Each day at just after midnight Eastern, a post like this one is created for contributors and readers of this site to upload news links and video links on the issues that concern this site. Most notably, Islam and its effects on Classical Civilization, and various forms of leftism from Soviet era communism, to postmodernism and all the flavours of galloping statism and totalitarianism such as Nazism and Fascism which are increasingly snuffing out the classical liberalism which created our near, miraculous civilization the West has been building since the time of Socrates.
This document was written around the time this site was created, for those who wish to understand what this site is about. And while our understanding of the world and events has grown since then, the basic ideas remain sound and true to the purpose.
So please post all links, thoughts and ideas that you feel will benefit the readers of this site to the comments under this post each day. And thank you all for your contributions.
This is the new Samizdat. We must use it while we can.
I think the enemy is about to achieve the perfect trifecta with Afghanistan, Taiwan, and South Africa, and I think they’re going to do it under the watch of their agent, Joseph Biden. I think they have enough dirt on that corrupt scumbag to put him away for life and he is doing whatever they say to avoid going to a place called, “Fort Leavenworth”.
Be nervous, folks. The enemy is poised to strike again while they have a ringer in the oval office and can do whatever they like until the Great Satan figures out that they’ve been seriously breached. The timing is perfect. The Chinese could invade Australia and Japan and the Americans would just sit there sputtering and defenseless. As long as Joe Biden is President there is no United States of America. The Chinese are currently winning 10 to 1…
Here’s a guy asking valid questions. Why the rush everywhere? Why have Biden’s handlers cut and run so haphazardly from Afghanistan? What’s with this insane panic to have everyone vaxxed overnight while there is no more pandemic? What’s coming?
https://alt-market.us/the-afghanistan-exit-debacle-incompetence-distraction-or-something-more-sinister/
Those are good questions, I thought they were rushing their plan through before they were lynched.
Normal US Gov screw up on my follow up antibiotics and steroids, I have to make a quick trip to the VA to pick them up. Will be back later today.
An international space station is not a great place to freak out:
https://southfront.org/russia-softens-edges-in-space-scandal-with-u-s/
You were asking where I am, I’m back I had pneumonia and was in hospital for 4 days, all hell broke loose and I couldn’t do anything more then watch FOX.
That was serious, Richard. Hope you are well.
Doctors working with a barrage of medications for Viruses, bacteria, and fungi.
The heartwrenching spectacle continues:
https://summit.news/2021/08/19/sources-british-and-us-troops-at-odds-in-afghanistan-as-uk-engages-rescue-missions/
Tucker Carlson Tonight 19 Aug 21
https://www.bitchute.com/video/ThFfyVQndubG/
Relative of DW journalist killed by the Taliban
Journalists and their families are in grave danger in Afghanistan. The Taliban have no compunction about carrying out targeted killings as the case of a DW journalist shows.
https://www.dw.com/en/relative-of-dw-journalist-killed-by-the-taliban/a-58912975
Taliban fighters hunting a DW journalist have shot dead one member of his family and seriously injured another. The Taliban were conducting a house-to-house search to try and find the journalist, who now works in Germany.
Other relatives were able to escape at the last moment and are now on the run. DW Director General Peter Limbourg issued a strong condemnation and called on the German government to take action.
“The killing of a close relative of one of our editors by the Taliban yesterday is inconceivably tragic, and testifies to the acute danger in which all our employees and their families in Afghanistan find themselves,” Limbourg said. “It is evident that the Taliban are already carrying out organized searches for journalists, both in Kabul and in the provinces. We are running out of time!”
[..]
Also see
https://www.dw.com/en/taliban-hunting-down-afghans-on-blacklist-report/a-58914571
On FOX Mitch McConnel just set a new standard us to live by, “Never get to the left of the French.”
Misread warnings helped lead to chaotic Afghan evacuation
https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-evacuations-7c1dee67125504cb3aa0800c414d6def
The warnings were clear: The Afghan government would likely fall once U.S. troops pulled out. But intelligence agencies and ultimately President Joe Biden missed how
quickly it would happen, losing weeks that could have been used for evacuations and spurring a foreign policy crisis.
Without a sense that the country could collapse so quickly, the administration heard out Afghan President Ashraf Ghani when he met face-to-face with Biden in June.
Biden says Ghani pressed him to hold off on any urgent evacuation of Americans, arguing that it would be inviting the Taliban to advance more quickly — as it turned
out they did anyway — and telling the Afghan army to give up.
[..]
Biden on Wednesday blamed Ghani for fleeing the country and Afghan forces for surrendering so easily to the Taliban. He told ABC News that he believed the problems with
the withdrawal were inevitable.
“The idea that somehow, there’s a way to have gotten out without chaos ensuing, I don’t know how that happens,” he said.
[..]
Biden’s assertion on Monday that some Afghans, “still hopeful for their country,” didn’t want to leave has been widely criticized. The State Department has a backlog of
tens of thousands of visa applications from those who have been trying for years to depart the country ahead of the U.S. withdrawal. That is now set for Aug. 31, though
Biden said Wednesday Americans would not be left behind.
While analysts have long warned that the Afghan government would be in grave danger without American support, they didn’t anticipate the speed at which it would fall to
the Taliban.
That miss is sparking instant reviews of what went wrong, current and former U.S. officials said, speaking only on condition of anonymity because they were not
authorized to speak publicly on the subject.
