Has Biden Made the Right Choice in Afghanistan?

[The Minsky Moment]

It appears that the situation is extremely chaotic outside of the airport.

That's where the people are coming from who are supposed be in the airplanes, so it's a pretty significant problem.

And while the US military may be in control of the runways, that hardly creates a logistical equivalent to London.  Heathrow operates the way it does because there is a large and continuous flow of supplies into the airport from the one of the most logistically dense parts of the world.  And that is without the additional challenge of supplying 5000 soldiers on the ground in 90 degree heat.  As for Kabul, look at a map and start drawing circles around the city.  How far out do you need to go to find a place where the US military has a base that can fly in significant amounts of supplies?

[The Minsky Moment]

Is the 70k in total or just the US?

According to Biden is his speech yesterday there were 19 US military flights and 31 "coalition" flights in a 12 hour period.  50 in total.

[OttoVonBismarck]

As of yesterday I had heard we'd (specifically the United States) had flown out 58,000 people. We also know the following numbers:

15,000 - reported total of Americans in country when the evacuation started
34,500 - Afghans in country with authorized visas to travel to the United States under special status
18,000 - Afghans who have applied for but not been granted visas

So in theory 58,000 is pretty damn close to our total expected maximum of 67,500. But it is, I believe, the case that some of the 58,000 we've shipped out have been foreign nationals bound for allied nations, and the exact breakdown is not known or hasn't been reported.

There's also likely some % of those above who either actually don't intend to leave Afghanistan, or who have found other ways to leave. For example the 15,000 Americans number has long been said to be a little shaky--you are encouraged but not required to check in with the Embassy when you land in Afghanistan as an American, and ditto for leaving. But not everyone does both, or some people check in but don't check out. So in those cases we actually don't even know if the person is in country.

Despite the hyperbole I'm much less concerned about people with American passports, I actually think even after 8/31, the Taliban is unlikely to block an American citizen from getting out, at least in the next few months while it tries to negotiate us releasing billions of their sovereign wealth that's locked in U.S. banks (I would hope we release none of it--I'm content to watch Afghanistan fall into the economic abyss its backwards tribal people want by supporting the Taliban.)

[Razgovory]

I don't know how much it has changed but the plan was to fly out one plane per hour. The numbers of people evacuated line up with that pace. That shouldn't be a logistical challenge for the US military with a modern runway.

It appears that the situation is extremely chaotic outside of the airport. The US military controls the airport.

Full disclosure:  I don't know much about military logistics, but getting fuel to the planes seems like it would be difficult and coordinating aircraft so they stay out of each other's way is probably harder than it looks.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I don't know how much it has changed but the plan was to fly out one plane per hour. The numbers of people evacuated line up with that pace. That shouldn't be a logistical challenge for the US military with a modern runway.

It appears that the situation is extremely chaotic outside of the airport. The US military controls the airport.

Full disclosure:  I don't know much about military logistics, but getting fuel to the planes seems like it would be difficult and coordinating aircraft so they stay out of each other's way is probably harder than it looks.

You actually don't have to know much about military logistics, or honestly anything at all, to understand that AR making a nonsense post where he assumes the evacuation is going slowly because Kabul airport isn't operating in an equivalent manner to Heathrow is something you can safely just ignore. It falls into a familiar bucket for his posts it's either obvious trolling or so manifestly stupid as to be unworthy of further commentary.

[alfred russel]

I've never said the evacuation is going slowly, nor do I think that it is.

I'm not even sure we should be trying to evacuate some of the US citizens there, considering they were told months ago that we were pulling out and advised to leave the country.

[Neil]

The leader in the Economist is pretty scathing.

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2021/08/21/the-fiasco-in-afghanistan-is-a-grave-blow-to-americas-standing

"and so force the Taliban to the negotiating table."

Unfortunately for the United States, the Taliban had already come to the negotiating table, and had negotiated the surrender of Afghanistan without reference to American policy. 

This wasn't a sudden event.  It had been brewing for years.  In the post 9/11 rush Americans might have been more willing to fight and spend vast sums to invade and occupy in the name of globalization, this is a different era.  Different policies are going to have to be considered to balance security needs with the need to ensure the expansion of the global economy. 

