Logic of Leaving Behind
 

What is the logic of leaving Americans and Allies behind???

If it's political, just state "political" and let the thread live.

Otherwise, what is the logic???

People first, Equipment second, Troops last seem logical.

:posting:

I’ve thought about this a lot over the last few days and for the life of me, I don’t understand. It’s either a catastrophic mistake or total incompetence. SMH.

There are Americans in Afghanistan who aren't officials, soldiers, connected to anyone of import. They're just normal people who for whatever reason went to Afghanistan. Maybe they have family there and are visiting. Maybe their spouses have family there and they're visiting. Maybe they're doing missionary work.

For whatever reason, ordinary American citizens are in Afghanistan. There's no singular list of everyone who's there. It's entirely possible that some people have chosen to stay and finish doing whatever they came there to do. It's also entirely possible that they didn't feel any need to inform YOU that they were there, and that they were there on purpose, and that they wanted to stay.

So YOU will never know why those people were "left behind." If even a single un-named unknown unimportant American citizen stays in Afghanistan on purpose, you won't ever learn that.

So why would you even ask what the logic is of "leaving Americans behind?"

The administration can't get ALL Americans out, because the administration doesn't have a list of ALL Americans who are there. That may be why they didn't state they would get ALL of them out. They said they'd get any who wanted to get out, out.

Those who choose to stay, will choose to stay.

The problem though, is that there are Americans who are in remote areas of the country who might not even realize that the American government wants to know if they plan on staying or not. Those people - may also get left behind, and discover that some day, when they decide to leave, they won't be able.

The intention though is to get all Americans out who want to leave.

If the intention was to get all Americans out that wanted to leave, there would have been a plan to do so….there wasn’t. Additionally, if there was a plan, we could have possibly avoided losing 13 military personnel.

There is ALWAYS an emergency evacuation plan for Americans in other countries. And there are ways to contact Americans. Most Americans in country are listed at the embassy and a means of contacting them with an evacuation order is known. The problem is that the plan was not utilized properly, if at all. Americans are instructed ahead of time where to meet for evacuation. It appears that this was not done.
Just my opinion, but this is probably an unusual circumstance where the leader of the country flees, leaving the country in the hands of the enemy. Even so, the evacuation plan should have stipulated such a contingency.
And yes the military has a plan written up for just about every foreign country. When civilians/bureaucrats/congress get in the way of set plans, it is inevitable that we have a catastrophe.

There is no doubt that it is incompetence.

Neo
 

Non-combatant Evacuation Operation.

The OP implies, my interpretation, that leaving people behind was intentional. I completely disagree with that interpretation,. I believe that decisions were made based on the best advice of top military and state department advisors.

There is NO way after 20 years we were just going to walk away and make a clean break. It has NEVER happened in all the places we have sent our military. It is just reality.

It is very easy to armchair quarterback after the fact. But, I don't accept the "incompetence" argument. People saying that were not there do not know what information was used to make the decision.

True there are always plans, and those plans never work out. NEVER have we left a major long-term operation (invasion?) cleanly - look at VN? It doesn't happen. Life is not simply and clean.

True, but there are always contingency plans written in. Even the military members that I know said it is plainly a cluster **** as bad as the assault on Iran way back. Probably going to be worse unless they can pull a rabbit out of their @$$ and pull off a miracle. The way it looks, quite a few will be left behind.

Again, arm chair quarterbacking is easy. Real life is never easy. If you KNOW what information was reviewed and what decisions were made, please inform us. Otherwise, I stand behind my country and my presidents decision.

I know that saying that I actually support something will be taken as political, while all the complaints are obviously not political. If I get banned, so be it. I am proud to be an American and support the Presidents decision to withdraw. I am confident he did was he and his advisors thought was best. I am sorry it didn't work out - that is war. It is messy, it is deadly and it is never the people that sent us there that serve and die.

All I know our govt handled this whole thing incredibly poorly.

I've been to Afghanistan, four tours

First you need to grasp the size of Afg, next you need to think how you get around Afg. Essentially, there is one road, the ring road, to get from many bases (FOBs) to another. This is not interstate level pavement, or pavement at all.

This one will be hard to grasp for many:

The US has said repeatedly that we are leaving, sometimes we even close a base only to reopen it again. Obama did something similar in 2015 when announcing a certain troop level only to step back from that number (this is a fact not a political statement).

