Taliban takeover of Afghanistan

Idrees Ali
@idreesali114
·
43m
A U.S. official tells Reuters that as many as 5 rockets were fired at Kabul's airport. They were intercepted by a U.S. anti-missile system. No initial reports of U.S. casualties, the official adds.

So if CNN's Clarissa Ward already knew about the Kabul attack why did the U.S government refuse to exercise caution? Maybe because they knew that no U.S personnel will be targeted (but they still will have to lie about U.S casualties).

Also note that last week's U.S missile strike claimed the lives of Afghans who collaborated with the U.S. Once - happenstance, Twice - coincidence. Third time - enemy action'

Sujoy wrote:So if CNN's Clarissa Ward already knew about the Kabul attack why did the U.S government refuse to exercise caution? Maybe because they knew that no U.S personnel will be targeted (but they still will have to lie about U.S casualties).

Some guy on twitter made the headlines with this clever tweet: "CIA tweets CIA interview with CIA" - all you need to know in a nutshell

And comparing Taliban with US occupation forces is not correct .

The Taliban are who they are fighting and who are taking control now they are leaving.

Who should I compare?

I know a situation from Germany, only a few years ago, when a young Afghan girl fully adopted to the German society and standards.
A decent job, learned German. She was a friend of my ex-girlfriend, they worked together.
She brought her brother to Germany. He was totally unable to adopt, and murdered own sister after few months, for "dishonoring the family". Shocked angry
Shall we really consider, that those kind of people will find sharia an oppressive system?

Anyone would find different cultures oppressive... ask a person from a liberal city in the US to live like a mormon or the amish and they would probably be kicked out of those groups pretty quickly for spreading bad ideas amongst their children... but who is to say who is wrong?

Claiming the Taliban will be bad for Afghanistan.... it is what they have had and what they are used to... it is very much like dangling a western lifestyle in front of the Warsaw Pact but not allowing them to achieve it without selling out anything of value to big western companies... and of course making them cut ties with old allies.

I am an athiest living in New Zealand.... should I complain about being oppressed and having my rights violated because my 12 wives are breaking New Zealand law?

Oppression comes in all forms and varieties and they ones they are most afraid of in Afghanistan... they should have seen coming.

These girls complaining about not going to university or going to school, but they don't fear for their brothers becoming dancing boys for the rich and powerful... Epstein must own a chain of islands there... but no body cares that the taliban will put an end to that...

BILAL SARWARY
@bsarwary
·
2h
Dr. Amin-ul-Haq, a major al-Qaeda player in Afghanistan, Osama Bin Laden security in charge in Tora Bora, returns to his native Nangarhar province after it fell to the Taliban. Dr. Amin became close to OBL in the 80s when he worked with Abdullah Azzam in Maktaba Akhidmat.





Dan Lamothe
@DanLamothe
·
11h
The U.S. military now acknowledging reports of civilian casualties following its drone strike today on alleged Islamic State bombers in Kabul.


TOLOnews
@TOLOnews
At least 10 people, including children, were killed in a US airstrike in Kabul on Sunday, local residents say. US officials said they had targeted a car carrying Daesh suicide bombers.

There really still isn't clarity in the news about the strike: one car, two cars, two ISIS-K, then "multiple", one car, two cars ? filled with explosives, caused the secondary blast - the house, Taliban condemned attack, then said no mistake, we don't, then said they welcomed it, now back to condemn it,


as far as I can see, one strike, AP reporters heard only one, and so far I've seen only one car at the residence.

Did they have intelligence shared by the Taliban ?? idk, if not, then I think the Biden Admin probably hit innocent civilians. & it appears the Taliban was not informed of the strike beforehand. I read that the Taliban said the US shouldhave informed them, and let them take care of it, not use a drone strike.

Muslim Shirzad
@MuslimShirzad
·
3h
Killed by U.S rocket attack, Who is Naseer?

- 30 yrs old, originally from #Kapisa
- 6 years interpreter with forging troops including Americans
- Now, army officer (Ghani gov)
- It was scheduled to get married today 30 August
- All the family members were waiting to go to U.S

Muslim Shirzad
@MuslimShirzad
·
2h
Afghanistan’s catastrophe beyond the borders- A huge number of Afghans rush at the door of German Embassy in Tehran, they want asylum.