[Josquius]

I do find it curious with the evacuation that theres no talk of taking people out via over land routes with neighbouring countries. Surely this should be covered under the withdrawal and be mostly safe?

[Valmy]

I do find it curious with the evacuation that theres no talk of taking people out via over land routes with neighbouring countries. Surely this should be covered under the withdrawal and be mostly safe?

I suspect that is because most of the press is focussed on the situation in Kabul. I would suspect people in the northern part of the country would find it relatively easy to just cross the border.

But I don't know.

[Maladict]

And it's the people in Kabul who are probably most at risk of reprisals.

[Josquius]

Yeah, I'm thinking even from Kabul looking at a map though- its not that far from Islamabad (I think one of those expensive but not very impressive tarmacced roads flows that way?) and the Tajik border.

[Neil]

Yeah, I'm thinking even from Kabul looking at a map though- its not that far from Islamabad (I think one of those expensive but not very impressive tarmacced roads flows that way?) and the Tajik border.

It's about 300km.  That's a fair stretch when you have to do it without getting caught. 

[Sheilbh]

Yeah, I'm thinking even from Kabul looking at a map though- its not that far from Islamabad (I think one of those expensive but not very impressive tarmacced roads flows that way?) and the Tajik border.

Sure - but the Taliban will likely ask questions of why the (inevitable) thousands of people are fleeing and there will be repraisals. In addition Pakistan is an ally of the Taliban and is probably not going to be particularly welcoming to the groups who are trying to flee them. Iran would be more of a fit especially for Dari speakers and Shi'ite Muslims, but the political situation there is already difficult for the regime so they've actually passed some of the most draconian anti-illegal immigration laws in the world specifically targeting Afghans - I think there's a 20-25 year sentence. Further along, immigration is now a huge issue in Turkey - they are building a wall along a chunk of the Turkey-Iran border (again, aimed at Afghans) - and unlike in 2015 when Erdogan accepted millions of Syrians there's no sign Turkey will welcome Afghans.

I'm less sure about the Central Asian states but my understanding is they may only welcome people from "their" ethnic groups. And then there's China.

I have no doubt there'll be thousands if not millions of Afghan refugees over-land but at this stage it doesn't look like Syria did in 2015 when Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon absorbed millions of refugees (and are still struggling with the economic and political consequences). All of the neighbours seem pretty anti-accepting any refugees. They will still come because of the desperate situation but they will be escaping that and then travelling through or across various other forms of oppression to get out.

[Malthus]

The leader in the Economist is pretty scathing.

https://www.economist.com/leaders/2021/08/21/the-fiasco-in-afghanistan-is-a-grave-blow-to-americas-standing

"and so force the Taliban to the negotiating table."

Unfortunately for the United States, the Taliban had already come to the negotiating table, and had negotiated the surrender of Afghanistan without reference to American policy. 

This wasn't a sudden event.  It had been brewing for years.  In the post 9/11 rush Americans might have been more willing to fight and spend vast sums to invade and occupy in the name of globalization, this is a different era.  Different policies are going to have to be considered to balance security needs with the need to ensure the expansion of the global economy.

The trust of the article is not that the decision to withdraw had been made, but rather that the implementation of the withdrawal has not been handled in a manner to America's advantage. There was no particular political pressure to withdraw so suddenly. The assertion is that the US made an error in relying, wildly overoptomistically, on the soundness of the Afghan government and army.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I'm not sure there will be a significant need for millions of Afghan refugees. The number of "collaborators" with the regime is probably less than 200,000 AFAIK. I don't think they're defining "anyone who had a government or military job" as a collaborator, especially since large numbers of those very people are the ones who did the surrender-for-cash deals with the Taliban in the first place.

People fled Syria because they were afraid of war or they were afraid of ISIS, ISIS was actively going into villages and committing genocide against basically anyone who wasn't a conservative Sunni Muslim. The Taliban wasn't like that even in the 90s. The vast majority of these rural tribal people are going to stay in their villages. Any refugees will likely come from the cities (which are only around 30% of the population) and a few specific ethnic groups like the Hazara who had been targeted for specific abuse previously.