What are your feelings as the Taliban reclaim Afghanistan after 20 years of US involvement?

LCDR Osker Dugger, I am a Veteran of both Viet Nam and Desert Storm. And was deployed in both operations. Leaving politics out I am very happy that we are getting out of a no win situation. Just like Viet Nam we spent millions of dollars and sacrificed thousands of American lives for a war that was not ours. Only to have the host country resume the status quo once we pulled out. The question should be how long must we send our sons and daughters on foreign soil to fight a war that can't be won? After 20 years of US Military involvement the Afghan military and/or people should be able to defend themselves. The military should never be used as mercenaries.

It sickens me to my core. This makes me think of Viet Nam all over again. I thank all those who served over there and pray for those who died that they may rest in peace, I also pray that the Creator of all things help everyone who is suffering restore some peace in their lives.

Bright Blessings to all.

Going in to get Bin Laden was a correct move. Once that mission was accomplished, we should have learned long ago from the errors of every other country over the millennia who have tried and failed to conquer them. Their terrain is their biggest asset to repel invaders. If the Soviets couldn't conquer them when they invaded 40 years ago, why did we think we could impose democracy on them? Democracy imposed by an outside force isn't really democracy anyway!

This was not inevitable. I don't want to hear that again. Trump drew down from 10,000 to 2500 without an issue. This is was a mad dash to have everyone out before the 9/11 anniversary. Biden withdrew without conditions or air support. He wanted to make a giant speech how he got us out. Fuck this! Someone needs to pay

You asked for my thoughts so here goes. Sorry guys. But please understand that I started my journey on 29 June 1971 and finished on 5 July 2009. I have tried to pay attention through my military service and through my formal education.

I have to look at what’s going on from a couple of different perspectives. The personal and the professional. On the personal level, this hurts. This will be long and I’ll probably have several spelling and grammatical errors so please forgive me in advance. I spent a couple of tours in both Kabul and Bagram (as well the Green Zone in Baghdad and at Speicer in Tikrit). Knowing the results of the Taliban taking control is deeply troubling; beheadings, rape, child marriage, Burqa’s and Niqab forced on women, losing the chance for education for women, playing sports with women’s heads while on horseback because the women failed to cover their ankles; this is what the AF women have to look forward to. As for the men; forced induction into the cause of the Taliban, the return of the extremist organizations safe havens, interpreters and security personnel we left behind murdered after they and their families are publicly tortured; I could on and on and on but everyone here knows what’s coming. We’ve all studied it and seen it first hand.

From a more professional view as both a soldier and student of political scientist; we seriously screwed the pouch. We started this action with a goal of bringing justice to Al Quida. We got OBL in 09. Our mission was complete. I said as much in the spring of 09 (and made a lot of enemies at the time). At that point, if we were going leave, that was the time to do it. Without telegraphing our punches, we should have quietly started to withdraw using our controlled airfields and been out within a year bringing all our support personal with us. I understand that one of the most difficult military maneuvers is retrograde operations. Nobody in leadership seemed to understand the capabilities and dedication the enemy has during the planning phase of this retrograde operation. And this has greatly reduced our standing throughout the world as a military force willing to support those who have supported us. The politics of this is a full condemnation of our politicians by itself which I’ll skip (I’m writing too much as it is). (A thought that keeps going through my fury little brain is, at the end of WWII we left a stay behind force that effectively is still in both Europe and Japan. If we were bringing down a government in AF, shouldn’t we have considered the long term need of a stay behind force there also? If for no other reason AF boarders Iran and Pakistan.)

As good as combat arms in our military are, no army can ever conduct a successful campaign without intelligence and logistics. Just read about the Red Ball Express “Know your enemy”. And on top of everything else that is true in the world we live in, we have reduced the size of our military so badly that we are completely dependent on contracted organizations to supply intelligence and logistics. Our internal capabilities are almost nonexistent. In the 90’s we coined the phrase “the incorporation of the US Army”. If I had my way, we’d go back to a 17 Division 750,000 person army with the concept of company cooks and company clerks being put back in. I’d also love to see us meet Regan’s goal of a 500 ship Navy. That way we could support from within without being dependent on corporations. These latest events show a complete failure of our intelligence and logistics community in underestimating the enemy capabilities. I almost believe that many of our leaders still believe that we were fighting nothing more than cave dwellers that could never defeat the superior US military fighting force with all its technology. That’s almost sadly hilarious when I think about the movie Gardens of Stone and the pronouncement of the young soldier who declared the NVA could never defeat the US Army; they were using bows and arrows against our superior technology. 50 years later it seems our senior leaders believe the same thing. The French lost to the Vietnamese by hand carrying ammo and heavy weapons up mountains to attack at Dien Phen Pho (please excuse my spelling). We’ve learned nothing since that conflict at the senior leadership level. The Taliban is a dedicated force fighting for their religious beliefs and nothing will stop them. They will use every brutal, internationally outlawed method of conducting warfare they want to use. They haven’t put themselves in any kind of moral box to restrict their meeting their end goals. We have. I don’t believe the current leadership has considered the dedication of the forces we’ve been fighting. And, what we’ve recently seen is only going to get worse. AF is a land locked country and supporting our forces is principally through the Air and over land using convoys. Once those options are off the table, we have no way to conduct any type of military operation. The way we left Bagram AFB was horrible. It provided the signal that now the real war can take place and that there was no one left to stop them.

My conclusion is that we need a complete overhaul of senior military leadership starting at the Pentagon and JCS level. They have sadly failed in their mission of knowing their enemy and capitulating to politicians on the conduct of warfare for their own personal gains. If I’m harsh, its because I’m so sad and disappointed at what’s taken place and do not look forward to what’s coming.

Mixed emotions. I'm happy we're leaving that place. I'm angry we've so mis-managed the withdrawal that the Taliban is holding a bunch of American equipment. I'm frustrated that the Afghan forces we spent 20 years building collapsed without firing a shot. I feel helpless and sad and empty that all the time I spent flying over Afghanistan, all the weapons expended, all the time away from home, was all for nothing. That we spent 20 years, $2 trillion dollars, thousands of lives, and beat the hell out of our equipment just to leave the country the way we found it.

Arguably, it is a terrible series of days. All the blood, sweat, tears, lives lost for nothing. I am all for the troops coming home, and part of me says eff them. However, what did we actually do? How did we actually help them? The good Afghanis are begging to leave because they will be killed and tortured because of us. We trained the police and army for nothing, because they fell faster than a small village.

I feel angry and betrayed. I will however, not let anger win. I will hold my head high and be proud of my service over there.

Afghanistan was never intended to be won. Non of these wars are. We know war is a racket, as stated by the greatest Marine ever, MajGen Smedley Butler. A million people dead and TRILLIONS wasted and funneled to the MIC. Trying to keep it short; recent, documented history (within my living grandma's life time) shows that America's military has become a corporate tool for securing profits. I truly don't know what this country looks like in 5 years. Do not let the fear mongering of the Taliban banning vaccines pull is back into this for profit war. Side note, CIA operations won't stop with the troop pull out. War must never stop because quarterly profits must always go up.

We should have left in 2001. We are terrible nation builders