Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Well its a shame in a way for a few afghans but hardly central to the tragedy is it? On a general point about such scholarships what is the thinking behind them anyway? Why are Uk students epected to pay 50K for a university education but some chosen Afghans get it free? To do what ? Go back to defend their country against the talaban? Well thats failed hasnt it?
By denying them student visas we effectively prevent them from claiming asylum.
Presumably those on these scholarships are vetted, indeed seen as a vanguard for our values.
But a bit of a kick in the teeth to English and Welsh students that our government will pay for Afghan students to be educated in British universities but not British ones, no?
On the Leeds fans, I'm pretty sure that they would have done exactly the same thing to Maguire and Shaw if they'd been the two United players who'd missed penalties. Would MP be calling for the fans to be banned then?
Ken Loach has been expelled from Labour. Good. I want to know how a man who attempted to produce a play that alleged Jewish leaders collaborated in the Holocaust in order to help form Israel, and subsequently blamed “prominent Jews” for its cancellation, was ever let back into Labour in the first place.
Because, and I am wildly guessing here, Jeremy agreed with the narrative.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Deary me.. people are getting sensitive. You should have listened to what went on in the 70s and 80s. This really is tame by comparison... ir might not be nice but you will never stop it.
I find this an interesting argument given that, as you say, we have stopped what went on in the 70s and 80s. Leaving aside whether it is right, football clubs clearly are capable of policing their fans' behaviour to a reasonably significant extent.
Yes, clubs do police their fans behaviour and, currently, it seems they do so in a reasonable way.
But do you really think banning these people for this song is justified in any way, shape or form ?
Over a harmless chant. If they were making monkey noises or racist chanting then they should be banned. The fans caught on film fighting in Manchester yesterday, largely posted on Twitter, should be banned. A ban for This song. No way.
So is there a difference from what the Leeds fans did and singing ‘you’re sh*t and you know you are’? Seems an odd one. Perhaps we should be singing ‘you’re still very good but not quite as good as my team, please don’t take offence’...
I once attended an U18 international where the crowd sang “You’re French, and you know you are”…
Ken Loach has been expelled from Labour. Good. I want to know how a man who attempted to produce a play that alleged Jewish leaders collaborated in the Holocaust in order to help form Israel, and subsequently blamed “prominent Jews” for its cancellation, was ever let back into Labour in the first place.
An early start here before more interesting matters such as the Jacques Le Marois at Deauville - I'm on ALPINE STAR each way at 10s against the front two but with eight runners, she finishes third and I still draw - take my attention.
The collapse of the Ghani Government in Afghanistan has been extraordinary and even more sudden than Thieu's South Vietnam in April 1975. Resistance to the Taliban seems to have ended in most cities and latest reports suggest Kabul itself is on the brink of capitulation.
As I said last night, history repeats itself first as tragedy second as farce but it's going to be more tragedy, I fear, for the people of Afghanistan who appear, to this observer, to have been abandoned militarily and politically by their leaders. I wonder how many of the local leaders of the Government have boltholes prepared much as happened in Saigon all those years ago.
For the overwhelming majority, there is no escape.
Once again, Republican administrations in Washington, anxious to bend to a growing anti-war sentiment, have come up with "treaties" which superficially look to save face and allow the troops to come home seemingly with honour intact but in truth abandon the residual population and Government.
Biden will be unjustly blamed for Trump's failure just as Ford was for Nixon's.
Yet it comes back to the seminal question - how and where do you fight terror in the 21st Century? If your own citizens can be radicalised via the Internet, what's the point of having thousands of troops stationed in other countries? Why will men fight and die for the Taliban when they won't fight and die for their own Government?
When you are fighting faith and ideas, you need different weapons and different thinking.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Well its a shame in a way for a few afghans but hardly central to the tragedy is it? On a general point about such scholarships what is the thinking behind them anyway? Why are Uk students epected to pay 50K for a university education but some chosen Afghans get it free? To do what ? Go back to defend their country against the talaban? Well thats failed hasnt it?
By denying them student visas we effectively prevent them from claiming asylum.
Presumably those on these scholarships are vetted, indeed seen as a vanguard for our values.
But a bit of a kick in the teeth to English and Welsh students that our government will pay for Afghan students to be educated in British universities but not British ones, no?
That sounds like an argument to bin tuition fees then.
With regard to the tories on the previous thread getting drippy dicks about the informal transmanche regatta which has so adorned out summer...
They are correct in their analysis: this government lacks the fortitude to do any on water operation that would make any difference.
However, what they are missing is that this cannot be fixed by a tory government. This is a Europe wide problem that needs a European solution. However the tories have spent the last five years gleefully shitting on European cooperation in general and the French and particular. They withdrew from the Dublin Convention which would have allowed the legal return of some of the arrivals to other European countries.
It's going to take a government of a different political complexion that can upgrade the UK's relationship with the EU to fix it.
In fairness, Commander(?) Ace, the situation cannot be fixed by THIS Tory government; up until 2015 one could reasonably say that Tory governments were, generally speaking, pro-Europe.
It's only under Johnson and his acolytes that the party has become rabid English Nationalists.
So, what is more likely?
1. the Conservative Party abandoning English Nationalism and becoming pro-Europe again, or 2. a government of a different political complexion taking power
Because one of those two things has to happen to solve the informal transmanche regatta.
Path 2 seems far more likely than path 1.
Consider also that, at least since party leaders were chosen by members, the standard response to defeat is to double down on what the members want and moderation can go to hell.
Suppose the Conservatives lose in 2024. Is the next LotO more likely to be a "Brexit with a human face" type (Hunt, say) or a "Boris's problem was he was just too soft on Europe, bless him" character (Patel or JRM, for example)?
It will always be the more extreme of the two members presented to them by the filtering committee of Tory MPs
In one year, Conservative Party membership increased by 50 per cent. That's ordinary Conservatives enthused by Boris, you understand, and not entryists as you'd suspect with Labour. 2018, 120,000 members; 2019, 180,000. So be slightly careful in guessing which way members will vote in any leadership election. Past performance may be no guide.
Whereas i read on here that Labour was almost broke and could barely pay its head office staff. The Unions don't seem keen to cough up much at the moment.
Talking of trade unions, I’ve just spotted this new market:
Best prices - Unite General Secretary election
Steve Turner 10/11 Gerard Coyne 2/1 Sharon Graham 11/4
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Deary me.. people are getting sensitive. You should have listened to what went on in the 70s and 80s. This really is tame by comparison... ir might not be nice but you will never stop it.
Of course they should not be banned. Good to see Spurs fans applauding Saka though, that was classy.
Brentford fans
Spurs play Man City today. Incidentally I think Spurs are good value at 5.8, Kane situation not withstanding, and I don't think he will go on strike. Man City have key players out and we're pretty poor last week at the Community Shield. I think their season will get off to a slow start.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Well its a shame in a way for a few afghans but hardly central to the tragedy is it? On a general point about such scholarships what is the thinking behind them anyway? Why are Uk students epected to pay 50K for a university education but some chosen Afghans get it free? To do what ? Go back to defend their country against the talaban? Well thats failed hasnt it?
By denying them student visas we effectively prevent them from claiming asylum.
Presumably those on these scholarships are vetted, indeed seen as a vanguard for our values.
But a bit of a kick in the teeth to English and Welsh students that our government will pay for Afghan students to be educated in British universities but not British ones, no?
That sounds like an argument to bin tuition fees then.
