The Dan Bongino Show - The Bongino Brief - Aug 28, 2021
Aired: 2021-08-28
Duration: 07:15


=== Why Abandon Bagram? (05:14) ===

[00:00:00]  Dan Bongino.
[00:00:02]  Welcome to the Bongino Brief.
[00:00:03]  I'm Dan Bongino.
[00:00:05]  You know, I was thinking that maybe this was time for some Thomas Sowell motivation.
[00:00:11]  Because whenever you think of policies like Joe Biden, even though Thomas Sowell is more of an economist and a philosopher than anything, he didn't cover foreign policy much.
[00:00:22]  He was more of a domestic policy analyst.
[00:00:24]  The great Thomas Sowell always had a way of looking at things.
[00:00:28]  And usually when it comes to Medicare, Social Security, other stuff, he would have this, he had this thing where he'd say, listen, you know, whenever you're analyzing a leftist policy, say compared to what, at what cost and what's the hard evidence.
[00:00:39]  Matter of fact, here's him saying it here.
[00:00:40]  And I want you to listen to this and think of Afghanistan the whole time.
[00:00:43]  Biden's choice to evacuate, dump Bagram Air Base in the mountains and try to secure an airport in the middle of the city with a mass evacuation while giving up all your weapons to the Taliban.
[00:00:54]  Evaluate that in the context of the three questions here Thomas Sowell asked.
[00:00:57]  Check this out.
[00:00:59]  I've often said there are three questions that I think would destroy most of the arguments on the left.
[00:01:03]  And the first is, compared to what?
[00:01:06]  The second is, at what cost?
[00:01:09]  And the third is, what hard evidence do you have?
[00:01:12]  Now, there are very few ideas on the left that can pass all three of those kinds of things.
[00:01:16]  There's almost, I'd make the case to you strongly, there's almost no idea on the left that can pass all three of those test questions.
[00:01:22]  None.
[00:01:23]  But although he, again, he wasn't, you know, he was very smart.
[00:01:25]  He knew a lot about foreign policy.
[00:01:27]  A lot.
[00:01:28]  Matter of fact, he wrote about foreign countries a lot in his books on economics.
[00:01:32]  But I want you to evaluate for a second Biden's decision-making chain on Afghanistan in light of Thomas Sowell's three questions.
[00:01:39]  So evacuate Bagram Air Base first, giving you no effective vehicle For air transporting people out of Afghanistan, right?
[00:01:48]  You have to air transport.
[00:01:49]  Afghanistan is landlocked.
[00:01:51]  There's no oceanfront.
[00:01:52]  There was no port to get people out.
[00:01:54]  There were liberals listening, so they don't get that.
[00:01:56]  You understand that, right?
[00:01:57]  The only way out was in the air.
[00:01:59]  That was it.
[00:02:01]  You can't walk out, or at least for the overwhelming majority of people, and you can't swim out.
[00:02:08]  You had to fly out, meaning you needed a runway.
[00:02:11]  We had two runways in Bagram Air Base, a 20-minute helo ride, helicopter ride out of Kabul.
[00:02:18]  Joe Biden abandoned that first.
[00:02:20]  I have not had one serious military professional tell me that was a sound decision, including General Jerry Boykin, a real American hero.
[00:02:29]  I'm hoping to get him on my Fox show this weekend.
[00:02:32]  Yes sir, I asked him this question.
[00:02:34]  Can you tell me one reason we would abandon a fortified military facility with two air runways, with two of them, why we would abandon that first, trying to defend a runway in the middle of a city of four million people where we don't know who's friend or foe?
[00:02:49]  No one has given me a satisfactory answer.
[00:02:51]  So ask that question in light of Thomas Sowell's question number one.
[00:02:55]  Compared to what?
[00:02:56]  Well, Joe Biden said, abandon Bagram first, compared to what?
[00:02:59]  Well, compared to, don't abandon Bagram first!
[00:03:02]  Fortify Bagram, get everyone out of Kabul, fly them to Bagram, where it's a fortified military facility in the mountains with almost no one around, and fight there rather than fighting in a city surrounded by 4 million people.
[00:03:15]  So when you say, oh, the decision to abandon Bagram was necessary, compared to what?
[00:03:21]  Compared to the decision to fortify it and use it as a base that was reinforced?
[00:03:26]  So, fails question number one, Biden's decision-making shade.
[00:03:29]  Question number two, hastily withdraw from Afghanistan and abandon Bagram.
[00:03:34]  Ask Thomas Sowell's question number two, at what cost?
[00:03:37]  Well, we're seeing the cost now.
[00:03:38]  Explosion outside Kabul airport, tens of thousands of American citizens, SIVs and green card holders left behind.
[00:03:46]  A human crisis, a hostage crisis like we haven't seen in years.
[00:03:51]  The weapons, good point, 75,000 vehicles, 600,000 small arms left behind, a fleet of Black Hawk helicopters.
[00:03:59]  At what cost?
[00:04:00]  At a significant cost.
[00:04:02]  We now have one of the most well-armed armies in the world, the Taliban, because of your tax dollars.
[00:04:10]  So abandon Bagram at what cost?
[00:04:12]  At significant cost.
[00:04:13]  Fails question number two.
[00:04:15]  Third question from Thomas Sowell.
[00:04:16]  What hard evidence do you have that abandoning this way is going to work?
[00:04:19]  The answer is none!
[00:04:21]  What example do you have?
[00:04:22]  Saigon?
[00:04:24]  That's your example?
[00:04:28]  What hard evidence do you have?
[00:04:30]  The Taliban, a terrorist group of medieval animal savages, and that's an insult to animals.
[00:04:37]  What evidence do you have the Taliban was going to be some kind of efficient, effective governing body?
[00:04:42]  The answer is you have no evidence.
[00:04:44]  Zero.
[00:04:45]  None.
[00:04:46]  You just made that up.
[00:04:50]  All three questions failed.
[00:04:53]  Compared to what?
[00:04:54]  At what cost?
[00:04:57]  And what hard evidence do you have?

