A dozen C-17s full of our best guys with common sense ROE this shit would be over in a week….PROVE ME WRONG!
- Thread starter Steel+Killer
- Start date
We haven't perminantly (meaning -- stamped out of relevance and ability to rebirth) won against any force than hides inside of civilian spaces because we cannot bomb those spaces (unannounced) without violating some international treaty. Well, we can, but it requires ultra-slow and expensive intelligence and limited-availability surgical special forces and weaponry. We can't play dirty like they can -- at least not in the overt and singular method that the Taliban uses.
Everyone cowered to the Taliban because they threaten your entire family and follow through with it if you happen to hold the door open for someone "from the West" following you into the convenience store. Not saying we should be like that but that's how they manage to be relevant (and take over an entire country in 11-days) with not much more than AK-47s and stolen munitions versus trillionaire western militaries.
Part of me thinks the only hope is civil war there. The citizens pushing back. But that's a uniquely American point of view because we had our own Civil War that's so heavily peppered with stories of tough men doing tough things. But those two sides fought not much different than ancient Kingdom A vs. Kingdom B with swords and arrows in an open field somewhere. The Taliban fight like packs of insatiable hyenas.
Everyone cowered to the Taliban because they threaten your entire family and follow through with it if you happen to hold the door open for someone "from the West" following you into the convenience store. Not saying we should be like that but that's how they manage to be relevant (and take over an entire country in 11-days) with not much more than AK-47s and stolen munitions versus trillionaire western militaries.
Part of me thinks the only hope is civil war there. The citizens pushing back. But that's a uniquely American point of view because we had our own Civil War that's so heavily peppered with stories of tough men doing tough things. But those two sides fought not much different than ancient Kingdom A vs. Kingdom B with swords and arrows in an open field somewhere. The Taliban fight like packs of insatiable hyenas.
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Okay...We are pulling out all our troops. 3 days later we are sending 6,000 troops back.....How's that a withdrawal??
This is the problem, we don't let the dog off the leash.
You're half wrong. When we are there they are all poor innocent civilians. They are only Taliban goat fucking extremists when we leave. Thus the question is when will we let them get back to their evil ways.
How does bombing downtown Kabul get you 10.000 US civilians behind enemy lines evacuated ? Many of these folks are not even in Kabul and those that are, are spread all around hunkering down . So you can't even make an armed excursion outside the fence to go and pick them up.
Those folks smart assing about ''we now have all the Taliban leadership on one spot '' lets bomb them, kinda forget that Taliban leadership was living within a walking distance a US base in UAE the last couple of years probably used the same whorehouse as US officers stationed there. And no hitting couple of big wigs will not collapse the Taliban and definetly not get you 10.000 evacuated.
Here you are in a situation where no matter the ROE you can't get evacuation done without the Taliban help.
Bring pellets of cash in, is the only smart move here , pay the Taliban for the assist, every other option gets you trainloads of civilians dead possibly some soldiers as well and most of 10k behind the enemy lines killed and missing in action.
Face it military leadership is incompetent they painted themselves in a corner, and no real options out of it , absolute morons, Kabul airport is quite small and hard to defend, and now even expanding the perimeter will be hard to do , due to all the civilians on the fence. Not only that , they chose to abandon Bagram that would be much better suited for actual airlift and host any force you might need including a CAS element, while Kabul airport would only serve as a hub .
Its absolutely clear that the intelligence that they worked with and around for past year or so preparing for drawdown was worth shit and they somehow figured Afghans will fight while US personnel ran for their lives , on what fucking planet could someone come to such a conclusion !!?
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Ok so maybe a better question is why the hell do we have 10K US civilians stuck over there didn't they know we were pulling out?
Don't you know..... Somebody woke up a week or so ago and said... Hey let's pull out of Afghanistan next week and leave millions of dollars in equipment for our enemy. Isn't that how large armies withdraw??
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Here's a few pictures taken on the ground there,so you tell me?
(Keep in mind they can melt into the background)
So do they look like farmers or someone that's had some training?
If you're still confused, below are some guys that definitely had some training.
Dude,wake up because carpet bombing went out in 1970's
In one propaganda photo, members of the Badri 313 Battalion are seen hoisting a Taliban flag in a similar fashion to the six U.S. Marines who raised the U.S. flag on Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in 1945.
