RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2021/08/warlord-diplomacy-now-the-real-struggle-begins/

Kabul has fallen to the Taliban in spectacular fashion, with the group’s fighters streaming across the country seemingly unopposed and walking into the capital city to declare victory. The speed of their advance shocked all but the most cynical analysts. President Biden has stubbornly stuck to his decision to end America’s participation in the Afghan conflict as one former national security official after another has come out in opposition, saying America needs to stick it out as long as it takes. Whether some of them are more interested in helping the Afghans or protecting their own legacies is an open question.

With President Ghani fleeing the country moments before Kabul fell, hordes of civilians swamping Karzai International Airport to try and get on the last flight out of town, and China, Russia, and Pakistan moving in to claim their share of the spoils, it might seem like Afghanistan’s more than four decades of perpetual war are finally over. Coverage in Western media widely paints the picture that the Taliban have won, all of America’s and her allies’ efforts were in vain, and all that is left to do is point fingers while we watch the Taliban reassert their brutal form of theocratic tyranny on a powerless population.

But having possession of Kabul, and ruling Afghanistan are not the same thing, as history has shown invaders and would-be kings, from Alexander the Great to the British and the Iron Amir alike.

The Military Victory that Wasn’t

The most surprising part of the Taliban’s takeover was how little fighting it took to accomplish. Even traditional strongholds of anti-Taliban sentiment, such as Mazar-i Sharif, and famed warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum’s home province of Jowzjan, fell almost without a shot being fired, with local officials either fleeing or publicly handing control over their districts to the Taliban. The Afghan military was well trained and equipped, with modern weapons and an effective, if fledging, air force that could have coordinated to stop the Taliban’s advance at numerous points but failed to do so. Even if only half of the 350,000 soldiers America was paying to train and employ on paper actually existed in practice, it was a force still more than enough to keep 75,000 Taliban fighters at bay.  Afghanistan’s traditional militias, after openly reforming and rearming in anticipation of America’s withdrawal also chose not to fight. In the final telling, the Taliban’s successful conquest of Afghanistan and seizure of the capital was not a great military victory. It was a political one.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17613/turkey-amir-hetsroni

Turkey, with a population of 83 million and two Nobel Prizes, ranks 62nd on the list of countries by Nobel laureates per capita. This score is worse than that of the Azerbaijan, Algeria, Yemen, Ghana, Bulgaria, Guatemala, Morocco, the Palestinian territories and Iraq.

Although [Professor Amir] Hetsroni just agreed to a new three-year contract a month ago, Koç University dismissed him in June for “conduct unbecoming to a member of Koç University faculty,” according to his termination notice. The reasons the university administration set out — including “inappropriate behaviour” — are vague, except for an accusation that he caused “significant damage to his faculty apartment by leaving its windows open.”

“I was fired on the spot without any advance warning for voicing criticism of Turkey and the university in private Whatsapp conversations that were leaked by a third party to the university management…. Obviously, my criticism of Turkey has nothing to do with my teaching level, research output, or service quality. If this is enough to get fired today in Turkey, I don’t even want to think about the fate of a professor who would dare say these things in class.” — Amir Hetsroni, newsaboutturkey.com., June 22, 2021.

Turkey is always fun unless one has to live there. Academia, for instance, is shockingly becoming solely “his master’s voice.”

There are more than 200 universities in Turkey, most of which are run by the state. There are, however, only 10 Turkish universities featured in the World University Rankings 2019, a list of top 1,018 institutions, according to Quacquarelli Symonds (QS), the world’s leading provider of services, analytics and insight to the higher education sector.

Turkey, with a population of 83 million and two Nobel Prizes, ranks 62nd on the list of countries by Nobel laureates per capita. This score is worse than that of the Azerbaijan, Algeria, Yemen, Ghana, Bulgaria, Guatemala, Morocco, the Palestinian territories and Iraq.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/08/freedom-protests-cuba-and-us-john-stossel/

John Stossel exposes the truth about the lies and propaganda being told by progressives, BLM and the mainstream media about massive freedom protests by Cubans who have rallying against oppression and suffering under Communism.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/the-taliban-havent-changed/

“The Taliban haven’t changed. The West’s sense of moral clarity about their wickedness and confidence in its ability to defeat them has.”

For the first time in nearly two decades, the Taliban control most of Afghanistan, including the capital city of Kabul.

As the self-destruction of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan continues apace and the Biden administration haphazardly races to evacuate U.S. citizens and allies from the war-torn country ahead of its self-imposed deadline of August 31, an odd line is emerging: Maybe the Taliban aren’t so bad.

