USA is finally out of Afghanistan

[ghazi52]

Celebrations have started in Kabul, after the fall of Panjshir to Afghan Taliban. For the first time in history Afghan Taliban have the control of entire Afghanistan.

 

[ghazi52]

September 3, 2021

Spectators wave Afghanistan's and Taliban flags as they watch the Twenty20 cricket trial match being played between two Afghan teams 'Peace Defenders' and 'Peace Heroes' at the Kabul International Cricket Stadium in Kabul on Friday. — Photos from AFP


A near-full house turned out to watch Afghanistan's top cricketers play in a trial match in Kabul on Friday, with Taliban and Afghan flags waving side by side in what sports officials called a show of national unity.

 

[Meengla]

September 3, 2021
A near-full house turned out to watch Afghanistan's top cricketers play in a trial match in Kabul on Friday, with Taliban and Afghan flags waving side by side in what sports officials called a show of national unity.

One thing is for certain--there is definitely much more peace in Afghanistan right now. Why? Because one of the major warring factions (NATO) has left while the other (the Taliban) have no one left to fight against. And hence we witnessed, almost overnight as Kabul fell on 15 August (India's Independence Day Gift, BTW, ) the choking checkpoints inside Kabul city were gone!! Gone overnight!! And also the double-taxation on truckers is gone now--previously, the transport truckers had to not only pay the Afghan govt. but also the Taliban to transport their goods. My understanding is that now they only pay once to a Taliban run toll booth and the receipt from that is valid and honored all across Afghanistan!!!

 

[ghazi52]

IEA Spokesperson Zabihullah Mujahid appreciates Pakistan's longstanding contributions for #Afghanistan & hoped for Pakistan's continued help for peace & greater trade by extending CPEC to Afghanistan. He assured that Pakistan will not have any threat from Afghanistan Talibans
..

 

[ghazi52]

The Telegraph

@Telegraph
Yesterday
Taliban arrests former British soldier as 400 Afghans he is trying to evacuate are turned away at border
A former British soldier's mission to evacuate 400 Afghans via a third country has failed after a coach of his staff was turned away at a land border between Afghanistan and a third country.
After being released, Slater was told he may cross the border with one assistant, but the rest of his staff must return to Kabul as they don't have visas to travel to the UK. Slater vowed he would continue to help them, telling
@Telegraph
he would attempt to secure visas

 

[ghazi52]

Kabul airport reopens to receive aid, domestic flights restart

Reuters
04 Sep 2021

DUBAI: Qatar's ambassador to Afghanistan said a technical team was able to reopen Kabul airport to receive aid, according to Qatar's Al Jazeera news channel, which also cited its correspondent as saying domestic flights had restarted.

The airport's runway has been repaired in cooperation with authorities in Afghanistan, the ambassador said, according to Al Jazeera. The channel said two domestic flights were operated from Kabul to the cities of Mazar-i-Sharif and Kandahar.

Kabul airport had been closed since the end of the massive U.S.-led airlift of its citizens, other Western nationals and Afghans who helped Western countries. The end of that operation marked the withdrawal of the last U.S. forces from Afghanistan after 20 years of war.

The evacuation of tens of thousands of people came amid the rapid takeover of Afghanistan by Taliban, the West's adversary in the two-decade war that followed the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the United States.

Thousands of people wanting to leave Afghanistan, fearful of life under Taliban rule, were left behind when the evacuation operation ended at the end of August. The Taliban has promised safe passage for those wanting to leave.

Qatar's Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, speaking at a joint news conference with Britain's Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab in Doha on Thursday, said the Gulf state was talking to the Taliban and working with Turkey for potential technical support to restart operations in Kabul airport.

 

[ghazi52]

US caused $350m worth of damage to Kabul airport: Taliban official

Al-Fatah Brigade formally handed security of airport


Shahbullah Yousafzai
September 04, 2021

PHOTO: EXPRESS


KABUL: Video clips showing US servicemen frantically damaging military vehicles and aircraft at Kabul airport before their evacuation went viral on social media earlier this week. According to Taliban estimates, the Hamid Karzai International Airport has suffered $350 million worth of damage.