So, let's say you are in Afg and another politician says 'we're out of here' do you believe it? Probably not. Let's say you are working at Bagram (BAF), now you have to dash over to Kabul, over the mountains. Just 70 miles, no problem right, just like a trip to Daytona! Eh, no.
US forces avoid that trip with MRAPs.

Suffice to say unless you caught a flight from a base you were screwed. Easy?, again no as the base shrinks more and more of the base perimeter becomes the responsibility of Afghan forces. Competency and the Afghan forces are two words which do not share the same sentence. If they don't let you in you're toast.

I could go on. Ask questions if you want more details.

One more thing, the State Dept might not know how many US citizens are in AFG but I will tell you 99% of the citizens are contractors and 99% of those are DoD contractors and with absolute certainty we do know who they are and if they left AFG. I personally supervised that program.

Had we just been smart enough to include the Afghani government in the withdrawal talks, instead of ONLY the Taliban, more than likely the whole country wouldn't have fallen to the Taliban in a record time - that no one could predict. At least smarter heads eventually prevailed, when the asinine idea of inviting the Taliban to Camp David on 9/11 was floated, to 'celebrate' the original May withdrawal. Let's hope we learned a big lesson here.

I’m not at all trying to make this political but the plan to remove Americans and friends of America was totally botched. You may disagree with the term, “incompetence”, but I’m not sure how else to describe it. Read the article from the NY Times first published on August 21st and updated on the 25th. There were mistakes and miscalculations galore. Advisors can offer advice but the results are only as good as the decisions made. The whole situation was a monumental mistake that could have been avoided.

It seems with all the people that are hired to advise on the evacuation, everything possible is being done. Being that the public shouldn't be privvy to every move made due to security reasons, maybe being a Monday morning quarterback should be on hold for the time being. We are out of a 20 year war and tough decisions have to be made. I guess we could have just evacuated like we did with the Kurds and left everyone behind. Apparently, that was acceptable.

"I guess we could have just evacuated like we did with the Kurds and left everyone behind."

THAT is a 'stain of shame,' that can never be washed away.

No, you don't know that, you think that.

Without knowing the alternatives, you can not say if they did poorly. You can only say the results are awful.

Thank you for your service and the insight.

Thank you, and to add to your excellent reply, we TOLD them we were getting out in May. That was the agreement we made. Then for whatever reason, we delayed the departure until now. That would emphasize your point of people hearing but not believing. I expect (I do not know) that the pull-out was delayed to better prepare for the exit.

And, also, I EXPECT/THINK the plan was to trust the Afgan military to hold for at least a few weeks or months so we could transfer security to them as we pulled out. What appears to have happened is the Taliban told the Afgan military, stand down and accept a bribe or die. And they chose to stand down. At least that is what appears to have happened. If so, yes, it was a serious mistake to trust them - I don't know what we did, if we did. It is just conjecture on my part.

So it is your position that any US Citizen who wants to leave, and has expressed that the/she wants to leave, will be gotten out?

We have hundreds and hundreds of military personnel strategizing, strategizing, What If'g, What If'g and yet we are told..............."No one predicted an early collapse of the good guys / the quick take-over of the bad guys." (the chicken vs. the egg)

I can't buy this.

The conversation has NOTHING to do with patriotism and your support for whichever political group you imply. And do not even imply that anyone other than you is a patriot.
I am not complaining about how it was handled, merely pointed out that emergency evacuation plans are available and should have been adhered to. I know they exist because I have been part of the planning and writing such plans for several countries.

I do not know of ANY military member that suggests that this operation has been done by SOP or that it has even been successful. Hopefully, for our American citizens, things will work out. Anyone in that country now, surely has a plan to exit that country, along with contingency plans. I will bet that many that are now stranded or blocked from getting to the airport, have plans to travel to the border. Some of the contracted folks will likely count on their company to furnish an evacuation team that will swoop in and rescue them. Most likely, any gov employees have been evacuated already.

In my opinion, if it had been left to the military to handle, the evacuation would have gone much more smoothly.

And yes, it IS Monday and the count down is moving swift. Personally, I am glad we are leaving that Mad Max country that is hardly good for anything. It is unfortunate that the women and children have to suffer, but that country does not wish to be tamed.

Incompetence.
 

It is either incompetence, or uncaring disregard for the lives of US Citizens and Allies who are being abandoned. Regrettably it seems a cold uncaring disregard. When asked about the people falling to their death from planes as they tried to escape the Taliban, Biden said "C'mon man, that was four or five days ago". I can not be too hard on him, as I believe he has a mental issue. Those who defend him on the other hand... Just terrible people. So desperate to make it seem like they have accomplished something that they turn their backs on men, women and children.

