Pompeo is ambitious, wanting to be the GOP nominee in 2024. And to earn it by being an asshole. He says Trump would have handled the Afghanistan withdrawal differently. Indeed. He had four years and never withdrew. With Pompeo being his trusted advisor during the stay there, no matter. Obama had eight years and stayed, that is true. But for Pompeo to criticize how Biden handles a giant step toward the nation having a better time, he should shut up and watch Biden giving our nation a chance to solve internal needs rather than warmongering over what, poppies?
Give me a break.
Here is the link, Breitbart of course, touting the meddling military academy graduate who wants war because it is his limited area of expertise. The headline, "Exclusive — Pompeo on Biden’s ‘Tragic’ Afghan Disaster: ‘It Didn’t Have to Be this Way.’"
Sure, we could have stayed the course, not leaving, the way Trump's advisors advised. Negotiate, but stay. Biden, in turn, aims to fix ills at home, and to give up on an unwinnable war, started by little Bush and Cheney. With fanfare and lies, the two-front war strategy, bog down in Afghan mountains, screw around with Iraq's oil.
The Republicans screwed it up, Obama kicked the can down the road, Trump dithered around with Pompeo, more focused on getting dirt on Hunter Biden than on suffering at home. Biden took action. Defending Biden is difficult because of his half-a-loaf domestic policies, but as to Afghanistan, he was right to leave and to not dither around doing so. Pompeo would have had what, two more years there to exit his way? However that would have been. Biden and his people seized the bull by the horns while Pompeo examines the bull's other end. With more words than insight.
Read that Breitbart item. It goes on and on, saying the same thing. Saying it was an exit, something Trump never really tried while Pompeo was close to advise, but that by some magic he'd have done it as cleanly as open heart surgery. Roughly that, in different wording - in a cascade of word after word.
Yes, the U.S. trained Afghanis laid down their arms and ran. Who had four years of training them for that after all. It was an unwanted occupation with a corrupt puppet government and Pompeo knows that because he was a part of puppit string pulling.
He should shut up.
Is there anything worth quoting in that long Breitbart screed?
Well, early in it,
“It is a demonstrably incompetent, tactical and operational use of America’s power in a way that has put American lives at risk,” Pompeo said in a phone interview. “And that is disheartening. It is sad. But more importantly, it has ramifications all across the world.”
Christsakes, he could have been talking about Little Bush getting us into setting up an unwanted puppet regime. That was the MISTAKE, in capital letters. Leaving was a wind of fresh air, however nasty details were.
Next -
Pompeo, who oversaw now former President Donald Trump’s negotiations for peace in Afghanistan after 20 years of war, said Trump would have handled the withdrawal much differently than Biden. Pompeo traveled multiple times to Doha, Qatar, to meet with the Taliban’s leaders, including a trip on the 19th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks last year on which Breitbart News joined him and interviewed him after he oversaw intra-Afghan peace talks. In this interview, Pompeo said that had he and Trump still been overseeing the withdrawal process, it would have been much different than how badly Biden has handled it.
So, bid deal. He pissed around and never got out, with the Taliban simply waiting until a more enlightened leader would lead the U.S. of A. out of the quagmire that Little Bush and Cheney handed the nation to deal with. Biden saw the Obama approach, and once elected declined to follow that lead. It was the correct step.
Pompeo opined -
“As far as how it would have been different, we had an approach that we literally worked on from the very beginning,” Pompeo said. “So President Trump had made clear in his campaign, he wanted to get our young men and women home as quickly as he could. We were striving to achieve that. He also made very, clear both when I was CIA director, but more directly to me when I was the Secretary of State, that we had a second objective—and that was to make sure we could do so in a way that was orderly, that got equipment home, that got American civilians out, and then protected our second objective there, which was to continue to be able to reduce the risk that we ever had an attack on the homeland from that place. And so there were lots of work streams underneath that, one of which was the intra-Afghan conversations. So we spoke with the Taliban, we spoke with the Tajiks, we spoke with the Northern Alliance, folks in the West, we spoke with the Afghan government and had an agreement with the government— we were working to begin the peace and reconciliation process – an ugly, complex, almost certainly years-long endeavor. But at the same time, we made clear to the Taliban that here are our set of conditions. If you honor those conditions, we will honor ours, which is to draw down our forces. We we did that in a measured, step by step way, from about 15,000 to about 2,500. But we never got to the conditions where President Trump felt comfortable that we could go to zero and so we didn’t go to zero.”
