What We Should Learn From Afghanistan
By: Ben Heinrich
Tags: US Politics, Afghanistan, Taliban, Afghanistan War

In mid-August of 2021, the Taliban retook Afghanistan after twenty years out of power. The Taliban was deposed by the US army after harboring Al Qaeda that attacked the World Trade Center on 9/11. In retaliation, the US invaded Afghanistan to go after Al Qaeda and punish Al Qaeda and formed the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, a secular government.

The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan was very corrupt. Commanders were exaggerating the number of troops they had to get more resources. Politicians simply embezzled money meant to arm, and supply troops. As a result, the Afghanistan government was very unpopular, and the army was unable to fend off the Taliban. So once the US left the country the Taliban quickly regained control because of damaged morale, hatred of the corruption of the government and the Afghan government unequipped troops lacking supplies. Many major towns were taken without a fight and soldiers simply put down their weapons and surrendered to the Taliban.

The Biden decided to leave for several reasons. First of all, they couldn’t defeat the Taliban because of the geography of Afghanistan. Afghanistan is a primary mountainous region and it is quite cloudy all the time and one mountain pass is the primary supply line for most towns and villages which made maintaining Afghanistan a logistical nightmare which is why the Taliban was able to survive through guerilla warfare and gain control of rural areas. Some villages don’t even have roads for cars and the only way to get there is by horseback or walking I know this because my Dad once flew over Afghanistan on one of his business trips to India. Also, the government corruption made supplying armies even more difficult than it already is.

Another reason why Afghanistan is impossible to maintain is that people aren’t loyal to the national government whatever it may be the Taliban or the Afghan government. Instead, people are loyal to their local warlord with each village or town having one. So Afghanistan is more of a system of a bunch of warlords rather than a country.

The US military and Joe Biden realized quickly that they couldn’t win and the Taliban would eventually take over and that staying would result in military disaster. US troops withdrew and the Taliban took over in 2020.

Despite supporting the withdrawal I think the withdrawal was poorly managed. First off military officials gave the names of all the Afghani translators and spies to the Taliban.

At first, I thought it was meant to punish them for their failure to defeat the Taliban. Sort of like a Hollywood movie where the villain kills one of their followers or allows them to die because they failed at their mission. Or that it was meant to save room on planes for US troops to evacuate.

It turned out however the US military didn’t know that the Afghan government will fall, quickly because they were so arrogant and foolish to believe they could hold out. So the Afghan translators and spies couldn’t evacuate in time.

As a result, people are really scared of the Taliban to the point of grabbing on the wings of airplanes and holding on and then falling to their deaths. So Biden should have really sent more planes for them to leave and actually anticipated the fall of Kabul since the Afghan government corruption was so bad that they couldn’t have survived.

Right now there are two concerns. First of all, is the treatment of women in Afghanistan and that rights for women, will be pulled back and another concern is that the Taliban would harbor the Taliban.

First of all the Taliban would obviously never harbor Al Qaeda again since that is what got them overthrown twenty years ago. Next is the treatment of women and girls in Afghanistan. A lot of the people who voice concern for woman’s rights in Afghanistan are hypocrites since these people who point this out have no problem with how they treat women and girls in Saudi Arabia. Though I think a lot of people are concerned about that woman's rights in Afghanistan. There is nothing we can do about it without invading or sanctions that will prevent Afghanistan from rebuilding.

I think the war in Afghanistan was lost, and staying there would only have delayed the inevitable. This just shows the US military is not perfect and can be beaten and they do have weaknesses. This just also shows that you cannot simply invade a country and install a stable democracy because it doesn’t work that way. In many countries around the world, people are not supportive of western-style democracy. It was clear in Afghanistan people just weren’t all into democracy.

I think the US needs to learn from its failures in Afghanistan and never try to nation-build or stay in countries for long periods of time. The war in Afghanistan shows that the US military is not invincible and can be defeated. The US military is especially vulnerable to guerrilla warfare this is how the Vietcong and Taliban were able to beat the US army.

Anyways, that is all I have, and hope you have a great day. Make sure to clap, leave a comment and follow me on Twitter and the Medium

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