Biden hammered for spending time at Camp David while Taliban take over Afghanistan

[Checkerboard Strangler]

I have no reason to care what that fat bastard Moore has to say. He hates the military anyway. Calling our snipers "cowards" & calling the Iraqi insurgents "freedom fighters".

That Time Ronald Reagan Hosted Those 'Freedom Fighters' At The Oval Office​

 

[ALiberalModerate]

Did Trump "negotiate" the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners in Feb of 2020?

Pompeo just 3 weeks ago was praising the Biden Admin's withdrawal and claiming the Afghan security forces should be able to secure the country as we pulled out. If someone is for getting completely out of Afghanistan, then they have to be okay with the result. If someone is far keeping a small military presence there indefinitely, then they have to be against both the Trump and Biden Administrations position on Afghanistan. These hardcore partisans trying to have it both ways are either ignorant, or just intellectually dishonest.

 

[MaryP]

We probably should not have pulled our military out before we pulled out the Afghans that worked for us the last 20 years.

Okay. I read an article last week that the US embassy was on overtime processing exit visas for those folks. Are you sure we didn't get any of them out? That we aren't still getting them out? We were shooting for at least having until the end of the month. That didn't work. The Taliban took the last road out of the country a few days ago, leaving only the airport.

 

[dcsports]

The better plan would have been to remove our security personnel and abandon (or destroy) our last airbase after getting all of the interpreters and other diplomatic/support personnel out of the Taliban‘s country.

They also could have hit the 'pause button' on the withdrawal, and reassessed, when the country started collapsing around them. Now we get to send in 5000 troops to withdraw 2500 - and I wouldn't be surprised if it got worse.

 

[ttwtt78640]

Or we could have just kept a small military footprint there indefinitely.

That would have been a terrible idea after letting the Taliban take over.

 

[TomFitz]

The fact that our last president was a despicable human being does not excuse this total catastrophe on the part of the Biden Administration.

Perhaps you would care to tell us what the alternative might be.

The quick success of the Taliban pretty much tells you that this collapse was inevitable.

It’s just a matter of when to cut bait.

 

[ttwtt78640]

They also could have hit the 'pause button' on the withdrawal, and reassessed, when the country started collapsing around them. Now we get to send in 5000 troops to withdraw 2500 - and I wouldn't be surprised if it got worse.

Worse is virtually guaranteed once the Taliban (and their radical Jihadist friends) take over (again). BTW, wasn’t that why we went there in the first place?

 

[Greenbeard]

They also could have hit the 'pause button' on the withdrawal, and reassessed, when the country started collapsing around them. Now we get to send in 5000 troops to withdraw 2500 - and I wouldn't be surprised if it got worse.

Twenty years of hitting the snooze button is quite a bit.

 

[Greenbeard]

Worse is virtually guaranteed once the Taliban (and their radical Jihadist friends) take over (again). BTW, wasn’t that why we went there in the first place?

Maybe some intrepid reporter can pull Dubya out of his art class and ask him what the long-term plan was supposed to be.

 

[MaryP]

See post #182

Okay. We should have evacuated our helpers and civilians first, before the military, is what you're saying? It seems so simple. Why didn't we?

 

[ALiberalModerate]

Perhaps you would care to tell us what the alternative might be.

The quick success of the Taliban pretty much tells you that this collapse was inevitable.

It’s just a matter of when to cut bait.

The alternative would have been to keep a small military presence there to conduct anti-terrorism operations with indefinitely. That is basically what we have been doing there the last few years.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

That would have been a terrible idea after letting the Taliban take over.

The Taliban did not take over until we pulled out. Prior to that, us conducting some air support and drone operations was sufficient to maintaining the status quo.

 

[ttwtt78640]

Maybe some intrepid reporter can pull Dubya out of his art class and ask him what the long-term plan was supposed to be.

I’m not sure that there ever was a long-term plan.

