Biden to address the nation at 3:45pm

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I suspect he won't just blame the Trump withdrawal agreement, he's also going to blame the former Afghan "government" and "army". His national security advisor already made that case this morning.

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I suspect he won't just blame the Trump withdrawal agreement, he's also going to blame the former Afghan "government" and "army". His national security advisor already made that case this morning.

Shameless self-plug, but I nailed it, he didn't even mince words and express it diplomatically, he straight up blamed them.

Edit: He's spending at least half his speech blaming them. Honestly I think this is a very good argument, they ing sucked so time to cut losses.

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Yah even one of my liberal friends is calling this speech terrible and said it was gaslighting the nation of Afghanistan

To be fair, it is extraordinarily rare for a world leader to openly bash another country like this, to basically call the former government weak and a bunch of losers and cowards. However, after the display this past week, can we all agree that he is telling it like it is?

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Yah even one of my liberal friends is calling this speech terrible and said it was gaslighting the nation of Afghanistan

That was the part of it I strongly took issue with as well.

We gutted the Afghan air force by removing contractors, gave the Army's pay to crooks we supported, told them we were going to abandon them, and now we're criticizing them for refusing to lay down their lives for our fleeting political advantage?

I can't agree with this at all. The Afghan "National Army" outnumbered the Taliban by at least 2 to 1, had more funds than the Taliban, had better equipment than the Taliban, had air supremacy over the Taliban, and started the final campaign with control of most of the country. On paper it was a far superior army to the Taliban, with or without the Americans.  I would assign all blame for the collapse on the former Afghan regime.

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The bluntness about his allies, the lack of contrition or overt virtue signalling, the refusal to take any questions and the rage caused among cable pundits.

For better and worse (and I think it is for the better, on the whole), this wasn't so far off a coherent Trumpian speech.

You nailed it. Although it had a far more professional style, the content was for sure Trumpian; he talked right to the people, told it like it is disregarding the usual flowery rhetoric, and struck a decidedly populist and nationalist tone.