Kabul Becoming More Dicey — FIGHT!
Various offline sources telling me they having more difficult time getting people out. Sort of a lost at sea situation with limited assets, a government that is more a part of the problem than are the Taliban, and a huge Cat 5 hurricane barreling in.
Do not give up hope. I know that there are efforts underway as I write this. More people will be rescued.
But in the end, Taliban checkmated the Pentagon and Biden — meaning, in my view, there is no way this ends nicely. If we reinforce, the war likely will flare up. If we don’t reinforce, we have no chance of getting a lot of the people out. They simply will be Left Behind.
Personally, I would go in guns blazing and remind Taliban how much power we still have. And I would match coercion with coercion. B-52s. Fuel Air Bombs. The works. I would say leave us alone until we get our people out or we will start arc-lighting your safe havens and you can sort that out at the war trials. Leave us alone or you will do an Operation Steady Rain of cruise missiles and everything else that makes it hard to sleep at night.
We simply cannot do this nicely. We either leave Americans behind, or we fight. I chose fight.
https://amp.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/23/uk-scrambles-to-complete-airlift-out-of-kabul-after-warning-about-taliban?__twitter_impression=true