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Keep in mind that's JUST the Afghan soldiers who were killed. That's not counting desertions, defections, and wounded who are unable to fight anymore.
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May 4, 2017 07:37
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Squalid posted:I'm curious now what kind of comparisons are made, because I'm not sure I quite understood where he was going with it. The IRA comparison is essentially about rapprochment with al-Qaeda's (et al) base. Ali is not a government official, but I'm sure that if you dig you'll find a slew of US officials slamming US CT policy in all sorts of manners.
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May 4, 2017 15:59
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Problem is the USA already effectively supports Sunni supremacism in the Middle East. What more could Al-Qaeda's base want?
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May 5, 2017 05:22
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http://www.militarytimes.com/articles/new-afghanistan-troop-plan-goes-to-white-house-next-week The Pentagon may send its plan for more troops to Trump as soon as next week.
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May 5, 2017 06:08
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icantfindaname posted:Problem is the USA already effectively supports Sunni supremacism in the Middle East. What more could Al-Qaeda's base want? Sunni supremacism but with AQ installed in power, duh.
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May 5, 2017 10:40
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I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!
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icantfindaname posted:Problem is the USA already effectively supports Sunni supremacism in the Middle East. What more could Al-Qaeda's base want? I'm sure you're a cool dude with a jazzy attitude and all, but the way you repeat Saudi/Iranian propaganda about Islamic affairs in this thread is making you look a little foolish.
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May 5, 2017 18:37
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On Thursday the US military suffered its first fatality in Somalia since 1993, five weeks after Trump approved expanded counter terror operations in the Horn of Africa. Frankly I'm just surprised there haven't been more deaths, given the scale of US activity in the country in the past few years.
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May 6, 2017 23:37
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https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/861710089551577088quote:The plan comes at the end of a sweeping policy review built around the president’s desire to reverse worsening security in Afghanistan and “start winning” again, said one U.S. official, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. There's been news that McMaster is on the outs with Trump, but I think he'll approve this plan.
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May 9, 2017 00:01
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gently caress yeah forever war 
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May 9, 2017 00:18
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OhFunny posted:https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/861710089551577088 Who could replace him? Anyway I doubt the anyone in the military really has the power to do anything that could actually fix Afghanistan, and little bandaids like this are just stalling for time
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May 9, 2017 02:56
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Squalid posted:Who could replace him? Anyway I doubt the anyone in the military really has the power to do anything that could actually fix Afghanistan, and little bandaids like this are just stalling for time Presumably Trump will go "I want a tremendous plan that lets us win Afghanistan bigly in a quick way, because clearly fixing Afghanistan isn't so hard as Obummer told me it is". Then he'll ask some generals on how to win Afghanistan bigly, and they'll presumably try to explain to him how the operation would need to be on the scale of the post-WW2 occupation of half of Europe and that it would cost like five trillion dollars. Trump will go "  that even our generals are so low-energy and keep talking about reality and stuff, I'm going to make a yuuuuge deal like you've never seen before that'll bring down costs while making us win Afghanistan even more bigly", make an announcement, fail to get money from Congress, and due to having the attention span of a goldfish wonder why a couple hundred more US troops got blown up while the Taliban still control half of Afghanistan after two years of """"surging""" a couple thousand troops back into the desert.
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May 9, 2017 10:36
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Squalid posted:Who could replace him? Anyway I doubt the anyone in the military really has the power to do anything that could actually fix Afghanistan, and little bandaids like this are just stalling for time I'd guess John Bolton.
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May 9, 2017 11:56
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Welp I've been waiting a long time to hear some straight on honest talk from US officials on Afghanistan. At least we're looking at this with clear eyes."US Intel Chief: Situation in Afghanistan Will 'Almost Certainly Deteriorate' posted:The United States’ top intelligence official believes the military conflict in Afghanistan will likely deteriorate in the coming years, even if the U.S. commits more troops to the 16 year-old fight. OhFunny posted:I'd guess John Bolton. John Bolton is epic.
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May 13, 2017 06:05
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blowfish posted:Presumably Trump will go "I want a tremendous plan that lets us win Afghanistan bigly in a quick way, because clearly fixing Afghanistan isn't so hard as Obummer told me it is". Then he'll ask some generals on how to win Afghanistan bigly, and they'll presumably try to explain to him how the operation would need to be on the scale of the post-WW2 occupation of half of Europe and that it would cost like five trillion dollars. Trump will go " Trump can ask his buddy Putin for help with Afghanistan.
