A Weird Alignment of the Planets; Ross Douthat Ed.

One of Ross Douthat's opinion pieces was published in the Times today. It's a rare piece in which I find myself in full agreement.

I should quote extensively from it, but fuck that. Go read the entire thing.

This morning, I was musing to a friend that when the Soviets left, the government that they left behind endured for several years. The one we tried to establish folded and fled almost two weeks before the last C-17 left Kabul.

Afghanistan was Vietnam-lite. Adjusted for inflation, it probably cost as much. We did lose a lot fewer soldiers, but we had far better technology and could do more things with fewer soldiers. Over the years, the pronouncements from Central Command and from the various names of the command in Afghanistan were filled with the same sort of misleading bullshit that MAC-V used to hand out. In both wars, reporters could easily go out and send back reports that showed that the press releases from the commanders were at best, highly optimistic, or cynically, self-serving lies. (Here's one example.)

I wrote this, ten years ago:

In no small measure due to the fecklessness of the Bush Administration, we are locked into a land war in one of the most inhospitable and inaccessible places on the planet. In Year Ten of the war, the best that the commanders can say at the Five O'Clock Follies is that "tangible progress" has been made. Many more American fighting men and women will be killed and maimed. At least another trillion dollars will be spent. There is no end in sight for this war.

Trump made a horrible deal with the Taliban, but at least he had the courage to go against the forever war national security establishment and set in place the end of the war, even though he and his administration made every attempt to make it harder for our in-country allies to leave. Biden may not have liked the deal and the ending could have been handled better, but he brought it to a conclusion.

And rest assured, we are not done paying for this war. We will be paying veterans' benefits and survivors' benefits well into the 22nd Century.