I think a lot of people are scratching their heads red faced about this.Yet another stellar performance by the US intelligence community. How many billions did it take per year again? Maybe they need a raise, next time for sure they'll nail it.
Afghanistan
- Thread starter Sherzad
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I think a lot of people are scratching their heads red faced about this.Yet another stellar performance by the US intelligence community. How many billions did it take per year again? Maybe they need a raise, next time for sure they'll nail it.
You're mixing the DOD, State Dept, and White House information which is highly questionable even with CNN reporters, who usually act as an echo of US authority statements. If you watched all of the reports on VICE News last week by Ben Solomon who was on the last plane out of Kandahar, you'd know...
- The leaders vanished, the commanders also packed up and disappeared. In the fight to defend the Kandahar base/airport, they were surrounded on all sides and vastly outnumbered. US military advisors are known to fudge the numbers. The most common phrase that Biden has used throughout the past 17 days (but not today) is, 'Our estimates were incorrect.' and 'We were wrong'
- Now if the military advisors lied about the strength of the Taliban and their capabilities, it only makes sense that they're not telling the truth about how much weaponry had been left behind.
- It's also troublesome that the Kandahar Afghan soldiers weren't supplied sufficient food
What we do know is that the Biden plan assigned zero US forces to places other than Kabul. Blaming this the Afghan soldiers is seriously short sighted of the fact that Biden had since the day he was elected in Nov 2020 until Aug 2021 to get this right, but he didn't
Biden today claimed it was $300M a day, not the stated $150M a day. I'd bet it was way higher than his adjusted $300M a day
But there are volumes of press reports from the Washington Post and NY Times of contractors being hired to do jobs and completing a minuscule fraction of the contracts, such as building health clinics and schools. I'm sure we will never know that degree of how much was skimmed from US contractors training the military.
My question was how many billions is the budget for all the intelligence agencies.
I don't have the exact figure for the Intel community, but that US military budget had been something between $550B - $780B twice a year. They would get budget packages in the Fall and each June.
Granted that was for all military spending. Good luck finding exact numbers for any of this. As a journalist, I would question leaders and members of the budget and ways and means committees on the hill in their offices. They never had any answers for me
Standard replie: Leave us your email and we will try to get back to you
My guess is that the only way you'd get an answer to that question would be to FOIA the military audit reports, but that's more than likely classified beyond civilian reach.
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Can't be sure about each agency, but the Pentagon knew the war was lost while they were telling the public a different story:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghanistan_Papers
I had found a blog which showed foreign funding (military and civil) was *multiples of total Afghan GDP*. It's a black hole of money -into US contractors and the Afghan govt - hard to comprehend.
@ooeat0meoo @berbatrick I think the intelligence budget does not pass through DoD except maybe the En Es Aa which has had traditionally brass leadership.
I'd imagine that black hole of a money pit increased under the Trump admin. It was something like 2 years about that the leadership in Kabul had signaled that they might switch alliances to Moscow. The New Yorker magazine wrote an article that explained how the US government stepped up their bribes with suitcases of cash to leaders in Afghanistan.
Either way, it's going to be classified way beyond civilian eyes.
Back when I had been digging into all this stuff, banging on doors on the hill, in a strange set of circumstances I wound up dating one of the top public relations personnel of Booze Allen Hamilton. She sufficiently scared my off reporting on all this stuff.
That's just my experience, but I'm still hoping someone at some point leaks the details.
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I did watch the whole video, I guess I don’t remember anyone mentioning that the leaders and commanders had disappeared. No need to be snide.
I know there were “ghost soldiers” on the payroll, maybe 300,000 is really 150,000, 75,000 of which would actually fight? While Taliban numbers are more like double the estimates I’ve read, and outnumber them 2-1?
From reading this thread there seems to be a lot of corruption. I don’t mean to deflect, the US military and intelligence services did a horrible job. But it does seem that a lot of money was spent, equipment was given, repairs were made and fuel and ammo were abundant. The govt was given money to feed the soldiers, but they didn’tget that food to the soldiers.