Experts such as Mustapha Ben Messaoud, the chief of field operations at the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), claim to be “optimistic” about the Taliban’s return to power, citing “ongoing discussions.” Reuters reported that officials at UNICEF have “cited some Taliban local representatives as saying they were waiting for guidance from their leaders on the issue of educating girls, while others have said they want schools ‘up and running.’” A spokesman for U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michele Bachelet at least had the decency to acknowledge that the concerns of Afghans were “thoroughly understandable,” in what nevertheless may qualify as the understatement of the century.

The president of the United States and his team have also hypothesized that the Taliban may turn over a new leaf. In an interview with ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos last Wednesday, Biden responded to a question about whether the Taliban had changed:

“No. I think — let me put it this way. I think they’re going through sort of an existential crisis about do they want to be recognized by the international community as being a legitimate government,” he said.

The claim that the Taliban were facing an existential crisis echoed White House press secretary Jen Psaki’s assertion from earlier this month that “the Taliban also has to make an assessment about what they want their role to be in the international community.”

It appears that they have made that assessment already.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-afghanistan-withdrawal-taliban-resistance-ahmad-massoud-panjshir-amrullah-saleh-islamist-national-security-11629728994?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

Ahmad Massoud is in a remote base in Afghanistan’s Panjshir province. He is the son and successor to the legendary commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, a resistance leader against both the Soviets and the Taliban until the latter assassinated him on Sept. 9, 2001.

As Kabul fell to the Taliban again, the young Mr. Massoud issued a resounding call for resistance. “We Afghans find ourselves in the situation of Europe in 1940,” he said on Aug. 16. “Except in Panjshir, the debacle is near total, and the spirit of collaboration with the Taliban is spreading among the vanquished, who lost this war by their own failings. Only we remain standing. And we will never yield.”

I visited Mr. Massoud in Panjshir last year and spoke with him by phone on Saturday. His voice was clear and resonant but choppy. I asked about rumors circulating in Europe and the U.S. that he was preparing to give up. “That’s propaganda,” he says. “Apparently, there are defeatists among you who mistake their wishes for realities. So, no. Make this known: There is no question of giving up the fight. Here in Panjshir, our resistance is just beginning.”

What about Taliban leader Sirajuddin Haqqani’s claims that Mr. Massoud was “withdrawing?” “I repeat that this is disinformation. We will never accept an imposed peace, and we will resist until we achieve justice and freedom. . . . No surrender, of course. I would prefer to die than to give up. I am the son of Ahmad Shah Massoud. Surrender is not in my dictionary.”

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9918373/Taliban-warn-consequences-Britain-try-extend-August-31-withdrawal-deadline.html?ito=social-twitter_dailymailus

President Joe Biden has set the deadline of August 31 for withdrawing troops from Afghanistan
Taliban spokesman Dr Suhail Shaheen said the group will not allow an extension and threatened a ‘reaction’
He warned of ‘consequences’ if US and UK cross the ‘red line’ and delay their exit amid evacuation efforts
Dr Shaheen also branded it ‘fake news’ that girls’ schools are being closed and residents fear the new regime
Boris Johnson will discuss a possible extension to the deadline with G7 leaders in a virtual call on Tuesday 
Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said there are ‘hours not weeks’ left for the Kabul airlift  
Taliban will not announce the makeup of its government until the US completes its troop withdrawal 
There are fears ISIS will ‘take advantage’ and mount a suicide bombing at Kabul airport

The Taliban has threatened a ‘reaction’ and warned of ‘consequences’ if the US or UK do not leave Afghanistan by August 31 and extend the deadline for the withdrawal of troops.

President Joe Biden wants all Americans to have left the country by the end of the month although he admitted on Sunday night that an extension was under discussion, while this morning UK Defence Secretary Ben Wallace said the evacuation effort is ‘down to hours now, not weeks’. 

Taliban spokesman Dr Suhail Shaheen said the group will not accept an extension to the deadline and warned of retaliation if Western forces extend their ‘occupation’ since the group dramatically swept to power. 

https://amgreatness.com/2021/08/20/france-deploying-special-forces-to-evacuate-french-civilians-from-afghanistan/

The French military has deployed their special forces to the crumbling nation of Afghanistan to evacuate their citizens, even as the leadership of the American military claims that they are incapable of doing the same, according to the Washington Free Beacon.

