Paula Lugones
08/15/2021 18:49
Clarín.com
World
Updated 08/15/2021 6:49 PM
When President Joe Biden announced months ago that "the time had come to end America's longest war," he set a more than symbolic date for the total withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan:
September 11.
Just
20 years after the 2001 terrorist attack
that unleashed the long war in that country.
It seemed like an auspicious idea to bring the soldiers home and stop spending billions of dollars on this conflict.
It didn't seem so easy
.
At the time, some experts warned that the hasty withdrawal of US forces could generate a fierce advance by the Taliban on Afghan ground and even a rise in international terrorism.
Biden, however,
went ahead with the withdrawal of troops
and his strategy now unleashed an earthquake with unpredictable consequences: this Sunday everything returned to zero, with the Taliban entering the Afghan capital in triumph and taking the presidential palace, while the head of State fled the country and diplomats accelerated their departure.
AFP
With the image of helicopters rushing out of Kabul with US diplomats and citizens rushing out of a decades-long war, with thousands of casualties and billions of dollars spent, the ghost of Vietnam
began to hover over the United States.
Rajan Menon, professor of Political Science at the City College of New York and an expert in American International Security told
Clarín
that "the scenes of people who worked with the United States desperately crowding the airport
bring back memories of leaving Vietnam."
"Building a stable (and ideally democratic) post-Taliban Afghanistan was a twenty-year, multi-billion dollar effort that
has failed.
The Taliban are in the driver's seat today," he added.
Jacqueline L. Hazelton, professor of strategy and politics at the US Naval War College, told
Clarín
that “the current situation in Afghanistan returns to the point
we were 20 years ago
.
The Western effort to reform, liberalize and turn the country into a modern and centralized state will never be achieved. "
President Joe Biden and a difficult decision.
AFP photo
Hazelton added that “it is similar to Vietnam in that in both wars the United States had political goals for another government that they could never achieve.
It is also similar in that the United States had
good intentions that were really impossible to fulfill
”.
Biden's advisers told
The New York Times
that they were bewildered by the rapid collapse of Afghan forces in the capital and the well-planned Taliban offensive.
The Pentagon knew of the Taliban's potential to defeat the Afghan army, but the military never imagined they would do so in just weeks.
The army
The training and supplies of the Afghan army, in which $ 83 billion have been invested since 2001, were clearly overestimated. "They have a trained air force," something the Taliban do not have, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Friday.
"They have modern equipment, they have the benefit of having trained with us for 20 years, it
is time for them to use those advantages."
But it did not happen.
With a feeling of
abandonment by the US
.
and without clear Afghan leadership, they offered little resistance and failed to come up with a plan to defend the cities.
When Biden arrived at the White House in late January, he was already convinced of total withdrawal, but the Pentagon
tried to convince him
to leave a small counterterrorism force on the ground for a few more years.
The US embassy in Kabul.
Photo DPA
They pointed out that the Taliban had grown stronger during Donald Trump's administration to the point that in two or three years Al Qaeda
could once again make base in Afghanistan.
A panel of retired senior generals also publicly recommended that he not establish retirement dates but rather a withdrawal according to the situation on the ground.
Biden replied:
How much can a small number of US troops do if Kabul is attacked?
The president told his military advisers that he was convinced that it did not matter what the United States did because Afghanistan was heading for another civil war, a conflict the White House did not want to plunge into.
Expert Menon notes: “The president, rightly in my opinion, concluded that the goals that
could not be achieved after 20 years
of effort could not be achieved by staying a few more years.
The political elite can criticize him, but I think his decision has wide public support. "
Hazelton adds another fact: "While the Western war against the Taliban in Afghanistan was in vain in terms of its overall governance goal, it contributed to changes that
mean a lot to the people
.
"
And it details: "The improvement of medical care and literacy and that
educated women helped other women to flee from violent families
and to become leaders in government and civil spheres. These changes at the individual level, at the level of life of Afghans and their individual economies are what make today's events much more bitter. "
The fears
Karl Kaltenthaler, director of the Center for Intelligence and Security Studies at the University of Akron, was not so pessimistic.
"
The 20-year war was not entirely in vain,
" he told
Clarín
.
"While removing and keeping the Taliban from power was a goal of the US military efforts, the primary goal
was to protect the US and its allies from al Qaeda terrorism," he
explains.
"
To the Qaeda was largely destroyed in the region of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Of course, there is concern that the Qaeda can, once again,
developing a growing presence in Afghanistan
controlled by the Taliban may threaten security national of the United States, "he said.
Taliban militants react in Mehtarlam, capital of Laghman province in eastern Afghanistan.
Photo Xinhua
Regarding how the crisis in Afghanistan may impact Biden's image, Kaltenthaler said: “The president
faces great
political
pressure
for what seems like a shameful end to the US presence in Afghanistan.
There will be many questions about what went wrong.
Biden's supporters will say this was inevitable and opponents will blame him. "
The expert highlights that the United States has not yet removed all its people from Afghanistan.
“There are diplomats and others have not been able to leave.
In fact, the United States is sending troops now to ensure that Americans are removed from the country safely.
If the Americans are taken hostage or killed by the Taliban,
it will hurt Biden very badly. "
But one thing is for sure, he notes: "The images of US helicopters in
Saigon and Kabul look strikingly similar
and will politically persecute President Biden."
PB
Look also
Afghanistan: Taliban claim victory from presidential palace as people flee Kabul en masse
Who are the Taliban and why they already control all of Afghanistan