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Comment by rbetts | Hacker News Reader

> Want anything else?

Yes. The Truth.

Economy: US economy out-performed the Europe, Japan, India, ... during Biden's tenure. https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.CD?end=2023...

Energy: Production is at historic highs and the US is a net energy exporter. https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/us-energy-facts/

World Affairs - I suppose you could concede portions of the Ukraine to Russia. Those aren't my politics. Maybe you believe in conquest by violence, though.

Afghanistan withdrawal was Trump's plan. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-51692546. I credit Trump with ending this conflicting. It should have been ended a long time before that. But he signed a weak deal in February of 2020 that left a lot political pain for his successor.

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> Afghanistan withdrawal was Trump's plan

Yes and Trump safely reduced troops down to 6000 out with no deaths for years.

But then, Biden pulled out of Bagram Airfield Base, leaving billions in weapons for the terrorists.

Then had Al Qaeda run security for the local airfield, so naturally there was a bombing that killed 300 people including 13 marines.

Not to mention the people falling of the airplanes because it was so chaotic and uncontrolled.

It's good to pull out of Afghanistan, Trump was right to do so. But Biden fucked it all up.

There were only 6000 troops left in Afghanistan, actually much less than that, when the date got there. It’s like, hey, let’s leave at the last minute with a skeleton crew and see if that isn’t chaotic. Trump wasn’t an idiot, he knew the position he was handing off to Biden. Biden had two choices, a chaotic withdrawal, or put more troops in for a secure one, but that went against what Trump agreed to with the taliban (so not really a choice). You know who the POS is in this story right?

You don’t withdraw the bulk of an army, leave a token force in place, and expect that to go well. You just don’t do that, and Trump the very stable genius he is, did. And it worked out well politically for him, so I guess it was smart.

That's completely false.

I was off on the numbers though.

So Trump reduced it from 4,500 to 2,500 mid Jan 2021.

Point is, terrible execution on the pull out.

Leave from the base, take the equipment.

Don't trust terrorists to run security.

300 people died because Biden is an idiot.

Again, Trump left Biden with a token force, there was no way that was going to work out for him, you just can’t drop more troops in when the security situations degrades but you are leaving. And Trump didn’t care about those soldiers deaths, his disdain for the military is well documented, this was a political win for him, it makes sense why he invited the taliban to 9/11 remembrance ceremony. The guy is just the worst kind of life form.

Why leave the base that has more security and airfields just to use the local airfield and rely on terrorists to run security because you pulled the troops out first?

It's not that he was pulling them out. It's HOW he pulled them out.

If it were a Republican you would have criticized that shit show too.

Because you didn’t have the troops to secure it. Isn’t t obvious? You don’t have the troops to secure your own base, and you have to rely on the party Trump made his deal with that was binding to Biden. It was lose lose for Biden and win win for trump.

???

The final 2500 were pulled out of Bagram by Biden.

THEN the evacuation was done by 500 troops at the local airfield by flying in.

If you knew it would collapse, why not fly everyone out when the 2500 troops were there and the airbase was still functional.

They even acted like they trusted the Afghan government for the 1 week it was still there.

It's not about losing or winning. Biden got 300 people killed.

From wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States%E2%80%93Taliban_...:

> The agreement stipulated fighting restrictions for both the US and the Taliban, and provided for the withdrawal of all NATO forces from Afghanistan in return for the Taliban's counter-terrorism commitments. The US agreed to an initial reduction of its force level from 13,000 to 8,600 within 135 days (i.e. by July 2020), followed by a full withdrawal within 14 months (i.e. by 1 May 2021) if the Taliban kept its commitments. The United States also committed to closing five military bases within 135 days, and expressed its intent to end economic sanctions on the Taliban by August 27, 2020. The agreement was welcomed by Pakistan, China, Russia and India,[4][7][8] and unanimously endorsed by the UN Security Council.[9]

> Insurgent attacks against the Afghan security forces, however, surged in the aftermath of the deal, with thousands killed. However, withdrawals per the agreement continued. By January 2021, just 2,500 US troops remained in the country, and NATO forces fully evacuated by the end of that summer. The US completed its full evacuation on August 30, 2021, as the Taliban took control of the country by force.

> Critics of the deal claimed that the then Trump administration appeased the Taliban and ignored the then Afghan government for a quick withdrawal from Afghanistan.[10]

Where does the deal say you have to pull the troops out before the civilians?

How is how Biden executed the final withdraw Trump's fault?

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