Not really just a good argument to not get UK taxpayers funding afghan students rather than there own kids to study in the UK.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Deary me.. people are getting sensitive. You should have listened to what went on in the 70s and 80s. This really is tame by comparison... ir might not be nice but you will never stop it.
Of course they should not be banned. Good to see Spurs fans applauding Saka though, that was classy.
Brentford fans
Spurs play Man City today. Incidentally I think Spurs are good value at 5.8, Kane situation not withstanding, and I don't think he will go on strike. Man City have key players out and we're pretty poor last week at the Community Shield. I think their season will get off to a slow start.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Well its a shame in a way for a few afghans but hardly central to the tragedy is it? On a general point about such scholarships what is the thinking behind them anyway? Why are Uk students epected to pay 50K for a university education but some chosen Afghans get it free? To do what ? Go back to defend their country against the talaban? Well thats failed hasnt it?
It is hard to imagine what it must be like for people in Afghanistan, trying to flee the Taliban. It must be a total nightmare. But the reality is that, after 20 years, whatever society has been built in Afghanistan cannot defend itself, so sadly like all evolutionary phenomena - will meet its fate accordingly.
It makes me doubt whether we have the ability or capacity to defend our own society, were it not for military technology - itself largely a legacy of a bygone generation.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
Undeniably.
An English veteran was just interviewed on BBC Radio Scotland. He’d lost two limbs. Spent a huge chunk of his adult life in Afghanistan. All that time, money, energy and effort was a complete waste. Lives and money down the drain.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
On the settled status scheme, I have helped or been involved in several applications and my experience is that the process may have had some slight hiccups at the outset (e.g. requiring an Android camera phone) but overall was impressively smooth and efficient. It is much to the credit of the Home Office that they processed ~6m applications in such a short period of time.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and handing it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Ken Loach has been expelled from Labour. Good. I want to know how a man who attempted to produce a play that alleged Jewish leaders collaborated in the Holocaust in order to help form Israel, and subsequently blamed “prominent Jews” for its cancellation, was ever let back into Labour in the first place.
A play is a drama not a documentary.
People got upset about a black Anne Boleyn too
The colour of an actor’s skin is not the same as a libellous narrative.
First. Obviously it’s not as dramatic, but it’s worth saying that leave voters have a higher rate of vaccination than remainers. Given the age profile, it’s a good job, too.
It is odd the way different beliefs cluster together. It has also been reported that leavers are more resistant to wearing masks, and you'd naively expect masks and vaccines to correlate. Why should either be connected to Brexit? (Unless there is a huge confounding factor such as age.)
Logic, in my opinion. I’m not anti-mask as such, but I think they are utterly pointless now. I wore one up to St John’s Wood on Thursday as everyone else was. But it’s stupid and felt more confident not to bother on the way back.
Vaccines work. They are the cure and life can go back to normal.
Not quite utterly pointless - there are specific situations, Foxy for example or people who are waiting for a vaccine dose to become effective - when they might still be useful.
But if a mask is useful for someone then they should be wearing a proper one not one of the worthless placebo masks.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
No, I am sure the arms dealing and manufacturing Republican donors coffers have been very nicely replenished over the 20 years.
More seriously if we had done nothing, then there would still have been billions of costs in regional security and lives lost and ruined as well.
There is no good solution here, it will take luck and many decades if not centuries to sort out regardless of what path the rest of the world chooses.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Your continual and purposeful whitewashing of Trump out of this picture is laughable. He’s the one who made ‘peace’ with the Taliban (lol) and started this withdrawal. This is his master plan.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Well its a shame in a way for a few afghans but hardly central to the tragedy is it? On a general point about such scholarships what is the thinking behind them anyway? Why are Uk students epected to pay 50K for a university education but some chosen Afghans get it free? To do what ? Go back to defend their country against the talaban? Well thats failed hasnt it?
By denying them student visas we effectively prevent them from claiming asylum.
Presumably those on these scholarships are vetted, indeed seen as a vanguard for our values.
But a bit of a kick in the teeth to English and Welsh students that our government will pay for Afghan students to be educated in British universities but not British ones, no?
That sounds like an argument to bin tuition fees then.
Not really just a good argument to not get UK taxpayers funding afghan students rather than there own kids to study in the UK.
Educating foreigners in British institutions before they return to key roles in their own countries must be one of the most cost effective ways of diplomatic influence available to us, and has a long tradition (Rhodes Scholars for example).
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Deary me.. people are getting sensitive. You should have listened to what went on in the 70s and 80s. This really is tame by comparison... ir might not be nice but you will never stop it.
Of course they should not be banned. Good to see Spurs fans applauding Saka though, that was classy.
Brentford fans
Spurs play Man City today. Incidentally I think Spurs are good value at 5.8, Kane situation not withstanding, and I don't think he will go on strike. Man City have key players out and we're pretty poor last week at the Community Shield. I think their season will get off to a slow start.
Brentford fans booed Saka when he touched the ball on Friday
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
The gamble is, surely, it will all be forgotten by the mid terms and 2024.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Deary me.. people are getting sensitive. You should have listened to what went on in the 70s and 80s. This really is tame by comparison... ir might not be nice but you will never stop it.
Of course they should not be banned. Good to see Spurs fans applauding Saka though, that was classy.
Brentford fans
Spurs play Man City today. Incidentally I think Spurs are good value at 5.8, Kane situation not withstanding, and I don't think he will go on strike. Man City have key players out and we're pretty poor last week at the Community Shield. I think their season will get off to a slow start.
Brentford fans booed Saka when he touched the ball on Friday
Ban them all and deduct the three points immediately !!
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
While not entirely disagreeing, the speed of the Afghan surrender does suggest the Taliban are not as unpopular as we think they ought to be.
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
How is any of this Biden's fault?
The Trump administration negotiated directly with the Taliban from 2018-20. It was the Trump Administration which signed up to the Doha Treaty and chose to accept the promises of the Taliban just as Nixon/Kissinger chose to accept the commitments of the North Vietnamese in Paris in 1973.
Doha was a legal treaty which committed America to withdrawal from Afghanistan in 14 months. Trump and then Biden have honoured that treaty.
They left behind the means for the Afghan Army to defend the country and keep the Taliban confined to the more remote and rural areas.
Yet, within a few weeks, just as with the ARVN in 1975, this well-equipped army has disintegrated. That's what you should be asking instead of making cheap jibes against Biden - why was no one prepared to fight and die for Ghani and his regime?
Why, after 20 years, was no one prepared to fight for this Government?
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Your continual and purposeful whitewashing of Trump out of this picture is laughable. He’s the one who made ‘peace’ with the Taliban (lol) and started this withdrawal. This is his master plan.
It will be difficult for Trump to claim much credit from this either. But what he might be able to argue is that his plan depended on facts on the ground and that he would have long reversed course when the facts changed.
Biden last night blaming this on Trump is about the most pathetic statement ever to come from the office of the US President.
First. Obviously it’s not as dramatic, but it’s worth saying that leave voters have a higher rate of vaccination than remainers. Given the age profile, it’s a good job, too.
It is odd the way different beliefs cluster together. It has also been reported that leavers are more resistant to wearing masks, and you'd naively expect masks and vaccines to correlate. Why should either be connected to Brexit? (Unless there is a huge confounding factor such as age.)
Logic, in my opinion. I’m not anti-mask as such, but I think they are utterly pointless now. I wore one up to St John’s Wood on Thursday as everyone else was. But it’s stupid and felt more confident not to bother on the way back.
Vaccines work. They are the cure and life can go back to normal.
Not quite utterly pointless - there are specific situations, Foxy for example or people who are waiting for a vaccine dose to become effective - when they might still be useful.