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May 13, 2017 06:59
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Jack2142 posted:Trump can ask his buddy Putin for help with Afghanistan. Putin is helping by hosting talks between Pakistan, the Taliban, Iran, the U.A.E, and the Afghan government; The United States was not invited and also Russia miiiight be funding the Taliban
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May 13, 2017 07:20
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Look, we've been frenemies with Pakistan for decades, and they are 100% definitely funding and providing material support to the Taliban. Also, I imagine that SIGAR just keeps a bottle of rotgut whiskey on their desk at all times these days.
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May 13, 2017 08:22
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Squalid posted:Putin is helping by hosting talks between Pakistan, the Taliban, Iran, the U.A.E, and the Afghan government; The United States was not invited and also Russia miiiight be funding the Taliban The more things change, the more they stay the same.
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May 13, 2017 08:24
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Can't wait for my kids to be old enough to serve in the Afghanistan War 19 years from now.
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May 13, 2017 08:45
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Dead Reckoning posted:Look, we've been frenemies with Pakistan for decades, and they are 100% definitely funding and providing material support to the Taliban. If only the drat Dutch didn't help the Pakistani's build nukes we wouldn't have to deal with their bullshit...  Sergg posted:Can't wait for my kids to be old enough to serve in the Afghanistan War 19 years from now. I mean the UK has been sending people to die in Afghanistan for like 6 generations at this point? That was one clever and depressing thing about the Sherlock Holmes modern day adaption that Watson getting wounded in Afghanistan didn't have to be changed at all. Jack2142 fucked around with this message at 09:19 on May 13, 2017 |
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May 13, 2017 09:17
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Abdul Rashid Dostum, Afghanistan’s vice-president, has left the country after a six-month standoff following allegations that he illegally detained a political rival and had him raped with an assault rifle.quote:His departure for Turkey makes it unlikely that he will face trial, calling into question more than a decade of western efforts to instill the rule of law in Afghanistan and help build public trust in the government. Return of warlord Hekmatyar adds to Afghan political tensions. quote:Kabul — When the fugitive warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar returned home to a lavish official welcome last month, abandoning his 16-year insurgency and forgiven for a history of wartime abuses, he was expected to quickly take up the cause of peace and set a conciliatory example for Taliban insurgents. Taliban Launch Rocket Attack and Kill at Least 20 Afghan Police Officers quote:KABUL, Afghanistan — In a two-pronged attack in a southern Afghan province, the Taliban shelled the provincial capital city with rockets and then raided police outposts in a neighboring district, killing at least 20 officers and wounding six others, officials said on Sunday. Things aren't going great and a few thousand US soldiers aren't going to prop things up.
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May 23, 2017 04:28
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This is Dostum's second exile in Turkey, the first time was also for allegedly raping someone. He's still claiming he will return following some medical care, but who knows, maybe he'd rather retire. The most disturbing thing in that article about Hekmatyar is that he apparently has electoral ambitions. Ethnicity is a potent faultline in Afghanistan, and the Afghan government is delicately balanced. Since the American occupation the Presidency has been held by two Pashtuns, Mohammed Karzai and Ashraf Ghani who have advocated for an inclusive government that represents all peoples and faiths. Nevertheless communal relations have often been tense, and voting often splits down ethnic lines. In the 2014 Presidential election Tajiks and Uzbeks generally went for Abdullah Abdullah while Pashtun's went for Ghani, and there was a terrible political crisis following credible accusations of ballot stuffing. A decidedly extreme Pashtun like Hekmatyar getting to the final round of the Presidential vote, or even pressuring someone like Ghani to posture more aggressively, is an explosive situation that could tear the Afghan government apart. These ethnic tensions are one reason it was difficult for the government to move on Dostum despite him being so objectively horrible, Ghani didn't want to lean on him too hard because it could alienate other Uzbeks.
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May 23, 2017 05:00
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The Taliban have been busy over the last week, in addition to the attack in Zabul OhFunny shared, there was another attack n a neighboring province south of Kabul and another in the northeast. Afghan forces, Taliban battle for control of Kunar quote:The Taliban began its assault on the districts on the evening of May 15. The Afghan military claimed it killed 22 Taliban fighters and wounded five more, while suffering no casualties of its own. The military also said it had repelled the jihadists’ attacks on “security posts located in Shegal, Watapur, Chapadara, Marwara district and several other areas,” Khaama Press reported. Taliban assaults provincial capital in southeastern Afghanistan quote:“This morning Ghazni’s Waghaz district was conquered. Numerous enemy fatalities, 2 APCs destroyed, 2 APCs plus weaponry captured,” Taliban spokesman Zahibullah Mujahid said on his official Twitter feed on May 20. “Dih Yak centre and provincial centers [Ghazni City] under attack,” he noted in a separate tweet.