French special forces have already succeeded in evacuating at least 400 civilians from the capital city of Kabul, including both French citizens and Afghan civilians who aided French forces in the war. The successful rescue efforts took place just outside the Hamid Karzai International Airport, the city’s main airport which has been secured by the Taliban, and thus has become a scene of pure chaos after the fall of the nation’s Western-backed government.

In addition to French efforts, British special forces have been similarly evacuating their citizens from the besieged capital city in the days since Sunday, when Kabul fell to the Taliban.

These successful European efforts have been carried out even as American military leaders have claimed that the United States is incapable of conducting such operations. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said at a press conference on Wednesday that “the forces that we have are focused on the security of the airfield…we don’t have the capability to go out and collect up large numbers of people.”

There are currently thousands of American citizens still trapped in the Taliban-controlled nation, in addition to thousands of Afghan civilians who assisted the American military over the course of the 20-year war. The sudden collapse of the nation to Taliban forces directly contradicted Joe Biden’s prediction back in July that it was “highly unlikely” that the Taliban would overrun the country prior to the final departure of American forces, which was set for August 31st.

Following the fall of Kabul on Sunday, which led to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fleeing the country, thousands of Afghan civilians stormed the airport in a desperate attempt to escape Taliban rule. Stunning videos showed hundreds of Afghanis surrounding an American Air Force jet as it was taxiing on the runway, with several men clinging to the landing gear. Shortly after the aircraft took off and reached an altitude hundreds of feet in the air, some of the men who still held on could be seen falling to their deaths.

The chaos has led to universal condemnation of the Biden Administration, from across the political spectrum in the United States as well as within the international community. Many have likened the disaster to the Fall of Saigon in 1975, which marked the end of the Vietnam War, with some even declaring the Fall of Kabul to be even worse.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17673/afghanistan-dreadful-consequences

Most of the Afghan army, after they saw the American military pulling out of the Bagram air base, might understandably have decided not even to try to fight. The “trillion dollars spent training and equipping hundreds of thousands of Afghan National Security and Defense Forces” with “advanced weaponry” has led to that US-provided “advanced weaponry” falling into the hands of terrorists it was meant to fight — a donation from US taxpayers to what is now the world’s best-armed terrorist state.

[T]he US has had troops in Germany and South Korea for about 70 years – a relatively modest “insurance policy” that never seemed “forever.” Ironically, by handing over Afghanistan to the same Taliban that hosted Al Qaeda, which murdered nearly 3,000 people on 9/11, the US is not only making a mockery of these victims; it will soon find itself having to fight at an even greater cost in life and treasure as countries trying to eliminate America can now do it without American troops nearby, and with America’s military equipment.

The French, British, Germans, Australians and Czechs have been venturing behind enemy lines to rescue their stranded citizens hiding there; Americans have not. The Pentagon and the State Department have admitted that they do not even know how many Americans are in the country; how could they know where they are?

Trump reportedly expected to leave a residual troop force in place, and apparently had a plan for an orderly military withdrawal — based strictly on conditions on the ground. These presumably included not departing in the middle of the Taliban’s summer fighting season, but in winter, when they shelter in Pakistan; not neglecting to consult with America’s European allies, and not surrendering the main US air base, Bagram, before evacuating Americans and their allies, whom they had promised to rescue should plans not work out.

Trump seems to have understood what the Biden administration ignores: that terrorists are probably not all that susceptible to diplomacy, but to strength — as Osama bin Laden put it… to “the strong horse”.

After days of silence, Biden read a 19-minute speech saying that he stood behind his decision to leave Afghanistan, and even accused he Afghan security forces, which had sacrificed an estimated 66,000 men. Biden left the press conference without answering questions and returned to Camp David where he resumed his vacation”. Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi praised his “strong leadership”.

Pakistan is more deeply linked to the Taliban’s victory than the United States might care to admit.

“Of all the foreign powers involved in efforts to sustain and manipulate the ongoing fighting, Pakistan is distinguished both by the sweep of its objectives and the scale of its efforts, which include…. soliciting funding for the Taliban, bankrolling Taliban operations, providing diplomatic support…, arranging training for Taliban fighters…, planning and directing offensives, providing and facilitating shipments of ammunition and fuel, and on several occasions apparently directly providing combat support.” — Human Rights Watch.

China, Pakistan, Russia, Iran, and the Taliban have different worldviews, but do possess three things in common: they are enemies of the United States and the Western world, they want to see the United States humiliated and defeated, and they want to eliminate the United States from the region. The United States has been humiliated, defeated and eliminated from the region. Its enemies have won.