But if a mask is useful for someone then they should be wearing a proper one not one of the worthless placebo masks.
My comment was about the cheap ones that are supposed to protect others, but I take the point about some people wanting to wear good ones for their own protection.
Your continual and purposeful whitewashing of Trump out of this picture is laughable. He’s the one who made ‘peace’ with the Taliban (lol) and started this withdrawal. This is his master plan.
As a part of the 2020 Doha deal, Donald Trump and Mike Pompeo made an agreement with the Taliban to lift sanctions against the group and have 5,000 Taliban prisoners released in exchange for a 3-month cease-fire. Those prisoners now control Afghanistan.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Your continual and purposeful whitewashing of Trump out of this picture is laughable. He’s the one who made ‘peace’ with the Taliban (lol) and started this withdrawal. This is his master plan.
Trump has gone. Biden didn’t need to Implement this. Far from it. Biden owns this not trump, and Biden owns the consequences too.
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
Deary me.. people are getting sensitive. You should have listened to what went on in the 70s and 80s. This really is tame by comparison... ir might not be nice but you will never stop it.
Of course they should not be banned. Good to see Spurs fans applauding Saka though, that was classy.
Brentford fans
Spurs play Man City today. Incidentally I think Spurs are good value at 5.8, Kane situation not withstanding, and I don't think he will go on strike. Man City have key players out and we're pretty poor last week at the Community Shield. I think their season will get off to a slow start.
Weirdly Trump was extremely pro-vaccine and purchased shit loads of Pfizer, AZ and Moderna vaccine doses in his America First way that he did.
I'm surprised that this can't be resolved with insurance companies making it mandatory for coverage. There would be s bit of moaning but it would get loads of those 16% of Biden voters and 46% of Trump voters over the line.
Are US health policies lifestyle specific ?
Smoking, obesity, work etc - if so then adding a covid vaccination cost variant seems inevitable.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Your continual and purposeful whitewashing of Trump out of this picture is laughable. He’s the one who made ‘peace’ with the Taliban (lol) and started this withdrawal. This is his master plan.
I think the absence of BJ from HYUFD’s Betrayal of Afghanistan narrative is just as notable.
Biden, last month: "The Taliban is not the North Vietnamese army. They’re not remotely comparable in terms of capability. There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of the embassy of the United States from Afghanistan." https://twitter.com/LizSly/status/1426801235966021634
You seriously have to question the level of intelligence he’s been provided with by his agencies because there is a great risk now they will be coming back in body bags. I dearly hope not but they must be panicking in the US at the situation.
I infer from what I've been reading this morning that the Taliban have elected to let all the foreigners go. The Americans have sent in thousands of troops to cover the retreat, who'll be much better armed than they are. Fighting an unnecessary battle and taking enormous casualties at the end of a war that they have already won makes little sense.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
While not entirely disagreeing, the speed of the Afghan surrender does suggest the Taliban are not as unpopular as we think they ought to be.
"Take back control" from foreigners appeals to many people.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and handing it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
While I agree with point you are making and agree it is an utter disgrace, how quickly we forget Trump which we must never do. He took America to the verge of a dictatorship.
Hopefully HYUFD is out there in his little tank, valiantly trying to hold back the Taliban hordes from entering Kabul!
If I was in charge I would never have withdrawn the troops in the first place
So British soldiers would have continued to die for a government that clearly had minimal to no support amongst its own population. For goodness sake, why?
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
How is any of this Biden's fault?
The Trump administration negotiated directly with the Taliban from 2018-20. It was the Trump Administration which signed up to the Doha Treaty and chose to accept the promises of the Taliban just as Nixon/Kissinger chose to accept the commitments of the North Vietnamese in Paris in 1973.
Doha was a legal treaty which committed America to withdrawal from Afghanistan in 14 months. Trump and then Biden have honoured that treaty.
They left behind the means for the Afghan Army to defend the country and keep the Taliban confined to the more remote and rural areas.
Yet, within a few weeks, just as with the ARVN in 1975, this well-equipped army has disintegrated. That's what you should be asking instead of making cheap jibes against Biden - why was no one prepared to fight and die for Ghani and his regime?
Why, after 20 years, was no one prepared to fight for this Government?
It is all Biden's fault.
He is in charge, he has withdrawn troops and left nothing to fill the gap.
The brutal suppression of women and freedom which the Taliban will now impose on Afghanistan and any future terrorist attacks on US soil planned in Afghanistan will be Biden's responsibility and Biden's fault and if it costs him and Harris re election it is no more than they deserve.
Yes Trump was wrong to withdraw too (Romney would have been a far better president than both and opposes the withdrawal) but it was Biden who has withdrawn so meekly and uselessly.
Even Trump would probably have gone out with some firepower and heavy bombing or put a warlord in charge or something not meekly just hand over the country as pathetically as Biden has done with barely a whimper.
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
Watching Sky with Stuart Ramsay reporting live from Kabul does make it very real and you wonder just how scared so many must be in Afghanistan and Kabul right now
I assume that Biden is just going to let this happen as it seems to have gone too far
Deborah Hayes of Sky suggesting that US and UK troops and civilians will not be targetted as that would see retaliation
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
It seems that over 99% of Afghans would prefer to live under the Taliban than fight the Taliban.
Ken Loach has been expelled from Labour. Good. I want to know how a man who attempted to produce a play that alleged Jewish leaders collaborated in the Holocaust in order to help form Israel, and subsequently blamed “prominent Jews” for its cancellation, was ever let back into Labour in the first place.
Because, and I am wildly guessing here, Jeremy agreed with the narrative.
I'm guessing wildly that all this pre-dates Jeremy Corbyn becoming leader. And can anyone be readmitted in the *first* place? Surely second at least.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and handing it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Instead of focusing on Washington, why was no one prepared to fight for Ghani or his Government?
The parallel is both with Saigon in 1975 and with East Berlin and Prague in 1989. If a point comes when no one will fight for a Government, however powerful it may be and whatever levers of control it may have, that Government will fall.
We provided the means for the Afghan Armed Forces to defend their country - what we didn't or couldn't provide was the will.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and handing it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
As I understand it Trump started the withdrawal and Biden concluded what Trump started
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
It seems that over 99% of Afghans would prefer to live under the Taliban than fight the Taliban.
Biden was half-right when he said the Taliban are not the formidable fighting force that the Vietcong were. That is the tragic truth behind his catastrophic blunder; unlike the Vietcong, the Taliban were being successfully contained with only minimal US and allied military engagement. All thrown away - for what?
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
How is any of this Biden's fault?
The Trump administration negotiated directly with the Taliban from 2018-20. It was the Trump Administration which signed up to the Doha Treaty and chose to accept the promises of the Taliban just as Nixon/Kissinger chose to accept the commitments of the North Vietnamese in Paris in 1973.
Doha was a legal treaty which committed America to withdrawal from Afghanistan in 14 months. Trump and then Biden have honoured that treaty.
They left behind the means for the Afghan Army to defend the country and keep the Taliban confined to the more remote and rural areas.
Yet, within a few weeks, just as with the ARVN in 1975, this well-equipped army has disintegrated. That's what you should be asking instead of making cheap jibes against Biden - why was no one prepared to fight and die for Ghani and his regime?
Why, after 20 years, was no one prepared to fight for this Government?
It’s a fractured place that barely exists as a country. Bill Polk described it as a vast plain of randomly scattered ping pong balls, with each ball representing a different village with its own fiefdoms and loyalties. Takes a long time to build something resembling a coherent and resilient civil society in such a place. Two to three generations probably.
