We do indeed have an absolute moral obligation to those who helped with the project of building a liberal democracy, vain though it may have been. We have put them at mortal risk. We made promises that couldn't be kept there. Keep it, and bring them here.
I agree about bringing those people on whose backs we've helped to pain target, but I incline towards the opinion of David French at The Dispatch, who maintains that the idea that we have lost the military conflict and need to retreat to save our troops is simply a fiction. The better course, therefore, is to maintain a small military presence there, which is all that's needed to keep the country from falling into the hands of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Also, I can't imagine why one would think that the Taliban would abide by any "concessions" we extract. It would be the height of irresponsibility and disingenuousness to assume that they would.
Well now Michael, look at us agreeing 100% on something! 🙂 This certainly is an interesting issue in that it doesn't seem to break down that neatly along the left/right divide. I have to say though, I'm disappointed with how many of my fellow progressives support this. Are we really that incapable of admitting our own mistakes? It boggles my mind how we don't seem even a little worried about "ISIS 2: The Caliphate Strikes Back".
Adam Garfinkle takes the interesting position that yes, it's going to be bloody and nasty, and yes, we still have to do it, because the political support has to be there for it to be sustained, and there's no guarantee of such support, especially across administrations. True, but this seems like a trivial political issue. Claim the war is over, we won, show pictures like the one above as evidence of what's been gained, and declare we will maintain a small but effective troop presence to protect it. Just like we do all over the free world (the one we created). The American public nods their heads and returns to their default state of not giving a damn about foreign policy, and our reputation around the world remains intact.
I really hope Biden is planning to make that "diplomatic military presence" comically large. Maybe the plan is to make it clear to the Taliban that our "withdrawal" is more political than military. I suppose one can always dream. 🙄
I hadn't realized we'd been at odds in the past. Be that as it may, while big chunks of both Left and Right want us out of Afghanistan, I suspect their reasons are almost disjoint. There's a point of contact where both sides want to keep our soldiers alive, but other than that I think that part of the Right is simply isolationist while that part of the Left is bothered by "colonialist" America projecting power in the Third World and wants to repudiate Bush and the NeoCons. The latter point is, I think, trumpeted by the choice of date for the final withdrawal.
Well, we've disagreed strongly on a couple of issues, not surprising since I believe we self-identify on different sides of the left/right divide. Nonetheless, you're right on point with the analysis here. I find it remarkable how people's ideology can so easily be used to paper over real, practical, life and death concerns. It just reinforces my belief that most people are far too ideological about most things.
Interestingly with regard to repudiating the "neoconservatives", at one point it was the refuge of the anti-Iraq leftist who didn't want to seem soft on terror or accommodating to radical Islam to claim that the war we *should* be vigorously fighting is in Afghanistan. I still believe Iraq was an enormous mistake, precisely because it has been a drain on our military and the political will to use it where needed to defend the free world. A generation of soldiers suffering from Iraq-induced PTSD left us unable to use our military strength when it was needed over the past decade (e.g. Crimea, Syria). Does this make me a "neocon"?
:) I don't actually know what defines someone as a neocon. More importantly, I'm not sure why it would matter. I have no objection to labeling someone if it's useful, but I don't see why it would be here. I like to think that's because I'm interested in ideas rather than ideologies, and that I don't remember our disagreements because I don't care who an idea comes from or what kind of ideas a person has.
I like to think those things, but of course it's just as likely that my motives are less creditable and I simply don't have access to them.
Anyway, I also don't have an opinion about our initial engagement with either Iraq or Afghanistan. If we've disagreed strongly you know that I have some strong opinions, but I don't feel the need to have one about *everything*, and what did I know at the time about the likelihood of bringing democracy to either country? The current situation in Afghanistan, though, seems clear enough.
I don't subscribe t to the Dispatch so can't read French on that. But how long are we supposed to maintain a "small military presence" there? Forever? It's been twenty freakin years of no progress building a nation state, and ten years since we bumped off bin Laden.
Jonah Goldberg has pointed out that we do lots of things for which we have no exit strategy. Policing. Firefighting. Troops in Japan.
Anyway, French writes that if we leave "nation-building" out of the picture, we find that the small number of troops we maintain in Afganistan does an excellent job of keeping the Taliban from taking over.
Not a very persuasive argument to compare polcing and firefighting to fighting a war in a foreign country. Again, they may be "small" depending on how you want to define small. Not small for the people getting killed though.
The point is simply that there are unpleasant -- and even dangerous -- tasks that we do with no thought that they will someday be "done". The fact that we don't know when we'll be done is therefore not an argument, by itself, for not doing something.
Right, but just because there are some such things in the world is not an argument for why we should be creating more of them. The list of foreign countries we could conquer, occupy, install a government, and then leave a "small" number of soldiers in is endless. We don't have endless money and lives to waste on returns that are modest at best and nonexistent or even negative at worst. Just because I have to wipe my own butt is not an argument for why I should be wiping everyone else's.
The case was made that keeping Afghanistan from being overrun by the Taliban indefinitely is worth an indefinite, small military presence there. One can agree or not, but it's a pragmatic decision that stands on its own. Mr. French thinks it's worth it. I tend to agree.
Thanks, Michael Walzer. I fear you're right about the aftermath of this unconditional withdrawal. Many voices, including the Washington Post and Foreign Policy, have been raised to defend a small US force being left to deter the Taliban's inevitable ruthlessness toward Afghans who carved out some kind of civil society after the US invasion. Even though no serious person thinks the US invaded Afghanistan to "save" women, my radical academic colleagues have consistently set up that straw person as a basis for the inevitable denunciation of US imperialism. Now my colleagues will get their wish. But there's little doubt that once the US is gone, the punishments will resume. And, having tired of the whole subject, most Americans won't know or care.