As recently as two weeks ago, intelligence agencies in briefings to lawmakers gave no warning that the Afghan government faced imminent collapse, an official familiar
with the briefings said.
A defense estimate that Kabul could be surrounded within 30 days — an assessment that was viewed as pessimistic when it was reported last week — turned out instead to
be far too optimistic. In just over a week, the Taliban overran the country and entered Kabul without a fight.
[..]
According to a former official, one assessment predicted that a large-scale terrorist attack could be planned in Afghanistan within one to three years of the withdrawal.
[..]
Chris Miller, who deployed to Afghanistan in 2001 and later was the nation’s top counterterrorism official and acting defense secretary under former President Donald Trump, called the missed speed “an intelligence failure of cataclysmic proportions.”
“We have something fundamentally wrong with the way we do our intelligence assessments in our country,” he said. “It’s cultural and technological arrogance. This was so predictable how this was going to go down.”
The Latest: US says Kabul evacuees don’t need COVID tests
The U.S. State Department says evacuees from Afghanistan are not required to get a negative COVID-19 test to be able to leave Kabul
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/latest-biden-troops-us-evacuees-79533389
Amid the chaos and confusion at the airport, the United States said it had taken at least one step to ease requirements for those seeking to leave: COVID-19 tests.
Although Afghanistan had been a hotspot for the coronavirus pandemic, the State Department said Thursday that evacuees are not required to get a negative COVID-19 result to travel.
“A blanket humanitarian waiver has been implemented for COVID testing for all persons the U.S. government is relocating from Afghanistan,” the department said.
It referred questions about how the matter would be handled once evacuees arrive in the United States to the Department of Health and Human Services. Medical exams, including coronavirus tests, had been required for evacuees prior to Taliban’s weekend takeover of Kabul, which added extra urgency to efforts to get at-risk Afghans out of the country.
Former Afghan Women’s National Soccer Team Capt. Warns Players to Delete Pics, Destroy Uniforms
https://www.breitbart.com/sports/2021/08/19/former-afghan-womens-national-soccer-team-capt-warns-players-to-delete-pics-destroy-uniforms/
The former captain of the Afghanistan Women’s National Soccer Team is warning her fellow players still in Afghanistan to delete all social media, burn uniforms, and discard their soccer gear to avoid retaliation by the radical Islamist Taliban.
Khalida Popal, who now lives in Copenhagen, told Reuters that in the past, members of the Taliban had beaten, raped, and murdered female athletes for violating the Taliban’s Islamist tenets. Popal says she is scared for women athletes still stuck in Afghanistan.
[..]
“Today, I’m calling them and telling them, take down their names, remove their identities, take down their photos for their safety. Even I’m telling them to burn down or get rid of your national team uniform,” she told Reuters.
[..]
Jonathan Pie: UK Foreign Policy (is a joke)
Sky News Australia: ‘Didn’t take long’ for Taliban to ‘show true colours’
9+
What China doesn’t understand is that Ta!iban is not Hamas
Afghanistan Falls to the Taliban: Whose Fault Is It?
Is China Teaming Up with the Taliban?
Gravitas: Amrullah Saleh: The face of anti-Taliban resistance
9+
Iran has a choice that can make or break it in Afghanistan
9+
Amrullah Saleh is Putin’s Man and he is going to rule Afghanistan
Winning was easy, power is difficult for the Afghani Primates with AKs
Forget world domination, China will even struggle to exist
Biden administration didn’t botch up the Afghanistan evacuation program, they purposely planned it
Gravitas: Taliban’s rise & India’s biggest worry
Take as many as you want and let us know if you need more – Biden to Tal!ban
Japan’s “Israel” plan to eliminate China from the Middle Eas
Afghanistan News: Decoding ‘Taliban’ Raj, Religious Council To Rule Afghans & More| 5ive Live
US and UK are planning to turn Tal!ban into a legitimate government. Russia has other ideas
Trump had the guts to talk about the real problem in Afghanistan. But Biden is avoiding it
9+
Joe Biden ‘will own the mess’ in Afghanistan
“Jovan Pulitzer Reveals It’s Not the ‘Watermarks’ on the Ballots – It’s Better (VIDEO)” by Joe Hoft – August 19, 2021
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/08/jovan-pulitzer-uncovers-not-watermarks-ballots-better-video/
‘Incompetent’ and ‘cognitively impaired’ Joe Biden is now ‘racing for the exit door’
Taliban fighters are ‘hunting down’ journalists, carrying out revenge executions against Afghans who worked with the West
Phil Shiver
3-4 minutes
Despite promising “amnesty” to Afghan residents who worked with Western governments and organizations during the last 20 years of U.S. military occupation, Taliban forces in Afghanistan are now reportedly “hunting down” journalists and other supposed dissidents in order to execute them.
What are the details?
According to German news outlet Deutsche Welle, bloodthirsty militants on Thursday shot and killed a family member of an Afghan journalist who works with the Western media organization.
DW director general Peter Limbourg said the heinous attack was carried out during a house-to-house revenge search, during which another one of the unnamed journalist’s family members was seriously injured. The journalist is reportedly safe, having escaped to Germany.
In a statement, Limbourg called on the German government to take action, exclaiming, “We are running out of time!”
