Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) has emerged as the most belligerent proponent for endless wars in Washington D.C. since the death of Sen. John McCain.
Crenshaw confirmed during an appearance on “The Charlie Kirk Show” that he never wants the troops to come home from Afghanistan. He wants U.S. troops to put their lives in harms way forevermore, despite the fact that the Afghanistan war has been proven to be a disaster of monumental proportions.
“Do you think we should ever end the current war in Afghanistan?” Kirk asked Crenshaw while he appeared on his podcast.
“No.” Crenshaw responded, “Again, this gets back to, ‘What is the mission?’ The mission is prevention. It always has been. Now, I think the reason we’re having this discussion is because for too long, leaders were telling you that the mission was winning.”
To his credit, the Turning Point USA founder pushed back against Crenshaw’s assertion that U.S. forces should be the policeman of the world.
“I think it’s long past time to end the war in Afghanistan,” Kirk told Crenshaw. “The American people tend to agree with that. Polling shows it’s under water. We spent $5 billion dollars on Afghan security forces — there’s questions if that’s even effective.”
Kirk put Crenshaw on the spot to defend the Afghanistan war effort, and urged him to make the case to remain in the nation that has historically been called the “graveyard for empires.”
“We’ve spent over a trillion dollars, lost thousands of people — make the case that we should continue the occupation in Afghanistan,” Kirk said. “What does success look like? What does victory look like?”
Crenshaw responded with a spirited defense of the military-industrial complex and the U.S. empire:
What we get out of it is not another 9/11, every single day — and you’re right, it is under water as far as public opinion goes, and there’s a lot of people who hold the opinion that you have. The president himself is very skeptical of it. And I think the reason behind that is because there’s been a lot of leaders who have been constantly saying that we’re going to win, and we’ve got to win, win, win.
And then everybody’s like, ‘Okay, but what does winning look like?’ And we’ve never been honest about what winning looks like. I’m very honest about what winning looks like. Winning means preventing [a terrorist attack]. It’s preventing the ability of these people, who wake up every single day and want to kill us — and yes, we do go there so that they don’t come here, and I know you think that’s the dumbest thing you’ve ever heard, and I’ve heard you say that — but it’s not.
Kirk challenged Crenshaw’s assertions, and noted that terrorists from Saudi Arabia committed the 9/11 attacks – not anyone from Afghanistan.
“Who was behind the Pensacola shooting?” Kirk said to Crenshaw. “I mean, to your argument, why don’t we go to Saudi Arabia and make sure they don’t come here?”
“Well, we are in Saudi Arabia,” he replied.
“We sell them arms,” Kirk said. “We trained their pilots. We don’t have a military occupation of Saudi Arabia.”
Crenshaw did not do a good job of countering Kirk’s points, but rather defaulted back to his stock talking points about generic terrorists.
“These people do wake up every single day, and they think of ways to kill us, and this happened well before 9/11, this happened well after 9/11,” Crenshaw said. “If they’re not thinking of ways to attack the base, where a bunch of armed guys like me are waiting for them, they’re thinking of ways to attack the homeland.”
Crenshaw is McCain’s heir, desperately trying to instill the Bush-era globalist mindset within Trump’s “America First” constituency.