=== Can't Negotiate With Leftists (02:15) ===

[00:05:00]  But folks, you can't negotiate with these people.
[00:05:03]  I'm talking about the Biden administration.
[00:05:06]  Can't negotiate with the Taliban either, although the Biden administration seemed to think that.
[00:05:10]  You can't negotiate with leftists because they are lost.
[00:05:13]  They are the program.
[00:05:14]  You know what?
[00:05:15]  Hey, Jim, for the radio show, we need that Yuri Bezmenov clip again about the one we used last week.
[00:05:19]  Yuri Bezmenov, KGB defector.
[00:05:21]  Saying how the effective way to dismantle a country from within is to program idiots.
[00:05:26]  Program idiots with propaganda.
[00:05:28]  Once they're programmed, you cannot break them.
[00:05:31]  There is no amount of evidence you can show them.
[00:05:34]  You can show them the concentration camps in front of their eyes and they will not believe it.
[00:05:39]  That's a quote from Besmanov.
[00:05:41]  Because leftists have been gaslighted to death.
[00:05:47]  You doubt me?
[00:05:48]  Listen to this.
[00:05:50]  This is the Canadian Minister for Women and Gender Equality.
[00:05:54]  Keep in mind, she's talking about the Taliban that rape children, subjugate women, Torture and kill their political opponents and impose Sharia law.
[00:06:05]  This is Maryam Mansaf.
[00:06:06]  This is real.
[00:06:08]  Talking about the Taliban.
[00:06:09]  I want you to pay very specific attention how this Canadian minister refers to the Taliban in this clip and why you can never negotiate with the left.
[00:06:18]  They need to be fully defeated.
[00:06:20]  Check this out.
[00:06:21]  I want to take this opportunity to speak to our brothers, the Taliban.
[00:06:29]  We call on you to ensure the safe and secure passage of any individual in Afghanistan out of the country.
[00:06:38]  He said it right.
[00:06:40]  He's like, this show is just depressing today.
[00:06:43]  But it's real.
[00:06:45]  And unlike the leftists, we're not going to run away and we're not going to program ourselves.
[00:06:50]  Gaslighting?
[00:06:51]  Gaslighting involves lies, lying often, lying confidently, and isolating people from the truth.
[00:06:55]  I refuse to isolate you from the truth, however hard it is to hear.
[00:06:59]  These are the kind of leftists you're dealing with who are dealing with the Taliban.
[00:07:02]  Our brothers.
[00:07:03]  Our brothers in the Taliban.
[00:07:05]  You mean the child rapists, murdering, terrorist thugs?
[00:07:07]  Those people?
[00:07:08]  They're your brothers?
[00:07:09]  They're not my brothers.
[00:07:10]  They may be your brothers, but they certainly ain't mine.
[00:07:13]  The Dan Bongino Show.