Vietnam and Afghanistan: A tale of two US military withdrawals

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Combo image showing a picture of the 1975 fall of Saigon by Dutch photographer Hugh Van Es (left) and a chaotic scene at Kabul airport on August 19, 2021. (Wikimedia Commons and AFP)
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Updated 06 September 2021
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Vietnam and Afghanistan: A tale of two US military withdrawals

  • US enmity with Vietnam’s communist rulers gave way to frienship and strategic partnership
  • Whether Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers and the US can bury their enmity remains to be seen

WASHINGTON D.C.: Images of the chaotic last days of the US mission in Afghanistan have been compared widely to the scenes of the final evacuation from Saigon in 1975 as the victorious North Vietnamese Army rolled into the capital of South Vietnam.

Iconic photos of desperate Vietnamese trying to scale the walls of the US embassy bear a striking resemblance to those of civilians clambering up the gates of Kabul airport last month in hopes of catching one of the last flights out of the country.

In hindsight, the parallels between the American experience in Vietnam and Afghanistan are too many to ignore. Just like the US began a rapid military drawdown in Vietnam after signing the Paris Peace Accords with North Vietnam in 1973, the February 2020 Doha deal between the US and the Taliban set the scene for America’s rush for the exits in Afghanistan.

By 1975, the only US soldiers remaining in South Vietnam were the Marines who guarded the embassy in Saigon and a small contingent at a nearby air base. By the end of April that year, the city, later renamed Ho Chi Minh City, had fallen to the North VIetnamese Army (NVA).




Jubilant communist troops atop tanks make their way to the center of Saigon as the city fell under their control on April 30, 1975. (Vietnam News Agency photo via AFP) 

The US had hoped that the peace accords would allow for the “Vietnamization” of the conflict, transferring combat operations and security away from the US military to the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN).

But just like the Afghan National Army — in which Washington had invested billions in training and equipment — proved incapable of securing the country on their own, the ARVN crumbled in the absence of the full complement of US ground combat units and field advisers.

For a long time after the humiliating end to the Vietnam War, the US seemed to suffer from a crisis of confidence, questioning its strength, the appeal of its values and its role in the world.

“This will be the final message from Saigon station,” wrote Thomas Polgar, the last serving CIA station chief in Saigon, before his evacuation. “It has been a long and hard fight and we have lost. This experience, unique in the history of the US, does not signal, necessarily, the demise of the US as a world power.”

He added: “Those who fail to learn from history are forced to repeat it. Let us hope that we will not have another Vietnam experience and that we have learned our lesson. Saigon signing off.”




Afghans crowd at the tarmac of the Kabul airport on August 16, 2021, to flee the country as the Taliban took control of Afghanistan. (AFP file)

American military historians would be right to assess that the lessons of Vietnam were lost when the US pursued another open-ended war whose initial limited objectives were overtaken by a zeal for nation-building.

As with Saigon in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the government in Kabul supported by the US military lacked the competence and broad legitimacy to combat an insurgency on its own.

In a now declassified 1969 memo to former president Richard Nixon, his national security adviser, Henry Kissinger, expressed deep concern that the war was unlikely to be won militarily.

“I am not optimistic about the ability of the South Vietnamese armed forces to assume a larger part of the burden than current plans allow,” he wrote, adding: “Hanoi’s adoption of a strategy designed to wait us out fits both with its doctrine of how to fight a revolutionary war and with its expectations about increasingly significant problems for the US.”

In both the Vietnam and Afghanistan missions, time and lack of strategic patience were America’s main weaknesses in the face of a stubborn insurgency. Of the four different administrations that have guided US foreign policy since the Afghan war began, none took a step back to assess the likelihood of success as rationally and impartially as Kissinger did in the 1969 memo.

Although the Afghanistan mission did not produce the kind of civil disturbance and political turmoil synonymous with the Vietnam War, there was a broad consensus among US politicians for some time now that an indefinite military involvement in the culturally distant Central Asian country was not desirable.

Now that the Afghanistan chapter is closed, some point to the fact that the post-1975 period has seen a slow but remarkable rapprochement between the US and Vietnam.

Within the space of 20 years, the former belligerent nations were able to forge a relationship that today has evolved into a veritable strategic partnership, symbolized by the US-Vietnam Comprehensive Partnership of 2013.

A quarter of a century after the establishment of bilateral relations in 1995, the US and Vietnam are thus partners with a friendship grounded in mutual respect and suspicion of China’s geopolitical motives.