Idrees Ali
@idreesali114
·
8m
Islamic State claimed responsibility for a rocket attack on Kabul airport on Monday, the group's Nasher News said on its Telegram channel.

Muslim Shirzad
@MuslimShirzad
·
4h
U.S. rocket attack, Killed 10 innocents

According to the documents, #Naseer was eligible to get Special Immigrant Visa (SIV). That’s why they were ready to go America.

"Turkey poised to recognize Taliban as Afghanistan's govt, expected to sign deal to operate Kabul airport after US exit - reports"


I wonder how this will effect Russia and China.

https://www.rt.com/news/533400-turkey-nears-taliban-recognition-deal/

Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
·
1h
The influx of Afghan refugees toward Iran





Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
·
7h
Panjsher telecommunication networks have been reactivated.



Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
·
7h
Taleban have arrested the former head of the National Council of Religious Scholar.

"Blowback: Taliban target US intel’s shadow army"


"The Kabul Airport bombing shows there are shadowy forces in Afghanistan, willing to disrupt a peaceful transition after US troops leave. But what about US intel’s own ‘shadow army,’ amassed over two decades of occupation? Who are they, and what is their agenda?"


"So we have the CIA Director William Burns deploying in haste to Kabul to solicit an audience with Taliban leader Abdul Ghani Baradar, the new potential ruler of a former satrapy. And he literally begs him to extend a deadline on the evacuation of US assets.

The answer is a resounding “no.” After all, the 31 August deadline was established by Washington itself. Extending it would only mean the extension of an already defeated occupation.

The ‘Mr. Burns goes to Kabul’ caper is by now part of cemetery of empires folklore. The CIA does not confirm or deny Burns met Mullah Baradar; a Taliban spokesman, delightfully diversionist, said he was “not aware” of such a meeting.

We’ll probably never know the exact terms discussed by the two unlikely participants –  assuming the meeting ever took place and is not crass intel disinformation.

Meanwhile, Western public hysteria is, of all things, focused on the imperative necessity of extracting all ‘translators’ and other functionaries (who were de facto NATO collaborators) out of Kabul airport. Yet thundering silence envelops what is in fact the real deal: the CIA shadow army left behind.

The shadow army are Afghan militias set up back in the early 2000s to engage in ‘counter-insurgency’ – that lovely euphemism for search and destroy ops against the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Along the way, these militias practiced, in droves, that proverbial semantic combo normalizing murder: ‘extrajudicial killings,’ usually a sequel to ‘enhanced interrogations.’ These ops were always secret as per the classic CIA playbook, thus ensuring there was never any accountability.

Now Langley has a problem. The Taliban have kept sleeper cells in Kabul since May, and much earlier than that in selected Afghan government bodies. A source close to the Ministry of Interior has confirmed the Taliban actually managed to get their hands on the full list of operatives of the two top CIA schemes: the Khost Protection Force (KPF) and the National Directorate of Security (NDS). These operatives are the prime Taliban targets in checkpoints leading to Kabul airport, not random, helpless ‘Afghan civilians’ trying to escape.

The Taliban have set up quite a complex, targeted operation in Kabul, with plenty of nuance – allowing, for instance, free passage for selected NATO members’ Special Forces, who went into town in search of their nationals.

But access to the airport is now blocked for all Afghan nationals. Yesterday’s double tap suicide-car bombing has introduced an even more complex variable: the Taliban will need to pool all their intel resources, fast, to fight whatever elements are seeking to introduce domestic terror attacks into the country.

The RHIPTO Norwegian Centre for Global Analyses has shown how the Taliban have a “more advanced intelligence system” applied to urban Afghanistan, especially Kabul. The “knocking on people’s doors” fueling Western hysteria means they know exactly where to knock when it comes to finding collaborationist intel networks.

It is no wonder Western think tanks are in tears about how undermined their intel services will be in the intersection of Central and South Asia. Yet the muted official reaction boiled down to G7 Foreign Ministers issuing a mere statement announcing they were “deeply concerned by reports of violent reprisals in parts of Afghanistan.”

Blowback is indeed a bitch. Especially when you cannot fully acknowledge it.