(Click on the link and read the article,seriously)
(313 Badri Battalion/AP)
"This has only been recently revealed, is a militia, a special operations unit of the Taliban that is being deployed not just in Kabul but elsewhere as well that has provided a completely different picture. No more just the sons of farmers and shepherds, a ragtag bunch of religious terrorists, but a special operations group comparable, perhaps, with the best in the world," senior editor and television anchor at India Today, Shiv Aroor, said in a news segment this week.
(Keep in mind they can melt into the background)
So do they look like farmers or someone that's had some training?
If you're still confused, below are some guys that definitely had some training.
Dude,wake up because carpet bombing went out in 1970's
In one propaganda photo, members of the Badri 313 Battalion are seen hoisting a Taliban flag in a similar fashion to the six U.S. Marines who raised the U.S. flag on Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima in 1945.
(Click on the link and read the article,seriously)
(313 Badri Battalion/AP)
"This has only been recently revealed, is a militia, a special operations unit of the Taliban that is being deployed not just in Kabul but elsewhere as well that has provided a completely different picture. No more just the sons of farmers and shepherds, a ragtag bunch of religious terrorists, but a special operations group comparable, perhaps, with the best in the world," senior editor and television anchor at India Today, Shiv Aroor, said in a news segment this week.
Corrected copy.
1991 is calling.
Jane you ignorant slut. 1775 called and wants its meme back
There was a mid-level officer in the British Army who was quoted as saying he could put down the rebellion with 5000 (or perhaps 3000) well trained soldiers. ( i can look up the quote for you)
How'd that work out for him.
Napoleon: Russia.
Napoleon: Spain
Britain: Afghanistan (19th Century).
How to win in Afghanistan: Put the country (U.S) on war footing. Instate the draft and rationing. Send 10 million men and woman and backed with our full airforce (sorry Navy, you can give em a ride, but the stan be Landlocked). Dig up W.T. Sherman and say "GO get em hoss"
Until you do that, we're just mental masturbating. You have to want to win. And that means killing every last man woman and child that moves if you have to. (see Japan, 1941-1945, also German 1917-18 and Germany, 1942-1945, Civil War later years). Get out the flame throwers and go cave to cave. Flame it, charge it, blow it. Move on. When they've had enough they will submit. Or you kill them all. Otherwise, stop wasting my time.
Seems to me this is an opportunity. Surround Kabul and set up an outer perimeter and hunt down all the Taliban that are in Kabul. Lots of the leadership in there now. Yes it would be a bloody shit show, but probably get more of the Taliban leaders than at any other time. Kill them all, take back all the weapons and destroy anything we dont want to take back home, blow ammo in place. Get everyone out and leave again. Maybe I watch too much t.v.
Im sure the 82nd and 101st airborne could drop in outside the city and land 20 C-17 at the airport full of ass kickers!
Im sure the 82nd and 101st airborne could drop in outside the city and land 20 C-17 at the airport full of ass kickers!
ROFL
Surround a city of 4.4+ mio and then play urban warfare over 1.100 square kilometers ? Taliban leaders were living high life in UAE right next to US base and troops. There is no such thing as we have them all here now lets get them .
Meanwhile
Brother of Afghan President Ghani who fled country joins Taliban
The Taliban entered Kabul without a fight on August 15
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Anyway we can get together a group of veterans that would be willing to go back and get our citizens back.
Would have a great influence back here and would be great to get our people back alive.
I'd be willing to go. Just dont have the financial means to start this.
Doc
Would have a great influence back here and would be great to get our people back alive.
I'd be willing to go. Just dont have the financial means to start this.
Doc
Yes, you watch too much TV. We all do. We all still continue to have hope.
These Tolly Bon are not LARP people, they are VERY good at wreaking havoc, asymmetrical warfare, etc. They'd have pretty much every hole filled with some sort of "sniper" (in loose parlance).
Second, there is no way this Defense Department has a strategy and plan for this. Had they, we wouldn't be here at all. Complete train wreck, head on with another train.
Ahhh...somebody that understands!!! Thank you Doc!!!!!!!!!!!!
I remember a discussion I had whilst working, when it was just myself and 2 other blokes in a lab. We once pondered that in order to achieve victory, true victory, that roughly 10% of the population had to die; because by then, almost everybody would have somebody near and dear to them perish. This is a sad fact and the very reason we should do our damnedest to avoid war. At that point (10%) things start changing and peace becomes a priority for the people of said country in war (and losing).