“The killing of a close relative of one of our editors by the Taliban yesterday is inconceivably tragic, and testifies to the acute danger in which all our employees and their families in Afghanistan find themselves,” Limbourg said. “It is evident that the Taliban are already carrying out organized searches for journalists, both in Kabul and in the provinces.”
https://www.theblaze.com/news/taliban-fighters-hunting-down-journalists-revenge-executions?utm_source=theblaze-breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20210820Trending-TalibanJournalists&utm_term=ACTIVE%20LIST%20-%20TheBlaze%20Breaking%20News
Trump on Afghanistan: ‘It’s like the captain of a ship jumping the ship before the people are off the boat’
BlazeTV Staff
3 minutes
Former President Donald Trump joined BlazeTV’s “Rick and Bubba” morning show Friday and hit the Biden administration hard on the tragic military exit from Afghanistan.
Rick kicked off the interview with a most pressing question: Will Trump run for president in 2024, or will he be a rally man behind the scenes?
“Maybe both,” Trump responded, adding, “because of the campaign laws, you aren’t allowed to say [if you plan on running] but, I think a lot of people are going to be very happy.”
“What was your plan for [the U.S.] leaving Afghanistan?” Rick asked.
https://www.theblaze.com/shows/the-rick-bubba-show/copy-edit-trump-on-afghanistan-it-s-like-the-captain-of-a-ship-jumping-the-ship-before-the-people-are-off-the-boat?utm_source=theblaze-breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20210820Trending-TalibanJournalists&utm_term=ACTIVE%20LIST%20-%20TheBlaze%20Breaking%20News
James Madison University trains students that Christians, white males are ‘oppressors’: Report
Paul Sacca
3-4 minutes
Student employees at James Madison University are being trained to believe that straight white males and Christians are “oppressors” engaging in the “systematic subjugation” of other groups, according to a new report.
Fox News obtained documents from training sessions at the Virginia university that are reportedly required for student employees to watch. The training video on social justice and inclusion was for student staff who were in charge of incoming freshman orientations.
The 25-minute video begins with a coordinator and assistant director introducing themselves by sharing their preferred pronouns, race, gender, sexuality, and economic class. The assistant director informs the audience on the training video that she is a white cisgender woman from a middle-class background who is bisexual and temporarily able-bodied.
https://www.theblaze.com/news/james-madison-university-train-?utm_source=theblaze-breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20210820Trending-TalibanJournalists&utm_term=ACTIVE%20LIST%20-%20TheBlaze%20Breaking%20News
Biden Vows to Bring Home Every American Who Wants to Leave Afghanistan
By Zachary Stieber
August 20, 2021 Updated: August 20, 2021
biggersmaller Print
The United States still does not know how many Americans are in Afghanistan, President Joe Biden told reporters on Friday, but will evacuate every U.S. citizen who wants to leave the country.
“Any American that wants to come home, we will get you home,” Biden said at the White House in Washington.. He made a similar pledge to Afghan allies who helped the United States.
Estimates from the government of how many Americans are stranded in Afghanistan have ranged from 5,000 to 15,000. Officials have said they’re not sure of the number in part because Americans do not have to report to the government when they travel to foreign countries.
Biden said officials are still working on verifying the figure.
“We want to get a strong number as to exactly how many American citizens are there and where they are,” he said.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_breakingnews/biden-vows-to-bring-home-every-american-who-wants-to-leave-afghanistan_3957984.html?utm_source=newsnoe&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=breaking-2021-08-20-2&mktids=b71fadc0313d04c5d8f3ed048911c8f2&est=PN9QZrGYr2Jo%2FJDCvY%2FvLx33%2Fj2ceMeuamY6X5JCIuTIWL4CdFeCKaCFHxU%3D
Taliban Accused of Brutally Killing, Torturing Minority Group Men: Amnesty
By Jack Phillips
August 20, 2021 Updated: August 20, 2021
biggersmaller Print
Taliban extremists brutally massacred several members of the minority Hazara community after taking control of Ghazni province, according to a recent report from human rights organization Amnesty International, disputing public claims that the Taliban will provide amnesty for certain groups after taking over Afghanistan this week.
“On-the-ground researchers spoke to eyewitnesses who gave harrowing accounts of the killings, which took place between 4–6 July in the village of Mundarakht, Malistan district,” said Amnesty. Six Hazara men were shot and “three were tortured to death, including one man who was strangled with his own scarf and had his arm muscles sliced off,” the report added
https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_breakingnews/taliban-accused-of-brutally-killing-torturing-minority-group-men-amnesty_3957823.html?utm_source=newsnoe&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=breaking-2021-08-20-2&mktids=b71fadc0313d04c5d8f3ed048911c8f2&est=qOr7mc3ZOT8b7dtEkx72B1sPgMpAHtXpnSHdrtCq4HbjZYm19b8eMrmHAsw%3D
Biden Is Dishonest, Delusional, And Dangerous
3 minutes
After Biden’s controversial and supposedly contingent plan to withdraw U.S troops from Afghanistan, the President addressed the public to justify why the 20-year war with Afghanistan had to end. However, Biden’s attempt to explain the withdrawal of U.S. troops was outright dishonest and shoddy, as the contingency plan implemented by the state was nothing but unorganized. In light of the Taliban troops gaining power in Afghanistan, many U.S diplomats and citizens based in Afghanistan were supposedly evacuated. However, many continue to be trapped, fearing that the Taliban may take their lives at any given moment.