So either you don’t bother, just go in hard and bomb the foreign fighters to smithereens and leave by mid 2002. Or swallow hard and recognise that if your wider goals are to be achieved, it’s going to be a long hard slog with the first decade barely counting due to the focus on security for that period.
What I hate from both Trump and Biden is all the implications about how they are somehow following the “moral” path. They’re not. They’re following the path where you wash your hands of everything you’ve done in that country over 20 years and anyone who’s helped you, for domestic political expediency. At least admit that.
I would strongly advise Biden to drop the “Trump made me do it” argument. It makes him look pathetic, weak and not in charge even after he won the election. Had he changed course, do you really suggest the Taliban leaders would be suing the US government for breaking a “legal commitment”? Laughable perspective.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and leaving it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
While not entirely disagreeing, the speed of the Afghan surrender does suggest the Taliban are not as unpopular as we think they ought to be.
Irrelevant, whether they are popular or not we were there to prevent it being a terrorist state again and should have kept troops there indefinitely if needed to secure that. Remember it was the Taliban who allowed Al Qaeda in in the first place.
Though to be frank most Afghans are not in the armed forces or Taiban and get little choice who is in charge other than the elections they had for the first time once the Taliban were removed which they used to elect the current Afghan government
Hopefully HYUFD is out there in his little tank, valiantly trying to hold back the Taliban hordes from entering Kabul!
If I was in charge I would never have withdrawn the troops in the first place
So British soldiers would have continued to die for a government that clearly had minimal to no support amongst its own population. For goodness sake, why?
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Hardly any point now though. There are only about 10 flights out of Afghanistan per day, and of course, they are full (you can only board if you have a negative coronavirus test).
You've got to admire the insanity. Woke governments (of which the US and to a lesser extent the UK are included) are in a performative panic about racism and womens rights; whilst they actively abandon a whole generation of young women to a life of rape and slavery, if they survive at all; in an actual patriarchial hell.
Whilst this is sadly true what is your solution: that we keep fighting?
There is no solution; obviously the problem was in trying to achieve liberal democracy and womens rights by way of regime change, too late now to go back in time and change that. It was more a comment on the obsession with identity politics: as an obsessive and possibly disproportionate amount of effort is spent achieving 'progress' in a small number of western countries, the rest of the world takes giant leaps backwards, and it all largely passes without significant comment or interest outside the old school legacy media.
I agree with you but successive UK governments did pour hundreds of millions into the education of female Afghans in the hope that this would create a more equal society. It's not as if we did nothing. We just failed. But it is undeniable that it puts the obsession with our supposed patriarchy here into perspective.
Perhaps Afghan men should also have been given some education. Because if men do not support women's rights then, no matter what you do for the women, those rights have little chance of lasting.
With regard to the tories on the previous thread getting drippy dicks about the informal transmanche regatta which has so adorned out summer...
They are correct in their analysis: this government lacks the fortitude to do any on water operation that would make any difference.
However, what they are missing is that this cannot be fixed by a tory government. This is a Europe wide problem that needs a European solution. However the tories have spent the last five years gleefully shitting on European cooperation in general and the French and particular. They withdrew from the Dublin Convention which would have allowed the legal return of some of the arrivals to other European countries.
It's going to take a government of a different political complexion that can upgrade the UK's relationship with the EU to fix it.
In fairness, Commander(?) Ace, the situation cannot be fixed by THIS Tory government; up until 2015 one could reasonably say that Tory governments were, generally speaking, pro-Europe.
It's only under Johnson and his acolytes that the party has become rabid English Nationalists.
So, what is more likely?
1. the Conservative Party abandoning English Nationalism and becoming pro-Europe again, or 2. a government of a different political complexion taking power
Because one of those two things has to happen to solve the informal transmanche regatta.
Path 2 seems far more likely than path 1.
Consider also that, at least since party leaders were chosen by members, the standard response to defeat is to double down on what the members want and moderation can go to hell.
Suppose the Conservatives lose in 2024. Is the next LotO more likely to be a "Brexit with a human face" type (Hunt, say) or a "Boris's problem was he was just too soft on Europe, bless him" character (Patel or JRM, for example)?
It will always be the more extreme of the two members presented to them by the filtering committee of Tory MPs
In one year, Conservative Party membership increased by 50 per cent. That's ordinary Conservatives enthused by Boris, you understand, and not entryists as you'd suspect with Labour. 2018, 120,000 members; 2019, 180,000. So be slightly careful in guessing which way members will vote in any leadership election. Past performance may be no guide.
Whereas i read on here that Labour was almost broke and could barely pay its head office staff. The Unions don't seem keen to cough up much at the moment.
Talking of trade unions, I’ve just spotted this new market:
Best prices - Unite General Secretary election
Steve Turner 10/11 Gerard Coyne 2/1 Sharon Graham 11/4
I can’t think of a more depressing betting market
How about the Boris Johnson exit date market?
2024 or later 4/6
At least the Scots have an exit route.
They don't, as long as Boris remains PM he has made clear he will refuse indyref2
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
It seems that over 99% of Afghans would prefer to live under the Taliban than fight the Taliban.
Or would prefer to live than die, perhaps?
They clearly preferred to live under the Taliban than risk dying to stop that possibility.
Their choice but now they have to live with whatever the consequences will be.
With regard to the tories on the previous thread getting drippy dicks about the informal transmanche regatta which has so adorned out summer...
They are correct in their analysis: this government lacks the fortitude to do any on water operation that would make any difference.
However, what they are missing is that this cannot be fixed by a tory government. This is a Europe wide problem that needs a European solution. However the tories have spent the last five years gleefully shitting on European cooperation in general and the French and particular. They withdrew from the Dublin Convention which would have allowed the legal return of some of the arrivals to other European countries.
It's going to take a government of a different political complexion that can upgrade the UK's relationship with the EU to fix it.
In fairness, Commander(?) Ace, the situation cannot be fixed by THIS Tory government; up until 2015 one could reasonably say that Tory governments were, generally speaking, pro-Europe.
It's only under Johnson and his acolytes that the party has become rabid English Nationalists.
So, what is more likely?
1. the Conservative Party abandoning English Nationalism and becoming pro-Europe again, or 2. a government of a different political complexion taking power
Because one of those two things has to happen to solve the informal transmanche regatta.
Path 2 seems far more likely than path 1.
Consider also that, at least since party leaders were chosen by members, the standard response to defeat is to double down on what the members want and moderation can go to hell.
Suppose the Conservatives lose in 2024. Is the next LotO more likely to be a "Brexit with a human face" type (Hunt, say) or a "Boris's problem was he was just too soft on Europe, bless him" character (Patel or JRM, for example)?
It will always be the more extreme of the two members presented to them by the filtering committee of Tory MPs
In one year, Conservative Party membership increased by 50 per cent. That's ordinary Conservatives enthused by Boris, you understand, and not entryists as you'd suspect with Labour. 2018, 120,000 members; 2019, 180,000. So be slightly careful in guessing which way members will vote in any leadership election. Past performance may be no guide.
Whereas i read on here that Labour was almost broke and could barely pay its head office staff. The Unions don't seem keen to cough up much at the moment.
Talking of trade unions, I’ve just spotted this new market:
Best prices - Unite General Secretary election
Steve Turner 10/11 Gerard Coyne 2/1 Sharon Graham 11/4
I can’t think of a more depressing betting market
How about the Boris Johnson exit date market?
2024 or later 4/6
At least the Scots have an exit route.
