How do we win in Afghanistan?

#501
#501
Velo Vol said:
Clearly the Pentagon has determined that the best course is to maintain bases with small forces available to firefight as the need arises.

At this point, I have no to reason not to defer to its judgment.
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Clearly, the Pentagon gets additional funding the longer they stay.

A peacetime armed forces isn't quite nearly as well funded as one at perpetual war. I'm all about funding the Armed Forces to the level they need to meet the tasks they may face, but we're squandering billions every year over there for what?
 
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#503
#503
RE: Bombing our way to victory

The US has dropped more munitions in 2018 in Afghanistan than it has in any year in over a decade

A ramped-up bombing campaign has been part of the Trump administration’s strategy for pushing the Taliban to the negotiating table. But the Kabul government has been unable to win territory back from the insurgents and the bombing has corresponded with a record number of civilian casualties caused by airstrikes, according to United Nations statistics.
. . .
It’s difficult to know to what extent the bombings have prevented insurgents from controlling more areas than would otherwise have been the case. Despite the uptick in airstrikes, the Taliban hold more territory than at any time since the war began in 2001, according to U.S. military data.
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#508
#508
You don’t win religious wars where suicide is not just on the table but glamorized.

Even if you wipe one sect out, the remaining sect will splinter and start all over.
 
#511
#511
Toujours Pret said:
OPINION: CHINA WILL WIN AFGHANISTAN — TO AMERICA’S EMBARRASSMENT - Soldier of Fortune Magazine
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Ironically, China will ultimately throw the Taliban under the bus because Beijing cannot achieve its commercial and military aims in South Asia with such an erratic and unreliable regime on its doorstep and giving China’s Muslim minorities dangerous ideas.

The disappearance of the Taliban will happen with the assistance of Pakistan, who could have done so for the United States in 2001, except for the fact that it has been an ally of China.

Afghanistan will then be welcomed as a participant in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), become a full member of the China-dominated Shanghai Cooperation Organization and be incorporated into the deep and comprehensive China-Pakistan military alliance.
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So, we have border instability with Russia and border instability with China.
 
#518
#518
Velo Vol said:
Six years ago today . . .

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The strategy has changed dramatically there in the last 5 months. It went from training the ANA and ANP to take the fight to the Taliban to us saying “ screw it. We need to drop as many bodies as we can.”
 
#519
#519
Orange_Vol1321 said:
Obama said the same. Once you get in there the true reality is if you leave you will have a huge problem on your hands in two years.
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17 years is long enough I think. If whatever we have tried over that period of time hasn't worked, then nothing will.
 
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