Could the Taliban get better funding than this? Or did they actually put their money into the war effort instead of stealing it? If 2 out of 3 dollars is stolen that would account for a lot of failure. Though again, there’s plenty to go around. I just wonder why all these left over assets weren’t used in the war effort. I wonder if many are even functional, or if that money was stolen too.
Well, according to Ben Solomon of VICE, weapons laid down and given to the Taliban were a condition that they keep their lives and were permitted to fly out of Kandahar. Although some soldiers fled with their weapons to continue fighting in other territories.
I get your point though, this is Iraq all over again. One might hope that the US military commanders would have learned their lesson but they obviously hadn't.
Biden has clearly stated that drone strikes will not cease. Maybe they have a way of tracking some of that equipment?
SIde Note: Apologies for the snide tone. Besides dating one of the top 6 Booz Allen PR people, I lived within walking distance of the NSA for close to a decade. I knew lots of people that shared more information that I can't discuss, and there are other reasons I have information from close contacts beyond the general talking points that people get upset about. I need to practice more patience.
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Assets left = Purchase order for contractors for replacement.
Now they left service dogs behind, the poor animals didn’t ask to be sent to Afghanistan and I’m sure they will starve to dead or get killed by the talibans.
You seem to find good "humor" in my exposing of war mongering.
You're not really exposing anything tbh.
In other words you are part of the 'blob'. It was obvious before you revealed your background that you likely live/have lived in the DC area for a long time as your views are generally not shared by a majority of people around the country (that's why I asked where you were from, to confirm my suspicion). The views your bring up are also basically a word for word copy of the same stuff I've been reading on various 'news' websites and some parts of twitter from journalists with high-ranking national security contacts. One could credibly argue that people with your views (not trying to take a shot directly at you but more so the views) are the reason we got stuck in Afghanistan and Iraq in the first place. The blob and their surrogates in the media are trying to blame the withdrawal and the Biden administration primarily to deflect from their own inadequacies and failures throughout the post Cold War era as focus has shifted from Europe to Asia. These failures perpetrated by the 'blob' were a far greater debacle than anything that has happened in the last few months. I truly believe that if our national security community ceased to be driven purely by white Anglo-Saxons and instead tapped into the diversity that the US has access to that a lot of decisions would have been made differently over the last two decades. I include members of the Biden admin in that critique to be fair.
It's time for a smarter approach to foreign affairs with the greatest competition now coming from East Asia rather than Europe, something I do not trust the current establishment (the 'blob') to properly guide. Culture and history drive many of the moves made by our competitors and so we need to better account for this (i.e. a person with rudimentary knowledge of Afghanistan and world history would know that nation building in Afghanistan is maybe the dumbest thing a superpower can engage in). I give you credit for being honest about your biases so that we can have a reasonably informed debate and conversation about the issues.
What can you say?
Afghanistan: UK embassy told Afghans to go to Abbey Gate before suicide attack
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58403047
Afghanistan: UK embassy told Afghans to go to Abbey Gate before suicide attack
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-58403047
I agree. Too many people getting worked up about a load of M4s and some basic vehicles. The Taliban already had a shitload of guns and trucks. This stuff is just a Brucie bonus.
Consider this - maybe the US military had been lying about the capability of the Afghan forces and thier success in securing thier country in order to justify the vast amounts of money they were getting from the govt.
If anyone wants to know the truth about the war in Iraq and Afghanistan I suggest they look into the personal finances of the military top brass and of the of the pro war politicians.
See what shares they own, where they consult post retirement, see what friends and family members got contracts.
This question will sound daft maybe but why did the Americans leave in such a hurry and left so many equipment?
Trump struck a deal with the Taliban to leave , in return the Taliban would not attack US forces. The equipment was originally given to the Afghan army, which folded like cheap tent.
The equipment was left behind and rendered inoperable as part of the retrograde process (which is military lingo for “sending stuff back at the end of the war”). Most of the weapons you’re seeing with the Taliban are from the Afghan Army and other weapons they’ve accrued over the years.
