I appreciate your answering these questions. But, I think there's a bit too much military and not enough truth in these answers.

I have no idea where yall stand politically or, in relation to the war. I'm not a listener of yalls podcast but the idea that the USA had to invade a sovereign nation, spend trillions (while children starved at home), kill thousands of people (let alone INNOCENT PEOPLE), to find and stop Bin Laden and Al-Qaeda, is absolutely absurd.

Those same militants you were trying to fight and kill were built by the government to fight a proxy war against Russia.

How do you feel, knowing that at the hand of your government, millions have died. Not for de facto, "oh, the ends justify the means", bull shit. But, for pure profit and greed? You yourself say the M.O has changed since WW2. None of what the USA has done since then has been to benefit anyone but their own agenda. So, in all seriousness, how does it feel to fight for that? To die for that? To have your friends blown up, for that?

I'm not a soldier and I'd rather blow my fucking brains out than participate in an unjustified war, but I cannot imagine fighting and thinking you're on the side of good, and then slowly discovering it's anything but that. I don't fault y'all. I just would be devastated.

>2. Contractors became a useful tool to bypass troop limits in war zones.

Do you mean to avoid the questions from the public, at home?

Black Rock made well over $15 BILLION per year, and gave back over 2 million in bribes (lobbying). How does this look like anything other than laundering billions in tax dollars to the elite?

>4. The US didn't decide it was okay to torture. Certain individuals did. Torture is wrong.

The USA government didn't know about the torture?

>5. Conducting patrols through poppy fields was common. Guarding them was not.

And yet, it happened. While some soldiers were caught smuggling drugs. Seems suspicious, don't you think? Not to even mention the CIA, Iran contra, crack cocaine scandal and how it relates to the military invading and the opiates crisis exploding at the same time ... just a conspiracy on my end. But, not unfounded.

>6. The US is trying to pressure the Taliban government to become more tolerant and inclusive before releasing additional funds. Mind you, our government is still sending them money, just not as much.

You don't truly believe this, do you? Abortions rights are stripped away, trans rights stripped away, gay rights stripped away, children plunged back into poverty with the stroke of a pen, homeless climbing rapidly and you truly believe your government has a vested interest in the human rights of a country it just finished raping? Really?

>7. We don't have a good number but there are quite a few Americans still in Afghanistan.

So the USA is, in fact, not pulled out?

>8. That money isn't for reparations. And it's being withheld from the government for the above stated reasons.

So, to be clear, the USA government, is controlling what, 7 billion dollars of poor farmers and civilians because "Taliban bad"? Really?

>expeditious

This is the part that really got me going (as you can clearly see). This is such a BS equivocation. I'm trying really hard to participate in good faith but for you (who, let's be clear, are also a victim of the American agenda), to insinuate anything other than murder for hire, is really, really frustrating.

Kyle - Hey European! Sorry for the refugees, but I can’t speak for why the EU continues to accept them. Afghans have been a refuge seeking people since prior to the Russian invasion, so there has always been an Afghan refugee issue. I think the US is obligated to help those afghans who helped us and the other NATO countries during the war effort by providing safety, housing and some job opportunities. But, as you know especially in Europe, those things are sadly hard to find anywhere even by native citizens of the west. Don’t think it’ll get better. Much of the world has been destabilized and people, either to escape war or as opportunists, will use whatever loophole they can to reach the glorious welfare states of the west one way or another. As for whether it is our fault? Yes, I believe a lot of it is the US’ fault. I’m sure it’s nice to live in Europe, though where there is no history of meddling in the affairs of poor countries.

That’s true. I don’t work in that field either. I was just curious hahah.

Y’all have a good one, can’t wait to check out the next episode

Kyle - That’s a good point, but for many who want to get into the Intel field the military is the only way they can. And it’s weird to think of Intel being privatized considering, outside of corporate espionage, intelligence is in service of the state and I think it’s strange any of it is contracted out to private entities. True intelligence is conducted by the guys on the ground, often local nationals, who risk life and limb to tell us things for either patriotism or the USD. The “analysts” are just bureaucrats with a job title that sounds cool to people who don’t know and the roles in the Intel agencies are better suited to Mormon types who are squeaky clean and idealistic and believe in the cause. Because I never believed in the “cause” I’m not a very safe asset for the state to keep around. I work in a totally unrelated field now.

Kyle - I went in during a really big unemployment crisis in 2011. I was young and had no idea what to do with my life and thought I wanted to see what the Army is about despite reading all the famous war novels warning against it. I really just wanted to try it and go and have the experience. They were offering a bonus to linguists and going to study languages in Monterey CA seemed nice. And it was nice and it was difficult and at the end of it I could speak Korean. Well, Kim Jong Il died at the time and the army asked any native Korean speaker to switch to a linguist job and they’d promote them. So I finished school and since everyone had been promoted into the slots above me, my only chance at promotion was to switch jobs. Lol. Hard to explain but that was the first sign it was a shit show. Then I was assigned to fort hood which is a terrible place to be. Then I worked the Afghan mission in spy planes or remotely with drones. I met a lot of good people who are my friends to this day, but you quickly realized all the missions didn’t really matter because at the time no one could tell you why we were even in Afghanistan. I knew I wanted out so used my security clearance to do more Intel work when I realized that everyone knew the war was a failure and we just had to keep going through the motions. See documentary: hypernormalisation. We all knew it was a sham and kept going. I realized I wanted no part it in it, quit, went home and became an RN and got my masters degree with my GI bill. All that killing and death and hard work for a mission everyone knew didn’t matter.

I'll try to answer all of these.