From Phoenix to Omega

The latest chapter of CIA ops in Afghanistan started when the 2001 bombing campaign was not even finished. I saw it for myself in Tora Bora, in December 2001, when Special Forces came out of nowhere equipped with Thuraya satellite phones and suitcases full of cash. Later, the role of ‘irregular’ militias in defeating the Taliban and dismembering al-Qaeda was feted in the US as a huge success.

Former Afghan President Hamid Karzai was, to his credit, initially against US Special Forces setting up local militias, an essential plank of the counter-insurgency strategy. But in the end that cash cow was irresistible.

A central profiteer was the Afghan Ministry of Interior, with the initial scheme coalescing under the auspices of the Afghan Local Police. Yet some key militias were not under the Ministry, but answered directly to the CIA and the US Special Forces Command, later renamed as the infamous Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC).

Inevitably, CIA and JSOC got into a catfight over controlling the top militias. That was solved by the Pentagon lending Special Forces to the CIA under the Omega Program. Under Omega, the CIA was tasked with targeting intel, and Special Ops took control of the muscle on the ground. Omega made steady progress under the reign of former US President Barack Obama: it was eerily similar to the Vietnam-era Operation Phoenix.

Ten years ago, the CIA army, dubbed Counter-terrorist Pursuit Teams (CTPT), was already 3,000 strong, paid and weaponized by the CIA-JSOC combo. There was nothing ‘counter-insurgency’ about it: These were death squads, much like their earlier counterparts in Latin America in the 1970s.

In 2015, the CIA got its Afghan sister unit, the National Directorate of Security (NDS), to establish new paramilitary outfits to, in theory, fight ISIS, which later became locally identified as ISIS-Khorasan. In 2017, then-CIA Chief Mike Pompeo set Langley on an Afghan overdrive, targeting the Taliban but also al-Qaeda, which at the time had dwindled to a few dozen operatives. Pompeo promised the new gig would be “aggressive,” “unforgiving,” and “relentless.”







Those shadowy ‘military actors’

Arguably, the most precise and concise report on the American paramilitaries in Afghanistan is by Antonio de Lauri, Senior Researcher at the Chr. Michelsen Institute, and Astrid Suhrke, Senior Researcher Emerita also at the Institute.

The report shows how the CIA army was a two-headed hydra. The older units harked back to 2001 and were very close to the CIA. The most powerful was the Khost Protection Force (KPF), based at the CIA’s Camp Chapman in Khost. KPF operated totally outside Afghan law, not to mention budget. Following an investigation by Seymour Hersh, I have also shown how the CIA financed its black ops via a heroin rat line, which the Taliban have now promised to destroy.

The other head of the hydra were the NDS’s own Afghan Special Forces: four main units, each operating in its own regional area. And that’s about all that was known about them. The NDS was funded by none other than the CIA. For all practical purposes, operatives were trained and weaponized by the CIA.

So, it’s no wonder that no one in Afghanistan or in the region knew anything definitive about their operations and command structure. The UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA), in trademark infuriating bureaucratese, defined the operations of the KPF and the NDS as appearing “to be coordinated with international military actors (emphasis mine); that is, outside the normal government chain of command.”

By 2018, the KPF was estimated to harbor between 3,000 to over 10,000 operatives. What few Afghans really knew is that they were properly weaponized; well paid; worked with people speaking American English, using American vocabulary; engaged in night operations in residential areas; and crucially, were capable of calling air strikes, executed by the US military.

A 2019 UNAMA report stressed that there were “continuing reports of the KPF carrying out human rights abuses, intentionally killing civilians, illegally detaining individuals, and intentionally damaging and burning civilian property during search operations and night raids.”

Call it the Pompeo effect: “aggressive, unforgiving, and relentless” – whether by kill-or-capture raids, or drones with Hellfire missiles.

Woke Westerners, now losing sleep over the ‘loss of civil liberties’ in Afghanistan, may not even be vaguely aware that their NATO-commanded ‘coalition forces’ excelled in preparing their own kill-or-capture lists, known by the semantically-demented denomination: Joint Prioritized Effects List.

The CIA, for its part, couldn’t care less. After all, the agency was always totally outside the jurisdiction of Afghan laws regulating the operations of ‘coalition forces.’

The dronification of violence

In these past few years, the CIA shadow army coalesced into what Ian Shaw and Majed Akhter memorably described as The Dronification of State Violence, a seminal paper published in the Critical Asian Studies journal in 2014 (downloadable here).

