy laws.” This isn’t even a reluctance not to criticize non-White countries. Many have no problems cursing out Modi and BJP government of India or Japan’s xenophobia but Muslim majority countries have seemingly earned a sort of immunity to criticism in some quarters.Report

              • InMD in reply to LeeEsq says:

                Wait this conversation is about actual war and you’re worried about some your friends not wanting to criticize Muslim countries? Dude just say what you think. You pay way too much mind to the social norms of idiots.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to InMD says:

                I pay attention to the social norms of idiots because idiots can and have done a lot of damage. Just because they are idiots doesn’t mean they won’t achieve power.Report

              • Philip H in reply to LeeEsq says:

                There’s also a certain kind of liberal/leftist who is tired of being called anti-Semitic for challenging the policies of the allegedly secular Israeli government.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to Philip H says:

                Can you explain why any Jew should want to live in a Muslim majority country based on how every Muslim majority country sets itself up? With blasphemy laws and the relegation of non-Muslims to second class citizenship status even if unofficially?

                https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/dec/02/jakarta-protests-muslims-against-christian-governor-ahok

                The entire responsibility of good relationships between Jews and Muslims is being placed in Jewish hands while they get to crap on us with impunity or really everybody else with impunity. Why would Palestine by free of all the pathologies that exist elsewhere in the Muslim world? This has never been explained to me.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to LeeEsq says:

                That’s a conspiracy theory. You’re being irrational. Why are you so afraid of people with dark skin? Maybe you’d appreciate them more if you ate food that actually tasted like something other than salt.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

                While you may have thought it tongue in cheek, its still insulting. Knock it off.Report

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                I’ll keep that in mind the next time that the argument bubbles up.Report

              • Philip H in reply to Jaybird says:

                Its not me you were insultingReport

              • Jaybird in reply to Philip H says:

                It’s the first time that I have seen it acknowledged that the argument could possibly be interpreted as such!Report

              • Philip H in reply to LeeEsq says:

                I’m not suggesting, hinting or outright telling anyone that Jews should do that. I am also not one to shy away from criticizing Muslim regimes, including the Palestinians. When they overstep they deserve to be called out.

                So does Israel. Bulldozing Palestinian homes on Palestinian lands is wrong. Filling in wells that provide drinking and irrigation water on Palestinian lands is wrong. Strapping up a suicide vest is wrong. Firing rockets into civilian areas is wrong.

                But as an American leftist, I only get kudos if I call out the Palestinian side of the conflict. Calling out Israel – which still claims it is a SECULAR democracy – gets me called anti-Semitic. That’s wrong too. No country is above criticism. Not America. Not Iraq. And certainly not Israel.Report

              • Chip Daniels in reply to LeeEsq says:

                These are fair comments, but its a bit difficult to hold conversations about unnamed people who are voicing unquoted comments which can only be characterized obliquely.

                For the record, I agree that there are people whose desire to be seen as tolerant of one disfavored minority causes them to turn a blind eye to abuses by that minority.

                But its important to single these people out instead of alluding to vague groups- its like when people say “Jews” when they mean “the Netanyahu administration” or “Muslims” when they mean the “Saudi government”.

                It tends to inflame an already boiling issue.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to Chip Daniels says:

                When people say Jews, I think they mean Jews. There have been interviews with the likes of Hezbollah and Hamas where the leaders send they mean Jews rather than Israeli Jews or a particular administration when they talk about Jews. Likewise, there have been times when Pro-Palestinian activists have randomly targeted Jews outside of Israel when they are angry at the Israeli goverment:

                https://www.timesofisrael.com/pro-palestinian-activists-planned-violence-at-israel-rally-in-nyc-prosecutors-say/

                From what I can tell, the majority of Pro-Palestinian activists still find the existence of Israel in and of itself to be an issue. Just a couple of weeks ago, there was crayon scrawl on Montgomery Street in San Francisco about how the Zionists need to leave Palestine. This usual means even Green Line Israel in my experience.Report

            • Philip H in reply to Chip Daniels says:

              Oddly enough – back in the 1980’s, as oil money was drying up in Louisiana and it became harder to pave roads etc, a state senator, in a speech on the Senate floor, opined that the way to to Louisiana fixed once and for all was to secede again, and attack the refineries in Houston. In order to reple the assault the Army and Marines would have to rebuild the state, and billions in foreign aid would flow for schools, hospitals and the like. For some time after many of us had “Louisiana, a banana republic.” bumper stickers.Report

          • InMD in reply to LeeEsq says:

            Well to be clear I am talking about letting the Northern Alliance Northern Alliance. However the reason to overthrow the Taliban was only as needed to get to bin Laden and send the appropriate message to anyone who would harbor someone willing to attack the US. Beyond that I’m not sure what else we’re supposed to do about it.Report

          • North in reply to LeeEsq says:

            Yes well there’re only two ways to make people in the places where, the Taliban and organizations like them operate, open minded to liberalism.
            A-generational conquest, occupation and reformation of society. Massively expensive in blood, treasure and time, unpopular with modern states and almost impossible to pull off successfully.
            B-Let the illiberal monsters do their thing until their populations are sick of them and want alternatives. AKA the Hundred Years War solution. Cheap and comparatively moral but presents some risk of terror attacks and other flailing attacks from those areas.

            Bush the lesser tried to pull off option A’s outcome while using option B’s footprint and ended up with the worst of both options. If there’s another method I don’t see it.Report

            • LeeEsq in reply to North says:

              B-Iran shows that it is possible for the illiberal monsters to maintain a lot of control even if people get sick of them if they are willing to brutal and ruthless enough. Having controls of the organs of the state doesn’t hurt either.Report

              • North in reply to LeeEsq says:

                The iranian revolution happened in ’79 Lee. That puts the Theocratic state of Iran at the same age as me. The illiberal monster Iranian state is barely a generation old and every kid under 30 that lives there despises it.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to North says:

                And the theocrats are barely bending. Sort of like how Republicans are really out of touch with young people in the United States but keep digging down.Report

              • Philip H in reply to LeeEsq says:

                Best analogy this week.Report

              • North in reply to LeeEsq says:

                Agreed, they’re barely bending, but you can hear the creaking and groaning. Is Iran exporting its system around the world? Does anyone look and say “We want to be Iran?” What is your over/under on Iran being more/less theocratic in 5 years? 10 years? Our lifetimes?

                And while, I grant, B is an unsatisfying option I see no option C and that puts us in a binary. If we don’t do B then we do A and the last 22 years have shown what a catastrophic failure A was. Frankly I’m struggling to think of an example of option A -ever- being successfully employed. Japan? Germany? Those were modern industrial (but not liberal) states BEFORE we flattened them and reformed them.Report

              • LeeEsq in reply to North says:

                There has been a big uptick in Islamic theocratic politics since the Iranian Revolution.Report

              • North in reply to LeeEsq says:

                Indeed there has been. I’d allege we’re seeing a steady implosion of the popularity of such politics, in fact I’d hypothesize we’re pretty far down the slop past the peak of their popularity since people in the Middle East don’t seem to have enjoyed their experience with theocrats very much.Report

  4. Damon says:

    You need to be there 30 years to get generational change, if it works. We didn’t. That being said, America is an empire, yet we don’t think of ourselves as one, nor does the gov’t. You can’t exist like that. You are and act like it or you’re not. Choose one or the other. I’m sure a lot of people got wealthier because of it though.Report