America’s exit and the lost generations of wounded Afghanistan
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I was in the village of Issori in North Waziristan when the US invaded Afghanistan in early October 2001. Young and old tribesmen huddled around an old fashioned three-in-one stereo recorder to listen to news in Pushto on BBC radio station as news of the attack on the Taliban in Kabul flooded airwaves.
“It will engulf us,” influential tribal elder, Malik Shahdeen Wazir, said. “The volcano is in Afghanistan but the lava will flow to our tribal belt.” His words were prophetic.
The epicentre of the ‘War on Terror’ was in Afghanistan, but its spill-over in Pakistan was bloody and brutal. Drone attacks, suicide bombers, bomb attacks and target killings became routine. That night, the tribal elders had cautioned with their stories about the ‘Roosi,’ defeat of the Russians, and to not burn down your own house in trying to protect it, but the younger tribesmen were more interested in the glory of the fight than in the lessons of the past. North Waziristan later became known as one of the most dangerous places in the world.
Initially, Taliban fighters in Afghanistan were on the run and adopted guerrilla tactics. Globally, analysts were surprised and western leaders were triumphant at how easily the government fell and networks disintegrated. But Taliban fighters in remote villages of Zabul and Uruzgan provinces in Afghanistan told me back in 2003: “The Americans will get tired.”
One weather bitten fighter said, “Our Amir ul Momineen [Mullah Omer] has said, ‘Americans have the clocks but we have the time.’”
Two decades later, it’s turned out to be the longest war America has ever fought. The US War on Afghanistan cost US$2 trillion, with 2,488 soldiers dead and over 20,000 injured.
Now US President Joe Biden has formally announced to end it, deeming it to be no longer aligned with the priorities of the US.
“...It’s time to end the forever war,” he said. “War in Afghanistan was never meant to be a multi-generational undertaking.”
Undertaking implies volition, a chosen action. For Afghans, the war was imposed on them and not something they had undertaken. The US president obviously meant future generations of America shouldn’t take the brunt. But more than 100,000 Afghan civilians were killed and injured in this conflict, leave aside other costs of war which destroyed the social fabric of society. And forgotten in this discussion is the loss of 70,000 lives in Pakistan during the ‘War on Terror.’
Now America will begin its withdrawal of troops on May 1, in line with an agreement signed between Biden’s predecessor, Donald Trump and the Taliban in Doha last year. The withdrawal of 2,500 American troops in Afghanistan will be followed by the exit of around 7,000 NATO forces, the culmination of the process to coincide with the 20th anniversary of 9/11 terror attacks this year.
An unspecified number of US troops will remain in Afghanistan to provide diplomatic protection.
“We were attacked. We went to war with clear goals. We achieved those objectives. Bin Laden is dead and Al-Qaeda is degraded in Afghanistan… It’s time to end America’s longest war. It is time for American troops to come home,” US President Biden said.
Biden’s declaration reflects Washington’s strategic fatigue in the Afghanistan region. Surprisingly, his Afghan exit policy does not feature a negotiated political settlement between the Kabul administration and the Taliban, creating waves of uncertainty on whether the country will once again descend into chaos. The distancing carries a risk. If Kabul falls, it will be on Biden.
Owais Tohid
The announcement comes in the face of the refusal of the Taliban to attend the Istanbul Talks on the Afghanistan conflict scheduled to be held next week. We might see mounting international pressure for the Islamic militia to sit on a negotiating table in Istanbul.
Biden’s declaration reflects Washington’s strategic fatigue in the Afghanistan region. Surprisingly, his Afghan exit policy does not feature a negotiated political settlement between the Kabul administration and the Taliban, creating waves of uncertainty on whether the country will once again descend into chaos. The distancing carries a risk. If Kabul falls, it will be on Biden.
His decision shocked many as an annual US intelligence community’s assessment released earlier has a grim outlook for Afghanistan. “The Taliban is likely to make gains on the battlefield, and the Afghan government will struggle to hold the Taliban at bay if the coalition withdraws support,” the assessment said.
Many Afghans fear Taliban will likely return to power once the Americans leave Afghanistan.
“We lost a historic opportunity to truly build self-resilience,” said Shaharzad Akbar, chairperson of Afghanistan’s human rights commission
“If this is what winning looks like: destroying your country and it’s future, ruling over graveyards, expanding your ruling by fear, deepening the wounds, Taliban may be ‘winning’, but Afghanistan and it’s people will keep losing in absence of real investment in peace,” says Shaharzad.
Where does this leave the Ghani-led Kabul government? Ghani is not a traditional or shrewd politician like Karzai and in the present situation, seems increasingly isolated.
“If Taliban gain power through negotiations, presumably its power would be checked through a power sharing deal,” says Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asian Program at the US based Wilson Center.
“If it seizes power by force, and this shouldn’t be ruled out, depending how much stronger it will get when foreign forces leave, we have to fear a return of the late 1990’s (regressive rule of Islamic militia), a terrible time for Afghanistan,” Kugelman added.
While Taliban fighters are celebrating the US exit as a “victory of Islam” and defeat of occupying forces, the Taliban’s political wing realises that Islamic militia’s previous form of rule is no longer viable. The Taliban are divided into mainly three groups; an ultra-conservative Shura, the Doha based political delegation – its moderates engaging with the diplomats of world powers, and the fighters on Afghan soil. Its fighters wish to see Afghanistan as Islamic Emirates in line with Mullah Omer’s vision, whereas the moderates are showing flexibility to enable girls’ education and minority rights.
Uncertainty about the future dominates most conversations on Afghanistan. “The Taliban will make major advances, perhaps capture some cities, but not seize power altogether. So a worsening civil war scenario is the most likely outcome,” Kugelman fears.
Underneath these relatively newer dynamics, older conflicts still remain unresolved. The country has a history of strife from the time it transitioned from a kingdom to a republic. With warring ethnic factions under warlords, centuries old sectarian and ethnic animosities have inflicted waves of destruction on the country. Kabul still has the ruins reflecting the power struggle between so-called Mujahideen after the Soviets withdrew. And instability in Afghanistan will continue to impact neighbouring Pakistan.
The clock is now ticking on Afghanistan with fears of another conflict brewing. The US may have declared it’s Operation Enduring Freedom a success, but Afghans are yet to experience enduring freedoms in their own lives.
– Owais Tohid is a leading Pakistani journalist/writer. His email address is [email protected].
He tweets @OwaisTohid.
