Notes on a war, a withdrawal, and a murky, anxious future.
Notes on a war, a withdrawal, and a murky, anxious future
T he Afghan withdrawal is a disaster — a humiliation for the United States, and an instance of dishonor. This will have a negative effect for a long time to come.
• The origins of the Afghan War are poorly remembered. War was not inevitable. The United States did not want to go to war in Afghanistan. We gave the Taliban a choice, an ultimatum: Give up al-Qaeda, thus sparing yourselves invasion, overthrow, and exile; or be invaded, overthrown, and exiled. The Taliban chose the latter.
This suggests a certain commitment, between the Taliban and al-Qaeda. The commitment has never waned. The Taliban and al-Qaeda have issued loyalty oaths to each other.
• Donald Rumsfeld used to say something like this: We did not go to war for revenge, retribution, or retaliation. Those are three misguided R’s. The lives that were lost on September 11, we cannot bring back. No, we went to war in self-defense: to try to prevent further attacks on us.
• I highly recommend a piece by Robert Kagan: “It wasn’t hubris that drove America into Afghanistan. It was fear.” People talk a lot of nonsense about the Afghan War, and its purposes. Smug nonsense. You especially hear this from the young, which is understandable. Kagan provides a valuable corrective.
• As I see it, we should have kept a military presence in Afghanistan for three reasons. Two relate to blunt self-interest.
We have an interest in denying terror groups, who seek to kill us, the haven of an entire country.
What we do in one country, affects our relations with other countries. Affects our standing at large, which affects our security. Everything’s connected. As a national-security official once put it to me, “The hip bone’s connected to the thigh bone.”
Some years ago, I was in the Baltics. I recall the words of one official, in Estonia, I believe: If you let us go — if you abandon us to Putin — Europe will not be the end of it. South Korea and Japan — not to mention Taiwan and some others — will have a look and say, “We’d better cut the best deal with China possible, ASAP.”
In the ’60s, there was a chant: “The whole world is watching.” Yes, it does.
The third reason to have kept a military presence in Afghanistan is moral, and therefore the most controversial: Some people feel, or felt, an obligation to keep night from descending on that people again.
But if you mention “girls’ education,” some people flip, and this flipping is understandable.
In any event, I will return to these subjects, these themes, later. I have often said, over the years, “I’m glad I don’t have to decide. There are no easy decisions in Afghanistan.” There are risks of staying, or were; and there were risks of leaving. One has to weigh.
• The phrase “pitiful, helpless giant” came to mind. I looked it up, and this is Nixon’s fuller phrase: “If, when the chips are down, the world’s most powerful nation, the United States of America, acts like a pitiful, helpless giant, the forces of totalitarianism and anarchy will threaten free nations and free institutions throughout the world.”
• Every minute, the United States is leaking prestige. And this makes the world at large more dangerous for Americans and for everyone else.
• Earlier this month, I recorded a podcast with Radek Sikorski, who made many excellent points, including this one: “The United States is present militarily in half the countries of the world. Why should Afghanistan be among those countries where the U.S. is at zero?”
• Afghanistan was not a campaign issue in 2020 — either at the presidential or at the congressional level. Why? Because the two parties essentially agreed on withdrawal. Only a few such as Liz Cheney dissented — and they were damned as forever-war–mongers.
• “Forever wars! Forever wars!” We have heard this for years, from Left and Right. It is a childish phrase, a childish concept. Nations have forever interests. There are forever threats, forever dangers. Self-defense requires a certain maturity. You may not like “forever wars” — who would? But they like you, to adapt an old formulation.
• A critic said to me on Twitter, “All the neocons are out beating their war drums today. It’s the only instrument they know how to play.” If I had my way, there would be no wars. No militaries. No missiles, tanks, or bombs. There would be no police departments. No locks on doors. But I don’t get my way. You have to deal with the world as it is, the best you can.
• I’ve noticed that people are using the word “anti-interventionists.” I suspect that’s merely a polite way to avoid saying “isolationists.” The truth is, any thinking person is for intervention in some cases and against it in others (most).
Remember the terms “anti-war” and “pro-war”? They are still heard today. And they are pretty silly.