The Gulf state of Qatar is working with the Taliban to reopen the airport with latest reports claiming that domestic flight operations have resumed at the facility.


Al-Fatah Brigade, an elite Special Forces unit of the Taliban, was handed the security of the airport Friday evening at a modest ceremony where the spokesperson for Logar province, Akif Mohajir, spoke to media persons informally.

“The US forces intentionally wrecked the airport equipment, their military vehicles and aircraft and other sensitive gadgets,” he said, adding that the Americans used explosives to blow up the items they couldn’t damage beyond use. “Most of the destruction took place at the Salt Hut area where CIA had kept most sensitive intelligence equipment.”


Al-Fatah Brigade


Al-Fatah Brigade has been formally handed the security of Hamid Karzai International Airport less than a week after the last US troops were evacuated from Afghanistan following 20 years of war. A contingent of Al-Fatah Brigade – comprising 70 newly-commissioned commandoes – was deployed to the airport.

During the insurgency, Al-Fatah Brigade was responsible for most daring operations, including suicide bombings and Fidayee attacks. “These special forces personnel had been trained for four months for specialised duties,” Qari Fawad Fateh, the commander of the Al-Fatah Brigade unit, told The Express Tribune at the Kabul airport.

In all, more than 12,000 Taliban guards have been deployed at the airport which has three layers of security, with Al-Fatah Brigade unit forming the last layer. The security of all airports and air strips nationwide has been handed over to Al-Fatah Brigade and Badri Brigades.

Kabul airport damages

The Taliban took full control of the airport on August 31, 2021, after the last US planes carrying military personnel and evacuees took off from the facility. Video clips showed Taliban fighters walking through hangars, inspecting damaged aircraft and equipment including helicopters, warplanes and armoured vehicles that American troops rendered unusable before they left.
According to rough estimates, the US military likely abandoned tens of millions of dollars’ worth of aircraft, armoured vehicles and sophisticated defensive systems in the rush to exit Kabul safely. Marine General Kenneth McKenzie, head of US Central Command, said some of the equipment had been “demilitarised”, essentially rendered inoperable.

US troops probably used thermate grenades, which burn at temperatures of 4,000 degrees Celsius, to destroy key components of the equipment, according to a defence department official who was not authorised to speak publicly.

The items at the Kabul airport, according to General McKenzie, include 70 MRAPs, or Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles, 27 Humvees, 73 aircraft, and an unspecified number of counter-rocket, artillery and mortar systems, which the Taliban are now parading as trophies of their long fight to retake their country.


While hectic efforts are ongoing to put the airport back into operations, the facility is littered with heap of unusable military garbage aside from the destroyed equipment. The Qassaba entrance to the airport and the nearby storm drain was filled with sandals, torn off clothes and other things which was the reminiscent of the chaos sparked by the hasty US exit and its evacuation of Afghans who support the Americans during 20 years of war.

Interestingly, the Taliban took over Kabul without firing a single bullet and announced general amnesty, yet crowds of Afghan nationals overwhelmed the airport in an attempt to find a seat on US military planes to get out of Afghanistan.

 

[khansaheeb]

View attachment 774066


The Taliban has asked Turkey to run Kabul airport providing it retains control of security there, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said.

"What does the Taliban say with regard to the airport issue? They say 'give us the security but you operate it'," he said in comments published by the official Andalou news agency.

"How come we hand you over the security? Let's say you took over the security, but how would we explain to the world if another bloodbath took place there? It's not an easy job."

He added that he would make a decision about whether or not Turkey could run the airport "once calm prevails".

However it has seemed less and less likely that Turkey will agree to do so since Wednesday, when it began to withdraw its approximately 500 non-combat troops from Afghanistan.

Dorduga , what choice do you have the Taliban must be asking. Turks need to realign with the Islamic world or face humiliation.
The time to chose is now or forever pay the price.

 

[ghazi52]

APP -04 09 21 KABUL: September 04 A view of medicines and medical equipment donated by United Arab Emirates reached at airport. APP

 

[ghazi52]

The last 24 hours: Brutality, trauma, moments of grace as the last US plane flew out of Afghanistan

Enemies for two decades, the Taliban and US were thrust into a bizarre collaboration for a common goal of wanting the latter out.