 

[dcsports]

Biden hammered for spending time at Camp David while Taliban take over Afghanistan

Republican members of Congress criticized President Biden on Sunday for spending time at the Camp David presidential retreat instead of the White House as the Taliban fought to finalize a takeover of Afghanistan.

www.foxnews.com

I know it's a Fox News article and I know the criticism is coming from very partisan Republicans, but they have a point. This is a moment of national humiliation. The Taliban has taken back Afghanistan before our eyes today and we have Americans in Afghanistan told to "shelter in place", which really is worse than the evacuation of Saigon, and we have the Secretary of State Blinken claiming we are evacuating in an orderly manner??? What a ****ing disaster. Sure, we would likely be in the same situation had Trump been reelected with the exception it would have been May 1st, but that doesn't mean that blame today doesn't fall upon the Biden Administration for what is going on now. This notion that their "hands were tied", total bullshit.

Almost all the Afghans that helped us for the 20 years we were there are going to be killed. There is no way we are going to get most of them out at this point, and that will be utterly catastrophic for future American military actions for decades to come.

So seriously, where the **** is the president right now? Why is not addressing the American people right now? Unlike a lot of people on here, I am not a rapid tribal partisan, I call shit how I see it, and this is an utter catastrophe.

Camp David is perfectly well equipped to facilitate communication with the President. I don't think that's a problem. It does benefit Biden in that he doesn't have to go in front of the press to answer questions.

Certainly puts the hypocrisy of Republicans pointing fingers - and Democrats who pointed fingers at Bush and Trump for similar actions - fully on display.

The bigger issue is how badly the withdrawal has failed. This administration needs to start answering questions about what happened.

 

[ALiberalModerate]

Okay. I read an article last week that the US embassy was on overtime processing exit visas for those folks. Are you sure we didn't get any of them out? That we aren't still getting them out? We were shooting for at least having until the end of the month. That didn't work. The Taliban took the last road out of the country a few days ago, leaving only the airport.

There was a huge backlog. You would think we could have waved some of the bureaucracy to speed things along.

 

[MaryP]

There was a huge backlog. You would think we could have waved some of the bureaucracy to speed things along.

Who says we didn't?

 

[trixare4kids]

Okay. We should have evacuated our helpers and civilians first, before the military, is what you're saying? It seems so simple. Why didn't we?

Because Biden had no plan other than pleading with the Taliban...

 

[Greenbeard]

I’m not sure that there ever was a long-term plan.

 

[ttwtt78640]

The Taliban did not take over until we pulled out. Prior to that, us conducting some air support and drone operations was sufficient to maintaining the status quo.

That seemed to be the Trump plan, therefore it simply could not become the Biden plan.

 

[vegas giants]

The alternative would have been to keep a small military presence there to conduct anti-terrorism operations with indefinitely. That is basically what we have been doing there the last few years.

That small footprint idea is the reason we have so many wars

 

[BlueTex]

Camp David is perfectly well equipped to facilitate communication with the President. I don't think that's a problem. It does benefit Biden in that he doesn't have to go in front of the press to answer questions.

Certainly puts the hypocrisy of Republicans pointing fingers - and Democrats who pointed fingers at Bush and Trump for similar actions - fully on display.

The bigger issue is how badly the withdrawal has failed. This administration needs to start answering questions about what happened.

Answering whose questions?

 

[slick]

Yep, and attempt to explain why his bug-out (forever?) plan was to remove the US military and control of our bases in country before the US civilians and Afghan translators were removed.

That level of stupidity is beyond addressing, IMHO. No amount of “c’mon mans” or other folksy language is ever going to be able to explain that.

Nobody has even heard from him during the critical days when in these situations the people are
used to hear from the Commander in Chief. Has it sunk in yet to him that he's like Nero fiddling while
Rome burned.

Being he's been conspicuously silent throughout the catastrophe could it be that he's considering resigning.

 

[ttwtt78640]

There was a huge backlog. You would think we could have waved some of the bureaucracy to speed things along.

Yep, simply fly them all to Mexico, have the cartels get them across our southern border and schedule their asylum hearings over the next two or three years.

 

[vegas giants]

Nobody has even heard from him during the critical days when in these situations the people are
used to hear from the Commander in Chief. Has it sunk in yet to him that he's like Nero fiddling while
Rome burned.

Being he's been silent throughout could it be that he's considering resigning.

I heard from him

 

[Metric Mouse]

Not unexpected. The right is going to attack Biden whatever he does.

What is happening in Afganistan was inevitable from the start. If you want to blame someone. Blame the ones who got us into this 20 year mess.

If it was inevitable, why did Biden say that it wasn't, just a month ago.