Afghanistan: haven for international terrorism?
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Editor's Note:
Peter Bergen is a CNN National Security Analyst, Vice President of New America, and a professor at Arizona State University.
Bergen has reported from Afghanistan since 1993. His new book is "The Rise and Fall of Osama bin Laden."
The opinions expressed in this column are yours.
See more opinion on CNNE.
(CNN) -
A group of religious warriors, mounted on captured US military vehicles, defeat a US-trained armed forces, which renounce much of their power without a fight.
Sounds familiar?
That is what happened in Iraq after the withdrawal of US troops from the country at the end of 2011. In three years, an army of ISIS fighters was only a few kilometers from the gates of Baghdad and had taken over many of the major cities. of Iraq.
It was then Vice President Joe Biden who negotiated the Obama administration's withdrawal from Iraq.
In 2014, after ISIS began ethnic cleansing in Iraq and assassinated American journalists and humanitarian workers, then-President Barack Obama reversed that decision and sent additional military support, increasing the troop presence to 2,900.
Now Biden is presiding over a debacle entirely of his own making in Afghanistan, one that has unfolded faster than even the most dire forecasts.
Since Biden announced a full US withdrawal in April, the Taliban have seized more than a third of Afghanistan's 34 provincial capitals and now control more than half of the country's 400 districts.
ANALYSIS |
Biden forges ahead in infrastructure and in Afghanistan where Trump and Obama failed
The Taliban have also taken control of much of northern Afghanistan, away from their traditional strongholds in the south and east of the country, demonstrating a well-thought-out military strategy. In fact, the Taliban now control the key cities of Herat and Ghanzi, the latter of which is less than 100 miles from Kabul and on the country's most important highway - the Kabul-Kandahar highway.
The US State Department is urging all US citizens to leave the country "immediately," and the Pentagon announced that it will send an additional 3,000 troops to assist with exits and evacuations for US diplomats. Meanwhile, the US government is also considering moving its embassy to the Kabul airport. Apparently, the Biden administration does not want the iconic images of the hasty evacuation of the US embassy in Saigon in 1975 to be reproduced.
Like ISIS had done in Iraq, the Taliban are also attacking prisons in Afghanistan and releasing fighters who are joining the insurgency.
However, the Afghan government has said that most of these inmates are criminals, convicted of crimes ranging from drug smuggling to armed robbery.
The United States Will Send More Military To Afghanistan Than It Initially Had Before Its Withdrawal
The fantasy of 'peace' with the Taliban
For Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, America's key negotiator with the Taliban, and academics like New York University Professor Barnett Rubin, who promoted the fantasy that the Taliban would seek a true peace deal negotiated with the Afghan government, a harsh reality is settling.
The chances of such an agreement are slim to none.
Khalilzad traveled to Doha this week, where he has led "peace" negotiations with the Taliban for the past three years "to help formulate a joint international response to the rapidly deteriorating situation in Afghanistan."
Good luck with that. During the last rounds of negotiations that began under the Trump administration, Khalilzad signed agreements with the Taliban that established, in exchange for a total withdrawal from the United States, they would break with Al Qaeda and enter into real peace talks with the Afghan government. The Taliban have breached those agreements, according to the United Nations and the Afghan government.
Meanwhile, Khalilzad agreed to pressure the Afghan government to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners, several of whom simply rejoined their former comrades on the battlefield once they were released. It's hard to remember a more unsuccessful and counterproductive diplomatic effort. Perhaps UK Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's attempt to strike a lasting peace deal with Adolf Hitler in 1938 in Munich on the cusp of World War II?
The withdrawal date for US troops from Afghanistan was initially supposed to be September 11, 2021, but the Biden administration seems to have realized that withdrawing all troops on the 20th anniversary of September 11, which was planned by Al Qaeda in Afghanistan of the Taliban would not be a public relations triumph, so the new date for the completion of the US withdrawal is August 31.
However, when the 20-year anniversary is commemorated at the World Trade Center and elsewhere in the US, the Taliban will surely be celebrating their great victory in Afghanistan.
According to a CNN report, a US intelligence assessment estimates that the Afghan capital, Kabul, could be completely surrounded by the Taliban on September 11, and that it could fall shortly thereafter.
ANALYSIS |
Fear and resentment reign in Afghanistan as the Taliban invade more cities
A global jihadist victory
For the global jihadist movement, the Taliban's victory will be as significant as ISIS's victories in Iraq and Syria.
As they did after those ISIS victories, many thousands of foreign fighters are likely to come to Afghanistan to join the victorious "holy warriors" and receive military training.
There they will join the 10,000 foreign fighters already based in Afghanistan from 20 foreign jihadist groups, including Al Qaeda and ISIS, according to Afghanistan's ambassador to the UN, Ghulam M. Isacza.
Was a complete American withdrawal necessary?
Of course not.
In Iraq, about 2,500 American soldiers remain in the country, the same number as there were in Afghanistan earlier this year.
In July, Biden announced an agreement with the Iraqi government that effectively re-labeled US troops in Iraq as "non-combatant" service personnel, while leaving them in place.
Biden could have taken a similar approach in Afghanistan.
It did not.
It is unclear why Biden chose one path in Iraq and another in Afghanistan.
But what is clear is that a predictable debacle is now unfolding under Biden's watch in Afghanistan.
Joe biden