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“We trained and equipped an Afghan military force of some 300,000 strong — incredibly well equipped — a force larger in size than the militaries of many of our NATO allies. ”
Let’s start with the size of the militaries. The gold standard is The Military Balance, an annual report issued by the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) that methodically lists the size and capabilities of the world’s armies. If Afghanistan actually had more than 300,000 military troops, the active force would be bigger than every NATO ally but Turkey.
IISS also notes Afghanistan has 99,000 “paramilitary” forces — members of the Afghan National Police. But NATO countries do not have such forces and so it does not make sense to include them as part of the total. NATO countries also have reserve forces — Turkey, for instance has 355,200 active troops and 378,700 reserve troops — but no reserves are listed for Afghanistan.
The Pinocchio Test
This is an inflated number. The president is including police forces, which are not part of the military and have often heightened insecurity with their tactics. Even among the active military, there is high turnover and only a small core of professionals which could be expected to fight professionally against the Taliban. In other words, the number is not 300,000 — and probably not even 30,000.
many Afghans who were part of the army were illiterate young men and the infrastructure in the country could not support the cutting edge military tech that was being used.
In addition to the pullout of US troops, it was also decided to withdraw US contractors who played a key role in supporting US logistics.
"We built an air force that depended on contractors for maintenance and then pulled the contractors," Ronald Neumann, a former US ambassador to Kabul under President George W. Bush, told NPR public radio
Worse, the salaries of the Afghan army had been paid for years by the Pentagon. But from the moment the American army announced its planned withdrawal in April, responsibility for those payments fell on the Kabul government.
Numerous Afghan soldiers have complained on social media that they not only have not been paid in months, in many instances their units were no longer receiving food or supplies -- not even ammunition.
The rapid US withdrawal provided a final blow.
"We profoundly shocked the Afghan army and morale by pulling out and pulling our air cover," said Neumann.
WaPo’s Ignatius: White House ‘Shell Shocked’ by ‘Defeat’ in Afghanistan
Host Joe Scarborough agreed that Afghanistan has been a failure for the Biden administration, calling it a “diplomatic defeat” and a “catastrophic blow globally among our allies.”
“We trained and equipped an Afghan military force of some 300,000 strong — incredibly well equipped — a force larger in size than the militaries of many of our NATO allies. ”
Let’s start with the size of the militaries. The gold standard is The Military Balance, an annual report issued by the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) that methodically lists the size and capabilities of the world’s armies. If Afghanistan actually had more than 300,000 military troops, the active force would be bigger than every NATO ally but Turkey.
IISS also notes Afghanistan has 99,000 “paramilitary” forces — members of the Afghan National Police. But NATO countries do not have such forces and so it does not make sense to include them as part of the total. NATO countries also have reserve forces — Turkey, for instance has 355,200 active troops and 378,700 reserve troops — but no reserves are listed for Afghanistan.
The Pinocchio Test
This is an inflated number. The president is including police forces, which are not part of the military and have often heightened insecurity with their tactics. Even among the active military, there is high turnover and only a small core of professionals which could be expected to fight professionally against the Taliban. In other words, the number is not 300,000 — and probably not even 30,000.
As I said in actuality the army was huge. That was not the problem. The problem is that all these years of enriching US military contractors and corrupt Afghan government officials at the expense of the American taxpayer did nothing to have a cohesive structure and will to fight. What happened was just the trigger to walk away.
And what I also said was that the writing was on the wall, all these years. However, the inability of our highly funded all types of intelligence agencies to come up with a reliable estimate of how quickly the fall will come about is definitely not something to brag about.
Regardless, the exit was never going to be pretty.
This seems to be your debating point.... claiming someone disproved their own point lol. You are just demonstrating a dogmatic adherence to the way you wish things turned out.
Contingency plans are detailed plans of what action to take in the event of A, B or C happening. A rapid takeover by the Taliban would have been one of the primary risk scenarios that was planned for. Now if you think this ineffective, deadly and chaotic response was the planned outcome in this event, you are out of luck.
Because I know who the Taliban are, and so do the Military planners, this is not and never was a worst case scenario. It was the likely scenario.
