THE ERA OF TRUMP

[Smitty-48]

I feel like we have been down this whole - operators training and arming the Afghans in a shadow war - rabbit hole before for some reason.

Yeah, and the problem was, when the Soviets pulled out, Americans stopped caring and they ceded it to chaos, and then that chaos came to America in airliners, so now you know you can't turn your back on it, pottery barn rule and you can never leave, but you can't have a big footprint in there neither, because your little lefty friends gonna cry about it, ergo; back to the future, which is back to small footprint and disrupting people in Afghanistan, indefinitely.

It was the Soviets problem, but you brought them down, so now it's now your problem, forever, so might as well just get comfortable with it, and the best way to do that, is out of sight out of mind.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

I feel like we have been down this whole - operators training and arming the Afghans in a shadow war - rabbit hole before for some reason.

Yeah, and the problem was, when the Soviets pulled out, Americans stopped caring and they ceded it to chaos, and then that chaos came to America in airliners, so now you know you can't turn your back on it, pottery barn rule and you can never leave, but you can't have a big footprint in there neither, because your little lefty friends gonna cry about it, ergo; back to the future, which is back to small footprint and disrupting people in Afghanistan, indefinitely.

It was the Soviets problem, but you brought them down, so now its now your problem, forever, so might as well just get confortable with it, and the best way to do that, is out of sight out of mind.

Ah, I see. There is no actual victory condition... or, rather, it has already been met and now we are just, I don't know, maintaining victory.

I'm fine with that, just make it as cheap as possible.

[Hastur]

Build a wall.

Form a Night's Watch.

[Smitty-48]

I'm fine with that, just make it as cheap as possible.

Yeah, well, realpolitik, that's all it is, just leading the American horse to that water and making him drink it, because really, this horse is on crystal meth, so he can't really run his own foreign policy, that has to be done for him, so he can spend all his time screeching at himself in the domestic political bunfight over keeping the black man down.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

I'm fine with that, just make it as cheap as possible.

Yeah, well, realpolitik, that's all it is, just leading the American horse to that water and making him drink it, because really, this horse is on crystal meth, so he can't really run his own foreign policy, that has to be done for him, so he can spend all his time screeching at himself in the domestic political bunfight over keeping the black man down.

Well, he was elected to be a domestic policy president... like W.

Wait... shit.

[Smitty-48]

The main issue is overcorrection, after the Cuban Missile Crisis you overcorrect into Vietnam, then you overcorrect out of Vietnam into Detente, then you overcorrect out of Detente into Afghanistan, then you overcorrect out of Afghanistan into It's The Economy Stupid, then out of It's The Economy Stupid into the GWOT, now you wanna overcorrect back out again, the trick to imperialism, is just trying to smooth that out, mostly rule the waves, rarely get off the boat, and keep the enemies at bay on a more steady routine, in order to avoid the overcorrection syndrome.

Don't let shit build up on yeas, then you have to go big in repsonse, instead if you distrupt the enemies at the nascent level, continously, and indefintely, you can just cruise along, never have to get off the boat, Netflix and chill.

You can still have a big military as a jobs program or whatever, but you just use them for guard duty, in places where they're not going to fight, Poland, Norway, South Korea, Australia, nice places, where the locals are not hostile. But on the edge of the empire, indian country, that's where you use your spies, assassins and mercenaries, small footprint, disrupt and contain, that's what spies, assassins and mercenaries are for. I mean, duh.

[Ex-California]

Build a wall.

Form a Night's Watch.

Ice dragon don't care

[Ex-California]

Just remember, no matter how bad Trump is fucking things up at least these people were crying on Election Night

[GloryofGreece]

I feel like we have been down this whole - operators training and arming the Afghans in a shadow war - rabbit hole before for some reason.

Yeah, and the problem was, when the Soviets pulled out, Americans stopped caring and they ceded it to chaos, and then that chaos came to America in airliners, so now you know you can't turn your back on it, pottery barn rule and you can never leave, but you can't have a big footprint in there neither, because your little lefty friends gonna cry about it, ergo; back to the future, which is back to small footprint and disrupting people in Afghanistan, indefinitely.

It was the Soviets problem, but you brought them down, so now it's now your problem, forever, so might as well just get comfortable with it, and the best way to do that, is out of sight out of mind.

America has never had to accept "dealing" with a problem "forever". And they won't

[ssu]

Now you are talking! Yep, that would be the way..

But that's all the contractor model is, the CIA just signs people to contracts, they might have a few NOC's, maybe a SAD team, but for most of their boots on the ground, they would just have a private contracting company which would hire ex-Green Berets.

Not actually. There's differences how CIA/Special Forces can operate.

The way that the US went in 2001 after 9/11 was different from what a the basic contractor model is. Last time the whole thing in Afghanistan was basically given to the Pakistani's. That lead to what it lead to. Or the Contra's is another example. With a pure contractor model basically the fighting and the decisions at the field are left to contractors.

Light footprint might be good. Yet it's a more of a tactic than strategy.

What Afghanistan needs is a "Pashtun Awakening", just like in Iraq. But that's only possible if there's a reason for the Pashtuns to side with the Kabul government in the first place.