Well sure, the 'treaty' was not 'binding' in that sense...it was simply an agreement between the two countries, and indeed the Taliban had already thoroughly broken their side. I'm not saying that Biden couldn't have amended the agreement (heck, he added four months) but rather that the horses had already left the barn by the time his Admin took over. No way to actually get them back in the barn, absent a massive, or at least major, escalation of forces, yet again.lagerhead wrote: ↑Wed Aug 25, 2021 8:45 amWas there a treaty ratified by congress? or an agreement in principle which Biden could have amended or broken? Trump was able to pull out of the Paris Climate Treaty, the Iran deal what are the differences?MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Wed Aug 25, 2021 8:36 amchildish?youthathletics wrote: ↑Wed Aug 25, 2021 8:17 amThere you go again with the partisan scoreboard card...worn out and childish.MDlaxfan76 wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 8:49 pmyouth, again, the 'team' you were riding effed it up royally...the only recourse for Biden would have been a re-escalation of the war, which he definitely wasn't going to do, having seen that such was fruitless in prior attempts.youthathletics wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 8:12 pmThe treaty was FEB20,18 months ago, slick, nothing like waiting until the last minute, to eff over your own people.Typical Lax Dad wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 7:32 pmWho cut the deal with the Taliban and sent all of our guys home and told the Afghans to let all the Taliban prisoners out…. You want him to start another war? That will show them…youthathletics wrote: ↑Tue Aug 24, 2021 5:57 pm Latest presser: Nice job BIden.....just dump it all on the military, expecting them to get it all done. After first pulling them out, then sending them back in, then have to work night and day to get them out by the 31st. As they have to turn people away........talk about mentally mind effing our soldiers.
Nice job leading the presser with a 3 Trillion Dollar spending deal, then talk about his boys at the G7 and UN are all cool with everything, then make it sound this effing debacle is just another day at the office. He's running scared of the Taliban.....UFB.
So it seems you are no different than BIden, you too, would sit on a deadline for close to 18+ months, to only wait until the last minute to perform would should have been a calculated and precision exercise with contingencies, rather than what we witnessed with this frenetic and chaotic exercise that also ignored our allies, as noted in the treaty. Further more, mentally mind effing our military men and women...putting them in to yet another position of jeopardy, facing our own weapons this time, while adding another layer of mind effing stress they bring home. I would expect more from you, especially as you have shared your story of health over the years.
Biden has been in office 6 months, not 18 months. He didn't sign the treaty. He didn't ignore that the Taliban wasn't abiding by the treaty and try to accelerate departure even faster, with even less planning.
I've been clear, I thought that the original mistake was declaring a 100% departure from Afghanistan, and even worse giving a date certain. I thought ( but don't have the full analytical, intelligence insight) that a small international force could maintain a strategic foothold in Afghanistan, with a reasonably stable, if imperfect, government...I also thought, as Adm. Mullen points out (now), that any such could only succeed if corruption was rooted out and the gov't gained sufficient credibility and legitimacy.
I don't know whether that was ever actually going to work long term, and whether the costs would have been worth it, but that's what I thought.
But by the time Biden was elected, the situation on the ground was severely worse, and the odds of my preference being successfully resumed were far, far worse, given that the US had already made clear we weren't going to stay long term and the Taliban had moved strongly in the meanwhile. That ain't his fault, and it's clear that his assessment was that the departure was necessary, indeed consistent with his decade long instincts on Afghanistan.
It appears that our intelligence community largely thought that the fall of the government would take more time, we were not anticipating as rapid a fall, though we'd indeed told everyone to get out months ago (many ignored that warning). Nevertheless, we're executing a massive withdrawal pretty darn effectively at present, dwarfing what was done, for instance in the fall of Saigon.
There will be plenty to critique about this withdrawal, but I don't think it's at all partisan, much less childish, to look at the actual facts as to who was in charge at various points and the implications for the subsequent POTUS of the decisions made by his predecessors. That goes for Obama and Bush as well...decisions were made by each that had implications for their successors.
Indeed, it was far more damaging to America's stature and credibility for future 'deals' and 'treaties' for Trump to dump Paris and Iran deals mid-stream, as it signified that our word is worthless with each change of Admin....in the Taliban situation it would have been easy to have demonstrated that the agreement had already been broken by the other party, whereas Paris and Iran were simply a new POTUS who declared he didn't think the deals were good ones in the first place. Not that that they had been breached by the other parties. Blowing America's future credibility up in smoke.
But, again, not the issue for Biden...very different situation, much different choices presented. He simply made the decision that, given the situation on the ground, staying was not going to be an option without a re-escalation, so might as well get it over with.