The fact that makes Biden’s position even worse in this scenario is that military services had already advised him against the repercussions of a hasty withdrawal from Afghanistan, as it might lead to a collapse of local regimes, giving the Taliban a golden opportunity to come to power. But Biden’s delusional strategy to withdraw U.S. troops and citizens before the predicted time further amplified the chaos we experience today. Not only this, but Biden also claimed in his speech that he had previously discussed American troops departure from Afghanistan with the Afghani commander of Bagram Air Force Base, which has been proven to be nothing but a pernicious lie, as the commander himself learned of America’s departure only after the troops had been withdrawn, leaving the Afghani Forces completely unprepared and vulnerable to the events that unfolded afterward.
https://thecongressionalinsider.com/biden-is-dishonest-delusional-and-dangerous/
VIDEO
UK Chief of Defence Staff, Sir General Nick Carter:
– Taliban are not enemies.
– They are country boys.
– They are changed.
– They follow Pashtunwali.
– Taliban want an inclusive govt in Afghanistan.
– We don’t have to approve of some of their ways (to work with them).
https://twitter.com/Natsecjeff/status/1428291601445568518
Turkey’s Islamist Tyrant Demands Europe Take More Muslim Migrants – Frontpagemag
Daniel Greenfield
2-3 minutes
Erdogan, the butcher of Istanbul, finds Muslim migrants quite useful for blackmailing Europe. Now he’s at it again.
Faced with a potential new migration wave from Afghanistan, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on European nations Thursday to shoulder the responsibility for Afghans fleeing the Taliban and warned that his country won’t become Europe’s “refugee warehouse.”
In a televised address following a Cabinet meeting, Erdogan also said his government would “if necessary” engage in talks with a government that could be formed by the Taliban ” for the stability and security of this country.”
That’s Erdogan trying to make his embrace of the Taliban look like he’s trying to help Europe out.
https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/2021/08/turkeys-islamist-tyrant-demands-europe-take-more-daniel-greenfield/
UK Parliament Holds Joe Biden in Contempt and the Details Are Disturbing – Patriot Outlook
by Patriot Outlook about 15 hours ago
3 minutes
The embarrassment on the world stage continues under Joe Biden. Following the total collapse of Afghanistan and while in the midst of an ongoing, dangerously chaotic evacuation, the UK Parliament has voted to hold the President of the United States in contempt. That came after several impassioned denunciations on the floor that were covered by RedState previously.
How does it feel to be respected on the world stage again?
But while it’s a travesty that things have gotten to this point, it’s the details of what went on behind the scenes that led to this that are most disturbing. Earlier in the week, NSA Jake Sullivan shocked onlookers by announcing that Biden had not spoken to any world leaders about the pullout from Afghanistan. A dereliction of duty at that level is hard to fathom, though, it’s become commonplace for a president who continues to run to Delaware instead of, you know, being president.
Following Sullivan’s jaw-dropping admission, Biden apparently did talk to UK PM Boris Johnson. Unfortunately, it took 36 hours for the president to get around to answering the call, though.
Was Biden incapacitated? It’s not like this was a request from the president of Thailand. We are talking about our oldest and closest ally in the British. And Biden took almost two days to even return their phone call as Afghanistan descended into absolute chaos?
https://patriotoutlook.com/uk-parliament-holds-joe-biden-in-contempt-and-the-details-are-disturbing
FBI has no evidence Jan. 6 riot was organized, coordinated, or otherwise planned by Trump or others: Report
Chris Pandolfo
4-5 minutes
The FBI has turned up no evidence that the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol was a coordinated attempt to launch an insurrection against the United States government by overturning the results of the presidential election, according to officials who spoke to Reuters Friday.
“The FBI at this point believes the violence was not centrally coordinated by far-right groups or prominent supporters of then-President Donald Trump,” Reuters reports.
Further, “the FBI has so far found no evidence that [Trump] or people directly around him were involved in organizing the violence.”
Of the more than 570 individuals who have been arrested on charges related to the riot, “Ninety to ninety-five percent of these are one-off cases,” said a former senior law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation. “Then you have five percent, maybe, of these militia groups that were more closely organized. But there was no grand scheme with Roger Stone and Alex Jones and all of these people to storm the Capitol and take hostages.”
https://www.theblaze.com/news/fbi-no-evidence-jan-6-riot-organized-trump-or-others?utm_source=theblaze-breaking&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20210820SponsoredTrending-Floraspring&utm_term=ACTIVE%20LIST%20-%20TheBlaze%20Breaking%20News
Exclusive: FBI finds scant evidence U.S. Capitol attack was coordinated – sources
Mark Hosenball,Sarah N. Lynch
6-7 minutes
Pro-Trump protesters storm into the U.S. Capitol during clashes with police, during a rally to contest the certification of the 2020 U.S. presidential election results by the U.S. Congress, in Washington, U.S, January 6, 2021. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton/File Photo
WASHINGTON, Aug 20 (Reuters) – The FBI has found scant evidence that the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol was the result of an organized plot to overturn the presidential election result, according to four current and former law enforcement officials.