1. The US initially went to Afghanistan following the events of 9/11 to eliminate Osama Bin Laden and al-Qaida.
2. Contractors became a useful tool to bypass troop limits in war zones. $108b, per the Costs of War.
3. Civilian deaths had numerous causes, most commonly from drone strikes, crossfire, and botched missions. Estimated civilian deaths from the Costs of War are around 70,000 people.
4. The US didn't decide it was okay to torture. Certain individuals did. Torture is wrong.
5. Conducting patrols through poppy fields was common. Guarding them was not.
6. The US is trying to pressure the Taliban government to become more tolerant and inclusive before releasing additional funds. Mind you, our government is still sending them money, just not as much.
7. We don't have a good number but there are quite a few Americans still in Afghanistan.
8. That money isn't for reparations. And it's being withheld from the government for the above stated reasons.
9. American foreign policy has certainly become more expeditious since World War II and that creates myriad problems. Problems that are not well known to people who enlist at 20 years old.

Watch the movie W. It will show you why and how the war happened. Rice and Rumsfeld were running the show.

I wish they wouldn't have deleted it. It sounds like it was an important question about the military destroying the planet.

Why was the USA over there? Why did the USA use contractors instead of actual military? How much was spent on those contractors and how much did those contractors spend on lobbying? Why did the USA murder so many innocent women and children? Why did the USA decide it was okay to torture? Why were soldiers guarding poppy fields? How many untold civilians deaths were there? How many civilians deaths did the politicians actually know about? Why is the USA using sanctions to kill civilians? How many more people are still in there even though they've "pulled out"? Why does the USA feel entitled to withhold billions of dollars of money from the Afghanistan people for supposed reparations to 9/11, when they had nothing to do with it?

Most importantly. How can anyone fight for a country whose sole purpose is to establish U.S hegemony in the Global South ostensibly for freedom but in reality for imperialist agenda

Well, the Taliban is running the show in Afghanistan again and thousands of people are dead. So there have been a few consequences. But none for the leadership that did the lying.

Zach - It seems the military as a whole is losing the race to attract good talent. I got paid about 5x more to do my job as a contractor than I did as a soldier. Why stick around when I know where the payday is? Furthermore, I now work in a completely different field in the civilian world. There are overlaps to my time as an analyst but I did not get my job because I was an analyst. I got my job because I had experience leading people from my days as a squad leader. That's becoming more common, at least among my friends. The military, specifically the Army, is starting to learn you can't treat soldiers like shit for $35,000 a year and expect them to stick around. If not for contracts, the situation would probably be worse.

No it isn’t, write him a letter lol.

1. Bin Laden was in Afghanistan and then fled to Pakistan.
2. I don't know what you should do with rejected Afghan asylum seekers. I couldn't tell you the first thing about your country's laws.

Well George W. isn't doing an AMA so kind of hard to ask him?

Have there been any consequences to the many lies the armed forces told everyone about the situation in Afghanistan?

Hey fellas, I was a sigint guy that worked with taac south quite a bit, now in the cyber world. Do you think the intel community as a whole is losing the race when it comes to attracting talent? What do you think the ramifications could be of a “lesser” IC? Looking at all of you and myself, contracting pays okay but once you have a truly marketable skill, your earning potential explodes and the government just doesn’t match that.

Not the AMA guy but this wasn’t done by them. Those decisions are made far, far above the level anyone of these guys worked at.

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European here. Thanks to the unnecessary mess the U.S. has created (Bin Laden did not even hide in Afghanistan) has lead to all kinds of turmoil in the region including hundreds of thousands of young male Afghans flee to Western Europe seeking for Asylum in the last 10 years. Some of them are criminal, unfortunately in relative numbers Afghans are most likely to commit a crime among all nationalities of immigrants. (at least in my county)

Now that you bailed and Taliban has taken over, the new Taliban Gov. Won't take rejected Asylum Seekers as well as criminals back and the European high Court has even decided that it is inhumane to send anyone back to Afghanistan and now everyone stays.

So you pretty much screwed us here. What should we do with them now? can you pick them up maybe?

Btw: thanks for having our back against putin. (I hope you will)

Zach - My parents both retired from the Army and tried to steer me away from joining. After pissing away an academic scholarship, I went to the recruiter. I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do but I knew I wasn't ready to continue trying to be a student. I took the ASVAB, scored really high, and joined. I don't know if I had a choice but to support the military when I joined, considering its impact on my upbringing. It's safe to say I certainly became disillusioned by the time I got out, but not necessarily with the military, but rather with senior leaders and policymakers.

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Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough

First off, thanks for everything you guys do with the podcast and whatnot. It's hard sometimes to get personal accounts and opinions from the warfronts when you live in the middle of the US and don't travel much.

What were your initial motivations in enlisting in the military? How much did you support the military going in, and how disillusioned were you by the time you left?

Bonus question for levity, what are y'all's favorite ice cream flavors?

Very interesting, thanks for the response.

Zach - Internet access is available in all provinces with varying levels of stability. All the figures we have found suggest only about a quarter of Afghans use the internet, specifically on their phones. We have followed certain Afghans who do exactly this, using technology to help provide education to remote and/or underserved areas of Afghanistan. I great account to follow for such activity is The Helmand Journal. He is doing a lot of good work and has opened at least a half dozen schools that I can think of. But he's only one person.

The Afghan people continue to receive aid through NGOs, albeit at a greatly reduced scale. And Afghanistan continues to trade with its neighbors. Despite public calls to outlaw opium production, that has not been the case, which provides an illicit and covert money supply for Afghans and the Taliban. If you're asking about the frozen funds designated for Afghanistan, we don't see that getting released any time soon.

Do folks have access to the internet on their phones? If so to what degree does it seem people able to educate themselves remotely instead of having to rely on whether or not the govt. decides to allow people in schools?