I went on to complain that the deaths of US service personnel in Afghanistan were not, as they should have been, front page news. That one is on WaPo and other newspapers.
Nor have I been taken in by the sunny and false pronouncements of the US spokesmen on Afghanistan.
I wrote at CNN in late 2012, just about exactly seven years ago, when the US still had 68,000 troops in that country along with some remaining ISAF (NATO) contingents, that:
"By summer of 2013, it is anticipated that the U.S. combat role in Afghanistan will draw to a close. By the end of 2014, only a few thousand U.S. troops will be left, and they will mainly supply close air support to the Afghanistan army when it engages in combat. Whether the some 350,000-strong Afghanistan security forces are up to the challenge of fighting the Taliban and other insurgents is a matter of great controversy. American officers in Kabul insist that the Afghanistan National Army (ANA) now takes the lead in 80 percent of operations against the enemy, up from 50 percent just last summer. But a recent Pentagon review admitted that only one of 23 ANA brigades is capable of functioning on its own, without U.S. or ISAF help. In 2012, some 300 were dying every month in battles with the Taliban and other militant groups. The ANA has low rates of literacy ([at 10%] a third the rate of the general population), high rates of drug use, and high rates of desertion. It is also disproportionately drawn from the Tajik, Dari Persian-speaking minority. Only 2 percent of the troops hail from Kandahar and Helmand Provinces in the Pashtun south, the strongholds of the Taliban."
My skepticism in 2012 has been more than borne out. I take no pleasure in saying so. When the US finally does get out of the country, which Trump desperately wants to pull off, my guess is that Kabul would fall within a year.
Bonus Video:
Washington Post: "Exclusive: A secret history of the war in Afghanistan, revealed"
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