Though federal officials have arrested more than 570 alleged participants, the FBI at this point believes the violence was not centrally coordinated by far-right groups or prominent supporters of then-President Donald Trump, according to the sources, who have been either directly involved in or briefed regularly on the wide-ranging investigations.
“Ninety to ninety-five percent of these are one-off cases,” said a former senior law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation. “Then you have five percent, maybe, of these militia groups that were more closely organized. But there was no grand scheme with Roger Stone and Alex Jones and all of these people to storm the Capitol and take hostages.”
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/exclusive-fbi-finds-scant-evidence-us-capitol-attack-was-coordinated-sources-2021-08-20/?utm_source=RC+Investigations+Today&utm_campaign=aef97f9b8d-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2016_11_11_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_d042379c8d-aef97f9b8d-85695671&mc_cid=aef97f9b8d&mc_eid=c4a952ab77
The Afghan gov’t overthrown by Taliban never existed – ex-soldier
https://m.jpost.com/middle-east/the-afghan-govt-overthrown-by-taliban-never-existed-source-677178/amp?__twitter_impression=true
Former US soldier discusses how myths, bad data, desire for promotions, corruption and waste underpinned the Afghan war.
“They believed it because they had to; they couldn’t bring themselves to admit that this might not be real, it was just a sham,” said Graham Platner, who served in Iraq and then Afghanistan as a US soldier, and later as a security contractor. “Military officers are not trained to admit that maybe we can’t do this.”
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post, Platner reveals the deeply troubling levels of corruption, waste and myths that underpinned the US role in Afghanistan, and explains why the country fell to the Taliban in just a few days.
The Taliban captured their first provincial capital of Zaranj on August 7, and by August 15 they were in Kabul after President Ashraf Ghani had fled the country. US forces had left Bagram Air Base in early July, roughly a month before the Taliban offensive gained momentum and swept over the country.
Platner came to Afghanistan with high hopes in 2010. He’d been in Iraq, and would ultimately serve for eight years with the US Infantry. He came to Afghanistan with the surge of US troops that was supposed to turn around a war that had already dragged on for a decade.
“My unit was deployed in November 2010 as part of the Obama surge to move troops into the country to conduct counter-insurgency the right way,” he said. “I believed it before I left.”
Platner had seen mistakes in Iraq, and believed that Gen. David Petraeus, commander of the International Security Assistance Forces, and Gen. Stanley McChrystal, his predecessor, were saying the right things about Afghanistan.
McChrystal said “that we would now drive on the road like we are part of the Afghans, and walk more and get out of our trucks,” remembers Platner. “And as an infantry sergeant who believed counter-insurgency could work, I wanted to do this, and I was excited to go and fight in an army that was going to take seriously this strategy that I had fully bought into.”
Then he saw how things really were. While the generals said the right things and lower-level US officers believed it and tried to get it done, “everyone in between doesn’t want to do any of this.” He sketches a pattern of officers being asked to quantify their successes through the number of missions and number of engagements carried out meeting Afghans. As officers wanted promotions, they were incentivized to put in big numbers, but not necessarily accomplish anything real on the ground.
“How do you quantify making Afghans happy?” Platner asks. “It is immeasurable and you need metrics, like killing this many enemy, and spending this much money, and this many combat patrols. It doesn’t matter what you did.”
WHILE THE US Army sought to get good “stats” on what was happening to pass up the chain of command, the Afghan army and police were largely an army only on paper. In northeast Afghanistan, where Platner was a rifle squad leader, he spent most of his time living with Afghan National Police, who were supposed to be performing paramilitary operations as well. The Afghan army in his area was being advised by the French Foreign Legion. He says this was in the Ghorband District not far from Kabul.
While the US brigade moved around a bit, his role in training Afghan police provided an insight into the failures across Afghanistan at the time.
“We were pretending that we were preparing them to do this on their own,” recalls Platner. “But since they were utterly incapable of doing it on their own, we were going on combat patrols and dragging along some Afghan cops to pretend they were doing a mission. So we operated basically as a US rifle company.”
This meant that the “advise and assist” nature of what the US thought it was doing, or the “by, with and through” approach the US would take later in Iraq after 2014, was largely a myth because the local units wouldn’t lead the way.
[..]
reuters -U.S. reviewing if Moderna shot tied to higher heart inflammation risk – Washington Post
Aug 20 (Reuters) – U.S. health officials are reviewing reports that Moderna Inc’s (MRNA.O) COVID-19 vaccine may be linked to a higher risk of a rare heart condition in younger adults than previously thought, the Washington Post reported late on Thursday, citing people familiar with the review.
The review was focused on Canadian data that suggests a higher risk from the shot than the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, especially in men below the age of 30, according to paper.
The Washington Post report quoted a source saying it was too early for the regulators to reach a conclusion, and that additional work was needed before any recommendation was made.
“While we won’t comment on internal meetings or discussions, we can say that FDA is absolutely committed to reviewing data as it becomes available to us,” the U.S. Food and Drug Administration said. Moderna did not immediately respond to Reuters’ requests for comment.
The possible review comes just two days after U.S. health officials said that COVID-19 vaccine booster doses will be available to Americans from Sept. 20, over concerns that initial vaccinations may offer lower protection in the face of rising infections due to the Delta variant. read more
Health regulators in June had added a warning to the literature that accompanies mRNA vaccines produced by Moderna and Pfizer (PFE.N) to flag a rare risk of heart inflammation seen primarily in young males.
