Low-Value Hostages

It looks like we've got anywhere from a couple hundred Americans trapped in Afghanistan to a thousand or more. 

What happens to them if we stop caring? 

I've been pondering how this might play out and wondering if the suggestions that the Taliban are sitting on a gold mine of ransom money might be overstating the issue. Who's to say we don't lose interest and wander off while they're being held as prisoners? Unless it does further damage to their poll numbers, which will only happen if the press keeps it in the public view, I could see the political class doing their best to avoid the topic. Hence, this, as reported by Kaitlan Collins of CNN.

President Biden is set to deliver what's being described as a pretty big Covid speech tomorrow, per multiple people. Officials still finalizing specifics, but expected to have several components on schools, private companies, fed workers. The most they've done to date, one says.

That brought out this particularly pointed response from John Hayward which pithily summarizes my thinking.

Joe is SO over you losers who stayed behind in Afghanistan.

You're so self-centered. It's always me, me, me: help ME, get ME out of here, don't leave ME behind, the Taliban wants to kill ME.

Why don't you think about Joe and what *he* wants to do for a change?

Snark aside, in a postmodern, post-honor world, what's the half-life of hostage value? Referring to what sure looks like a hostage situation in northern Afghanistan to me, our Secretary of State simply denied it was what it was.

Biden administration Secretary of State Antony Blinken responded to claims that dozens of Americans and perhaps hundreds of Afghan allies are being held by the Taliban at Mazar-i-Sharif Airport (MAZ), unable to board privately chartered planes out of the country, telling a press conference in Doha, Qatar that he is “not aware” of any “hostage-like situation,” only a “relatively small number of Americans” who should be allowed to leave Afghanistan.

“We are not aware of anyone being held on an aircraft or any hostage-like situation in Mazar-i-Sharif,” Blinken said when asked about the six planes on the ground at MAZ, reportedly unable to leave.

Who cares?

Can't you just see the Taliban leadership looking at each other in stunned amazement about a month from now, wondering what to do with 500 Americans no one wants?

The view from Chevy Chase, VA.