It won't be long before the intel and military community start leaking. There is no way they want to be thrown under the bus by Joe and share his legacy of failure on this.
Good points.
The debacle in Afghanistan is reminiscent of Benghazi. Obama's administration had no freaking plan in case the Benghazi mission was attacked. Even though the mission had been attacked in the past, Obama / Clinton did not bother to draw up any contingency plans. The place came under attack and Obama and Hilary just started at the video stream and there was no plan in place to deal with it.
As you point out, the Biden admin had no contingency plans in place to deal with a scenario in which the Taliban overrun Kabul. this was despite watching the Taliban do exactly this, to other cities for months.
The sheer level of incompetence from Biden all the way down to the local command structure in Kabul, should all be fired and or resign in disgrace.
As I said in actuality the army was huge. That was not the problem. The problem is that all these years of enriching US military contractors and corrupt Afghan government officials at the expense of the American taxpayer did nothing to have a cohesive structure and will to fight. What happened was just the trigger to walk away.
And what I also said was that the writing was on the wall, all these years. However, the inability of our highly funded all types of intelligence agencies to come up with a reliable estimate of how quickly the fall will come about is definitely not something to brag about.
Regardless, the exit was never going to be pretty.
All you said was literally "No, the Afghan Army had close to 300k troops"
The exit would have been just fine if we had left in May, so don't give me that moral equivalency crap. Were the Taliban overrunning Kabul back in May? No.
“We trained and equipped an Afghan military force of some 300,000 strong — incredibly well equipped — a force larger in size than the militaries of many of our NATO allies. ”
Let’s start with the size of the militaries. The gold standard is The Military Balance, an annual report issued by the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) that methodically lists the size and capabilities of the world’s armies. If Afghanistan actually had more than 300,000 military troops, the active force would be bigger than every NATO ally but Turkey.
IISS also notes Afghanistan has 99,000 “paramilitary” forces — members of the Afghan National Police. But NATO countries do not have such forces and so it does not make sense to include them as part of the total. NATO countries also have reserve forces — Turkey, for instance has 355,200 active troops and 378,700 reserve troops — but no reserves are listed for Afghanistan.
The Pinocchio Test
This is an inflated number. The president is including police forces, which are not part of the military and have often heightened insecurity with their tactics. Even among the active military, there is high turnover and only a small core of professionals which could be expected to fight professionally against the Taliban. In other words, the number is not 300,000 — and probably not even 30,000.
Rather interesting that WAPO took a break from its usual TDS, racism and insurrection nonsense to call Biden out for this particular lie.
Biden couldn't even answer his ally George Stephanopoulos' softball questions in the ONLY interview Biden has granted since he caused this damaging mess. George wasn't buying any of it.
National Review (no supporter of the previous president) is genuinely concerned with his cognitive ability (and notes his rather peculiar schedule the last 4 days) and wrote this today:
Something Is Wrong with the President
By JIM GERAGHTY
August 19, 2021 9:24 AM
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After making no public appearances for four days — during a major foreign crisis — President Biden read a 20-minute speech off a teleprompter on Monday afternoon and took no questions. He immediately returned to Camp David. He had no events on his schedule Tuesday. On Wednesday, he gave another 20-minute speech about vaccine boosters off a teleprompter from Camp David, and again took no questions. Also on Wednesday, the president sat for an on-camera interview with George Stephanopoulos that did not go well. According to the White House public records, Biden has had two phone conversations with foreign leaders in the past ten days — one with Boris Johnson and one with Angela Merkel.
As of this writing, Biden has no public events on his schedule for today. He is scheduled to receive the president’s daily briefing from the intelligence community and meet with his national-security team. According to the Federal Aviation Administration, he is scheduled to return to his house in Delaware today.
This is a highly unusual schedule for a president during a foreign-policy crisis. Yes, a president can perform his job anywhere, whether it’s Camp David or his own private residence. But Biden is barely appearing in public, not saying much of anything when he does, not answering any questions outside of his lone scheduled interview, and sounding angry when he did face questions from Stephanopoulos.
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