Taliban entering Kabul 'from all sides' | Hacker News Reader

Taliban entering Kabul 'from all sides'

bbc.com

44 pointsosivertsson29 comments

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Old Afghan saying from the Soviet invasion:

"They have watches, but we have time."

"Afghanistan: Taliban enter outskirts of Kabul as US begins embassy evacuation – live updates"

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2021/aug/15/afghanist...

We have seen this image before, 20 years ago: https://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/caf1a9685fe81c717224491a3ce54...

Sounds like this next Sep 11 will be a celebration party in Kabul. I could not think of a more inept handling of 20 years legacy. At this moment you run the risk to leave behind members of the 25 to 40 other Nations, that also have troops on the ground, and it seems they are still working on visas for the translators...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Security_Assista...

Didn't Biden say within the past couple of days there wouldn't be helicopters evacuating the embassy like in Vietnam? Guess he got that wrong.

Here is what he said:

https://twitter.com/i/status/1426900769656254468

Purely speculating… I wonder if there were any talks about this. I don’t think the US would leave without ensuring that no terrorism would come out of it, same with the Taliban now keeping civilians and those who surrender unharmed. Perhaps they made a deal where the Taliban can do what they want as long as they don’t bother others.

I don't believe the US has much leverage in this situation. Given how the war in Afghanistan is extremely unpopular domestically, any recourse against the Taliban that would involve US military involvement would be a political slip 'n slide.

No, but I imagine the US can still make it very difficult for the Taliban, perhaps in a more clandestine way. There are still bases across the border afaik.

There was a long time for peace treaty talks, so perhaps some countries in the (Gulf) region are intermediaries in this new balance of power.

Yes there was an agreement between the US and the Taliban:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doha_Agreement_(2020)

Thanks, gonna read that!

There were. Keeping Al Qaida “out” and preventing any other terrorist groups from rising was part of the deal. Talks / negotiations between the Taliban and the US started back in 2018.

A lot of people throw the Taliban, Al Qaida and IS on the same pile mentally. But although the Taliban are no friendly bunch. They’ve been the ruling majority in the 90’s, until they made a pact with the devil: Osama Bin Laden. From what I read, they won’t make that same mistake twice. Their interest is purely domestic this time around.

It’s a sad day though, for sure.

>Their interest is purely domestic this time around.

and their support and finances from China

If the Taliban can weaken the position of the US China will support them, just like the US supported the Taliban when they could weaken the position of Russia back in the 80ies.

China next into Afganistan confirmed

would the 'graveyard of dynasties' befall upon China also? how differently / innovatively would China deal with Afghanistan and avoid the risk of Taliban/Islamic blowback ?

it is quite unbelievable how they made Taliban say "we've no problems with the Uighur situation"

They'd probably annex it and then install re-education facilites to show everyone on how awesome socialism with mainland Chinese characteristics are.

The president just left the country, the top post in this thread is as factual as it can...Why is HN now flagging the BBC?

"Afghan President Ghani leaves country "

https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-asia-58219963

This is "deja vu all over again" in reverse, from 20 years ago. In Nov 2001 US special forces led Northern Alliance also took Kabul much quicker than anticipated or planned. The Taliban regime back then folded pretty quickly as well.

It amazes and saddens me how much harm ideology can justify inflicting on others.

The impact on women and girl’s lives is shameful.

My prayers are with them.

The same may also generalize for Capitalism.

I chose “ideology” because it captured religious fundamentalism (in all flavours), specific state ideologies, critical theory, “communism” (as implemented by various countries)…

Many bright things have dark sides to them.

20 years for what?

For funding the military industrial complex; what else?

They have UAP vehicles now, maybe worth it?

More seriously, this is extremely concerning from a geopolitical perspective. Looks like this next week will be tumultuous.

EDIT: I'm too scared to post to their Twitter, but the latest tweet from Matin Bek ("Member of negotiating team of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan" per his profile) was "Don't panic! Kabul is safe!" which just darkly reminded me of this scene from a Mars Attacks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vUrAMxmO_A&ab_channel=Sadys...

Exactly this. Wish some journalist provide an accounting of how much Military industrial complex made out of this mess.

Don't forget the massive "NGO-industrial complex" presence.

https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/exotic-birds-in-a...

that's exactly what i was thinking while asking this question.

20 years of fighting the same one-year war. The US Army never learned, and the politicians were fine with delegating responsibility. Also, the recent status quo was fine, and there was no reason to be hasty about a withdrawal deal that the Taliban never honoured.

What would be different if they withdrew a year later?

Well, if they actually withdrew when they said they would rather than sneaking in the night months in advanced, the Afghan government could have prepared better. If they didn't abruptly stopped supplies the Afghan air force wouldn't have been grounded and some more troops could fight. If they didn't press Kabul to release Taliban prisoners they'd have more cards to play. And someone could have done fieldwork to prevent the predictable defection avalanche (a bit of money to select warlords would have helped). And if the withdrawal process wasn't so transparently lopsided in favour of the Taliban, Afghan factions wouldn't have assessed the Taliban as the winners, which would have again helped to stop defections.

But that the withdrawal was done with maximum spite is just the latest bout of ideological incompetence, and not the real issue. The real issue is how the US is so entirely self-absorbed it can't even begin to understand another country, much less try to act in someone else's self interest. Until that is fixed there's isn't much the US army can do regarding counterinsurgency, aside from the 'do no harm' principle (and this change to the status quo in AfPak is very much 'harm'). And maybe letting smarter countries lead for once.

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