Those who love the United States, however, believe that without its strength and power, American liberty and freedom would quickly vanish from creation. Seeing what the Biden administration has done in just seven months to weaken America and strengthen its enemies has been nothing short of shattering. One can only hope for a change of course, a return to real leadership, before more damage is done.

The fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban is a debacle for the United States; the consequences will take shape fast. The Biden administration and President Joe Biden himself have an overwhelming responsibility for what is taking place and what will follow; they have shown a degree of incompetence unseen in the United States since the calamitous Carter years.

On July 8, President Biden said, “the Afghan troops have 300,000 well equipped — as well equipped as any army in the world — and an air force against something like 75,000 Taliban”. A Taliban takeover of the country, he added, was “not inevitable”. He was wrong. Most of the Afghan army, probably after they saw the American military pulling out of the Bagram air base, understandably decided not even to try to fight.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/08/us-out-afghanistan-will-iran-move-hugh-fitzgerald/

Analysts now suggest that with the American forces completely out of Afghanistan, Iran’s forces may be tempted to move in. This was the subject of speculation several weeks ago, before anyone contemplated the magnitude of this weekend’s debacle in Afghanistan: “Experts fear Iran will move in after US leaves Afghanistan,” by Tara Kavaler, The Media Line, July 16, 2021:

With the US set to complete its troop withdrawal from Afghanistan by the end of August, regional analysts fear Iran will fill the void.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its proxies already exercise a powerful influence in the region, be it in Yemen, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon or the Palestinian territories.

In all of those countries, however, the Shi’a are much more in evidence than they are In Iran. In Yemen, the Shi’a are 50% of the population; in Iraq they are 70%; in Lebanon they are 40% of the population; in Syria the Shi’a are close to 15% of the population, and in addition, they also control the Alawite-officered army. But in Afghanistan, the Shi’a are only 10% of the population and, unlike the Shi’a (Alawites, Ismailis, Twelvers) in Syria, do not control the military. The Shi’a in Afghanistan are ethnically distinct: almost all of them belong to the Hazara tribe, while the Sunni population consists of Pashtun, Tadjiks, and Uzbeks.

Iran is trying to use the situation in Afghanistan both to present itself as a mediator between the Afghan groups, and in the future, as Iran has always done, trying to turn every threat into opportunity,” Dr. Raz Zimmt, an Iran specialist at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University, told The Media Line.

“And if we see what happened in the Arab Middle East over the last decade, where the chaos and the civil wars actually provided Iran with opportunities to be more engaged and more involved, I can’t rule out the possibility that this will happen as well in Afghanistan,” Zimmt said.

The Taliban and the Iranian leadership are not obvious bedfellows, as the former are Sunni extremists, and the latter are radical Shi’ites.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/08/after-america-melanie-phillips/

Much deserved opprobrium has been heaped upon US President Joe Biden for his shameful recent remarks justifying his decision to cut and run from Afghanistan. He blamed everyone but himself for the Taliban’s expedited return to power, and accused the Afghan army — who have lost almost 70,000 soldiers fighting the Taliban — of having 

collapsed, sometimes without trying to fight… American troops cannot and should not be fighting in a war and dying in a war that Afghan forces are not willing to fight for themselves… We gave them every chance to determine their own future. What we could not provide them was the will to fight for that future.

The Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat subsequently made an emotional and blistering speech in the House of Commons emergency debate. You can watch his speech here.

Tugendhat served in Afghanistan both as a soldier and as an adviser to the governor of Helmand province. He spoke about the soldiers who had died in Afghanistan, the good men he had watched going into the earth and who had taken with them “a part of all of us”. He said how proud he had been to be decorated by the American 82nd Airborne Division after the capture of Musa Qala in 2006. Making an effort to compose himself, he went on:

To see their Commander-in-Chief call into question the courage of men that I fought with, to claim that they ran; it’s shameful. Those who have never fought for the colours they fly should be careful about criticising those who have.

He went on to raise the issue that must now be preoccupying all who have depended upon the United States as the principal defender of the free world. For as I wrote here, the US has now shown itself to be a faithless ally and the weak link in that defence. 

As a result, said Tugendhat, there was now a need to 

reinvigorate our European NATO partners, to make sure we are not dependent on a single ally, on the decision of a single leader, but that we  can work together with with Japan and Australia, France and Germany, with partners large and small and make sure that we hold the line together.