They don't, as long as Boris remains PM he has made clear he will refuse indyref2
Didn't Boris also say he would never allow a border down the Irish Sea?
He is in charge, he has withdrawn troops and left nothing to fill the gap.
The brutal suppression of women and freedom which the Taliban will now impose on Afghanistan and any future terrorist attacks on US soil planned in Afghanistan will be Biden's responsibility and Biden's fault and if it costs him and Harris re election it is no more than they deserve.
Yes Trump was wrong to withdraw too (Romney would have been a far better president than both and opposes the withdrawal) but it was Biden who has withdrawn so meekly and uselessly.
Even Trump would probably have gone out with some firepower and heavy bombing or put a warlord in charge or something not meekly just hand over the country as pathetically as Biden has done with barely a whimper.
The withdrawal of US troops within 14 months was part of the Doha Treaty, an international legally-binding document.
"Left nothing to fill the gap" is just risible - the Afghan Armed Forces were as well-equipped as ARVN in 1975. With proper leadership and commitment, they had more than enough to keep the Taliban bottled up in rural areas and no real threat to the cities. The Taliban will inherit all this equipment.
Yes, I suppose the odd valedictory gesture might have made everyone feel a little better but you've not answered the central question - why, after 20 years of American and British involvement and influence in Afghanistan, has no one been prepared to stand and fight for Ghani and the Government?
Why were we unable to inculcate within the Afghans any kind of commitment or loyalty to the Government in Kabul? Why instead were so many men, it seems, more willing to take up arms for the Taliban?
How do you fight faith and ideas - not, I'd argue, with airstrikes? We need different thinking and all you want to do is make cheap political jibes against the Democrat administration in Washington.
Hopefully HYUFD is out there in his little tank, valiantly trying to hold back the Taliban hordes from entering Kabul!
If I was in charge I would never have withdrawn the troops in the first place
So British soldiers would have continued to die for a government that clearly had minimal to no support amongst its own population. For goodness sake, why?
To avoid 9/11 2, the chances of which and another major terrorist attack on a big western city are increasing every day now as Afghanistan moves back towards becoming a haven for terrorist jihadis as it was pre 9/11
Hopefully HYUFD is out there in his little tank, valiantly trying to hold back the Taliban hordes from entering Kabul!
If I was in charge I would never have withdrawn the troops in the first place
So British soldiers would have continued to die for a government that clearly had minimal to no support amongst its own population. For goodness sake, why?
With regard to the tories on the previous thread getting drippy dicks about the informal transmanche regatta which has so adorned out summer...
They are correct in their analysis: this government lacks the fortitude to do any on water operation that would make any difference.
However, what they are missing is that this cannot be fixed by a tory government. This is a Europe wide problem that needs a European solution. However the tories have spent the last five years gleefully shitting on European cooperation in general and the French and particular. They withdrew from the Dublin Convention which would have allowed the legal return of some of the arrivals to other European countries.
It's going to take a government of a different political complexion that can upgrade the UK's relationship with the EU to fix it.
In fairness, Commander(?) Ace, the situation cannot be fixed by THIS Tory government; up until 2015 one could reasonably say that Tory governments were, generally speaking, pro-Europe.
It's only under Johnson and his acolytes that the party has become rabid English Nationalists.
So, what is more likely?
1. the Conservative Party abandoning English Nationalism and becoming pro-Europe again, or 2. a government of a different political complexion taking power
Because one of those two things has to happen to solve the informal transmanche regatta.
Path 2 seems far more likely than path 1.
Consider also that, at least since party leaders were chosen by members, the standard response to defeat is to double down on what the members want and moderation can go to hell.
Suppose the Conservatives lose in 2024. Is the next LotO more likely to be a "Brexit with a human face" type (Hunt, say) or a "Boris's problem was he was just too soft on Europe, bless him" character (Patel or JRM, for example)?
It will always be the more extreme of the two members presented to them by the filtering committee of Tory MPs
In one year, Conservative Party membership increased by 50 per cent. That's ordinary Conservatives enthused by Boris, you understand, and not entryists as you'd suspect with Labour. 2018, 120,000 members; 2019, 180,000. So be slightly careful in guessing which way members will vote in any leadership election. Past performance may be no guide.
Whereas i read on here that Labour was almost broke and could barely pay its head office staff. The Unions don't seem keen to cough up much at the moment.
Talking of trade unions, I’ve just spotted this new market:
Best prices - Unite General Secretary election
Steve Turner 10/11 Gerard Coyne 2/1 Sharon Graham 11/4
I can’t think of a more depressing betting market
How about the Boris Johnson exit date market?
2024 or later 4/6
At least the Scots have an exit route.
They don't, as long as Boris remains PM he has made clear he will refuse indyref2
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Hardly any point now though. There are only about 10 flights out of Afghanistan per day, and of course, they are full (you can only board if you have a negative coronavirus test).
You've got to admire the insanity. Woke governments (of which the US and to a lesser extent the UK are included) are in a performative panic about racism and womens rights; whilst they actively abandon a whole generation of young women to a life of rape and slavery, if they survive at all; in an actual patriarchial hell.
Whilst this is sadly true what is your solution: that we keep fighting?
There is no solution; obviously the problem was in trying to achieve liberal democracy and womens rights by way of regime change, too late now to go back in time and change that. It was more a comment on the obsession with identity politics: as an obsessive and possibly disproportionate amount of effort is spent achieving 'progress' in a small number of western countries, the rest of the world takes giant leaps backwards, and it all largely passes without significant comment or interest outside the old school legacy media.
I agree with you but successive UK governments did pour hundreds of millions into the education of female Afghans in the hope that this would create a more equal society. It's not as if we did nothing. We just failed. But it is undeniable that it puts the obsession with our supposed patriarchy here into perspective.
Perhaps Afghan men should also have been given some education. Because if men do not support women's rights then, no matter what you do for the women, those rights have little chance of lasting.
Isn't the mens' education largely provided by madrassas instilling knowledge of the Koran by incantation?
The MP for Leeds NW’s response to footage of Leeds fans singing “Sancho & Rashford let the country down” at Old Trafford yesterday. A bit much to call for supporters to be banned for that I think, this is tame stuff
‘An absolute disgrace I hope @LUFC bans these people as they are no supporters of the club’
An early start here before more interesting matters such as the Jacques Le Marois at Deauville - I'm on ALPINE STAR each way at 10s against the front two but with eight runners, she finishes third and I still draw - take my attention.
The collapse of the Ghani Government in Afghanistan has been extraordinary and even more sudden than Thieu's South Vietnam in April 1975. Resistance to the Taliban seems to have ended in most cities and latest reports suggest Kabul itself is on the brink of capitulation.
As I said last night, history repeats itself first as tragedy second as farce but it's going to be more tragedy, I fear, for the people of Afghanistan who appear, to this observer, to have been abandoned militarily and politically by their leaders. I wonder how many of the local leaders of the Government have boltholes prepared much as happened in Saigon all those years ago.
For the overwhelming majority, there is no escape.
Once again, Republican administrations in Washington, anxious to bend to a growing anti-war sentiment, have come up with "treaties" which superficially look to save face and allow the troops to come home seemingly with honour intact but in truth abandon the residual population and Government.
Biden will be unjustly blamed for Trump's failure just as Ford was for Nixon's.
Yet it comes back to the seminal question - how and where do you fight terror in the 21st Century? If your own citizens can be radicalised via the Internet, what's the point of having thousands of troops stationed in other countries? Why will men fight and die for the Taliban when they won't fight and die for their own Government?
When you are fighting faith and ideas, you need different weapons and different thinking.