Condensed to its essence, Pompeo said "we didn't go to zero."
Is he saying the puppet regime could have survived on its own? What proof has he? It existed while we had boots on the ground half a world from where the nation had homeland needs.
He presumes there was actual viability to the puppet government. What proof? Money and arms went in, and disappeared. Great job.
Call it whatever, but cut losses and get out and pay attention to other needs. It was Vietnam all over, a war that never should have been, unwanted, we finally had to face reality and leave. War as a part of "diplomacy" was Bismark's creed, and he did not end up well leading Germany into the First World War by BEING A WARMONGER. Rome got away with imposing its will for centuries, but today's U.S. of A. is not Rome and in good judgment should not aim to be.
The Breitbart link is above. Read as much of the remainder as you feel justified.
It is after the fact saying, "We could have done it better. But didn't."
It is unconvincing whining. Move on. Fix problems in the nation. We have problems. One of them is Pompeo. All he does is obfuscate. We'd have done this. We'd have done that. Then in four years in power, why didn't you? Because it was never nearly so simple a thing as talking about it is. And the SOB knows that. But he dissembles while Biden and his people act. If that brand moves your trust, so be it.
_______UPDATE_______
Custer was a warmonger too. Bear that always in mind.
This is speculative, but is there hidden policy?
Now things stands with well armed Sunni extremists in Afghanistan bordering well armed Shia forces in Iran, and other Central Asian nations to the north have their concerns.
How that shakes out is unclear, but the Afghan puppet government was never going to be a strong force bordering Iran. It was a construct, and a farce, and it fell in days, not months. Taliban, faults and all, will be a regional force with primarily evolving regional issues in the forefront of their perspective.
If a balance of power exists via Iran facing opposing Islamic theology and vigor, is that better than our troops propping up a joke government in Afghanistan with Pakistan housing the waiting Taliban across a different Afghan border (the pre-exit situation)?
We will find out. A link. A map.
And there was a bundle of arms left with the Taliban. Next door to Iran. If they want upkeep supplies, they can buy them, yes/no, from us? Had the will been otherwise, it would have been gathering material before exit, but it was not that way.
Perhaps that represents a plan or part of one. Perhaps not.
The Pakistan border with Iran is also interesting. There is copper ore there. Link.
Another link, same theme. One more. Varying search words help. Variations on a theme where nobody knows the future. Otherwise everyone would agree on global policy if we all knew fully the range of options and outcomes.
In any event, resources can be applied in the U.S. of A. and who knows, homelessness might be ended and universal single payer healthcare might evolve. We don't need to be worldwide bullies. There are other ideas. Likely better ones.
And we do not need to keep kissing the ass of Wall Street. Or Lockheed-Martin.
_______FURTHER UPDATE_______
Pompeo will have like minded, regardless of plain common sense.
With regard to the last update, were the policy to deliberately leave a strongly armed Taliban because the joke government was not a viable option, it is not something that would have been said. So, put up with the bleating of the Pompeo's of the nation, pounding their chests like Tarzan while their voices hopefully drown out with domestic policy and needs being the sensible main U.S. policy focus.
But the man wants badly to be President.
That is a worry. There are many all too willing to act as enablers and facilitators. Like minded, as noted. Trump possibly among them. Staying in Floridian comfort, playing king-maker. While really, in fact, not liking "low class."
________FURTHER UPDATE_______
Thousands are being evacuated. Civilian aircraft are taking evacuees from third party countries so that military flights can maximize the number of evacuees being taken to the third party sites. Security is maintained.
So far. So good. The military is in action. Hysteria and fearmongering are no help. Logistical needs apparently are being met. Given people pressing, things are reported as relatively under control in Kabul. Yet some here, stateside. clutch pearl necklaces and keen, or bluster. Helping nothing.