When I read the post you replied to here my immediate thought was "written like a true civilian....this person has never served in uniform".

Those of us that have get your point perfectly....NO man left behind....EVER!

An estimated 300 US people are "stuck" in Afghanistan that would prefer to leave. Leaving by aircraft became difficult because the Taliban delayed Americans at checkpoints and ask for their names and addresses. Many found out about that practice and stayed at home. Others that may have gotten through the checkpoints were stopped by crowds at the gates. Basically, chaos prevailed!

I agree with the content of this post.

My guess, is that EVERYONE on this post is GUESSING! What is the point. Why after 20 years of training Afghans, did they lay down their arms. I'm glad it's almost over. Can't think of any reason we are there to settle THEIR civil war.

what I don't understand is that the treaty with the taliban was signed in Feb, of 2020... why didn't American citizens start leaving then?? also why were most of the armed forces removed before the evacuations were complete??

I agree with you, and I read an article that indicated the Taliban was bribing afghan soldiers to lay down their weapons. That would make sense to me, but I don't know.

No politics here

Wonder why we could maintain a very large base in Germany for about 75 years after we defeated the Nazi and help ensure a stable government. Same for Japan. Same for Manila.

But now a relatively small force left in Afghanistan that mostly operated air power and intelligence services for the remote locations from a secure base at Bagram was deemed urgent to close.

I question why our leaders are making these decisions.

According to that treaty we were supposed to be out in May 2021. Why were they still there now? I expect the post earlier explaining that no one there believed we were actually leaving is probably close to the truth - but, I was not included in that email, it is above my pay grade.

I was there in February 2020, we were leaving. It was horrible for those that did. COVID hysteria was in full motion by then. If you could get a flight you could expect to be quarantined at every stage, every country. A military run quarantine is not like a vacation. Our news source was MSM who were besides themselves with paranoia. We were concerned to come back to the US, it sounded like a disaster.

No one could come into theater, we kept whoever we could. When I left in April, 20 I got the same reception that you would give a first date who just told you that they had AIDS. In fact those deployed were under far less risk than you in Florida as every aspect, every risk was managed to minimize our exposure.

It's really easy to guess what should have been done but you didn't live it.

Absolutely.

I grew up in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Liberia - father was CIA. he sept his career in the Middle East. We (and other Americans) were evacuated form Pakistan, to Afghanistan and from Liberia to US.

In both cases, state department (it’s not the military, its the state department with the CIA who knows) knew EXACTLY what and where things were happening. you don’t provide billions of assistance and not get that information.
Dad still knows a thing or two. This is from him..
State Department knows where and who every American is, don’t kid yourself. They could have gotten everyone out if they wanted. Maybe not the spouse of an Afghan living in a village who doesn’t want to leave. Most did not want to get left behind. The Afghans who provided support to the US certainly didn’t think the Taliban was ever coming back in control - do you think they would have supported us?
The whole pull out of Afghanistan was not supposed to happen, it was a political talking point. Neither president (the R or the D) would have pulled the troops out.
We had fairly low troop numbers, generally staying on the airbase. Afghan’s were providing security, we were providing air support. It was expensive, we were paying the afghan troops and bribing the village leaders.
We have 3.5 million troops in South Korea, 60,000 in Germany, 50,000 in Japan.
China put pressure on the US to get out of Afghanistan and we (someone) caved to the pressure.

……When you agree to even talk to the Taliban, who our government had ignored, and who we were told up till the day of the agreement could not be trusted, and instead ignore the existing “government”, and then release 5000 prisoners, who may be the worst of the worst and actual “leaders” who returned immediately to the “war” they had been fighting…….what could be expected to happen. They were not imprisoned because they carried signs

We’re there lapses in intelligence recently…..heck yeah, but this was doomed from the very beginning.

No politics, just the answer, ask President Trump, he signed the treaty agreeing with the Taliban that we would leave last May.

With a lot of conditions / requirements.

The current retreat had nothing to do with the "treaty" agreeing to leave in May........the withdrawal happened way after May.

Buc, gots to agree with you. These were nasty boys and obviously had no love for the USA, what did "we" expect????, start painting more signs???

Yup, lots of conditions and requirements. And they were mostly living up to them, not all but mostly.

As to why we left now, I was not at the meeting you apparently attended where the decision was made, since you KNOW it had nothing to do with the treaty... Please share what was said.