This year marks the second time since America’s flee from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s return to power.
In response to the evil attacks of September 11, 2001, al-Qaeda, the United States had intervened in Afghanistan. The goal was to stop global terrorism and establish a new world attempt to make the world safer and more stable.
Yet, as I argue in my new book,” How to Lose a War: The Story of America’s Intervention in Afghanistan”, the world today is arguably more conflict-ridden and polarised than during the Cold War. It has the potential to start a new world battle.
America’s targets– and problems
Backed by its NATO and non-NATO friends, as well as extensive world sympathy, the important US aims in Afghanistan were:
- reduce al-Qaeda
- destroy the Taliban’s ultra-extremist program as the keeper of al-Qaeda
- Afghanistan can be changed to prevent it from becoming a breeding ground for global violence.
Under the administration of Republican George W. Bush, the global war on terrorism and the promotion of democracy were two different broader US foreign policy objectives. In accordance with the US’s stated goal of being the only post-Cold War power, both of these were means to bring about change in the Middle East and indeed the wider earth.
Unfortunately, the US could not reach any of these objectives.
At second, it prevailed physically in toppling the Taliban government and scattering al-Qaeda, with support from the anti-Taliban Afghan forces. However, the key employees of both parties, Mullah Mohammad Omar and Osama bin Laden, their respective leaders, eluded Pakistan.
The Taliban quickly regrouped. And with Pakistan’s assistance and its ongoing ally with al-Qaeda, it organized an insurgency that went beyond the objectives of the US and its supporters, including the budding Afghan government in Kabul.
Initial intentions for the US to remain in Afghanistan were for a short period of time. However, the US search for bin Laden took ten years because of its failure to behead al-Qaeda in its initial stages of its involvement. Additionally, it led to America’s growing involvement in Afghanistan’s very morally divided and traditionalally divided state-building mission.
The Bush administration invaded Iraq in 2003 on the fake ground that Saddam Hussein had collaborated with al Laden and was a member of the UN’s nuclear arsenal without ensuring Afghanistan was firmly established on a secure, safe, and democratic trajectory.
Iraq was prioritised over Afghanistan. Critical military and intelligence assets were transferred from the latter to the past as a result.
The US was caught between two untenable war because of the lack of a well-thought-out plan of action regarding how to bring harmony to Afghanistan and Iraq. Without having any other option, it had little choice but to leave Iraq by the end of 2011 and Afghanistan by August 2021, failing to accomplish its initial goals.
It likewise left behind two cracked countries. Iraq is also struggling to recover. Under the Taliban, Afghanistan is in a disaster.
The US’s humiliating defeat in Afghanistan was unlike that of Vietnam’s destructive Vietnam War, which ended in a decade.
The Taliban’s fanaticism
The Taliban’s 2.0 minority ethnic government has demonstrated that its previous years of despair, from 1996 to 2001, were as terribly extremist and biased.
It has proclaimed a self-centered and self-serving version of Islam that is not practiced anywhere else in the Arab world. People are denied all of their fundamental right, including those to work and education. Any type of opposition is ruthlessly suppressed. Another immigrants, along with relics of the past US-backed plan, are punished regularly. Many have been murdered.
The organization has made al-Qaeda and other similar organizations ‘ possessions in Afghanistan. These include the Pakistani Taliban ( Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP ) and the Islamic State–Khorasan Province ( ISKP).
Only 4 % of respondents, according to a recent survey by the UN Mission in Afghanistan, wanted the Taliban to be recognized internationally. The organization’s lack of local legitimacy is mirrored by its position as a pariah in the world community.
However, the organization has benefited from taking advantage of local and significant power geopolitical conflicts and ambitions to consolidate control in Afghanistan and fend off external pressure.
A more fragile earth
In some parts of the Arab world, like the TTP and ISKP, the Taliban’s re-empowerment has substantially inspired and encouraged like-minded groups. And the US battle in Afghanistan has heartened America’s main enemies – Iran, Russia, China and North Korea.
The ironic pledge by Washington to secure Israel’s security and its inability to put an end to the destructive Gaza war have sparked new radical groups in Muslim nations and strengthened America’s allies.
The cause of stability and security in a region that has traditionally been volatile has been seriously hampered by the growing tensions between Israel and Iran, as well as with Tehran’s allies ( more particularly Hezbollah in Lebanon ). Russia and China may support Iran, leading to a prospective Israel-Iran conflict, which might compel the US to join Israel in defense.
This is not a situation in which the Middle East and the rest of the world may be optimistic.
At the Australian National University, Professor Emeritus of Middle Eastern and Central Eastern Research Amin Saikal
This content was republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original post.