Shaw and Akhter define the alarming, ongoing process of dronification as: “the relocation of sovereign power from the uniformed military to the CIA and Special Forces; techno-political transformations performed by the Predator drone; the bureaucratization of the kill chain; and the individualization of the target.”

This amounts to, the authors argue, what Hannah Arendt defined as “rule by nobody.” Or, actually by somebody acting beyond any rules.

The toxic end result in Afghanistan was the marriage between the CIA shadow army and dronification. The Taliban may be willing to extend a general amnesty and not exact revenge. But to forgive those who went on a killing rampage as part of the marriage arrangement may be a step too far for the Pashtunwali code.

The February 2020 Doha agreement between Washington and the Taliban says absolutely nothing about the CIA shadow army.

So, the question now is how the defeated Americans will be able to keep intel assets in Afghanistan for its proverbial ‘counter-terrorism’ ops. A Taliban-led government will inevitably take over the NDS. What happens to the militias is an open question. They could be completely taken over by the Taliban. They could break away and eventually find new sponsors (Saudis, Turks). They could become autonomous and serve the best-positioned warlord paymaster.

The Taliban may be essentially a collection of warlords (jang salar, in Dari). But what’s certain is that a new government will simply not allow a militia wasteland scenario similar to Libya. Thousands of mercenaries of sorts with the potential of becoming an ersatz ISIS-Khorasan, threatening Afghanistan’s entry into the Eurasian integration process, need to be tamed. Burns knows it, Baradar knows it – while Western public opinion knows nothing.


https://thesaker.is/blowback-taliban-target-us-intels-shadow-army/

One goal, different approaches: why the Taliban * and ISIS are killing each other
https://www.gazeta.ru/politics/2021/08/29_a_13929422.shtml?updated

https://youtu.be/68nkDNCnRGM  https://youtu.be/e0pHWFFDsAk

https://youtu.be/4t9EY4_59w8

Media Bury Story That US May Have Fired on Crowd at Kabul Airport
US Destroys CIA Outpost Outside Kabul Airport
State Dept Says 250 Americans Still In Afghanistan
Blinken: 'Not Likely' Diplomats Will Stay After Afghanistan Withdrawal
28 Taliban Members Dead in Kabul Airport Explosion: Official
Pentagon Says One Suicide Bomber Carried Out Kabul Attack
A Marine Killed in Kabul Attack Was Pictured Cradling Baby at the Airport
Biden Pays Respects to US Soldiers Killed in Kabul Bombings
Pentagon Deploys Special Hellfire Missile to Strike ISIS-K in Afghanistan
Afghanistan Evacuation
Taliban Largely Seal Off Kabul Airport as Airlift Winds Down
Macron Says France, Britain to Propose Kabul Safe Zone
US Makes Room on Bases for Up to 50,000 Afghans as Evacuations Continue
Erdogan Says Turkey to Maintain Diplomatic Presence in Kabul
Veteran Group Says It Moved 630 Afghans to Kabul Airport
Taliban Promise Afghans They Will Be Able to Travel
US Evacuates All Afghan Embassy Staff: Report
Ex-Uk Marine Leaves Kabul With Dogs, Cats but No Local Staff
As Troops Return, UK Under Pressure as Afghans Left Behind
Taliban Criticizes US Airstrikes in Afghanistan
UK and Germany Seek Common G7 Approach on Taliban
Taliban Say Afghan Women Health Service Staff Should Go Back to Work
Veteran Afghan Commanders to Negotiate With Taliban
The Taliban Says It Wants to Ban Drugs in Afghanistan. Here's Why It Can't
Turkey and Taliban Close to Deal on Kabul Airport
Taliban 'Requests Qatari Technical Help' in Operating Kabul Airport
Massoud Supporters Reject Taliban Claim of Entering Panjshir
Taliban Supreme Leader Hibatullah Akhundzada in Afghanistan: Spokesman
Taliiban: Male and Female Students in Separate Classrooms
China's Special Afghan Envoy Optimistic About Future Relations With 'Friendly' Taliban
Turkey Holds First Talks With the Taliban in Kabul https://www.antiwar.com/