Data from a government agency’s safety monitoring system in that month suggested a rate of 12.6 cases of heart inflammation per million in 12-to 39-year-olds. read more
The benefit of mRNA shots in preventing COVID-19 continues to outweigh the risks, regulators in the United States and the EU as well as the World Health Organization have said. read more
If new information changes the risk-benefit profile of COVID-19 vaccines, the FDA will update the public accordingly, the agency said in an email.
There might be a 2.5 times higher incidence of myocarditis in those who get the Moderna vaccine compared with Pfizer’s vaccine, the Post quoted a source as saying.
Roughly 142 million shots of the Moderna vaccine have been administered in arms, according to U.S. government data as of Thursday.
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-probing-moderna-vaccine-increased-heart-inflammation-risk-washington-post-2021-08-20/
Planes, guns, night-vision goggles: The Taliban’s new U.S.-made war chest
https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/planes-guns-night-vision-goggles-talibans-new-us-made-war-chest-2021-08-19/
Video showed the advancing insurgents inspecting long lines of vehicles and opening crates of new firearms, communications gear and even military drones.
“Everything that hasn’t been destroyed is the Taliban’s now,” one U.S. official, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told Reuters.
Current and former U.S. officials say there is concern those weapons could be used to kill civilians, be seized by other militant groups such as Islamic State to attack U.S.-interests in the region, or even potentially be handed over to adversaries including China and Russia.
[..]
There is a more immediate concern about some of the easier- to-use weapons and equipment, such as night-vision goggles.
Since 2003 the United States has provided Afghan forces with at least 600,000 infantry weapons including M16 assault rifles, 162,000 pieces of communication equipment, and 16,000 night-vision goggle devices.
“The ability to operate at night is a real game-changer,” one congressional aide told Reuters.
Votel and others said smalls arms seized by the insurgents such as machine guns, mortars, as well as artillery pieces including howitzers, could give the Taliban an advantage against any resistance that could surface in historic anti-Taliban strongholds such as the Panjshir Valley northeast of Kabul.
Biden’s comment on Taiwan clarified by administration official
Edmund DeMarche
3-4 minutes
President Biden’s recent comments during a televised interview with ABC News raised questions if the U.S.’s position of “strategic ambiguity” has changed when it comes to Taiwan.
The president was interviewed by ABC News and was asked about how other countries—in particular Taiwan—should view the U.S. pullout from Afghanistan. Many asked if the U.S. could be viewed as a reliable ally.
MEGHAN MCCAIN SLAMS BIDEN AS ‘JIMMY CARTER ON ACID’ OVER AFGHANISTAN DEBACLE
Reuters pointed out that Biden said in response, “We have made—kept every commitment. We made a sacred commitment to Article 5 that if, in fact, anyone were to invade or take action against our NATO allies, we would respond. Same with Japan, same with South Korea, same with Taiwan. It’s not even comparable to talk about.”
The comment was seen by some as a change in posture by the U.S. on the issue, but a senior official from the Biden administration told Reuters that the policy has “not changed.” Analysts told the outlet it appeared Biden had misspoken. The White House did not immediately respond to an after-hours email from Fox News.
Last month, President Xi Jinping marked his Communist Party’s 100th anniversary from Tiananmen Square and struck a bellicose tone, reconfirming China’s ‘historic mission’ to control Taiwan while warning other countries not to interfere.
Biden has made it clear that China is the biggest geopolitical challenge for the U.S. In February, he announced the formation of a Defense Department China Task Force to assess the future challenge from China; earlier this month, G7 member states agreed to an initiative aimed at challenging China’s Belt and Road Initiative.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/bidens-comment-on-taiwan-clarified-by-administration-official
Deadly ‘kissing bug’ that kills thousands needs to be taken seriously now
New York Post
4-5 minutes
It’s the kiss of death for Latin American communities in the U.S.
While health experts often warn of mosquitoes and other disease-carrying bugs, the deadly kissing bug — a k a the triatomine bug, which kills 10,000 people per year globally — continues to be overlooked in the U.S., as it disproportionately affects poor Hispanic communities. That alarming disparity is the subject of the new book “The Kissing Bug: A True Story of a Family, an Insect, and a Nation’s Neglect of a Deadly Disease.”
Apparently, not even the infectious disease world is immune to racism.
“[The disease] was still very much being neglected by medical schools, medical institutions and public health officials, that was such a shock,” author Daisy Hernández told NBC of the shocking find.
https://www.foxnews.com/science/kissing-bug-kills-thousands
July 9 2021 Special Report: Afghan pilots assassinated by Taliban as U.S. withdraws
By Phil Stewart and Idrees Ali, Hamid Shalizi
https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/afghan-pilots-assassinated-by-taliban-us-withdraws-2021-07-09/
Afghan Air Force Major Dastagir Zamaray had grown so fearful of Taliban assassinations of off-duty forces in Kabul that he decided to sell his home to move to a safer pocket of Afghanistan’s sprawling capital.
Instead of being greeted by a prospective buyer at his realtor’s office earlier this year, the 41-year-old pilot was confronted by a gunman who walked inside and, without a word, fatally shot the real estate agent in the mouth.
