Thread by @djrothkopf

The Taliban, created in 1994, took over the country with lightning speed. They controlled it by 1996. The most powerful nations on earth sent in an army and still after a matter of a relatively few years, the Taliban regained control or contested 30-40% of the country.

The US military has for two decades overstated its ability to materially change the ground truth of this country. In recent years, the Taliban were gaining again. The last administration recognized they were the real power in Afghanistan and effectively capitulated to them.

The outcome you see today was inevitable, predictable before this started, predictable ten years ago. The advocates for keeping a force there ignore the gains achieved by the Taliban while we have had a force there.

The efforts to create a counter-force there controlled by the Afghan government were, from the start, a shit show and few who viewed them up close had any faith in their ability. Corruption and incompetence undercut the best efforts of a valiant, committed and capable few.

The real choice in Afghanistan has for many years been how to postpone the inevitable, whether to watch what is happening now happen sooner or later. For the US military and many politicians it has been an exercise is ass-covering, trying to avoid blame and shame.

Recently, it became clear that our choice was limited on that front too. This was coming. The speed with which the takeover has happened only further reveals the degree to which our past efforts failed and that the Taliban held the stronger hand.

We should have taken better care of those who helped us on the ground. Our intelligence should have better prepared us for the speed and effectiveness of this Taliban onslaught. But those who argue that a Taliban take-over could have been forestalled are lying.

Many of those who are lying are doing it for political benefit--from opposition pols who supported a president in Trump who first wanted to hand over the country to the mercenaries of Blackwater then just wanted to pull the plug and who set in motion a handover far swifter...

...and more reckless than this one. Others who misrepresent our choices are willfully ignoring the responsibility of past admins, the failures of our military leaders, the failures of the Afghan government or the agency the Taliban themselves have, their authorship of all this.

Some who argue that we could stay forever ignore the massive US public opposition to this & the very real fact that the US has no long-term national interest in doing so. They argue the terror threat will return but ignore that it's already elsewhere and it was always overstated.

Some with excellent intentions worry as they should about the plight of women, girls and others in Afghanistan but fail to acknowledge that difficult reality the US military cannot permanently intervene everywhere human rights are at risk.

The military & occupation are not the right tool. Afghanistan isn't the only place these problems occur. The world must rise to the challenge of protecting the rights of all women & girls everywhere...but the mechanisms to do it are political, multilateral, diplomatic, economic.

There are hard truths here. For soldiers who fought in Afghanistan, it is difficult to acknowledge that we gave them both a mission they could and did courageously achieve--defeating extremist cells--and one that was always impossible--permanently remaking Afghanistan.

As with Vietnam, it is difficult to accept failure when it comes with such a high price. But it has not been a failure of soldiers on the ground, but rather has been one of their leaders. It is hard to acknowledge just how wrong and dishonest with themselves those leaders were.

It is a historic disaster for American and allied policymakers of all political stripes. But the answer to such a failure is not to prolong it. It is not to compound old lies with new ones. It is not to maintain the illusions that got us here in the first place.

It is to be honest with ourselves about where we are, how we got here and our options. And of all the options before us, as President Biden accurately said yesterday, this is the best. It is the best bad option among many awful ones.

The President said this knowing full well that he will be heaped with criticism. He said this while his team works furiously to find ways to make the best of a bad situation, to be humane and responsible to the full extent reality and our capabilities allow.

He is doing the right thing. And if it seems he is not doing it at the right time, that it is because all the other better times came before now and were passed over by others who lacked his courage, the courage to see what really is, accept it and find the best way forward.