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May 24, 2017 04:38
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Car bomb in the diplomatic quarter of Kabul. 80 dead and climbing.
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May 31, 2017 11:01
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The pictures are horrific. One bomb was that powerful?  It's just incredible to me that we can be involved in a war this disastrous and it's barely considered an important news topic from day to day.
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May 31, 2017 12:05
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https://twitter.com/AndrRoy/status/869848950064513024
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May 31, 2017 13:25
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Looks like over 450 injured.
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Jun 1, 2017 01:33
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 That's a big loving crater. 
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Jun 1, 2017 15:31
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The Taliban have gotten pretty good at blowing up helicopters with IEDs. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYi0YhVgNPc&t=110s This like at least the third time the Taliban have filmed themselves destroying a helicopter with a mine. That truck bomb last week has been attributed to the Haqqani network, although they have declined to take credit. Possibly because it was supposed to target the foreign embassy district but was detonated early after being stopped by police, and only managed to kill Afghans.
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Jun 8, 2017 03:34
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...db2e_story.html 3 US troops killed and 1 wounded by an Afghan soldier.
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Jun 11, 2017 03:51
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RIP
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Jun 11, 2017 04:30
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Squalid posted:The Taliban have gotten pretty good at blowing up helicopters with IEDs. Why are the Iraqis fighting the Taliban now?
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Jun 11, 2017 04:49
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Bip Roberts posted:Why are the Iraqis fighting the Taliban now? ? I think you're going o have to spell this one out for me.
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Jun 11, 2017 18:27
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Squalid posted:? I think you're going o have to spell this one out for me. The Taliban are based in Afghanistan, they really don't have a presence in Iraq.
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Jun 11, 2017 18:51
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SimonCat posted:The Taliban are based in Afghanistan, they really don't have a presence in Iraq. oh. . . lol I see now. To be honest I never even looked at the video title, I first saw the video when it was hosted on facebook linked through a think tank's blog and searched youtube for 'helicopter Taliban ied" and that was the same footage linked elsewhere, I don't know why the name is stupid. In other news Al Shabaab overran a Puntland military base, killed upwards of 30 soldiers and may have seized as many as 15 military vehicles. Unrelated to this incident, the US just launched its first drone strike in Somalia since Trump relaxed restrictions on offensive strikes in the country. This attack was on the opposite side of the country in southern Somalia, where Al Shabaab has recently escalated its operations against and within Kenya.
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Jun 12, 2017 01:27
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CNN posted:Washington (CNN)The Pentagon is expected to soon announce that Defense Secretary James Mattis will now have authority to make decisions about how many US troops are deployed to Afghanistan without first having to get formal agreement from the White House, according to a US official familiar with the plan. If this is true, there will almost certainly be a troop increase. Expect as many as 5,000 additional US troops to deploy to Afghanistan. There's also been talk of some American allies deploying small numbers of extra personnel as well.
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Jun 14, 2017 04:01
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We're going to throw a lot troops into Afghanistan over the next few years.
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Jun 14, 2017 17:20
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OhFunny posted:We're going to throw a lot troops into Afghanistan over the next few years. Hell yeah we are. Trumps gonna harden the generation of liberals up with a little reoccupation. 90k re enlistment bonuses for infantry? Yeah im gonna go teach kids how to kill and buy myself a tesla in the process. Just wsit till those little poo poo barrickstangs in the company parking lot try and race my 90d
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Jun 14, 2017 19:43
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Guess it will be "interesting" to find out just how long this pointless meat-grinder that wastes billions of dollars can last. 2025? 2035?
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Jun 14, 2017 23:10
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...omepage%2Fstory There it is. 4,000 more troops headed to Afghanistan.
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Jun 16, 2017 11:11
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How does 4000 troops do anything for anyone at all? Like, even if you are somehow a neocon in 2017, if you really want to change the situation in Afghanistan you'd need many multitudes of that number. You'd run into the same problems the initial invasion and the whole Iraq shitshow did being that dudes with guns alone isn't going to magically make a country a nice place, but you know, let's just put that aside. Even if you believe dudes with guns is going to solve anything, can anyone argue with a straight face another 4000 is going to do jack poo poo?
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Jun 16, 2017 14:37
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