The news out of Afghanistan is not good. Over the last few weeks, the Taliban have captured almost two-thirds of the country, and most recently the city of Kandahar. Most experts believe that it is only a matter of time before Kabul, the nation's capital, falls. The situation is deteriorating so rapidly that the Biden Administration is sending in thousands of troops to help evacuate American personnel from the city.
Since Biden announced in April that he was pulling combat troops out of Afghanistan, there have been calls from former military leaders and Congressional Republicans for him to reconsider. If Afghanistan falls into the hands of the Taliban, they say, our national security will be at risk. Only by staying can we ensure our safety.
Where have we heard this before?
Look, no one should minimize or dismiss the bloodletting that will ensue once the Taliban complete their takeover. The images that will emerge from that country over the next few months will be horrific. And the specter of several thousand Afghan interpreters who were instrumental during our occupation being left behind to be slaughtered was, I believe, an unintended consequence. To be honest, they deserved a better fate than the one that awaits them.
But I have a question for those who are decrying our quick exit: how much longer should we remain? A month? Two months? Three? Six? A year? Two?
October 7 marks the 20th anniversary of the U.S. invasion into Afghanistan; an invasion, we were told at the time, that had one mission: to track down and bring to justice the man responsible for the murder of almost three thousand of our fellow citizens on 9/11. And when Osama bin Laden fled into neighboring Pakistan, we hunted him down and ended his miserable existence on this planet.
That was 2011 - ten years ago!
The reality is that there was never any legitimate reason for our continued occupation of a country that, ever since the fall of the Ottoman Empire, has proven to be intractable. The Soviets got their asses kicked there. Think about that for a moment. If an army that was pretty much unfettered by the typical checks and balances other armies have to contend with couldn't tame this country, what made any of us think we'd be the exception?
Face it. Not only have we not had a good track record in the Middle East; our continued presence there has only made things worse. From the Iraq War to the invasion of Libya, the last twenty years of U.S. foreign policy in this region has been one giant clusterfuck that has set back American diplomacy half a century.
And what do have to show for the longest military engagement in U.S. history? A trillion-dollar tab, that's what. And what did that money buy us? A corrupt Afghan government and an inept Afghan military that, as feared, is now folding like a cheap tent against superior Taliban forces.
How many roads and bridges do you think we could've repaired in this country with a trillion dollars? Ask the 69 Democratic and Republican senators who just voted for the $1.2 trillion bi-partisan infrastructure bill if they could've used some of that money in their negotiations. Shit, with the money we doled out on both Iraq and Afghanistan we would've had more than enough to finance the entire $3.5 trillion human infrastructure reconciliation package that progressives want.
The sad fact is that had Barack Obama pulled out of Afghanistan in 2016 - the 15th anniversary - he could've taken some of the steam away from one of Donald Trump's campaign pledges: to end America's entanglement in foreign wars. While not as popular with his base as his pledge to build a wall on the border with Mexico, it nonetheless resonated with many voters - progressives and libertarians especially - who've grown weary of America's seemingly endless obsession with being the world's cop on the beat. We'll never know for sure how many people voted for Trump based solely on that pledge, but given his razor-thin margins in Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, it's reasonable to assume it could've made all the difference in the world.
But as my mother would say at the dinner table, "No use crying over spilled milk." What's done is done. Bemoaning what might've been isn't going to help us going forward. The only thing that matters is whether we learn from this experience.
The President's decision to withdraw U.S. forces out of Afghanistan is the correct one. Yes, there will be unspeakable atrocities committed against civilians, many of whom will be women. And yes, that will be gut wrenching to watch. But that is not our problem. It is the problem of the Afghanistan government, or what's left of it, which for almost twenty years was content to suck at the tit of American prowess while doing virtually nothing to prepare for the eventual day when it would be weaned off.
Shame on them for being so presumptuous, and shame on us for enabling that presumptuousness.
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