‘An Incredible Full Circle Event’: CIA Target Taliban Leader Freed By Trump Meets With CIA

John Hudson, national security reporter for the Washington Post, talks with Rachel Maddow about the ironic twist in the story of Taliban leader Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, who was captured in a joint CIA-Pakistani operation and imprisoned for years before being freed by the Trump administration and met Monday with new authority with the head of the CIA, William Burns. 

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97 comments

    1. A quick look into the comment sections here shows a disturbing picture. It seems as if the US has become just like those 3rd world countries in which it fights its wars. Yet another british ex-colony becoming a failed state due to tribal conflicts.

    2. @Ash Roskell – Get a real job instead of trolling for MSDNC and stop berating people about their English when you yourself cannot frame two sentences together. Not sure if MSDNC helps its trolls with tuition assistance but if they do then then grab the opportunity with both hands and take some English classes. We are going to see a repeat of the Iran hostage crisis and hope the current administration has ordered plenty of caskets from their Chinese friends.

    3. @Borvo – Looks like your an avid viewer of MSDNC and have been blinded by fake news. Joe Blunder – Afghanistan has 300k million strong army who have been well trained and stronger than some of the armies of our NATO allies compared to 75k Taliban fighters. There is absolutely no possibility of them taking over. This man is either lying straight up or has absolutely no clue of what is happening around him.
      What about the Economy – how are your gas prices and inflation treating you, Hope your current on your rent or get ready to lose your roof. Agree with you we do have a f****** disaster of an administration right now.

    4. @i dont have time 2 reply you people just can’t grasp the fact that we don’t like Joe anymore than you. He was voted in to kick trump out and it worked. You should learn to take your grievances up with Trump. He let you down when he lost.

  1. It’s ironic that taliban master mind was captured in 2010 during Obama presidency and Trump/pompeo released him. And yet team Trump acts as if they are the only “true” patriots.

    1. @John Messer – Dude you sound demented just like your boss. Don’t talk about Iraq/Afghanistan.. just make sure that the dollar amount below $1000 while running out of Walgreens/CVS.

    2. @TheKosmikid oh you’re Back usually it’s your Knees you’re on..enjoy…. leave the money on the night stand

    1. @BlaQ Bay17 you people just can’t grasp the fact that we don’t like Joe anymore than you. He was voted in to kick trump out and it worked. You should learn to take your grievances up with Trump. He let you down when he lost.

    2. @arkinner no, he couldn’t change the Taliban deal it was NOT the same as trumps other policies, ,

      and what about all the civilians trump left behind? He should have withdrawn them first, right?
      You people are such idiots, we h ave left equipment after evrerywar we were in, and what was left behind was disabled or the Afghans had or the Taliban had NO way to maintain or operate them.

      trump had NO exit plan, he had nO recourse in the deal for when the Taliban kept on fighting like they are now.
      He met with him to extend the exit date you moron.

    3. @TheKosmikid • The U.S. envoy chosen by President Donald Trump, Zalmay Khalilzad, has publicly confirmed that he requested and secured the release of senior Taliban official Abdul Ghani Baradar from prison in Pakistan ahead of negotiations to end the war in Afghanistan

    4. @Art Turnas I did get the whole story , I looked up trumps deal he made with the Taliban, its all there.

  2. Should you ever feel useless, remember that it took the US 4 presidents, 20 years, and billions of dollars to replace the Taliban with the Taliban! Great job USA!

    1. @CJ Mclane OBL was a Saudi and there was no need to waste the whole of Afghanistan to get him.

    2. @Islam Explained any religion that says those who leave their religion isnt a religion its a gangste org

    1. @Stefan Jakubowski Stefano, people are not all the same in the same way that not all democrats are a special kind of dumb.
      Not all anifa are violent criminals and not all BLM are buying .ultimately million dollar homes.
      It is your views that are Important on what biden has done and not MSDNC

    2. @Carl os Only the last bit is true… there’s no stopping China.. but Trump’s tax cuts benefited only the rich.

    3. @Robert van Ruyssevelt everyone had a tax cut. !! If You did not then you must not be working!!