AP

Bone-tired like everyone else in Kabul, Taliban fighters spent the last moments of the 20-year Afghanistan war watching the night skies for the flares that would signal the United States was gone. From afar, US generals watched video screens with the same anticipation.

Relief washed over the war’s winners and the losers when the final US plane took off.

For those in between and left behind — possibly a majority of the allied Afghans who sought US clearance to escape — fear spread about what comes next, given the Taliban’s history of ruthlessness and repression of women. And for thousands of US officials and volunteers working around the world to place Afghan refugees, there is still no rest.

As witnessed by The Associated Press in Kabul and as told by people The AP interviewed from all sides, the war ended with episodes of brutality, enduring trauma, a massive if fraught humanitarian effort and moments of grace.

US Marines with Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force - Crisis Response - Central Command, provide assistance during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 20, 2021. — AP

Enemies for two decades were thrust into a bizarre collaboration, joined in a common goal — the Taliban and the United States were united in wanting the United States out. They wanted, too, to avoid another deadly terrorist attack. Both sides had a stake in making the last 24 hours work.

In that stretch, the Americans worried that extremists would take aim at the hulking, helicopter-swallowing transport planes as they lifted off with the last US troops and officials. Instead, in the green tint of night-vision goggles, the Americans looked down to goodbye waves from Taliban fighters on the tarmac.

The Taliban had worried that the Americans would rig the airport with mines. Instead, the Americans left them with two useful fire trucks and functional front-end loaders along with a bleak panorama of self-sabotaged US military machinery.

After several sleepless nights from the unrelenting thunder of US evacuation flights overhead, Hemad Sherzad joined his fellow Taliban fighters in celebration from his post at the airport.

In this undated image Hamed Sherzad holding his M-4 rifle, poses for a photo outside of Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. — AP

“We cried for almost an hour out of happiness,” Sherzad told AP. “We yelled a lot — even our throat was in pain.”

In the Pentagon operations centre just outside Washington at the same time, you could hear a pin drop as the last C-17 took off. You could also hear sighs of relief from the top military officials in the room, even through Covid masks. President Joe Biden, determined to end the war and facing widespread criticism for his handling of the withdrawal, got the word from his national security adviser during a meeting with aides.

“I refused to send another generation of America’s sons and daughters to fight a war that should have ended long ago,” he said.
Gen Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was among those watching at the Pentagon. “All of us are conflicted with feelings of pain and anger, sorrow and sadness,” he said later, “combined with pride and resilience.”

It was a harrowing 24 hours, capped on Monday by the final C-17 takeoff at 11:59pm in Kabul. Some who spoke to The AP about that period requested anonymity. US officials who did so were not authorised to identify themselves.

US Marines with Special Purpose Marine Air-Ground Task Force - Crisis Response - Central Command, provide assistance at an evacuation control checkpoint during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 21, 2021. — AP

Airport madness

Before leaving Kabul, a US consular officer with 25 years at the State Department was busy trying to process special visas for qualifying Afghans who made it through the Taliban, Afghan military and US checkpoints into the airport. What she saw was wrenching.

“It was horrendous what the people had to go through to get in,” she said. “Some people had spent three to five days waiting.
On the inside, we could hear the live ammunition being fired to keep the crowds back and the ones who made it in would tell us about Taliban soldiers with whips, sticks with nails in them, flash-bang grenades and tear gas pushing people back.”

Even more upsetting, she said, were the children who got inside the airport separated from family, some plucked by chance out of teeming crowds by US troops or others. As many as 30 children a day, many confused and all of them frightened, were showing up alone for evacuation flights during the 12 days she was on the ground.

A small unit at the airport for unaccompanied children set up by Norway was quickly overwhelmed, prompting Unicef to take over. Unicef is now running a centre for unaccompanied child evacuees in Qatar.

An Afghan man hands his child to a British Paratrooper assigned to 2nd Battalion, Parachute Regiment while a member of 1st Brigade Combat Team, 82nd Airborne Division conducts security at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 26, 2021. — AP

More broadly, the US sent thousands of employees to more than a half-dozen spots around Europe and the Middle East for screening and processing Afghan refugees before they moved on to the United States, or were rejected. US embassies in Mexico, South Korea, India and elsewhere operated virtual call centres to handle the deluge of emails and calls on the evacuations.

