The Issue: The Taliban’s capture of Kabul, Afghanistan, after President Biden’s removal of US troops.
Are we the greatest country in the world with the strongest military power (“Kabul falls,” Aug. 16)? Seems hard to believe.
No disrespect to our brave men and women. The problem goes all the way to the top.
I refuse to believe that the American military could not defeat this group of savage thugs. After 20 years and over thousands of casualties, there’s absolutely nothing to show for the sacrifices of our military and their families.
This is totally unacceptable and another President Biden blunder, among many.
The American people are all for ending our longest war, but the Taliban should have been terminated before pulling out.
Raymond Klett
Warwick
The disgraceful way our forces were withdrawn from Afghanistan will go down as one of the most humiliating episodes in the history of our country’s military.
The complete blame for this rests at the feet of President Biden, who has shown himself to be completely inept as our commander-in-chief.
The responsibility for the carnage that will result after the Taliban has complete control of the population will rest with him.
His attempt to blame President Donald Trump for any of this will only serve to illustrate what a feckless, pathetic leader he is. He should resign.
Robert DiNardo
Farmingdale
Afghanistan can be added to the long list of stupid wars lost by the United States.
President George W. Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and the neocons got us into this war because they are part of the military-industrial complex warned about by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1961.
Critics are pointing to this as a foreign-policy disaster by Biden, which it is, but he knew that this would happen.
Biden and Trump both follow President George Washington’s advice in his farewell address against “permanent alliances.”
Taiwan is going to be the next domino to fall. China is reading the tea leaves from the United States’ abandonment of Afghanistan.
Andrew Delaney
Jamaica Estates
The Biden administration decided to pull the troops out of Afghanistan, and the results are a complete disaster, with innocent American civilians being put in great peril, the country itself being taken over and the release of hard-core terrorists who probably want to take revenge by committing despicable acts against innocent Afghan people caught up in the siege.
Some 20 years of fighting against those who wish to do innocent people harm down the drain.
No matter what anyone says about the prior president, he wouldn’t have allowed evil people to destroy everything proud soldiers bled and died for without retaliating.
Joseph Comperchio
Brooklyn
Taliban extremist evil-doers have taken control of Afghanistan.
Now, after 20 years of US presence, we are back to where we started after 9/11. We have lost 2,448 brave Americans who died there with more than 20,000 wounded. The cost was over $2 trillion.
This is a humiliating end to our presence there. Women and children are endangered and terrorism is free to roam.
The conflict ended much like how we left Saigon in 1975. I myself served in the Vietnam era as a member of the US Navy and remember how we left Vietnam.
As such, I am greatly saddened over the fall of Afghanistan. My heartfelt prayers go out to the Afghan people, who will be suffering so much under the Taliban. Biden has failed the Afghan people.
Fredrick Bedell
Bellerose
Bush started a war in Afghanistan with zero exit plan. Does he get much blame today? He has always had others take the fall for him. Now all he does is paint pictures.
He should be remembered like President Lyndon Johnson — another big talker from Texas who was part of the United States’ downfall.
Dannel Martin
Manchester, Conn.
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