As with these taliban heathens, I don't know how many have to perish. Even Japan, as fanatical as they were, had some sense of culture and society whereas these people have NONE - they blow it all up.
If one looks at WWI and WWII this 10% number is roughly what the "Central Powers" and "The Axis" powers lost. Certainly in WWII this number was very close. Horrific, absolutely. As Mark Levin pointed out yesterday and the day before. The past 100 (well, really 107) have been the most violent in human history; more people killed as a result of war and psychopaths of Hitler, Stalin, and Mao.
Isn't this what Ross Perot did when Iran took over?
I'd be in, and I have some friends that would too, but it would take someone like Trump to get us there and more importantly, Get us out
He has the money to pull off something like that.
Trump has actually already gotten my brother out of the sandbox once before, many years ago, but things were different then. That was in accordance with the state dept.
Panjshir Valley?
The acting President of Afghanistan has raised the Flag of the Northern Alliance there once again and is collecting fighters.
Might be a place to set up shop and/or send support.
Reports are coming in that those Afghan Army soldiers still willing to fight are starting to collect there to resist the Taliban.
Still hard to believe that dumbass biden did what he did. Of course, just think of the Brass that actually carried it out... it's so sickening.
We should never have moved in to begin with.
That's not to say, we shouldn't have shown up for a while.
Our entire combat philosophy of 'nation building' needs to die a fiery death, which ironically, I think it may just have. it doesn't work. It will never work. There was never any actual plan or prior performance that said that it even COULD work. Yet, that was the plan.
This is where the shittastic ROE began. Don't kill 'the wrong people' because it would then upset the 'good' people. We doubled down on that idiocy when we embraced COIN as anything more than a pie in the sky theory that 'could' work, just like communism; yet in actual real life practice, will absolutely never work. Yet, that was Plan A, literally.
Here's the problem with all of that. The Taliban/ISIS/flavor of the week offshoot club, doesn't wear uniforms. They also abide by absolutely zero ROE or 'rules of war'. They are everyone you see, all of the time. It really just depends on if they are active, passive or indifferent. But we looked at it as, if they weren't shooting at us, they must be the good ones. By default, that meant, if we killed anyone who wasn't shooting at us right that second (but was yesterday), you are now in violation of the ROE as well as have 'weakened' our COIN strength with the populace.
News flash. They all thought it was a total fucking farce to begin with and just started playing your game. A good quote I'll give you from one of the guys on one of my teams was, "I've never met an Afghan with any problems over here until they wanted something from us and realized that we'd give it to them".
They are literally all, in some way, the enemy. Leadership was too naive and stupid, along with a weird policy of needing to appease/keep happy an extremely weak US populace with a weak stomach towards actual warfare, and that turned into a circular problem for 20 years.
We needed to go there and destroy anyone directly fighting us. Then destroy anyone hanging around in a 'war zone' that always just seemed to be there, but couldn't be deemed an 'enemy' under ROE and COIN. After a while, they'd either become overt, or would have been subdued of their will to fight.
Would have taken less than a year with the best results being that we would have left Afghanistan while only keeping Bagram or Kabul as .mil installations with basically a 'we will fucking kill anyone that even looks over here funny' ROE.
That's not to say, we shouldn't have shown up for a while.
Our entire combat philosophy of 'nation building' needs to die a fiery death, which ironically, I think it may just have. it doesn't work. It will never work. There was never any actual plan or prior performance that said that it even COULD work. Yet, that was the plan.
This is where the shittastic ROE began. Don't kill 'the wrong people' because it would then upset the 'good' people. We doubled down on that idiocy when we embraced COIN as anything more than a pie in the sky theory that 'could' work, just like communism; yet in actual real life practice, will absolutely never work. Yet, that was Plan A, literally.
Here's the problem with all of that. The Taliban/ISIS/flavor of the week offshoot club, doesn't wear uniforms. They also abide by absolutely zero ROE or 'rules of war'. They are everyone you see, all of the time. It really just depends on if they are active, passive or indifferent. But we looked at it as, if they weren't shooting at us, they must be the good ones. By default, that meant, if we killed anyone who wasn't shooting at us right that second (but was yesterday), you are now in violation of the ROE as well as have 'weakened' our COIN strength with the populace.
News flash. They all thought it was a total fucking farce to begin with and just started playing your game. A good quote I'll give you from one of the guys on one of my teams was, "I've never met an Afghan with any problems over here until they wanted something from us and realized that we'd give it to them".