The partnership now spans political, economic, security and people-to-people ties. Tens of thousands of Vietnamese citizens study in the US and contribute almost $1 billion to the US economy.

“We must remember that the immediate consequences of the Vietnam War were horrible. Many in South Vietnam were sent to camps and murdered, resulting in a huge human-rights tragedy,” James Carafano, a fellow at the Heritage Foundation, told Arab News. “Today, Vietnam is a different place. Vietnamese are terrified of China and they need the US to defend them.”

A strong, prosperous and independent Vietnam is very much in Washington’s interest as Hanoi and Beijing remain locked in a standoff over competing territorial claims in the South China Sea.

Bilateral trade between the two nations has grown from $451 million in 1995 to more than $90 billion in 2020. US goods exports to Vietnam were worth more than $10 billion in 2020, while imports were worth a whopping $79.6 billion. US investment in Vietnam touched $2.6 billion in 2019.




Vietnam's exports to the US swelled over the past decade. (Reuters file photo)

Now that the war in Afghanistan is over and discussions between the Taliban and regional countries toward diplomatic normalization are ongoing, the evolution of US-Vietnamese relations from enmity to a flourishing partnership can prove instructive.

Could economic leverage, common security interests and deft diplomacy achieve in Afghanistan what the expenditure of billions of dollars in building a defense force in the mold of Western militaries failed to do?

The Taliban have been keen to signal that they are ready to engage diplomatically with regional powers, including China, the Arab Gulf states, Turkey and even India.

For the US, the immediate security objective is to make sure that neither Al-Qaeda nor Daesh establishes a base of operations to plot transnational terror attacks from. To this end, the US will have to make use of all the tools at its disposal: Soft power, diplomacy and economic incentives.

The worst-case scenario at the time of the 1975 US defeat was a communist victory in South Vietnam having a “domino effect,” leading to the collapse of Southeast Asian governments allied with the US. But such an eventuality did not come to fruition.

The dramatic turnaround in US-Vietnam relations means there is room for hope in the case of Afghanistan, too, but with a number of caveats.

“There were two reasons why the US remained in Afghanistan: One, to prevent another space for transnational terror again, and two, to prevent the destabilization of South Asia. Both were legitimate US interests,” said Carafano.

“Now we have no presence, no visibility on the terrorist situation and no deterrent against actors in the region. We have lost the trust of allies.”

As for the future, Carafano said: “The Taliban are not going through an evolution like Germany post-Second World War. It’s a ridiculous notion that the Taliban will normalize as a government. Daesh are useful idiots who do not have the capacity to threaten anybody. They are a bigger threat to the Taliban than to us.

“Will the Taliban break with the Haqqani network and Al-Qaeda? They won’t. The Taliban may not plan the next 9/11, but Al-Qaeda and Haqqani will.”




In this photo taken on May 31, 2017, Afghan security forces stand at the site of a deadly explosion blamed on the Haqqani network. (AP file)

Clearly, the time-worn tribal partnership between the Haqqani network, which is an integral part of the Taliban, and Al-Qaeda, will be a major complicating factor in the Taliban’s ability or willingness to prevent the international terror group from rebounding.

For the moment, the Taliban seem to be making all the right noises. The political leadership has emphasized that they are pursuing a nationalist vision, not a transnational one.

What remains to be seen is whether the group can prioritize the needs of running the affairs of state, which will require significant outside financial support and technical expertise, over a wild-eyed “revolutionary” vision that includes terror sanctuaries.

“In Vietnam, military victory over the US did not translate to a strategic defeat of the US and the anti-communist bloc globally,” Carafano told Arab News.

“Both Republican and Democratic administrations have taken successive steps toward strengthening Washington’s commitment to a security partnership with Vietnam. Previously unthinkable, US Navy aircraft carriers are now allowed to dock in Vietnamese ports.




US Vice President Kamala Harris meets with Vietnam's Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh din Hanoi on August 25, 2021. (REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/Pool)

“Whether the US and Taliban-controlled Afghanistan can develop some level of security arrangement based on a common threat perception is an open-ended question.

“But already, China and Russia have signaled that they are ready for a bigger role in Afghanistan in the wake of the US withdrawal. Though they are likely to engage cautiously. Both powers’ interest in Afghanistan lies in winning without fighting. But they’ll take their time in Afghanistan.”

In the final analysis, time was the overarching factor in America’s military defeat by the insurgency in both Vietnam and Afghanistan. But it also was the passage of time following the Vietnam War that enabled the adversaries to grow into friends based on common interests and threats.

