There was never going to be a way out of Afghanistan that was anything other than chaos. For 20 years their army has failed to learn a single thing or operate with any integrity at all. They were always going to buckle at the first push from ANY outside force, be it Taliban or anyone else.
The moment the US committed troops to that land, everyone knew how it was going to end, because a decisive military victory against a guerrilla army simply isn't possible. People stick their AK-47 under the floorboards in the shed, go back to work, and wait... until they take it out again.
I have never seen or heard any practical plan for any troops to exit from Afghanistan, once committed. Never.
I remember my 4th grade teacher crying when he found out we would be invading Afghanistan. I didn't understand why until my babysitter, youngest son of my pastor was killed by an IED 3 years later. The resources and fruit of the youth of my generation have been spent enriching Raytheon, Lockheed, Academi et. al. This is what we got for our money and blood instead of Healthcare, infrastructure and education.
The big mess is that we didn’t evacuate our allies and those that worked with us. If we had done that well then we could have preserved a lot of good will and been able better wage future wars and influence the ground situation in Afghanistan though ex-Pats.
My father told me that a representative stated on the floor of Congress in 1969 that the United States could pay every man, woman and child ten thousand dollars a year not to fight and save money. I've never found the quote. Rough napkin calcs - $843b in 2017 dollars, 17 year war, 37 million people in North Vietnam in 1965 has it at closer to $1200 a year.
Lol because when the "advisors" the CIA inserts into Saigon stir shit up to the point of Agent Orange, the Agent Orange comes out of someone else's budget. The initial calcs on the cost of Afghanistan were "take bin Laden" followed by "hearts and minds won" followed by "mission accomplished. If you look at SOCOM's history in Afghanistan you'd think we left in 2004.