Thread by @bansisharma

1. Should America Have Continued To Have A Presence in Afghanistan?

Almost every American is sad and ashamed of the aftermath of Biden's poorly planned execution of withdrawal from Afghanistan, but many are convinced total withdrawal was the only good and right option.

Wrong.

2. Many argue that this travesty is more on Bush, Obama and Trump. That we knew long ago that the Afghans couldn’t (or wouldn’t) be up to the task, and we should have gotten out long ago. That is a reasonable position to take, but I disagree that we had no other options now.

3. While my preferred option right from the outset of this war was to chase Osama to the gates of hell, and kill him even if it took reducing the entire Tora Bora to rubble, that was regrettably not the strategy followed by President Bush.

https://twitter.com/bansisharma/status/1425465826874990594?s=20

4. After finding ourselves in a position of protracted military presence in Afghanistan (even if it was a mistake), we did not have to compound the mistake with a hasty withdrawal with poor planning and a poorer rationale.

No, there is no reason why America should exit quickly.

5. Yes, we can and should stay in Afghanistan for as long as it serves Afghanistan's and America's mutual interests, even if it takes a 100 years.

We are still not out of Germany after 75 years.

6. We need physical presence and launch capabilities in places like Afghanistan for our own protection, not just to do them favors. China will not think twice to fill the vacuum.

7. It is foolhardy to occupy Afghanistan as Russia discovered. But America was not occupying Afghanistan. Afghanis wanted us there. Only the extremists didn’t. Unlike the Russians, we weren’t lording over the Afghani people. We were protecting them (and us), and they knew it.

8. It was an amicable arrangement — an alliance. It provided them security and stability, and it gave us a strategic foothold in a troubled spot of the world. This isn’t just about the stability in Afghanistan, but also about stability in nuclear powered Pakistan.

9. With China flexing its malicious muscle abroad and indulging in genocide at home, we need strategic footholds in key theaters for self-defense and for world peace. Myopic political rhetoric of pithy slogans is going to get a lot of innocents, including Americans, killed.

10. "It's on them" riposte of some people in response to Afghanistan immediately falling to Taliban after American exit will not age well if another terrorist attack on the U.S. is masterminded there or if China takes over Afghanistan and terrorizes the world 20 years hence.

11. Remember "it was on them" even the first time the Talibans had taken over Afghanistan. That did not end well -- either for Afghan people or for America.

12. So get rid of the notion that America was in Afghanistan now only for altruistic purposes. No, it was in our mutual interest. Neither Afghanis' interests nor American interests are well served by this ignominious exit.

13. The alternative of a relatively small American military presence to maintain even an uneasy peace, in order to avoid murder, mayhem, and a much larger global catastrophe down the road, was far better. Powerful nations sometimes have to do such things.

The End

P.S. The above thread is an elaboration of my response to @dgold113 ten days ago (

https://twitter.com/bansisharma/status/1425981138212950016?s=20

).

I am glad to see Tony Blair (who was the Prime Minister of UK in 2001) say the same thing.
dailymail.co.uk/debate/article…