They are literally all, in some way, the enemy. Leadership was too naive and stupid, along with a weird policy of needing to appease/keep happy an extremely weak US populace with a weak stomach towards actual warfare, and that turned into a circular problem for 20 years.
We needed to go there and destroy anyone directly fighting us. Then destroy anyone hanging around in a 'war zone' that always just seemed to be there, but couldn't be deemed an 'enemy' under ROE and COIN. After a while, they'd either become overt, or would have been subdued of their will to fight.
Would have taken less than a year with the best results being that we would have left Afghanistan while only keeping Bagram or Kabul as .mil installations with basically a 'we will fucking kill anyone that even looks over here funny' ROE.
First,
The problem with COIN in the American military, is that most people in our own military are often poorly educated about it. Most only know what it is from the manuals which restricted most of their material to HAM and cost/benefit theory.
Julius Caesar, Pol Pot, General Sherman, Kemal Ataturk, Napoleon, Hafez al-Assad, Stalin and even Saddam Hussein all had successful COIN operations. Even Machiavelli and Clausewitz had some commentary on it.
Genghis Khan's and his successors methods appear to be the only successful example of counter insurgency operations that proved to be successful in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
I think you are specifically referring to the United States COIN theories of HAM and cost/benefit theory. If so, then I agree these ideas need serious reevaluation, but it should be noted, that they are the only ones we have formulated that allow us to maintain the political will of our populace to support the war effort. Scorched Earth policies tend to repel American sensibilities.
Second,
Its odd that you are advocating that the "Nation Building Strategy" doesn't work, when the theory was created by George C. Marshall and executed by Dwight D. Eisenhower immediately after WWII. Its roots can be traced to the Reconstruction Period in the American South. Last I checked we still have troops stationed and bases open in German and Japan. It looks to have worked pretty well there.
"Our policy is directed not against any country or doctrine but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos. Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist."
- George C. Marshall
I've seen you make the point elsewhere in this forum that the basic societal fundamentals were in place in those countries that allowed it to thrive, but I disagree with your assessment that the concept should be thrown out altogether. Maybe more of just asking the simple question, "Hey can it work in this 3rd world country?" prior to implementation in the future.
Even if COIN actually worked on a large scale, this fact alone is something that can never be changed to a point of having a high success rate. Additionally, you have to actually have people that are the majority of the populace in the country you are attempting this in who also want the same end goal that you do; thats definitely NOT Afghanistan even though leadership was dumb enough to constantly be fooled by all of the people 'playing along/playing the game' and assuming they are the good guys.
Yes, US COIN. Everything else has too many other variables to compare.
Funny you should mention Napoleon. COIN is a long term thing especially if 'fighting' with it as your intention; Napoleon's 1st rule of war actually completely contradicts that this could even remotely work on that fact alone.
One important part you're forgetting here; Germany and Japan were destroyed and gave a formal surrender when nation building began. When we showed up in Afghanistan, all the way until 20 years later, the enemy was always actively at war with us. Huge difference.
There was also an engagement that we did a version of COIN again with an active enemy with the same results we've seen in Afghanistan; Vietnam.
Step 1 of COIN even remotely working, maybe, sometimes, allegedly; the active enemy needs to be destroyed and/or has to have surrendered.
COIN is a complimentary philosophy to winning/fighting a war by turning the inhabitants away from aiding/joining/agreeing with the enemy; not the main way of fighting it. It's like saying I'm going to win this fist fight with love.
It can't. From a core level, they only understand strength and consequences. Wanting to fight them with anything else is an exercise in naivety and stupidity. These people don't even like each other, let alone someone else.
Just ask the guy who we found out afterwards, wasn't some bloodthirsty dictator but rather a referee between 2 opposing factions in his own muslim country; Saddam Hussein.
So you agree that Nation Building does work under select conditions? That was my only moderating point to add to your original blanket statement on "Nation Building".
Regarding counter insurgency operations, I believe that I fundamentally agree with your points, as long as you actually mean the modern US counter insurgency doctrine every time you use the word "COIN". However, there are alternate doctrines out there that could be defined as counter insurgency operations which were historically effective.
Verdict is still out on China's current COIN doctrine.
For shits and giggles, I went and pulled the following quote from one of the United States' COIN manuals for you.
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