It was George McGovern and the Democrats who led opposition to the Vietnam War in 1972 and the Democrat majority in Congress who most strongly voted to prohibit US military involvement in Vietnam in 1973 overriding Nixon's veto despite the attempts of him and Kissinger to extend the deadline
They don't, as long as Boris remains PM he has made clear he will refuse indyref2
You don’t think BJ will have to resign because of his complicity with *checks notes* ‘the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years’ and ‘ cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and handing it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda’?
Biden was half-right when he said the Taliban are not the formidable fighting force that the Vietcong were. That is the tragic truth behind his catastrophic blunder; unlike the Vietcong, the Taliban were being successfully contained with only minimal US and allied military engagement. All thrown away - for what?
Again, no one answers the basic question.
We provided more than enough means for the Afghan Armed Forces to hold the Taliban at bay. We did the same for the ARVN in 1975.
Yet, the ARVN collapsed in weeks because though they had the means, they didn't have the will.
The same has happened here - why is no one prepared to fight and die for Ghani and his Government?
I just logged on to watch BBC News on iplayer in the hope of being able to watch what is happening in real time - I thought they may have film crews in Kabul, or something like that. It was truly useless. They keep repeating unconvincing announcements from both the taliban and the afghan government, or whatever is left of it. They had a decent interview with Tom Tugenhadt, but no great insight beyond what you can read in a few seconds on their website.
Someone posted that the real problem here is not that we would be dealing with a Saigon evacuation situation, but an Iranian hostage crisis situation. If it is correct that the Taliban are in Kabul, then we are surely at risk of the latter. The situation has deteriorated rapidly in a few days and it is unclear how we are going to get anyone out without doing a deal with the taliban.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
The speed of the collapse of the government there has been extraordinary. It suggests that the billions spent trying to bolster and train the government's army has once again been a total waste.
It seems that over 99% of Afghans would prefer to live under the Taliban than fight the Taliban.
Or would prefer to live than die, perhaps?
They clearly preferred to live under the Taliban than risk dying to stop that possibility.
Their choice but now they have to live with whatever the consequences will be.
As a thought experiment, how would you personally fight a well-armed militia? Presumably you are not one of those Germans with a tank in your garage. By all means criticise Afghan troops who folded early but most of the population have little choice in the matter.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Hardly any point now though. There are only about 10 flights out of Afghanistan per day, and of course, they are full (you can only board if you have a negative coronavirus test).
You've got to admire the insanity. Woke governments (of which the US and to a lesser extent the UK are included) are in a performative panic about racism and womens rights; whilst they actively abandon a whole generation of young women to a life of rape and slavery, if they survive at all; in an actual patriarchial hell.
Whilst this is sadly true what is your solution: that we keep fighting?
There is no solution; obviously the problem was in trying to achieve liberal democracy and womens rights by way of regime change, too late now to go back in time and change that. It was more a comment on the obsession with identity politics: as an obsessive and possibly disproportionate amount of effort is spent achieving 'progress' in a small number of western countries, the rest of the world takes giant leaps backwards, and it all largely passes without significant comment or interest outside the old school legacy media.
I agree with you but successive UK governments did pour hundreds of millions into the education of female Afghans in the hope that this would create a more equal society. It's not as if we did nothing. We just failed. But it is undeniable that it puts the obsession with our supposed patriarchy here into perspective.
Perhaps Afghan men should also have been given some education. Because if men do not support women's rights then, no matter what you do for the women, those rights have little chance of lasting.
I am sure that they were. But the traditions and culture of the country proved far more powerful than our "universal values". The Afghan people face a brutal misogynist regime. Its tragic but I don't really buy into the idea that it is somehow our fault.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Well its a shame in a way for a few afghans but hardly central to the tragedy is it? On a general point about such scholarships what is the thinking behind them anyway? Why are Uk students epected to pay 50K for a university education but some chosen Afghans get it free? To do what ? Go back to defend their country against the talaban? Well thats failed hasnt it?
By denying them student visas we effectively prevent them from claiming asylum.
Presumably those on these scholarships are vetted, indeed seen as a vanguard for our values.
But a bit of a kick in the teeth to English and Welsh students that our government will pay for Afghan students to be educated in British universities but not British ones, no?
That sounds like an argument to bin tuition fees then.
Not really just a good argument to not get UK taxpayers funding afghan students rather than there own kids to study in the UK.
Educating foreigners in British institutions before they return to key roles in their own countries must be one of the most cost effective ways of diplomatic influence available to us, and has a long tradition (Rhodes Scholars for example).
We would be crazy to stop doing it.
well its really worked here hasnt it- Wonder how many talaban we have educated this way? Some of the worst dicatators have had a UK university education. I am afraid I find your argument here wishy washy nonsense
Ken Loach has been expelled from Labour. Good. I want to know how a man who attempted to produce a play that alleged Jewish leaders collaborated in the Holocaust in order to help form Israel, and subsequently blamed “prominent Jews” for its cancellation, was ever let back into Labour in the first place.
Because, and I am wildly guessing here, Jeremy agreed with the narrative.
I'm guessing wildly that all this pre-dates Jeremy Corbyn becoming leader. And can anyone be readmitted in the *first* place? Surely second at least.
I though Loach returned to the fold in 2016, which would coincide with the dates when Jeremy turned the party into the election winning machine that prevailed victorious in 2017 and 2019.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Hardly any point now though. There are only about 10 flights out of Afghanistan per day, and of course, they are full (you can only board if you have a negative coronavirus test).
You've got to admire the insanity. Woke governments (of which the US and to a lesser extent the UK are included) are in a performative panic about racism and womens rights; whilst they actively abandon a whole generation of young women to a life of rape and slavery, if they survive at all; in an actual patriarchial hell.
Whilst this is sadly true what is your solution: that we keep fighting?
There is no solution; obviously the problem was in trying to achieve liberal democracy and womens rights by way of regime change, too late now to go back in time and change that. It was more a comment on the obsession with identity politics: as an obsessive and possibly disproportionate amount of effort is spent achieving 'progress' in a small number of western countries, the rest of the world takes giant leaps backwards, and it all largely passes without significant comment or interest outside the old school legacy media.
I agree with you but successive UK governments did pour hundreds of millions into the education of female Afghans in the hope that this would create a more equal society. It's not as if we did nothing. We just failed. But it is undeniable that it puts the obsession with our supposed patriarchy here into perspective.
Perhaps Afghan men should also have been given some education. Because if men do not support women's rights then, no matter what you do for the women, those rights have little chance of lasting.
We needed to make the economy work for most people. Getting the median income to somewhere around $10-20 per day would have been sufficient for people to embrace a major cultural change and try and build from there, and gradually reduce the power of local "leaders".
Expecting those on a couple of dollars per day to care about politics, religion or education over day to day survival is not going to work.
Hopefully HYUFD is out there in his little tank, valiantly trying to hold back the Taliban hordes from entering Kabul!
If I was in charge I would never have withdrawn the troops in the first place
Are you going to resign from the Conservative Party in protest at the support given by the British Government to the American Government’s decision?
I stand with Tory MPs from Tobias Ellwood to Tom Tugenhadt who are appalled at this withdrawal, although to be fair to Boris once the US withdrew it was unrealistic for the UK to stay alone. The fault lies with Biden.
Kudos to the LDs too who have attacked Biden's withdrawal as condemning the Afghans to medieval barbarity and us to the return of terrorism
Mr. Away, it is rather bedwetting. Like when a Labour MP (I forget the name, alas, he formerly trained as a priest) wanted Delilah no longer sung at Welsh rugby matches.
