US and Nato withdrawal from Afghanistan...- threadbanned users in OP

But last week we had people saying the US should be using drone strikes to take out ISIS/Taliban troops. Collateral damage didn't seem to matter then but now its a talking point.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, no matter what Biden does he will be wrong in the eyes of some.

I read an interesting interview with an Afghan translator who has been on the ground there working since 9/11.

He said that there was a time around 2003/4 that the Taliban were demoralised and defeated and retreated to the mountains. He felt strongly that that was the point where some dialogue around a peace deal would have been possible and was sought out by the Taliban but the Americans appeared only interested in revenge and continued bombings and drone strikes on controversial targets.

It was after this point that any chance of building on support from the Afghani people was irrevocably lost.

This sh*tshow goes from bad to worse. Now they appeared to have killed an innocent family with a drone strike while claiming it was a suicide bomber on the way to Kabul airport.

US "Intelligence" strikes again.

One of the most surreal videos I have seen yet about what the new Afghanistan will look like. And we all think our jobs are high pressure!

Hasnt "collateral damage" been a talking point for many years, since the beginning of the war, in fact? One of the first big stories I recall was the pentagon trailing a convoy supposedly carrying Al Zawahiri and the heated debate that ensued whether or not to zap the mosque into which the convoy had alighted. The hawks were frustrated on that occasion, whatever his other many crimes GWB didn't seem entirely sold on zapping large numbers of innocent human beings to take out one suspect. (From what i recall the conclusion was that Zawahiri was not even among the convoy, there was no absolute clarity).

The point is, though, a military strategy based on minimising your own casualties while inflicting greater casualties on the civilian population - and rationalizing it as "collateral damage" - is as doomed as pouring in huge numbers of troops and facing the wrath of people back home, as in the 60s.

Afghanistan version of Question Time!

"You sir, top row, with the AK47, what would you like to ask?"

There was an AFB photo posted online showing the car they blew up with the rocket launchers inside it.

Many more lives saved.

I suppose the US is rightly held to a higher standard here...

Just had a thought. Turkey has had these drone weapons as well for a few years and has become quite the drone "power". From what I've (edit) read the Turkish govt. uses them as the US has done (to kill their own versions of "terrorists") but perhaps with less restraint. I rarely see a reference to their actions in the media (which can also involve "collatoral damage") & the government certainly don't apologise and the Turks don't seem too worried about it either. In fact they are impressed (according to below article).

I'm not sure whether that indicates a failing by the US in setting ground rules for the use of these remote and possibly soon to be fully autonomous weapons (since they developed and deployed them first). IMO it's more likely expecting states to avoid civilian deaths when they use drones and the like to kill their enemies is totally unrealistic. We all know how the countries of the world have used "dumb" bombs dropped from aircraft since WW2 that are even more likely than drone strikes to result in civilian deaths. 

But but but,,,can you not see that they are protecting him????🙄

The war is officially over.

Last plane left.

Right or wrong, it’s the end of a 20 year war.

manned*

will this mean the middle east will go to sh1t again? with civil wars, oil prices sky rocketing etc?

How many civilians died in the last 20 years?