It remains to be seen what American policymakers have learnt from the two humiliating withdrawals in order to avoid a third. With Vietnam, the US was able to salvage a measure of diplomatic victory from its military defeat. In Afghanistan, much will depend on the Taliban leadership’s ability and willingness to make a complete break with the past.

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Twitter: @OS26


Four confirmed dead in small plane crash at London regional airport

Updated 4 sec ago
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Four confirmed dead in small plane crash at London regional airport

  • Video footage had shown a 12-meter (39-feet) plane in flames with a plume of black smoke at Southend-on-Sea

LONDON: Four people were killed when a small plane crashed at a London regional airport at the weekend, UK police said on Monday.
The plane went down around 4:00 p.m. (1500 GMT) on Sunday, shortly after departing London Southend airport in southeast England for the Netherlands.
“Sadly, we can now confirm that all four people on board died,” Essex Police chief superintendent Morgan Cronin told reporters.
“We are working to officially confirm their identities. At this stage, we believe all four are foreign nationals,” he added.
Cronin said the force was interviewing dozens of witnesses, and detectives and forensic teams were working to “build an accurate picture of what happened.”
He added that the airport “will remain closed until further notice.”
Video footage had shown a 12-meter (39-feet) plane in flames with a plume of black smoke at Southend-on-Sea.
Police evacuated a nearby golf club and rugby club as a precaution.
According to the BBC, the plane was a Beechcraft B200.
Southend-on-Sea is about 65 kilometers (40 miles) east of the capital, and its airport is the sixth largest in the London area.


Japanese FM offers support for Palestine in talk with Salameh

Japanese Foreign Minister IWAYA Takeshi met with Estephan Anton Salameh, Minister of Planning and International Cooperation.
Updated 14 July 2025
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Japanese FM offers support for Palestine in talk with Salameh

  • Iwaya reiterates Japan’s support for a two-state solution for Palestine and its commitment to assisting Palestinian state-building efforts

TOKYO: Japanese Foreign Minister IWAYA Takeshi met with Estephan Anton Salameh, Minister of Planning and International Cooperation of Palestine, at CEAPAD IV and expressed his hope that the conference would contribute to promoting CEAPAD’s objectives of expanding assistance to Palestine.

The Fourth Ministerial Meeting of the Conference on Cooperation among East Asian Countries for Palestinian Development (CEAPAD IV) was held in Kuala Lumpur and Foreign Minister Iwaya reiterated Japan’s support for a two-state solution for Palestine and its commitment to assisting Palestinian state-building efforts.

According to the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo, Minister Salameh expressed his appreciation for Japan’s continued support for Palestine, including through its initiatives such as CEAPAD. He also elaborated on the grave humanitarian situation in Gaza, stating that an immediate ceasefire is essential for advancing Palestinian development.

Iwaya expressed deep concern over the humanitarian situation in Gaza and stated that Japan has been calling for a ceasefire in Gaza as soon as possible.


Nigeria’s former leader Buhari to be buried on Tuesday, official says

Nigeria’s late former President Muhammadu Buhari will be buried in his northern home state of Katsina on Tuesday. (File/AP)
Updated 14 July 2025
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Nigeria’s former leader Buhari to be buried on Tuesday, official says

LAGOS: Nigeria’s late former President Muhammadu Buhari, who died in a London clinic on Sunday aged 82, will be buried in his northern home state of Katsina on Tuesday, the state governor said.
Buhari, a former military ruler after a coup in the 1980s, returned to frontline politics to become the first Nigerian president to oust an incumbent through the ballot box in 2015. He was re-elected for a second term four years later.
Nigeria’s Vice President Kashim Shettima and government officials were in London on Monday to organize the repatriation of the former president’s remains.
Katsina state governor Dikko Umaru Radda said after consultation with Buhari’s family it was agreed the body would arrive in Nigeria on Tuesday for burial the same day in his home town of Daura.
Among those who paid tribute to Buhari was Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who posted on X platform that “his wisdom, warmth and unwavering commitment to India–Nigeria friendship stood out.”
Buhari earned a devoted following for his brand of anti-corruption conviction politics, especially in Nigeria’s largely Muslim north.
He referred to himself as a “converted democrat” and swapped his military uniform for kaftans and prayer caps.
Ibrahim Babangida, another former military ruler who toppled Buhari in a coup in 1985, said he knew Buhari as a deeply spiritual and humble man.
“We may not have agreed on everything — as brothers often don’t — but I never once doubted his sincerity or his patriotism,” Babangida said in a statement.
After leaving office in 2023, Buhari spent most of his time in Daura, away from the public eye.
His successor Bola Tinubu inherited a country grappling with double digit inflation, foreign exchange shortages, economic hardship, low oil production and insecurity that had spread to most parts of Nigeria.
Buhari’s supporters, however, viewed him as Nigeria’s conscience because he had a reputation for shunning the corruption and ostentatious lifestyles often associated with the country’s political elites.
To his critics, Buhari was “an absentee landlord — a leader who governed by delegation, who disappeared for long stretches (often to London for medical treatment), and whose aloofness felt like abandonment,” the local BusinessDay newspaper said.