      You are going to be a lot worse off with the democrats spending spree
      Everyone will be taxed more, inflation will mean the poor will be worse off
      Productivity will drop

    1. Agreed, there’s a big difference between what we had then and what we have now. Joe took another unilateral action, did not consult with our allies and has been roundly criticized. The British Parliament issued a condemnation, the French president was apoplectic and were so many other NATO allies.
      This is the second unilateral action that Joe has taken without consulting our friends. The first unilateral action was to stop the Keystone XL pipeline which was most upsetting to our Canadian friends. Some Canadian lawmakers wanted to impose sanctions on the USA.
      We work so hard we’re going to become president and now he has become a bitter disappointment. We know he had cognitive issues that we overlooked we cannot understand the mental process involving this most recent madness.

    2. @Charles Vandenburgh – Don’t worry they have already passed it on to the 6000 soldiers that Biden sent. It’s called importing the virus by air and through the Southern border.

    1. @maria schultz so Biden has a stutter that he has largely overcome. But you mock him for it. What a creep you are

    2. @i dont have time 2 reply it’s not a conspiracy if it actually happened. I mean this literally happened in front of our eyes. Trump still screwing our country and he’s out of office. I’m so glad he’s not President right now and I’m a American tax paying citizen and No I didn’t didn’t vote for Trump

    3. @Francis Davis properly armed with the knowledge of discerning proof from propaganda and an awareness of the patterns of events applying a critical assessment will bring you to the truth. Information is out there

    4. @Peter Martell , He NEVER had a stutter. Hes Brain dead and misnames people, places, cant walk up steps without falling, 3 times! and has stage 3 dementia. Hes an embarrassment whos dementia is KILLING people.

  3. The self described world’s greatest deal maker, some how managed to give the Taliban everything they wanted. With no consequences if they didn’t keep their end of the bargain (which they didn’t). While handcuffing the US and the Afghan governments at the same time. That was some deal, the Taliban will probably name a square in Kabul after the Mango Mussolini as thanks for his efforts on their behalf.

    1. @dan o thanks ,but i dont need a russian bot to explain American politics. Everyone with a brain knows the parties switched ideaologies decades ago. The dixiecrats of old are now the graham crackers ,and moscow mitchs. Didnt get that lesson at the St. Petersberg school for russian bots? Better hurry ,I hear puti gets upset wen the bot brigade is late for his fluffing appointment

    2. @i dont have time 2 reply for someone who’s name is, “I do t have time 2 reply” you sure have a lot of free time on your hands.

    3. Well what could US do which they haven’t done already???? Do you think you are smarter then those people

    4. @Parris Price actually there isnt and wasnt a switch at all. Democrats enslave minorites by trying to make republicans seem like racists.
      Its race baiting.

    1. @Colm Coss Huh -resigned- sacked 5 years ago .. War criminal Blair should be sharing a cell with Bush ..

  4. We haven’t won a war since 1945. Trillions upon trillions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of dead Americans literally for nothing at all. We could actually be the great country we think we are if we stayed out of all that BS since World War II.

    1. We haven’t BEEN IN a war since then. These, including Viet Nam were “military actions”. There was no declaration of war and NEVER anything to win. Why do you think 100s of thousands protested?

    2. The Vietnam war was also totally unnecessary. In Europe neither Western-Europe nor America had any problems to maintain good relations with Yugoslavia, a communist state but one which managed to remain outside of the soviet sphere of influence and which did its own thing. Yugoslavia was member of the “block-free” nations. In the 1960s and 1970s Yugoslavians for example also came in significant numbers to West-Germany as contract workers. Remember that the yugoslavian car “Zastava Yugo” was exported to America in the 1980s? It was a crapy car, but more than 110.000 were sold in the US.
      North-Vietnam, although a communist state, never wanted to be and never was a soviet or chinese satellite state. They were also member of the “block-free” nations. The North-Vietnamese and the Viet-Cong did not fight to export communism all over the place. All they wanted was national independence and reunifcation with the south. South-Vietnam by the way wasn’t a democracy, it was a corrupt military dictatorship, not really worth to be defended by young Americans. It would have been a great master-piece of american diplomacy if they would make business with North-Vietnam just like we all did with Yugoslavia. This would have been a major blow for the Soviet Union, if their own comrades chose the other side.