Edited extra bit: may've been Chris someone-or-other.
The one with the underpants - New Labour's answer to John Major?
Ken Loach has been expelled from Labour. Good. I want to know how a man who attempted to produce a play that alleged Jewish leaders collaborated in the Holocaust in order to help form Israel, and subsequently blamed “prominent Jews” for its cancellation, was ever let back into Labour in the first place.
Because, and I am wildly guessing here, Jeremy agreed with the narrative.
I'm guessing wildly that all this pre-dates Jeremy Corbyn becoming leader. And can anyone be readmitted in the *first* place? Surely second at least.
I though Loach returned to the fold in 2016, which would coincide with the dates when Jeremy turned the party into the election winning machine that prevailed victorious in 2017 and 2019.
You might be right but as a general rule, it was Ed Miliband who let back in all the hard-left groups that Neil Kinnock had thrown out, including the antisemitic ones.
Rory Stewart:- Deeply disappointing to hear – on top of everything – that Afghans who received Scholarships from the UK government to study in the UK this year have now been told they will not be granted visas due to "administration issues". Surely someone can sort this out? https://twitter.com/RoryStewartUK/status/1426558342709891078
Hardly any point now though. There are only about 10 flights out of Afghanistan per day, and of course, they are full (you can only board if you have a negative coronavirus test).
You've got to admire the insanity. Woke governments (of which the US and to a lesser extent the UK are included) are in a performative panic about racism and womens rights; whilst they actively abandon a whole generation of young women to a life of rape and slavery, if they survive at all; in an actual patriarchial hell.
Whilst this is sadly true what is your solution: that we keep fighting?
There is no solution; obviously the problem was in trying to achieve liberal democracy and womens rights by way of regime change, too late now to go back in time and change that. It was more a comment on the obsession with identity politics: as an obsessive and possibly disproportionate amount of effort is spent achieving 'progress' in a small number of western countries, the rest of the world takes giant leaps backwards, and it all largely passes without significant comment or interest outside the old school legacy media.
I agree with you but successive UK governments did pour hundreds of millions into the education of female Afghans in the hope that this would create a more equal society. It's not as if we did nothing. We just failed. But it is undeniable that it puts the obsession with our supposed patriarchy here into perspective.
Perhaps Afghan men should also have been given some education. Because if men do not support women's rights then, no matter what you do for the women, those rights have little chance of lasting.
Isn't the mens' education largely provided by madrassas instilling knowledge of the Koran by incantation?
No, not in areas that have been under government control. The situation has been messy and underfunded, especially for girls, but not dominated by madrassas.
That will now, sadly, presumably change. Note by the way that the only systematic attempt to provide secular education for girls on a large scale was under the PDPA (communist) government which the West conspired to overthrow.
Hopefully HYUFD is out there in his little tank, valiantly trying to hold back the Taliban hordes from entering Kabul!
If I was in charge I would never have withdrawn the troops in the first place
Are you going to resign from the Conservative Party in protest at the support given by the British Government to the American Government’s decision?
I stand with Tory MPs from Tobias Ellwood to Tom Tugenhadt who are appalled at this withdrawal, although to be fair to Boris once the US withdrew it was unrealistic for the UK to stay alone. The fault lies with Biden.
Kudos to the LDs too who have attacked Biden's withdrawal as condemning the Afghans to medieval barbarity and us to the return of terrorism
An early start here before more interesting matters such as the Jacques Le Marois at Deauville - I'm on ALPINE STAR each way at 10s against the front two but with eight runners, she finishes third and I still draw - take my attention.
The collapse of the Ghani Government in Afghanistan has been extraordinary and even more sudden than Thieu's South Vietnam in April 1975. Resistance to the Taliban seems to have ended in most cities and latest reports suggest Kabul itself is on the brink of capitulation.
As I said last night, history repeats itself first as tragedy second as farce but it's going to be more tragedy, I fear, for the people of Afghanistan who appear, to this observer, to have been abandoned militarily and politically by their leaders. I wonder how many of the local leaders of the Government have boltholes prepared much as happened in Saigon all those years ago.
For the overwhelming majority, there is no escape.
Once again, Republican administrations in Washington, anxious to bend to a growing anti-war sentiment, have come up with "treaties" which superficially look to save face and allow the troops to come home seemingly with honour intact but in truth abandon the residual population and Government.
Biden will be unjustly blamed for Trump's failure just as Ford was for Nixon's.
Yet it comes back to the seminal question - how and where do you fight terror in the 21st Century? If your own citizens can be radicalised via the Internet, what's the point of having thousands of troops stationed in other countries? Why will men fight and die for the Taliban when they won't fight and die for their own Government?
When you are fighting faith and ideas, you need different weapons and different thinking.
It was George McGovern and the Democrats who led opposition to the Vietnam War in 1972 and the Democrat majority in Congress who most strongly voted to prohibit US military involvement in Vietnam in 1973 overriding Nixon's veto despite the attempts of him and Kissinger to extend the deadline
McGovern and the Democrats were right to do so. The Vietnam War poisoned several countries, but I suspect the US came off worst.
Looks like Kabul has already been effectively lost
And if it does it is on the Biden-Harris administration, without doubt the weakest, most hapless and useless US administration of the past 100 years in terms of foreign policy. Cutting and running with no responsibility at all to the Afghan people and handing it back to the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Instead of focusing on Washington, why was no one prepared to fight for Ghani or his Government?
The parallel is both with Saigon in 1975 and with East Berlin and Prague in 1989. If a point comes when no one will fight for a Government, however powerful it may be and whatever levers of control it may have, that Government will fall.
We provided the means for the Afghan Armed Forces to defend their country - what we didn't or couldn't provide was the will.
Yes but there was always a risk the Afghan armed forces would not have been strong enough or strong willed enough to defeat the Taliban.
Comments
You expect a lot of things in war; the carnage, the sleepless nights but what they don't prepare you for is the incessant use of Fortunate Son.
People got upset about a black Anne Boleyn too
An early start here before more interesting matters such as the Jacques Le Marois at Deauville - I'm on ALPINE STAR each way at 10s against the front two but with eight runners, she finishes third and I still draw - take my attention.
The collapse of the Ghani Government in Afghanistan has been extraordinary and even more sudden than Thieu's South Vietnam in April 1975. Resistance to the Taliban seems to have ended in most cities and latest reports suggest Kabul itself is on the brink of capitulation.
As I said last night, history repeats itself first as tragedy second as farce but it's going to be more tragedy, I fear, for the people of Afghanistan who appear, to this observer, to have been abandoned militarily and politically by their leaders. I wonder how many of the local leaders of the Government have boltholes prepared much as happened in Saigon all those years ago.
For the overwhelming majority, there is no escape.
Once again, Republican administrations in Washington, anxious to bend to a growing anti-war sentiment, have come up with "treaties" which superficially look to save face and allow the troops to come home seemingly with honour intact but in truth abandon the residual population and Government.
Biden will be unjustly blamed for Trump's failure just as Ford was for Nixon's.
Yet it comes back to the seminal question - how and where do you fight terror in the 21st Century? If your own citizens can be radicalised via the Internet, what's the point of having thousands of troops stationed in other countries? Why will men fight and die for the Taliban when they won't fight and die for their own Government?
When you are fighting faith and ideas, you need different weapons and different thinking.
2024 or later 4/6
At least the Scots have an exit route.
Spurs play Man City today. Incidentally I think Spurs are good value at 5.8, Kane situation not withstanding, and I don't think he will go on strike. Man City have key players out and we're pretty poor last week at the Community Shield. I think their season will get off to a slow start.
