The Pentagon Is Really Ramping Up The High Quality Bullsh*t About Afghanistan

Share

The flaks in the Pentagon’s press office seem to be working overtime to convince you that everything is fine, remain calm over in the dumpster fire that is the War in Afghanistan.

Exhibit A comes from a Defense.gov story from a few days ago:

None

That lead sentence certainly took my fucking breath away.

And then just one day later, “reporter” Jim Garamone, who works for the Pentagon’s official DoD News, knocked out this even higher-quality bullshit from a forward operating base in Afghanistan.

None

The propaganda piece notes that “Marine Corps Gen. Joe Dunford told reporters traveling with him ‘that from a military dimension, I am enthusiastic about the prospects for 2018.'”

Oh boy, you’re right, Joe. If you look at the Afghan War purely from a military dimension, it really hasn’t been a miserable failure for over a decade.

Speaking of Dunford, he testified last October alongside Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to the Senate Armed Services Committee, where they both argued that relaxed rules of engagement and an increase in airstrikes would help to do the trick.

I, for one, think we should definitely increase our bombing of North Vietna… I mean the Taliban.

And Dunford went on to tell a skeptical panel of congressional leaders that the U.S. military drew down in Afghanistan “too far and too fast” from a high of 100,000 troops in 2011 down to roughly 10,000 in 2016.

Apparently for Dunford, reducing the number of U.S. troops by about 18% each year over a five-year period seems to be at the speed of NASCAR. And the four-star general was intimately involved in that drawdown as the commander of the International Security Assistance Force there from 2013 to 2014.

“The Afghans no longer need much help fighting the Taliban — they can do that on their own,” Dunford wrote in July 2014.

Now in 2018, perhaps we should let them handle things. From a military dimension.

WATCH NEXT:

Paul Szoldra Avatar

Paul Szoldra

Editor

Paul Szoldra was the Editor in Chief of Task & Purpose from October 2018 until August 2022. Since joining T&P, he has led a talented team of writers, editors, and creators who produce military journalism reaching millions of readers each month. He also founded and edits Duffel Blog, a popular satirical newsletter for the military. Before becoming a journalist in 2013, he served as a Marine infantryman in Afghanistan, Korea, and other areas of the Pacific. His eyes still go up every time a helicopter from Camp Pendleton flies over his office in Southern California.