So most of that won't be of any use to Talibans?
Good answer.
"Middle east experts" messed it up for twenty years and now Biden is to blame
The weapons they got from the Afghan Army (mainly guns and some vehicles) would be of use. Larger military hardware like old helicopters, MRAPs, and the like, have been rendered inporerable by the US prior to leaving. None of this will help the Taliban much since they already have control over most of the country and their primary problems going forward will be economic and geopolitical, since they need foreign governments to recognize them to gain access to funds required to run the country which were previously being supplied by the US.
While I don't necessarily disagree with what you're saying here about that 'blob', I have no idea how you can connect that to this poster. If you are going to go ad hominem, at least look into the poster a bit first. They actually described their career here:
Or:
The moment I gave up all hope was during the Baltimore riots of 2015 while reporting in the streets. It had very little to do with Fox or Facebook. Almost every aspect of civility had been revealed to have failed, prior to the date, straight up to cops executing each other before they could testify against each other.
Our institutions in America are beyond repair.
Trump was just able to capitalize on the disenfranchised. As we watch things unfold with the exit from Afghanistan, it's difficult to have much faith in it returning anytime soon.
That's why I got a new puppy and live very far from the general population.
Enjoy the little things in life
Could a possible civil war happen in the near future? How strong are the groups opposing them?
True and they chased America out with rusty Toyota hiluxes and decades old ak47s ... do they really don't need this new gear to stone collaborators to death ... looks good for them on insta though
Not sure... hopefully stronger than a usa funded and equipped army of 300,000 people though
A civil war would mean that a considerable proportion of the Afghan public loose enough fear of Taliban to oppose them. That would be a bigger hit to their morale and confidence. Without that fear factor, a fighting force of 70,000 cannot exert control over a country of ~ 40 million.
It depends a lot on the Taliban. At first glance, you wouldn't think a civil war would be possible given that they could simply crush all dissent. But beneath the surface, one has to take into account that Afghans in all the major cities have been leading fairly stable, increasingly progressive lives over the past few years with a lot more freedoms than what they had before, so if the Taliban were to crack down too hard and/or not provide sufficient economic resources, not crack down on corruption etc., then that would be a pretty good foundation for a new insurgency to emerge.
We also have to take into account competing factions within the Taliban and how they are going to settle into new leadership roles, especially the power dynamic between Baradar, Yacoob (Mullah Omar's kid), and Siraj Haqqani (who has links to Al-Qaeda) - and the role each of them will settle into under Akhunzada. If for instance the new regime becomes too focused on moderating, it may estrange Siraj to where he breaks off and starts fighting the regime using Haqqani Network connections and resources. If on the other hand Siraj gains more power in the new regime, he will almost certainly get killed via a US drone strike since he is on the most wanted list due to his Al-Qaeda and Haqqani Network ties.
Much will depend on how Akhunzada handles the first few months and how his deputies deal with their new roles within the government
Some of the terms and names I had to Google cause I'm a bit of a noob in the subject. Thanks guys, especially @Raoul.
Thanks guys, especially @Raoul.Some of the terms and names I had to Google cause I'm a bit of a noob in the subject.
This may be helpful in explaining my above post a bit better.
I'm not saying he's nat sec himself, I'm saying his views are very much influenced by the nat sec community and having been around DC.
Most people in DC are libs.
the DMV area is pretty much libs
Those aren't opposing ideologies.
60% of Democrats supported the Iraq war, not even including the Afghan war here. 3 of their next 4 presidential candidates, put in position by the party base, voted for the war.
Ah yes, Liz, another blonde right-wing nutjob. Meanwhile, the truth comes to light. Even Ted "I sucked Trump's taint" Cruz corrected himself later.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/worl...o-was-fixing-flag-report-101630455213770.html
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/08/31/...n-helicopter-hanging-cruz-crenshaw/index.html
https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-hang-helicopter-idUSL1N2Q22W0