It makes me doubt whether we have the ability or capacity to defend our own society, were it not for military technology - itself largely a legacy of a bygone generation.
An English veteran was just interviewed on BBC Radio Scotland. He’d lost two limbs. Spent a huge chunk of his adult life in Afghanistan. All that time, money, energy and effort was a complete waste. Lives and money down the drain.
However there is also significant African American resistance too, only 28% of young black Americans in New York city have been vaccinated for instance
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/12/nyregion/covid-vaccine-black-young-new-yorkers.html
I’m often told that it doesn’t matter than Biden is senile, he has good people running the show. Who are these people? Who will take responsibility for the impending massacre?
Are there any journalists left in Kabul to capture this humiliation for Pax Americana? All it will need is one prize winning photo from the roof.
Seems pretty clear that less than a year after Biden entered office, this will come to be seen as the defining event of his term. How long until he gets shunted sideways? Or is still too early in his term for the Democrats to do so without implicit admittance that they put in place a president without his marbles?
It is much to the credit of the Home Office that they processed ~6m applications in such a short period of time.
But if a mask is useful for someone then they should be wearing a proper one not one of the worthless placebo masks.
More seriously if we had done nothing, then there would still have been billions of costs in regional security and lives lost and ruined as well.
There is no good solution here, it will take luck and many decades if not centuries to sort out regardless of what path the rest of the world chooses.
https://twitter.com/eduardhabsburg/status/1426550867298299905?s=21
We would be crazy to stop doing it.
The Trump administration negotiated directly with the Taliban from 2018-20. It was the Trump Administration which signed up to the Doha Treaty and chose to accept the promises of the Taliban just as Nixon/Kissinger chose to accept the commitments of the North Vietnamese in Paris in 1973.
Doha was a legal treaty which committed America to withdrawal from Afghanistan in 14 months. Trump and then Biden have honoured that treaty.
They left behind the means for the Afghan Army to defend the country and keep the Taliban confined to the more remote and rural areas.
Yet, within a few weeks, just as with the ARVN in 1975, this well-equipped army has disintegrated. That's what you should be asking instead of making cheap jibes against Biden - why was no one prepared to fight and die for Ghani and his regime?
Why, after 20 years, was no one prepared to fight for this Government?
Biden last night blaming this on Trump is about the most pathetic statement ever to come from the office of the US President.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-51689443
Hey Donald Trump, You invited the Taliban to Camp David for the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Sit TF down.
https://twitter.com/DrGJackBrown/status/1426767086806724611
They tried acting like fans of Glasgow Rangers in Manchester yesterday.
Incidentally taking the knee was cheered throughout the ground at the King Power yesterday. The few boos were drowned out.
Smoking, obesity, work etc - if so then adding a covid vaccination cost variant seems inevitable.
He is in charge, he has withdrawn troops and left nothing to fill the gap.
The brutal suppression of women and freedom which the Taliban will now impose on Afghanistan and any future terrorist attacks on US soil planned in Afghanistan will be Biden's responsibility and Biden's fault and if it costs him and Harris re election it is no more than they deserve.
Yes Trump was wrong to withdraw too (Romney would have been a far better president than both and opposes the withdrawal) but it was Biden who has withdrawn so meekly and uselessly.
Even Trump would probably have gone out with some firepower and heavy bombing or put a warlord in charge or something not meekly just hand over the country as pathetically as Biden has done with barely a whimper.
I assume that Biden is just going to let this happen as it seems to have gone too far
Deborah Hayes of Sky suggesting that US and UK troops and civilians will not be targetted as that would see retaliation
What a terrible mess
The parallel is both with Saigon in 1975 and with East Berlin and Prague in 1989. If a point comes when no one will fight for a Government, however powerful it may be and whatever levers of control it may have, that Government will fall.
We provided the means for the Afghan Armed Forces to defend their country - what we didn't or couldn't provide was the will.
Your hyperbole is so typical of you
So either you don’t bother, just go in hard and bomb the foreign fighters to smithereens and leave by mid 2002. Or swallow hard and recognise that if your wider goals are to be achieved, it’s going to be a long hard slog with the first decade barely counting due to the focus on security for that period.
What I hate from both Trump and Biden is all the implications about how they are somehow following the “moral” path. They’re not. They’re following the path where you wash your hands of everything you’ve done in that country over 20 years and anyone who’s helped you, for domestic political expediency. At least admit that.
I would strongly advise Biden to drop the “Trump made me do it” argument. It makes him look pathetic, weak and not in charge even after he won the election. Had he changed course, do you really suggest the Taliban leaders would be suing the US government for breaking a “legal commitment”? Laughable perspective.
Though to be frank most Afghans are not in the armed forces or Taiban and get little choice who is in charge other than the elections they had for the first time once the Taliban were removed which they used to elect the current Afghan government
Their choice but now they have to live with whatever the consequences will be.
"Left nothing to fill the gap" is just risible - the Afghan Armed Forces were as well-equipped as ARVN in 1975. With proper leadership and commitment, they had more than enough to keep the Taliban bottled up in rural areas and no real threat to the cities. The Taliban will inherit all this equipment.
Yes, I suppose the odd valedictory gesture might have made everyone feel a little better but you've not answered the central question - why, after 20 years of American and British involvement and influence in Afghanistan, has no one been prepared to stand and fight for Ghani and the Government?
Why were we unable to inculcate within the Afghans any kind of commitment or loyalty to the Government in Kabul? Why instead were so many men, it seems, more willing to take up arms for the Taliban?
How do you fight faith and ideas - not, I'd argue, with airstrikes? We need different thinking and all you want to do is make cheap political jibes against the Democrat administration in Washington.
One could argue whether it makes a difference if drones etc are in the hands of the Taliban or the Iranians.
We provided more than enough means for the Afghan Armed Forces to hold the Taliban at bay. We did the same for the ARVN in 1975.
Yet, the ARVN collapsed in weeks because though they had the means, they didn't have the will.
The same has happened here - why is no one prepared to fight and die for Ghani and his Government?
Someone posted that the real problem here is not that we would be dealing with a Saigon evacuation situation, but an Iranian hostage crisis situation. If it is correct that the Taliban are in Kabul, then we are surely at risk of the latter. The situation has deteriorated rapidly in a few days and it is unclear how we are going to get anyone out without doing a deal with the taliban.
Expecting those on a couple of dollars per day to care about politics, religion or education over day to day survival is not going to work.
You should have been more classier and sung something like 'He's shagging your missus.'
Kudos to the LDs too who have attacked Biden's withdrawal as condemning the Afghans to medieval barbarity and us to the return of terrorism
https://twitter.com/LibDems/status/1426223270961975305?s=20
https://twitter.com/LibDems/status/1425827915455942656?s=20
Davey is a proper liberal in the Gladstone and Ashdown mode, prepared to intervene abroad where needed.
The old wet, pacifist social democratic LDs of Charles Kennedy is now thankfully dead for now
I think it was Chris Bryant.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_Afghanistan#:~:text=Education in Afghanistan includes K–12 and higher education,,The nation still requires more schools and teachers.
That will now, sadly, presumably change. Note by the way that the only systematic attempt to provide secular education for girls on a large scale was under the PDPA (communist) government which the West conspired to overthrow.
The mistake was withdrawing US and UK forces in the first place, John McCain was right we should have kept them there permanently if needed
https://www.npr.org/2015/10/07/446499466/sen-mccain-expects-a-permanent-u-s-presence-in-afghanistan