Army Says Arlington National Cemetery Employee Being 'Unfairly Attacked' by Trump Campaign

Maj Kevin "Mac" McLaughlin - At some point we would have been down to just a few people left just like we were and been in a very vulnerable position. No matter how you try and rearrange the Jenga blocks, we were always going to get to that point. SOF would have have been just as vulnerable to the type of attack that was made. It was at the entrance to the secured area where people were trying to get in and the bomb was exploded outside the secured area.

What could have SOF forces done differently to stop it? As we evacuated the area and had very few troops left how could have the US troops secured the area outside of the secured area (the area the Taliban were securing)? By necessity as you draw down troops in the area, the perimeter you can secure gets smaller, does it not?

Maj John Bell - It seemed to me you were being disingenuous with the question as it really is information that is very easy to verify and kind of the heart of the issue.

SPC Kevin Ford - I was not. Nor do I believe that in the long list of dialogues I have been disingenuous. I'm more than a littles sick of you "tolerant" left that jump to insult or characterization as a debate tactic. It says more about your character than mine. I don't take the questioning of my integrity lightly. You might think umbrage is funny. Only an ass fights a war with no thought to leaving the possibility of a lasting peace. But if that's the way the left wants it... so be it. Piss off.

No, this is categorically wrong. Please understand I am informing you about the history that got us to how this took place, not my opinion. I got to observe things early on in 2002 and in 2014. Afghanistan began with roughly 10-20% of the lands controlled by the Northern Alliance forces. The Taliban essentially had control of most of the country. Some of our fist initial forces to aid the Northern Alliance and to establish a foothold in Afghanistan was through special ops and air power. The "12 Strong: The Declassified True Story of the Horse Soldiers" book/movie depicts this initial strategy. President Bush initially had things set at a significant force of SOF and air until goaded into surging far too many troops, as the media and the left criticized him for not emphasizing enough attention in Afghanistan vs Iraq (even though this wasn't true, and the troop strength never declined). I believe this to be my air chair QB opinion of a mistake. Regardless, we surged, and we started to literally train the entire military from cradle to grave. Toward that end, in most cases, we tried to do so using our current doctrine vs allowing them to mature properly. Our doctrine is dependent on many things like educated forces, technical capabilities, stable conditions, etc. The Afghan were simply not prepared to effectively learn what we had to teach, and this created a struggle for several years as we had to revise the training strategies to get them to basic levels of technical competency. It was worse for their Air Force, which started later in terms of OEF, and by 2014 (when Obama decided to pull the advisor out), we were only able to train them do perform decent logistical and MEDEVAC operations. They had VERY little combat insertion and virtually no close air support capabilities. However, they did in fact depend on all of this in order to push the Taliban back and keep them from being significant. In the end, determining the right strategy for training the AAF was incredibly hard, and we made several mistakes in platform selection and the reliance on uneducated Airmen to maintain and sustain this force. By 2014 we found our stride to get them to the most basic levels and start introducing more of the combat capabilities. Bear in mind, they still did not have the ability to conduct air control tower operations at that time. At best they had decent maintenance skills for the current fleet (mostly MI-17s, MD-530 Little Birds, Cessna 182 transports/trainers), some skills for combat insertion (MD-530 insertion of Afghan commandos), and decent skills for logistics / MEDEVAC. They still needed significant training for the incoming Super Tucano attack planes they were about to receive (which was significantly derailed by the advisory pullout).

You ask what SOF could have done; I assume in reference to defending the area around Kabul during the withdrawal. I wasn't in any way suggesting we use SOF to maintain perimeter security. First of all, we should not have used Kabul as the staging point for the withdraw in the 1st place (bear in mind, I don't think we should have withdrawn at all). Like many of the military advisors had said leading up to executing Biden's order, Bagram was better suited to carry out this effort. We already had a solid perimeter; and the base was isolated from the large city center where masses of Afghans were already present. It is also built to be defensible with multiple layers of perimeters within. We could have seen the Afghan / civilian evacuations through, then removed our own supporting forces, and finally force protection forces in the end. But the fact is, you are actually not getting the point. The expectations from those that Biden looked to for advice (vs those he ignored) was that the Taliban would not be able to retake Afghanistan for at least two years. So essentially, they believed pulling out from Kabul would be fine, as the ANA would be there to support the city/airport security. That turned out to be categorically wrong, and Biden was in fact told it was not an ideal scenario. So as the chaos ensued, we had to go to the Taliban for help (tail between our legs). There's no hindsight 20/20 here. Biden, in his diminished and stubborn state made a bad decision and should be held accountable for it. While I am truly relieved he will no longer be our President, I still take issue with the person who stated she was the last person in the room (i.e. his last advisor) to support this decision and to this day is proud of it. That would be Harris.

So, what could SOF have done had we retained Bagram as a permanent base of US/Coalition operations to support the ANA/AAF in maintaining control of Afghanistan (which IS what I was referring to)? PLENTY... Just like we were able to effectively do starting in 2001, only with the ANA/AFA and Afghan National Police controlling ~95% of the nation now. Also, this would have been coupled with combat air support assets as well. SOF is a force multiplier, they bring the proper strategies into play, backed by our intelligence. That coupled with the air power, the Taliban would have never been able to retake Afghanistan. Period. You may not truly comprehend the size and strategic location of Bagram either. It is somewhat central-ish to Afghanistan, ~45 min drive to Kabul (even faster by air), and it was isolated and highly fortified. It was wrong to give it up. Again, I was there in 2002, shortly after 9/11 and I even met and got to support several of the same Air Force Special Tactics team members that were still there. Many of which were the same ones who supported the British SBS forces in taking the airfield in 2001. Bagram was a fortress by 2014, when I returned, and would have been highly effective at keeping the Taliban in their place. We did not need to, nor should we have left.