  5. Hum the Taliban leader could not have had a sanctioned “accident” as he was walking out the prison door’s or wen he was in PRISON 🤷🤦🤦🤦

    1. @Piotr Trebisz Possibly the Afghan army was not keen to fight for a corrupt puppet government.

    2. @Robert van Ruyssevelt The current Boss was released by Obama and Biden while I was still in the military dude

    3. @Robert van Ruyssevelt yeah. I went a little wide on that. Silly of me I know. Thank you though. Admiral William McRaven led the campaigns that captured both men though

    1. @Silver Back ll insults don’t equate to facts. A 5-minute Google search will let you know what U.S. Party is infested with Nazis and White Nationalists. So unless you’re intent on persisting in ignorance and stupidity, cut that nonsense out. Democrats don’t do tiki-torches, red-hats or storm the Capital when they disagree with election results.

    2. @JimBobBek you people just can’t grasp the fact that we don’t like Joe anymore than you. He was voted in to kick trump out and it worked. You should learn to take your grievances up with Trump. He let you down when he lost.

    1. @D A What Hitler did by burning down the German Parliamentary building called the Reichstag. He blamed it on Poland to launch his attack. 911 was a Reichstag effect.

    2. mostly BS, America must be strong to quell islamic terror, no matter who is president. Soft brained Biden is the moron who allowed this to explode in his lap…

    3. Does not matter who is at fault, what matters is what we will do now and what this means for the future of America and possible solutions we can work towards

  6. *Didn’t the German government do the same with Hitler? Remind me again, how did that turn out?*

  7. Coming soon to a bookstore near you:
    “The Art of the Deal, Volume 2: How to Give Your Enemy Everything They Want, and Get Nothing in Return” by Donald J. Trump.
    The former guy reveals his secrets to making a deal every single time. Bonus chapter: How to Abandon Your Allies.
    “Sir, people are saying this is the greatest book anybody ever wrote. Nobody has ever seen a book this good,” — quote by unpaid ghostwriter.

    1. Yes that’s why Biden left the Taliban with billions of dollars worth of equipment and gave the entire Afghanistan to them.

    2. Rachel – This must be Russia. Remember the fake news about Russia putting bounty’s on the heads of American troops!!! Maybe we should subpoena Putin’s phone records and emails….. Thoughts????

    3. @Jehovah Witness – Actually not out of the realm of possibility that there was Russian support.

      That also said, remember the Taliban was essentially going no where fast until 2019 and picked up speed in 2020.

      Biden has been President so far for only 7 months of 2021.

      Who, then, was the President at the time? The one who released this guy and 5,000 others like him? All of them important to the Taliban in leadership positions throughout every facet of the organization.

      Donald John Trump

      Have a word with him. His name and signature is on the document that the surrendered Afghanistan to the Taliban. Not Biden. He was left holding the bag in what is a big political frame up to desperately hide that the Taliban, way back under Bush Jr offered their surrender and full circle has come to show that the Republicans now have surrendered in turn and again, Democrats are left holding the bag.

      The Paris Peace Accords Nixon signed with North Vietnam failed and now Trump signed away Afghanistan on empty promises and both times saw twin rotor helicopters evacuating people with Democrats left holding the bags.

      And, to add another facet, after significant US Military draw downs started under Republicans.

      History repeated because no one wanted to learn a thing.

      Also interestingly, there were Race Riots, Civil Rights Legal Battles, and groups running around screaming about Patriotism holding Confederate Flags even them.

      My, my history has repeated with a sledgehammer to the face.

      Again.

      So that means, Russian Mercs and SOF have to be mixed in there somewhere to.

      Geez. Why did I study History again? Maybe because I want to know more of my nation and the world?

    4. @bkit5 you people just can’t grasp the fact that we don’t like Joe anymore than you. He was voted in to kick trump out and it worked. You should learn to take your grievances up with Trump. He let you down when he lost.

    1. If it wasn’t real life and destroying the Afghan people I would laugh loudly at your comment.

    1. @Censorship Is real Because U.S. is NOT in Taliban hunt mode any more…they are in pullout mode and likely Taliban have been given an ultimatum… don’t rock the boat or else, while were pulling out our people.

  8. In other words someone with experience, knowledge and qualifications to do their job. As opposed to your son-in-law, daughter, big donors, and yes men being appointed as your advisors and envoys like TFG?

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