Dr M Ali Hamza
An international combat mission with a ruthless enemy and a corrupt as well as perplexed Afghan government partner has at last reached to an end.The Taliban’s summer-long military campaign has forced surrenders and retreats by Afghan government forces.Six hundred fifty troops that were left behind to secure US embassy and international airport in Kabul appear to be helpless. Since 2018 the quarterly reports by SIGAR (Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction) have been pointing out the footprint of Taliban on 65% of the rural land of Afghanistan. But now all rural and Urban Afghanistan is Talibanistan.
Mr. Biden admitted that after nearly 20 years of war; America’s longest war on foreign soil, it was clear that the US military could not transform Afghanistan into a modern and stable democracy.This confession seems unacceptable over the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians in the region and around the world. Surprisingly Mr. Biden appears to be a president of a naive country that never had such poor war decisions in the past. The deaths of US soldiers, and causalities of civilians in Vietnam war belongs to some alien forces, and got nothing to do with US war experiences. More surprisingly the trillions of dollarscost of lives and money on training, reconstruction and providing ammunition to Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), Afghan National Army, Afghan Air Force could not resist a blow of Taliban; apparently untrained and poorly armed. A natural question arises that ‘did US stabbed Ghani’s government?’
In December 2001, Taliban offered an unconditional surrender. US rejected the offer. Nearly 20 years later, the world witnessed that US assembled on negotiating table with the Taliban to agree on a political settlement with the USbacked Afghan government. Let us recall the memories of this interesting voyage. Almost exactly two decades back, junior Bush ordered to launch attacks against the Taliban.The publicized purpose was to disrupt the use of Afghanistan as a terrorist base of operations, and to attack the military capability of the Taliban regime. US demanded to hand over Al Qaeda leaders who planned 9/11. “Now Taliban will pay a price. Operation Enduring Freedom would entail a lengthy campaign unlike any other we have ever seen” said the then US president Bush, on refusal to the US demands. By December 2001, the Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden and other top commanders fled. American forces did not pursue them rather inside Afghanistan US troops quickly toppled Taliban government and crushed its fighting forces as 2001 drew to a close.In May 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced an end to major combat operations in the country. Now US and NATO designed rebuilding a failed state and establishing a Western-style democracy. A pro-Western government was installed. Resources were spent to build schools, hospitals and public facilities. Then Barack Obama came into power. He promised towithdraw US troops from the foreign lands by 2014, but on the contrary the deployment kept increasing. On the other side Taliban did not just kept quiet. They often engaged with the foreign forces, captured the most of the rural land, developedsecret diplomatic ties, got stronger and smarter. In May 2011, a US Navy SEAL team claimed to kill Ousama Bin Laden; wasn’t it face saving tactic? In or around 2014 the Pentagon realized that Afghanfighters defeated the British army in the 19th century and the Russian military in the 20th century, thus war could not be won militarily and only a negotiated settlement could end the battle. What a quick realization.Nearly three years after this realization, the Trump administration held talks with the Taliban, leading to formal negotiations that excluded the Afghan government, led by President Ashraf Ghani. In February 2020, the Trump administration signed an agreement with the Taliban that called for all American forces to leave Afghanistan by May 1, 2021. Objectives of the 2020 deal were for Afghan leaders and the Taliban to negotiate a political road map for a new government and constitution. Though the objectives were not met in letter and spirit, but after some hiccups finally the US troops abandoned the Ghani’s government. And Afghan forces that were trained on modern weapons could not hold their land for good.
US exit could have been better executed. If neutralizing the threat from al-Qaeda and denying them safe haven in Afghanistan had actually remained the yardstick of success, USand its allies could have left the country a decade ago. It is a long-term strategic competition with China that forced US to prolongeffort in Afghanistan.Trump and Biden administration recognized that the unnecessary rift with China is distracting the USfrom necessary shift. Once again the realization is too late. We must expect that China and Russia will fully take advantage of this episode and willstrategically use to diminish US standing in the world and undermine its leadership of the free-market world order. Comprehending this most probable fact can help Pakistan to re-energize some of its diplomatic relations, such as with Russia.