Pakistan military brooks no dissent on the Taliban
By FM Shakil
Analysts and observers have suggested Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency provided strategic battlefield advice that helped to steer the Taliban’s blitzkrieg takeover as soon as US troops withdrew – a lightning strike strategy that US and Western intelligence agencies clearly didn’t foresee.
https://asiatimes.us14.list-manage.com/track/click?u=2049a8663daea00bd30c32cf2&id=9dda8b6132&e=5455568640

Why Biden won’t be held accountable for Afghanistan
By Jonathan Gorvett
When US soldiers die during a botched military mission, calls for accountability usually ring out among politicians and the public. In the wake of the deaths of 13 American soldiers in a terrorist bombing at Kabul airport, US President Joe Biden is facing such loud and intense criticism. Some political opponents even demand he either resign or be removed from office. Neither will happen.
https://asiatimes.us14.list-manage.com/track/click?u=2049a8663daea00bd30c32cf2&id=d5c53776a0&e=5455568640

Enduring terror forever: from al-Qaeda to ISIS-K
By Pepe Escobar
ISIS-K, the new viper’s nest, opens multiple Pandora boxes that may lead to the new incarnation of the Forever Wars. ISIS-K has claimed responsibility for the horrific Kabul suicide bombing. Even CENTCOM commander General Kenneth F McKenzie, Jr, has admitted that US military personnel are sharing intel on ISIS-K with the Taliban.  https://asiatimes.us14.list-manage.com/track/click?u=2049a8663daea00bd30c32cf2&id=4bff73c77c&e=5455568640

Iran-Taliban whitewash the past to restore relations
By Kourosh Ziabari
On the surface, a crisis should be emerging on Iran’s eastern border as the Taliban seizes power and establishes a new Sunni-led Islamic emirate. Yet despite a history of hostility rooted in Sunni-Shiite antagonism, Tehran doesn’t appear troubled by the militant group’s return to power.

India reaches to Russia to break its Afghan isolation
By M K Bhadrakumar
India’s establishment media hyped Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call with Russian President Vladimir Putin on August 24 in a desperate attempt to distract attention from Delhi’s abject isolation over the Afghanistan situation. The desperation to clutch at any straw stems out of the complete breakdown of India’s Afghan policy. https://asiatimes.us14.list-manage.com/track/click?u=2049a8663daea00bd30c32cf2&id=315c618b31&e=5455568640

Hundreds Of Russian Troops Take Part In Military Drills In Tajikistan

Russia says about 500 of its troops are taking part in military drills in Tajikistan amid fears of instability across its Central Asian allies after the Taliban gained control of much of Afghanistan, including its northern areas.

"Tactical maneuvers with weapons training exercises have started with the participation of motorized rifle troops from the Russian Federation's military base No. 201 located in Tajikistan," the Central Military District's press service said on August 30 in a statement, adding that the exercises were taking place in the mountainous Sambuli military training field.

All of the servicemen involved in the exercise come from the Russian military base in Tajikistan, it added.

The statement comes three days after spokesman of the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) said the alliance plans to hold military exercises in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan due to the ongoing situation in Afghanistan.

CSTO members include Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan.

Central Asians states bordering Afghanistan are concerned about security threats emanating from the war-torn country and the potential for tens of thousands of refugees to pour over the border.

The group has said several thousand troops will be involved in another set of exercises, the Rubezh (Frontier) exercises, in Kyrgyzstan, which will be conducted on September 7-9.

Three more sets of military maneuvers will be held close to the Tajik-Afghan border in October, with a fourth scheduled for November.

On August 10, Russia completed joint military exercises with Tajik and Uzbek troops near the border with Afghanistan, which followed smaller Russian-Uzbek maneuvers along the Uzbek-Afghan border.
The Taliban has sought to reassure neighboring countries and Russia that it poses no threat since gaining control over much of Afghanistan’s territory in recent weeks, including Kabul, the capital.

Russia, which has military bases in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, has vowed to defend Moscow's allies in Central Asia against any security threat from Afghanistan.

https://gandhara.rferl.org/a/russia-tajik-drills-afghanistan/31435035.html

Osama bin Laden’s security chief triumphantly returns to hometown in Afghanistan

BY BILL ROGGIO | August 30, 2021 | admin@longwarjournal.org | @billroggio

The man who served as Osama bin Laden’s security chief at the battle of Tora Bora triumphantly returned to his home in eastern Afghanistan today, less than two weeks after the country fell to the Taliban. The Al Qaeda commander was reportedly freed by Pakistan a decade ago.

