While everyone's blaming Biden for the Afghanistan fiasco, do you think what happened was inevitable and if so by which time?

[Ad_Quid_Orator]

in my opinion, the turning point of the War was all the way back in 1989 when he just said "OK, we're done here" after the covert war got the USSR out of Afghanistan and didn't follow up by funding the construction of schools and infrastructure in Afghanistan.

The idea that the Taliban could have been defeated entirely became a pipe dream in 2003 when the US got side tracked in Iraq however, I do think that up until 2008, there was still a possibility for a "two state solution" with the Islamic State of Afghanistan ruling in the North while the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan rules in the South. But after that point the Taliban dominance of Afghanistan wasn't a matter of "if" but "when" and after we got Bin Laden, we should have just withdrawn and the same thing would have happened.

[jshm2]

You're wrong, of course.

There never was any intent to develop anything in Afghanistan other than the pipeline. The former CIA operative Osama bin Laden knew that too. The Taliban didn't exist then and even now there are various different factions calling themselves "Taliban". The main group is the Emirate of Afghanistan.

[Ram0n83]

I do think that things could have been handled a lot better. Mainly, I think Biden shouldn't have waited until the last-minute the way that he did. But I do believe that the outcome would have been largely inevitable: we spent all of the resources and lives and didn't really accomplish anything over there that couldn't be undone, anyway.

[Spermdumster99]

The US stayed in Germany and Japan for 50 years. Biden bears responsibility for the US military's defeat.

[kc_4308]

Yes a deplorable POS and you best to believe Obama is his side kick

[Sargentcaptain]

Under any semi competent president billions of dollars would not have been left behind to a bunch of terrorists. It's safe to assume that some of the more secretive tech is now being analyzed by countries like Russia or China. But, yeah, Afghanistan is and always will be a shithole. A forever war wasn't a good solution and this is just a natural consequence of losing a war and pissing billions of dollars down the wind.

[princeofromance]

No, this would not have happened if Trump was still in office.