We do indeed have an absolute moral obligation to those who helped with the project of building a liberal democracy, vain though it may have been. We have put them at mortal risk. We made promises that couldn't be kept there. Keep it, and bring them here.
I agree about bringing those people on whose backs we've helped to pain target, but I incline towards the opinion of David French at The Dispatch, who maintains that the idea that we have lost the military conflict and need to retreat to save our troops is simply a fiction. The better course, therefore, is to maintain a small military presence there, which is all that's needed to keep the country from falling into the hands of the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
Also, I can't imagine why one would think that the Taliban would abide by any "concessions" we extract. It would be the height of irresponsibility and disingenuousness to assume that they would.
Well now Michael, look at us agreeing 100% on something! 🙂 This certainly is an interesting issue in that it doesn't seem to break down that neatly along the left/right divide. I have to say though, I'm disappointed with how many of my fellow progressives support this. Are we really that incapable of admitting our own mistakes? It boggles my mind how we don't seem even a little worried about "ISIS 2: The Caliphate Strikes Back".
Adam Garfinkle takes the interesting position that yes, it's going to be bloody and nasty, and yes, we still have to do it, because the political support has to be there for it to be sustained, and there's no guarantee of such support, especially across administrations. True, but this seems like a trivial political issue. Claim the war is over, we won, show pictures like the one above as evidence of what's been gained, and declare we will maintain a small but effective troop presence to protect it. Just like we do all over the free world (the one we created). The American public nods their heads and returns to their default state of not giving a damn about foreign policy, and our reputation around the world remains intact.
I really hope Biden is planning to make that "diplomatic military presence" comically large. Maybe the plan is to make it clear to the Taliban that our "withdrawal" is more political than military. I suppose one can always dream. 🙄
I hadn't realized we'd been at odds in the past. Be that as it may, while big chunks of both Left and Right want us out of Afghanistan, I suspect their reasons are almost disjoint. There's a point of contact where both sides want to keep our soldiers alive, but other than that I think that part of the Right is simply isolationist while that part of the Left is bothered by "colonialist" America projecting power in the Third World and wants to repudiate Bush and the NeoCons. The latter point is, I think, trumpeted by the choice of date for the final withdrawal.
Well, we've disagreed strongly on a couple of issues, not surprising since I believe we self-identify on different sides of the left/right divide. Nonetheless, you're right on point with the analysis here. I find it remarkable how people's ideology can so easily be used to paper over real, practical, life and death concerns. It just reinforces my belief that most people are far too ideological about most things.
Interestingly with regard to repudiating the "neoconservatives", at one point it was the refuge of the anti-Iraq leftist who didn't want to seem soft on terror or accommodating to radical Islam to claim that the war we *should* be vigorously fighting is in Afghanistan. I still believe Iraq was an enormous mistake, precisely because it has been a drain on our military and the political will to use it where needed to defend the free world. A generation of soldiers suffering from Iraq-induced PTSD left us unable to use our military strength when it was needed over the past decade (e.g. Crimea, Syria). Does this make me a "neocon"?
:) I don't actually know what defines someone as a neocon. More importantly, I'm not sure why it would matter. I have no objection to labeling someone if it's useful, but I don't see why it would be here. I like to think that's because I'm interested in ideas rather than ideologies, and that I don't remember our disagreements because I don't care who an idea comes from or what kind of ideas a person has.
I like to think those things, but of course it's just as likely that my motives are less creditable and I simply don't have access to them.
Anyway, I also don't have an opinion about our initial engagement with either Iraq or Afghanistan. If we've disagreed strongly you know that I have some strong opinions, but I don't feel the need to have one about *everything*, and what did I know at the time about the likelihood of bringing democracy to either country? The current situation in Afghanistan, though, seems clear enough.
I don't subscribe t to the Dispatch so can't read French on that. But how long are we supposed to maintain a "small military presence" there? Forever? It's been twenty freakin years of no progress building a nation state, and ten years since we bumped off bin Laden.
Jonah Goldberg has pointed out that we do lots of things for which we have no exit strategy. Policing. Firefighting. Troops in Japan.
Anyway, French writes that if we leave "nation-building" out of the picture, we find that the small number of troops we maintain in Afganistan does an excellent job of keeping the Taliban from taking over.
Not a very persuasive argument to compare polcing and firefighting to fighting a war in a foreign country. Again, they may be "small" depending on how you want to define small. Not small for the people getting killed though.
The point is simply that there are unpleasant -- and even dangerous -- tasks that we do with no thought that they will someday be "done". The fact that we don't know when we'll be done is therefore not an argument, by itself, for not doing something.
Right, but just because there are some such things in the world is not an argument for why we should be creating more of them. The list of foreign countries we could conquer, occupy, install a government, and then leave a "small" number of soldiers in is endless. We don't have endless money and lives to waste on returns that are modest at best and nonexistent or even negative at worst. Just because I have to wipe my own butt is not an argument for why I should be wiping everyone else's.
The case was made that keeping Afghanistan from being overrun by the Taliban indefinitely is worth an indefinite, small military presence there. One can agree or not, but it's a pragmatic decision that stands on its own. Mr. French thinks it's worth it. I tend to agree.
Thanks, Michael Walzer. I fear you're right about the aftermath of this unconditional withdrawal. Many voices, including the Washington Post and Foreign Policy, have been raised to defend a small US force being left to deter the Taliban's inevitable ruthlessness toward Afghans who carved out some kind of civil society after the US invasion. Even though no serious person thinks the US invaded Afghanistan to "save" women, my radical academic colleagues have consistently set up that straw person as a basis for the inevitable denunciation of US imperialism. Now my colleagues will get their wish. But there's little doubt that once the US is gone, the punishments will resume. And, having tired of the whole subject, most Americans won't know or care.