111 monsoon-related deaths in Pakistan since late June: disaster agency

A man along with a child carrying umbrellas walks along a street during monsoon rains in Islamabad on July 14, 2025. (AFP)
Updated 14 July 2025
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111 monsoon-related deaths in Pakistan since late June: disaster agency

  • Data from the national disaster agency between June 26 and July 14 showed that electrocution was the leading cause of fatalities, followed by flash floods

ISLAMABAD: Monsoon rains in Pakistan have been linked to more than 110 deaths including dozens of children since they arrived in late June, according to government figures released Monday.
Data from the national disaster agency between June 26 and July 14 showed that electrocution was the leading cause of fatalities, followed by flash floods.
In late June, at least 13 tourists were swept to their deaths while sheltering from flash floods on a raised river bank.
In its latest report, the disaster agency said 111 people including 53 children have been killed, with the highest number of deaths in the most populous province of Punjab.
Meanwhile, the national meteorological service has issued a warning for further heavy rainfall in the northern and eastern regions of the country, with the potential for urban flooding, landslides, and infrastructure damage due to strong winds.
Monsoon season brings South Asia 70 to 80 percent of its annual rainfall, arriving in early June in India and late June in Pakistan, and lasting through until September.
The annual rains are vital for agriculture and food security, and the livelihoods of millions of farmers.
But it brings with it flooding, landslides and causes buildings to collapse.
South Asia is getting hotter and in recent years has seen shifting weather patterns, but scientists are unclear on how exactly a warming planet is affecting the highly complex monsoon.
Pakistan is one of the world’s most vulnerable countries to the effects of climate change, and its 240 million residents are facing extreme weather events with increasing frequency.
In 2022, unprecedented monsoon floods submerged a third of Pakistan and killed 1,700 people, with some areas yet to recover from the damage.
In May, at least 32 people were killed in severe storms, including strong hailstorms.


Greek govt calls for EU farm scandal probe

Updated 14 July 2025
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Greek govt calls for EU farm scandal probe

  • In May, investigators searched the Athens offices of OPEKEPE and seized documents and electronic equipment
  • They indicated that “a significant number” of people had gained payment rights between 2019 and 2022

ATHENS: The Greek government on Monday called for a special parliamentary committee to probe a European Union farm subsidies scandal, reportedly involving tens of millions of euros, that has seen at least two ministers put under EU investigation.
Government spokesman Pavlos Marinakis said the ruling conservative party would request an investigation into the 27-year operation of the Greek authority for the payment of common agricultural policy aid (OPEKEPE).
“Our proposal concerns the period from the establishment of OPEKEPE in 1998 until today in order to investigate the dysfunctions, identify the problems, and ensure complete transparency,” Marinakis told reporters.
An investigation by EU prosecutors has shown widespread abuse of funds at OPEKEPE, which according to the government annually disburses 2.5 billion euros ($2.9 billion) to nearly 650,000 farmers. Reports said prosecutors suspect tens of millions of euros have been siphoned off.
The investigation period is mostly under the current government, which came to power in July 2019. But the government argues that the fraud has lasted decades.
In nearly 30 years, the Greek state has paid more than 2.7 billion euros in fines, Marinakis said.
Greece’s ruling New Democracy party has a large enough majority in parliament to create the committee on its own.
Last month, a minister who had formerly held the agriculture portfolio resigned, after the European Public Prosecutor’s Office sent a case to parliament on the alleged involvement of two former ministers in Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s government in the misappropriation of EU funds.
Three junior ministers and another senior government official also submitted their resignations.
In May, investigators searched the Athens offices of OPEKEPE and seized documents and electronic equipment. They indicated that “a significant number” of people had gained payment rights between 2019 and 2022, mainly by falsely claiming public land.