Zamaray reached for his sidearm but the gunman shot him in the head. The father of seven collapsed dead on his 14-year-old son, who had tagged along. The boy was spared, but barely speaks anymore, his family says.
Zamaray “only went there because he personally knew the realtor and thought it was safe,” Samiullah Darman, his brother-in-law, told Reuters. “We didn’t know that he would never come back.”
[..]
In response to questions from Reuters, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid confirmed the group had killed Zamaray, and that it had started a program that will see Afghan Air Force pilots “targeted and eliminated because all of them do bombardment against their people.”
[..]
“Pilots are on top of the Taliban’s hit list,” the senior Afghan government official said.
That Afghan official and two others, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they’re working to protect pilots and their families, moving some to on-base housing and relocating others to safer civilian neighborhoods.
[..]
David Petraeus, a former CIA director and former commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, warned that failure of the United States to provide enough support for the Afghan military could be disastrous.
“We are potentially consigning Afghanistan and the Afghan people to a civil war,” Petraeus said in an interview.
Washington is moving to evacuate interpreters who worked for the U.S. military, but it’s unclear if the Biden administration would risk doing the same for Afghan forces, like pilots. Some officials believe offering an exit strategy for elite Afghan troops could accelerate a feared collapse following the U.S. withdrawal. [..] “No one wants to have the (Afghan forces) preemptively throw in the towel,” another U.S. official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
[..]
It wasn’t just Taliban death threats against him and his family that drove decorated Afghan helicopter pilot Major Naiem Asadi out of Afghanistan. Asadi said the Afghan Air Force had failed to do enough to protect pilots vulnerable to off-base assassinations.
“They spend a lot of money on (the training) of these pilots, but they can’t spend any money on the pilots for their security,” Asadi told Reuters in an interview, after arriving in New Jersey in June to start his bid for asylum.
Asadi complained that not all Afghan pilots got paid the same or even regularly. As a member of the ethnic Hazara minority, Asadi believed he was also passed up for promotion.
“They are not taking care of every pilot equally,” he said.
[..]
Niloofar Rahmani, the first female fixed-wing pilot in the Afghan Air Force, won asylum in the United States in 2018 after receiving death threats from the Taliban and others in Afghan society who condemned her for working alongside the U.S. military.
Rahmani, who is now training in Florida to become a flight instructor, said the Afghan government didn’t take those threats seriously enough and that even some of her fellow pilots didn’t think women should fly. She said she wasn’t paid for a year.
[..]
Masood Atal, a Black Hawk helicopter pilot, was driving on his day off on Dec. 30 to buy fruit for his mother when two motorcycles flanked his gray Toyota Corolla on a Kandahar city highway, one on each side of the car.
Gunmen on the back of both bikes opened fire on Atal, shooting him 11 times, once in the face, six times in his right arm and hand, the rest in his chest, his family said.
Atal had confided to his family that he had received Taliban death threats, the latest in an expletive-laced phone call just two days before he was killed.
“We’re killing you,” they told him, recounted Bashir Ahmad, one of Atal’s brothers.
Atal had asked for bodyguards and a bullet-proof car but the Afghan military turned him down, Ahmad said, accusing it of being “very weak on these things.”
[..]
Catching the killers of Afghan pilots has proven difficult.
A few weeks after the January shooting of Zamaray, the airman shot dead in his realtor’s office, Kabul police told the family they had made an arrest. They asked Zamaray’s 14-year-old son to identify the suspect.
Glimpsing the detainee at the police station, the teen informed police they had the wrong man. Police tried to convince the boy that the suspect might now look different because he had a broken nose, the family said.
“The police were pushing (Zamaray’s) son to identify and implicate the wrong person just to hide their weakness and show an achievement,” Darman, Zamaray’s brother-in-law, said.
‘Gruesome’: Federal Court Upholds Texas Law Banning ‘Dismemberment Abortions’
Steve Warren
5-6 minutes
A federal appeals court in New Orleans has upheld a Texas law outlawing “dismemberment abortions” commonly used to end second-trimester pregnancies.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit on Wednesday reversed previous court rulings that blocked the pro-life law. Some court watchers say the case may ultimately end up before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The 2017 law, which passed the Texas Legislature with bipartisan support has never been enforced because of legal challenges. It prohibits the use of forceps to tear the unborn baby apart limb from limb to remove from the mother’s womb without first using an injected drug or a suction procedure to ensure the child is dead.
A three-judge panel from the federal court blocked enforcement of the law last year. But Texas sought and was granted a rehearing by the full court.
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A majority among the 14 appellate judges who heard arguments in January sided with Texas (three of the court’s 17 active judges were recused). The opinion, by judges Jennifer Walker Elrod and Don Willett, said “the record shows that doctors can safely perform D&Es and comply with SB8 using methods that are already in widespread use.”
https://www1.cbn.com/cbnnews/2021/august/gruesome-federal-court-upholds-texas-law-banning-dismemberment-abortions?utm_source=news&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=news-eu-cbnnewspm&utm_content=210819-2754496&inid=67c0d20d-ebba-4010-a401-b759b7d98f76
August 12 2021 In a Former al Qaeda Redoubt, Afghans Take On the Taliban and ISIS
The province of Nangarhar, Afghanistan, is where Osama bin Laden hid from U.S. forces. Now that those forces are gone, local tribesmen are fighting the enemies who remain
https://newlinesmag.com/reportage/in-a-former-al-qaeda-redoubt-afghans-take-on-the-taliban-and-isis/
“This is where our uprising began three years ago. Under this tree.” It was where Jaafar and his comrades decided to work against both the Taliban and the local branch of the Islamic State group.
