These words are those of ITV correspondent JOHN IRVINE in an article for the Mail on Sunday dated 29.08.21 and are echoed by US-born Tory defence chairman TOBIAS ELLWOOD as he comments on Biden's 'geo-strategic blunder' with these words "If this isn't what defeat looks like, I don't know what does". The article can be read in full by clicking at the bottom of this post.
However, for me these words from Tobias Ellwood stand out and need to be highlighted:
"President Biden's decision to follow through on Donald Trump's election promise to 'bring our troops home' was made with little thought as to what might happen next.
Biden has gifted the Taliban $85 billion worth of abandoned US military equipment, including 600,000 weapons, 75,000 vehicles and 200 aircraft.
The Taliban now have more Black Hawk attack helicopters than 85% of the world's countries.
Worse, the President claims that leaving Afghanistan enables us to focus on the bigger geo-political threats of China and Russia.
But look where Afghanistan sits - squarely between the two. China and Russia are already stepping into our shoes, ready and willing to finance and bolster the very people that allowed 9/11 to happen.
And we will know little because, most critically, we have lost complete intelligence oversight of their plans as we have lost our eyes and ears on the ground.
Now the country is in play again, we have no traction. US money, which propped up three-quarters of the Afghan Government's annual budget, is gone.
But China has already offered $60 billion for access to the country's rich mineral resources.
It was not as if Afghanistan was a terrible drain of the West's blood and treasure.
Only 2,000 troops remained. Combat operations had ended in 2014.
Yes, Afghanistan was messy, corrupt and the governance model we imposed totally inappropriate.
But things were plodding in the right direction. It was entirely the wrong moment to withdraw troops.
In short, we have cut and run. We have armed our enemy and handed them to Presidents Xi and Putin, our historic rivals."
Here is the link to the article in pdf:
Afghanistan is today a graveyard of Western ideals that many Afghans had come to hold dear. Pictured: Troops in Kabul on August 26
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