Dr. Amin al Haq, the former head of bin Laden’s Black Guard, was captured on video in a large convoy as it traveled through a checkpoint in Nangarhar province. Haq was accompanied by a large convoy of heavily armed Taliban fighters in brand new SUVs. A small crowd flocked to Haq to shake his hand and take selfies with him.

The video of al Haq is evidence that Al Qaeda commanders now feel secure enough to appear publicly in a Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
It was not immediately clear if al Haq was returning to his home in eastern Afghanistan for the first time, or if he has been in Afghanistan the entire time since being released from Pakistani custody. He may have also been traversing the porous border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Either way, the confidence to travel and operate out in the open – in plain sight for the first time in a decade – speaks to the marked change in Afghanistan over the last month.

Al Qaeda leaders and fighters have been in Afghanistan supporting the Taliban’s insurgency for the past two decades. Pakistan’s cities and the tribal areas have served as safe havens for Al Qaeda over the past two decades.
Al Haq was said to be detained by Pakistani security forces in the city of Lahore in 2008. Lahore is the home of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Al Qaeda-allied, Pakistan-sponsored terror group that has significant infrastructure in the city. He was reportedly released in 2011, and he subsequently disappeared from public eye until he emerged in Nangarhar today.

https://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2021/08/osama-bin-ladens-security-chief-triumphantly-returns-to-hometown-in-afghanistan.php

Al Qaeda IS already back in Afghanistan: Bin Laden security chief and arms supplier Amin ul-Haq RETURNS to his hometown after 20 years, just hours before final US troops leave


A video surfaced Monday of Amin ul-Haq returning to his home province

He led security for Osama bin Laden in Tora Bora, Al Qaeda's cave complex, and escaped with him when US military forces attacked the terrorist hotbed

The new video shows people crowding ul-Haq's car to welcome him back

He returned in the final hours of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan

His warm reception signals the Taliban's unwillingness to adhere to its promise that it would not foster terrorism, made under the peace agreement with Trump

Joe Biden said ten days ago that Al Qaeda wouldn't have a significant presence
Days after Kabul fell to the Taliban, Biden inaccurately claimed Al Qaeda is 'gone' from Afghanistan.

'What interest do we have in Afghanistan at this point, with al Qaeda gone? We went to Afghanistan for the express purpose of getting rid of al Qaeda in Afghanistan as well as - as well as - getting Osama bin Laden. And we did,' the president said at the White House on August 20.

Biden was directly contradicted by his own Defense Department a short while later. Spokesman John Kirby said after his remarks that Al Qaeda's presence in the region isn't 'significant enough to merit a threat to our homeland' compared to its numbers in 2001.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9939989/Al-Qaeda-Afghanistan-Bin-Laden-security-chief-Amin-RETURNS-20-years-pulls-out.html

Almost 90 Retired Flag Officers Demand Mark Milley, Lloyd Austin Resign After Afghanistan Debacle
AUGUST 30, 2021 By Jordan Davidson
Nearly 90 retired U.S. generals and admirals penned an open letter asking Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley to resign from their positions following their “negligence in performing their duties primarily involving events surrounding the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.”
“As principal military advisors to the CINC [Commander-in-Chief]/President, the SECDEF and CJCS should have recommended against this dangerous withdrawal in the strongest possible terms,” the letter states. “If they did not do everything within their authority to stop the hasty withdrawal, they should resign. Conversely, if they did do everything within their ability to persuade the CINC/President to not hastily exit the country without ensuring the safety of our citizens and Afghans loyal to America, then they should have resigned in protest as a matter of conscience and public statement.”
This “hasty retreat,” the letter continues, not only left thousands of vulnerable Americans and Afghan allies stranded at the hands of the Taliban but also contributed to the “catastrophic” loss of “billions of dollars in advanced military equipment and supplies falling into the hands of our enemies.”