Over the previous days in Kabul, many Afghans were turned back by the Taliban; others were allowed past them only to be stopped at a US checkpoint. It was madness trying to sort out who satisfied both sides and could make it through the gauntlet.

Some Taliban soldiers appeared to be out for rough justice; others were disciplined, even collegial, over the last hours they spent face to face with US troops at the airport. Some were caught off-guard by the US decision to leave a day earlier than called for in the agreement between the combatants.

US Marines and Norweigian coalition forces assist with security at an Evacuation Control Checkpoint ensuring evacuees are processed safely during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 20, 2021. — AP

Sherzad said he and fellow Taliban soldiers gave cigarettes to the Americans at the airport and snuff (smokeless tobacco) to Afghans still in the uniform of their disintegrating army.

By then, he said, “everyone was calm. Just normal chitchat,” yet, “We were just counting minutes and moments for the time to raise our flag after full independence.”

US efforts to get at-risk Afghans and others onto the airport grounds were complicated by the viral spread of an electronic code that the US sought to provide to those given priority for evacuation, said a senior State Department official who was on the ground in Kabul until Monday.

The official said the code, intended for local Afghan staff at the US Embassy, had been shared so widely and quickly that almost all people seeking entry had a copy on their phone within an hour of it being distributed.

At the same time, the official said, some US citizens showed up with large groups of Afghans, many not eligible for priority evacuation. And there were Afghan “entrepreneurs” who would falsely claim to be at an airport gate with groups of prominent at-risk Afghan officials.

Soldiers with the 82nd Airborne Division check evacuees during an evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 25, 2021. — AP

“It involved some really painful trade-offs for everyone involved,” the official said of the selections for evacuation. “Everyone who lived it is haunted by the choices we had to make.”

The official said it appeared to him, at least anecdotally, that a majority of the Afghans who applied for special visas because of their past or present ties with the US did not make it out.

Among the hurdles was the design of the airport itself. It had been constructed with restrictive access to prevent terrorist attacks and did not lend itself to allowing any large groups of people inside, let alone thousands frantically seeking entry. All of this unfolded under constant fear of another attack from an offshoot of the militant Islamic State (IS) group that killed 169 Afghans and 13 US service members in the Aug 26 suicide bombing at the airport.

There were times, said another US official familiar with the process, when Afghans made it on to evacuation planes, only to be pulled off before the flight when they were found to be on no-fly lists.

This official said that as far as is known, all but one US Embassy employee made it out. That person had the required special visa but couldn’t bear to leave her parents and other relatives behind. Despite pleading from Afghan and American colleagues to get on the evacuation bus to the airport, she opted to stay, the official said.

Afghan passengers board a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III during the Afghanistan evacuation at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 22, 2021. — AP


But a 24-year-old former US contractor, Salim Yawer, who obtained visas and a gate pass with the help of his brother, a US citizen, never got out with his wife and children aged four and one-and-a-half years old. They tried four times to get to the airport before the Americans left.

“Each time we tried getting to the gate, I was afraid my small children would come under the feet of other people,” he said. He, too, did not expect the Americans to leave on Monday, and he went back to the airport the next day.

“We didn’t know that night that the Americans would leave us behind,” Yawer said. ”Monday, still, there were US forces and planes and hopes among people. But Tuesday was a day of disappointment. [...] Taliban were all over the area and there was no plane in the sky of Kabul anymore.”

Yawer owned a Kabul construction company and travelled to various provinces doing work for the US Army Corps of Engineers, he said from his village back in northern Kapisa province, where he fled.

A US Air Force airman guides evacuees to board a US Air Force C-17 Globemaster III at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 24, 2021. — AP


Countdown

On the evening of Sunday, Aug 29, in Kabul, surveillance showed people loading explosives into the trunk of a vehicle, US officials said.

The US had been watching the car for hours, with reports of an imminent threat of another IS attack. An American RQ-9 Reaper drone launched a Hellfire missile into the vehicle, in a compound between two buildings.

