Opinion: I fought and bled in Afghanistan. I still think America is right to accept defeat.

[Nevilledog]

Link to tweet

Tweet text:
Greg Jaffe
@GregJaffe
“Now, in Biden, we finally have a president who won’t be cowed into inaction by the threat of political damage… Because he is unwilling to simply say “more,” he is being unfairly vilified.”
Dan Berschinski eloquently lays out a view common to many vets.

Opinion | I fought and bled in Afghanistan. I still think America is right to accept defeat.
I am angry that my fellow soldiers gave lives and limbs in vain. But I am even angrier that our nation's leaders spent 20 years ignoring reality.
washingtonpost.com
7:02 AM · Aug 22, 2021

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/08/20/i-fought-bled-afghanistan-i-still-think-america-is-right-accept-defeat/

When the twin towers fell, I was a high school senior deep in college applications. The United States Military Academy topped my list. Watching the devastation of Sept. 11, 2001, unfold, I knew the Army would be part of the response, though I figured that response would be over by the time I graduated from West Point. Never did I imagine that, eight years later, I would be leading soldiers in a war provoked by that one terrible day.

Yet lead them I did, across Afghanistan, witnessing horrors and enduring losses I still struggle to describe. What I saw there convinced me that the awful scenes we are now witnessing were inevitable — and that President Biden deserves credit for nonetheless braving the fallout to do the right thing by our troops.

I saw early warning signs as a U.S. Army infantry platoon leader on my first mission in Kandahar in 2009. In my very first conversation with a local, a shopkeeper told me: “Lieutenant, I met the previous American lieutenant 12 months prior, I will meet another American lieutenant in 12 months when you leave.” He did not like the Taliban, the shopkeeper told me, but it would be in Afghanistan long after I would — and so he had no choice but to deal with it.

If that first mission diminished my hopes for the United States’ success in Afghanistan, my last dashed them entirely. On Aug. 18, 2009, two days before a national election, I was supposed to partner with Afghan army forces to reconnoiter local polling sites. As I walked across our base that morning, I learned that my Afghan partners had fled overnight. They did not want to risk their lives to protect their own polling sites.

*snip*

[cayugafalls]

1. Think about it. If President Biden did not withdraw now, 2022 would be hell.

It is better to take the hit now, then to prolong the agony and give them fodder for 2022.

By 2022, there will be plenty of other things happening to make this moment moot.

My opinion.

[brush]

2. Al Qaeda was driven from the country. Bin Ladin was killed.

Missions accomplished. After that it was a stasis for 11 years and now a withdrawal. I wouldn't call that a stalemate not a defeat.

[crickets]

3. More and more veterans are speaking up, and all of them seem to agree.

The war was never winnable, we've been wasting our personnel and resources, and it was past time to get out.