“The consequences of this disaster are enormous and will reverberate for decades beginning with the safety of Americans and Afghans who are unable to move safely to evacuation points; therefore, being de facto hostages of the Taliban at this time. The death and torture of Afghans has already begun and will result in a human tragedy of major proportions,” the letter says. “The damage to the reputation of the United States is indescribable. We are now seen, and will be seen for many years, as an unreliable partner in any multinational agreement or operation. Trust in the United States is irreparably damaged.”
This damaged trust, the retired generals and admirals argue, gives confidence to U.S. enemies who “are emboldened to move against America due to the weakness displayed in Afghanistan.”

“China benefits the most followed by Russia, Pakistan, Iran, North Korea and others. Terrorists around the world are emboldened and able to pass freely into our country through our open border with Mexico,” the letter states.

The letter also points out how military leadership’s focus on “wokeness” is hurting the viability of U.S. troops and the military as an institution.

“In interviews, congressional testimony, and public statements it has become clear that top leaders in our military are placing mandatory emphasis on PC ‘wokeness’ related training which is extremely divisive and harmful to unit cohesion, readiness, and war fighting capability,” the letter says. “Our military exists to fight and win our Nation’s wars and that must be the sole focus of our top military leaders.”

“For these reasons we call on the SECDEF Austin and the CJCS General Milley to resign,” it concludes. “A fundamental principle in the military is holding those in charge responsible and accountable for their actions or inactions. There must be accountability at all levels for this tragic and avoidable debacle.”

Over the last week, multiple GOP lawmakers called on President Joe Biden to resign for “dereliction of duty that has left Americans dead at the hands of terrorists.”

https://thefederalist.com/2021/08/30/almost-90-retired-flag-officers-demand-mark-milley-lloyd-austin-resign-after-afghanistan-debacle/

Afghanistan: US investigates civilian deaths in Kabul strike
A US drone strike near Kabul airport ended up killing 10 members of one family, including six children, surviving relatives have told the BBC.

The 10 were killed when a car parked at their home was struck by an explosion on Sunday.

The US military said it was targeting a vehicle carrying at least one person associated with the Afghan branch of the Islamic State group.

It said people nearby may have been hit in the aftermath of the strike.

The youngest child to be killed was two-year-old Sumaya, and the oldest child was 12-year-old Farzad, the family said.

"It's wrong, it's a brutal attack, and it's happened based on wrong information," Ramin Yousufi, a relative of the victims, told the BBC.


He added, tearfully: "Why have they killed our family? Our children? They are so burned out we cannot identify their bodies, their faces."

Another relative, Emal Ahmadi, told the BBC that it was his two-year-old daughter who was killed in the strike.

Mr Ahmadi said he and others in the family had applied for evacuation to the US, and had been waiting for a phone call telling them to go to the airport.

That included one of his relatives, Ahmad Naser, who was killed in the strike and had previously worked as a translator with US forces. Other victims had previously worked for international organisations and held visas allowing them entry to the US.

The US, Mr Ahmadi added, had made "a mistake, it was a big mistake"
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-58380791

Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
·
17m
Fighting began between resistance forces of Panjishir and the Taliban in the Jabulseraj area. Panjshir PANJSHIR
Quote Tweet
Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
· 17m
The Taliban are said to have attacked the Panjshir defences lines tonight, and the clashes continue...
PANJSHIR twitter.com/Ashish_sinhaa/…

Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
·
1h
This section of Kabulairport is now also under Taliban control. They're very close to the runway. Afghanistan

Ashish Sinha
@Ashish_sinhaa
·
3h
Panjshir - The front line of resistance against the Taliban. The only place where women's views are still heard and women's play important role in every decision with men. #Afganistan

14m
Afghan journalist Ali Latifi
@alibomaye
tells me he went to the house where 10 family members including 6 children were killed by a US drone strike and that, tragically, they had been issued with special visas and were about to leave the country Afghanistan




Yalda Hakim
@BBCYaldaHakim
·
3h
"We saw hell, we gathered our family with our hands. Why did they kill our family? Why did they kill our children? Why did they kill seven children?" A distraught relative of drone strike victims says he wants the United States to answer his questions Afghanistan Kabul




Yalda Hakim
@BBCYaldaHakim
·
3h
Ramin Yousufi says his cousins house was hit by a US drone strike and 10 members of the family were killed, including seven children, the youngest was two years old "This is wrong, this was a brutal attack, an attack happened with wrong information" Afghanistan