US officials said surveillance showed the initial missile explosion, followed by a large fireball, which they believed to be caused by the explosives in the vehicle. Neighbours disputed the US claims of a vehicle packed with explosives.

On the ground, Najibullah Ismailzada said his brother-in-law Zemarai Ahmadi had just arrived home from his job working with a Korean charity. As he drove into the garage, his children came out to greet him, and that’s when the missile struck.

“We lost 10 members of our family,” Ismailzada said. Six ranged in age from two to eight. He said another relative, Naser Nejrabi, who was an ex-soldier in the Afghan army and interpreter for the US military, also was killed, along with two teenagers.

Several hours after the drone strike, Biden was at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware to witness the dignified transfer of the remains of the 13 US troops killed on Aug 26’s suicide bombing and to meet the bereaved families. The card he keeps with him, listing the number of American service members who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan, had been updated with “plus 13”, according to a person familiar with the president’s exchange with the families.

President Joe Biden watches as a carry team moves a transfer case containing the remains of Marine Corps Lance Cpl Kareem M Nikoui, 20, of Norco, California, during a casualty return at Dover Air Force Base, Delaware, US on August 29, 2021. — AP


In the final scramble at the Kabul airport that evening, evacuees were directed to specific gates as US commanders communicated directly with the Taliban to get people out.

About 8am on Monday, explosions could be heard as five rockets were launched toward the airport. Three fell outside the airport, one landed inside but did no damage and one was intercepted by the US anti-rocket system. No one was hurt.
Again, IS militants, common foe of both the Taliban and the Americans, were suspected as the source.

Smoke rises from a deadly explosion outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 26, 2021. — AP


Through the morning, the last 1,500 or so Afghans to get out of the country before the US withdrawal left on civilian transport. By 1:30pm, 1,200 US troops remained on the ground and flights began to move them steadily out.

US airpower — bombers, fighter jets, armed drones and the special operations helicopters known as Little Birds — provided air cover.

Into the evening, US troops finished several days’ work destroying or removing military equipment.

They disabled 27 Humvees and 73 aircraft, often draining transmission fluids and engine oil and running the engines until they seized. They used thermite grenades to destroy the system that had intercepted a rocket that morning. Equipment useful for civilian airport purposes, like the fire trucks, were left behind for the new authorities.

Afghan military aircraft is seen after the Taliban's takeover inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on September 5, 2021. — AP

In the end, fewer than 1,000 troops remained. Five C-17 planes came in darkness to take them out, with crews specially trained to fly into and out of airfields at night without air traffic control.

From Scott Air Force Base in Illinois, Gen Jacqueline Van Ovost, commander of Air Mobility Command, watched on video screens as the aircraft filled and lined up for takeoff. An iconic image showed Maj Gen Christopher Donahue, commander of the 82nd Airborne Division, carrying his M-4 rifle as he walked into a C-17 and into history as the last of the US soldiers in Afghanistan.

Maj Gen Chris Donahue, commander of the US Army 82nd Airborne Division, XVIII Airborne Corps, prepares to board a C-17 cargo plane at Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 30, 2021, as the final American service member to depart Afghanistan. — AP



.

 

[ghazi52]

Crisp orders and messages captured the last moments.

“Chock 5 100 per cent accounted for,” said one message, meaning all five aircraft were fully loaded and all people accounted for. ”Clamshell,” came an order, meaning retract the C-17 ramps one by one. Then, “flush the force,” meaning get out.

One minute to midnight, the last of the five took off.

Soon came the message “MAF Safe,” meaning the Mobility Air Forces were gone from Kabul air space and in safe skies.

The American generals relaxed. From the ground in Kabul, Taliban fighter Mohammad Rassoul, known among other fighters as “Afghan Eagle”, had been watching, too.

“Our eyes were on the sky desperately waiting,” he said. The roar of planes that had kept him up for two nights had stopped. The Taliban flares at the airport streaked the sky.

“After 20 years of struggle we achieved our target,” Rassoul said. He dared hope for a better life for his wife, two daughters and son.

“I want my children to grow up under peace,” he said. “Away from drone strikes.”