Here, the locals are well aware of the oppression and lack of opportunities for their children that will result under a Taliban regime. Tribal ties are strong, and since many of the older men have fighting experience from previous decades, it seemed only obvious that the local men would come together to fight, they said.
Jaafar said that some of his men had received training and had been getting salaries from the National Directorate of Security (NDS), Afghanistan’s intelligence and security services, since shortly after they started the uprising.
I asked whether — as the Taliban and their backers often claim — any of the men had received training from any Western military forces.
Jaafar practically snorted: “I got training from the KGB during the [Soviet] period, then from Pakistan’s Inter-Intelligence Services (ISI). Then the NDS. Exactly what are the Americans supposed to teach me?”
[..]
The United Nations has warned in recent months that al Qaeda, ISIS and other groups with foreign fighters retain a presence in the country. The Taliban have long worked closely with al Qaeda, and most observers say that it has no intention of cutting ties with the group.
[..]
Many in Afghanistan blame Pakistan — and more specifically the Pakistan military — for supporting the Taliban, providing refuge for its fighters and allegedly financial support, as well as training.
There is evidence for this, as there is for Iran supporting some factions of the Taliban closer to its border. Experts note, however, that the Taliban also has significant income streams from drug trafficking, taxing locals, customs revenue at “unofficial” border crossings and other sources.
[..]
An interior ministry source involved in analyzing online support for the group told me in late July that the vast majority of the thousands of tweets they had analyzed and considered “pro-Taliban” are from Pakistan-based accounts, presumably as part of a concerted propaganda effort.
Kandahar also shares a border with Pakistan. Its Chaman-Spin Boldak border crossing was taken by the Taliban on July 14. The Torkham border crossing with Pakistan in the Nangarhar province instead remains under government control.
“Where are they coming from? Their families are there. Pakistan is sending them to destroy this country. More than 10,000 Pakistanis have crossed in the past two or three months,” Amarkhil claimed.
[..]
He said that 40 Taliban had been killed the night before in the Sherzad district of the province.
“We support the peace process. Taliban are Afghans. We want them to come to the table,” Amarkhil said. “But we have some red lines: freedom of speech, human rights, women’s rights, education rights,” adding, however: “Honestly, though? The Taliban do not want peace. They want to fight.
[..]
The release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners from Afghan prisons was part of a deal reached between the U.S. and the Taliban in February 2020. The Taliban and the U.S. both put pressure on the Afghan government to comply with it. Many of those released are known to have returned to fighting and some are now commanders in key areas.
[..]
the professor of Islamic law, who is originally from the area, suggested that the local population’s prior experience with the Taliban has been key in preventing the group from taking over the area.
“Neither [ISIS or Taliban] have any idea what Islam is. They believe God is bestial, like them,” he said with unveiled disgust.
“They killed so many of the educated people and tribal elders,” he added. “They ordered the local people to come and watch.”
gatestoneinstitute.org
History Lesson – Biden is Obama 3.0 on Embracing Jihadists
Pete Hoekstra
8-11 minutes
President Joe Biden is following in Barack Obama’s ill-fated footsteps. In fact, Biden’s foreign policy is so unoriginal that you could almost describe the “Biden Doctrine” — as more and more left-wing pundits are calling it — as “Obama on steroids.” (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)
“Rommel, you magnificent bastard, I read your book!” An unforgettable line from the classic movie Patton. George C. Scott, in the title role as the legendary General George Patton, is surveying the battlefield from his command post. He senses that his U.S. forces will rout the Germans, led by the brilliant Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, in this pivotal World War II tank battle in Tunisia. Why would the Americans be blessed with victory? In large part because Patton, himself a military genius, took the time to thoroughly study Rommel’s book on battlefield tactics and strategy during the previous war, World War I. Patton believed in the value of knowing his history, learning from his adversaries and avoiding the mistakes of his predecessors.
I truly wish President Joe Biden were interested in learning from history. Tragically, however, the pattern is becoming more pronounced every day: instead of learning from the mistakes of the Obama a
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17669/biden-obama-jihadists
thetruthaboutguns.com
The Taliban and Joe Biden Agree – Civilians Don’t Need to Own Firearms – The Truth About Guns
TTAG Contributor
4-6 minutes
taliban afghanistan firearms
Taliban fighters patrol in Wazir Akbar Khan neighborhood in the city of Kabul, Afghanistan, Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2021. The Taliban declared an “amnesty” across Afghanistan and collected civilian owned firearms a day after deadly chaos gripped the main airport as desperate crowds tried to flee the country. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)
By Lee Williams
On Monday throughout Kabul, teams of Taliban terrorists started going door-to-door searching for our former allies, young girls and, of course, personally owned firearms.
Our allies were disappeared. Their fate was sealed. Some have been shot, hung and beaten to death. Their bodies usually turn up on a dusty road several days after they were taken for their families to bury
https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/the-taliban-and-joe-biden-agree-civilians-dont-need-to-own-firearms/