www.thornwalker.com/ditch/morley_aftergran.htm
August 23, 2021
Afergranistan update
By EDWARD MORRISON MORLEY
Editor’s note: Mr. Morley was an international affairs analyst for CNN in its neocon days and did not attend some fancy-schmancy Ivy League school, but, as he succinctly puts it, “graduated from the school of hard knocks.” He was a Marine weapons instructor atFt. Bragg and later an interrogator at several rendition sites where he learned “how the other half lives.” He now works as a fence for rumors being spread by Edward Snowden and Glenn Greenwald, when not promulgating satirical takes on the news behind the news behind the news. Whatever.Now, as his veteran readers will know, in addition to everything else, Mr. Morley is quite the card. I must point out that I did not actually write any of the “editor’s” notes you will find below. — Nicholas Strakon, carefully backing away
1. “Taliban Snatch Up U.S.-Made Weapons,” by Brett Forrest, Wall Street Journal, August 21-22, 2021.
“Tanks, aircraft, rifles, and ammunition (Editor’s note: Oh, my!) fall into militant hands with rapid collapse ... scores of videos have emerged of Taliban fighters rejoicing near abandoned American helicopters, carrying U.S.-supplied M24 sniper rifles and M18 assault weapons, stacking other small arms and materiel in unending piles and driving Humvees and other U.S.-made military trucks.”
Aha! Expect Green New Dealers to criticize the Taliban for using climate-changing gas-hog vehicles. How disappointing. Or not. However, we aren’t sure how much of this stuff (some of which will likely soon be on sale in Chicago, Portland, Minneapolis, and other crime capitals of the United States. Be the first in your neighborhood!) has been “left behind.” (Editor’s note: Observe the sly reference here to the Biblical Apocalypse. EMM certainly has a way with words.) A Government Accounting Office report in 2017 said Washington had sent 600,000 small arms, 76,000 vehicles, and 208 airplanes to the Afghan military and police between 2003 and 2016. A recent report added to that 174 Humvees,
“National security advisor Jake Sullivan told reporters earlier this week that the administration doesn’t know where all of the military equipment has gone since delivery nor how much of it the Taliban have captured. (Editor’s note: A check of who signed for these weapons revealed names such as Mickey Mouse, Marlon Brando, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Nicolass [sic] Strakon, Bruce Willis, Roger Goodell, and Eric Holcomb.) The Pentagon for years has had a limited grasp of the disposition of military equipment sent to Afghanistan. (Editor’s note: That isn’t all that they have a limited grasp of.) A 2014 report ... stated that more than 200,000 small arms were unaccounted for.” That’s more than half of the small arms sent by 2014.
On the positive side, the article notes that airplanes and helicopters will not be of much use since the Taliban lack the expertise to operate and maintain them. And: “As the Taliban took control of the country, hundreds of Afghan service members flew to neighboring Uzbekistan on nearly 50 Afghan air force aircraft.” However, “the most valuable items are Humvees and Mine-Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles, known as MRAPS, since they ... require limited know-how and upkeep.”
2. Numerous publications on Saturday, August 21, 2021, headlined Sleepy Joe’s Big Promise: “Biden Vows to Bring All Americans Home,” as the Wall Street Journal put it. The prez neglected to say whether this meant “Alive or Dead,” but there are enough weasel words there to allow him to tick this off of his long list of “Promises Kept” whatever happens. (Editor’s note: Mr. Morley is funning with you here; the president has no such list. The only list he keeps is for his Alzheimer’s meds.)
Loyal readers of TLD (both of them) probably experienced a brief frisson at hearing the prez was going to “Bring All Americans Home,” but that only applies to Afergranistan, not the 170+ other countries in which the United States has some 200,000 active-duty U.S. military personnel as well as 70-plus bases. This does not count Afghanistan, Iraq, or Syria, since these are considered active combat deployments, and the Pentagon refuses to give accurate numbers there. Some 40,000 of the 200,000 are part of classified missions in locations that the U.S. government does not disclose either. (Editor’s note: I’m shocked! Shocked! The gummint won’t tell us these facts and doctors the numbers when it does?) (EMM note: I’m shocked! Shocked! That Strakon is shocked at the above.) (TLD readers: We’re shocked! Shocked! That you jokers are wasting so much of our time with ill-advised attempts at humor. Suck it up!)
BTW, for the difference between “frisson” and “ASMR,” for those of you taking notes, check this out. Where else but TLD can you get such informative stuff amidst all the satire? But I digress.
Anyway, Sleepy Joe — turning incredible incompetence and bungled planning that resulted in humiliating defeat into amazing victory the stuff of which legends are made — bragged, “This is one of the largest, most difficult airlifts in history, and the only country in the world capable of projecting this much power on the far side (Editor’s note: No, not that “Far Side”) of the world with this degree of precision is the United States of America.” Yowza! Too bad Washington abandoned earlier a much better and more easily defensible base at Bagram. And the U.S. authorities apparently don’t actually know at this late juncture how many Americans are still in Afergranistan or how many of the 18,000 allegedly evacuated since July were Americans, but we can count that later, much later, assuming that the gummint doesn’t think it is a secret as well.
3. In other news, Biden has dispatched VP Kamala Harris, fresh from resolving the border catastrophe (I think this might have been done by supporting the U.S. Afghan “policy” as a distraction), to the Far East, where the “chaotic exit from Afghanistan is raising questions about Washington’s reliability as an ally.” No kidding. Harris actually is going to take up “President Barack Obama’s unfinished ‘Asia rebalance’ policy.” I am not making this up. See Feliz Solomon and Terini Parti, “Asia Visit Aims to Mend Ties,” The Wall Street Journal, August 21-22, 2021.
“Analysts say a more comprehensive U.S. military presence in the region (Editor’s note: But obviously not including Afghanistan.) could ward off further encroachment” by China. Or not. So much for not spilling any more American blood in the Asian “Graveyard of Empires.” EMM predicts that China will “resolve” the Taiwan problem before the next U.S. presidential election.
No word on whether the Taliban are planning to celebrate on Biden’s chosen exit date, September 11, 2021. Stay tuned to TLD, your only legitimate source of news that ought to be news and/or fits.
4. The Economist magazine (UK), which for some reason persists in calling itself “a newspaper,” has for its August 21-22, 2021 cover the following in bold white letters: “Biden’s Debacle.” Glad they still speak some truth to power, even if it’s in another country. Ω
August 23, 2021
Published in 2021 by WTM Enterprises.
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