Taliban fighters stand guard inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport after the US withdrawal in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 31, 2021. — AP

A damaged Afghan military airplane and vehicle are seen after the Taliban's takeover inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on September 5, 2021. — AP

Damaged Afghan military aircraft are seen after the Taliban's takeover inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on September 5, 2021. — AP

Damaged Afghan military aircraft are seen after the Taliban's takeover inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on September 5, 2021. — AP

Taliban fighters collect military clothes near damaged Afghan military aircraft after the Taliban's takeover inside the Hamid Karzai International Airport in Kabul, Afghanistan on September 5, 2021. — AP

 

[Meengla]

A surreal but hilarious video about the American 'spoils of war' ending up in Lahore, Pakistan! There is even gadgets for 'shut your ears to your nagging wife'!! Oh, this old man even sold the spoils of war when the Soviets left Afghanistan. Hilarious!! But, sorry, its in Urdu.

 

[ghazi52]

Around 200 evacuated Afghans come under suspicion of US intelligence, Pentagon says

https://nation.com.pk/NewsSource/sputnik
Sputnik
1:47 PM | September 05, 2021


The US completed its withdrawal from Afghanistan earlier this week, ending a 20-year military presence in the country, with the Taliban* re-taking control of the nation after ousting the Western-backed government.

The Taliban took full control of Kabul after the withdrawal of the US and its allies was completed this week. However, Panjshir, with prominent resistance leader Ahmad Massoud at the helm, was reported to remain the only province in the country to have refused to surrender to the Islamist group.

On Friday, Taliban spokesman Bilal Karimi said that Panjshir was fully controlled by the terrorist group, while the resistance leaders had allegedly fled the country. However, later in the day, self-proclaimed interim president Amrullah Saleh denied the capture of Panjshir and said that he remained in the province.

The group's swift takeover of the country and especially Kabul in mid-August has led Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to flee the country for the United Arab Emirates and forced thousands of Afghans to seek escape for fear of reprisals from the militants. The panic among locals caused deadly chaos at Kabul's airport as the US and its allies were evacuating foreigners, diplomatic staff and war-time Afghan allies.

 

[Meengla]

Around 200 evacuated Afghans come under suspicion of US intelligence, Pentagon says

The whole concept of granting immigration to Western countries to those who collaborated with invading forces is a BIG ABSURD STUPIDITY!! Let's set aside the political correctness and sensitivities about this and think: The main motives to 'help' the NATO presence in Afghanistan was to secure a way to feed their families-- to survive! Those who helped, helped with that and only that in their minds. They would help an Army of Lucifer in that wretched country just to survive. And I am NOT even remotely blaming the Afghans for trying survive however they could in that wretched country. I am simply ridiculing the absurd sensitivities of the Western discourse about 'helping those Afghans who stood by us'. Indians are smarter than that and they have not accepted Afghan collaborators!!

Also, Afghans have been DESPERATELY running away from Afghanistan for decades. DECADES!!! And to a lesser extent, most poor countries of the world have people running away to the WEST. These exoduses are not different from the millions of years old human being migrating for better opportunities.

What a load of CRAP we have been told and sold about Afghans fleeing the Taliban!!!!

 

[SIPRA]

The whole concept of granting immigration to Western countries to those who collaborated with invading forces is a BIG ABSURD STUPIDITY!! Let's set aside the political correctness and sensitivities about this and think: The main motives to 'help' the NATO presence in Afghanistan was to secure a way to feed their families-- to survive! Those who helped, helped with that and only that in their minds. They would help an Army of Lucifer in that wretched country just to survive. And I am NOT even remotely blaming the Afghans for trying survive however they could in that wretched country. I am simply ridiculing the absurd sensitivities of the Western discourse about 'helping those Afghans who stood by us'. Indians are smarter than that and they have not accepted Afghan collaborators!!

Also, Afghans have been DESPERATELY running away from Afghanistan for decades. DECADES!!! And to a lesser extent, most poor countries of the world have people running away to the WEST. These exoduses are not different from the millions of years old human being migrating for better opportunities.

What a load of CRAP we have been told and sold about Afghans fleeing the Taliban!!!!

That is exactly the case.