• John McCain was blasted by Left and Right. But he was a pretty realistic, and pretty experienced, guy. For a taste of his thinking, consult an interview in October 2015, here. His interviewer — National Public Radio — asked, “Is the United States headed toward a permanent presence, then, in Afghanistan?”
• In my view, Trump’s team would not have withdrawn. And Biden’s team would not have withdrawn. But either president would have — and Biden did.
Trump had planned to withdraw in May; he knocked Biden for delaying withdrawal until August.
• Ideally, recriminations would wait, I think. They would wait for the passing of the immediate crisis — for the evacuation of Americans and so on. We still have work to do. Lives to save, obligations to keep. But delaying recriminations is not the American way, obviously.
• To my mind, the pullout from Afghanistan is an American catastrophe — a bipartisan one. Both Left and Right — Democrats and Republicans — were itching to withdraw. “Twenty years! Forever wars!” You know the lines. But the incumbent president did not have to follow his predecessor down this path. He could have said, “I’m not abiding by their deal. I do not think it is in the American interest. I have taken an oath. So . . .”
But Biden wanted to withdraw as much as Trump did. And he is presiding. Therefore, this disaster is on his head.
• Will he pay a political price? Everyone thinks so. I’m not so sure. There is a national consensus for withdrawal. In coming months and years, people may well say, “Sure, it was messy — sloppily handled — but 20 years!” Etc.
• One of the most interesting pieces of this whole period was written by Tom Nichols: “Afghanistan Is Your Fault: The American public now has what it wanted.” Oh, people love to “speak truth to power.” Nothing is easier — and nothing is more satisfying — in a free country. But a helluva lot harder is to speak truth to the people. Where the real power lies (in a democracy such as ours).
• For a long time, Afghanistan was “the good war” and Iraq “the bad war.” Afghanistan was “the war of necessity” and Iraq “the war of choice.” The Dispatch has published an editorial, under the headline “A Defeat of Choice.” Yes. And the subheading: “It did not have to be this way.” No, it did not. It was chosen.
• H. R. McMaster, one of Trump’s national-security advisers, said, “The Taliban didn’t defeat us. We defeated ourselves.” His full statement was as follows: “Our secretary of state signed a surrender agreement with the Taliban. This collapse goes back to the capitulation agreement of 2020. The Taliban didn’t defeat us. We defeated ourselves.”
• Mike Pompeo has been spinning day and night, aided by his allies in the media. I think a dignified silence would have been better. I think he should have waited until the 2024 campaign trail. But he has been spinning, posturing, and revising like mad.
Will Saletan published a piece titled “Pompeo Is Lying About Afghanistan,” and subtitled “He laid the groundwork for the Taliban takeover. Now he’s blaming Biden.” As Steve Hayes commented, the piece is “devastating.” If it can be answered — that would be interesting to hear.
• There are a lot of born-again hawks on the right. I wonder what these same people would be saying if Trump had been reelected. “Well, when you end a forever war, there are going to be some broken eggs”? Tribalism is practically definitional in America right now. It’s red–blue nonsense all the way down.
Still, to repeat: Biden has carried out the withdrawal — appallingly — and he bears responsibility.
• You hear, “Well, the Afghan army refused to fight! They folded like a house of cards! If they weren’t ready after 20 years, they wouldn’t have been ready after another 20!” Yeah. We Americans cut them out of negotiations with the Taliban. We left Bagram Air Base in the dead of night, without telling our Afghan partners. We withdrew our air support. The handwriting was on the wall. We signaled our total capitulation to the Taliban. Therefore, it was sauve qui peut.
You and I would have “deserted,” too. You and I would have failed to “hold the line,” too. You don’t ask men to commit suicide. David French has been eloquent on this, as here. (More than 50,000 Afghan soldiers have died in this war, David notes, and that includes 2,600 through August 5 of this year.)
• Ahmad Mukhtar works for CBS News. On August 14, he tweeted,
For the second time witnessing a Taliban takeover of my country. In 96 I was in 3rd grade when they come to Kabul and now 25 years later I’m reporting their historic, tragic, rapid, and unpredictable advance. Nothing has changed & all lives were lost in 2 decades for nothing.
Hard to take. Hard to refute.
• Did we Americans gain anything in two decades? I think so, yes — a certain respite from terror attacks, despite our casualties abroad. (“Either we deal with them here or deal with them over there.”) It’s hard to remember now — and young people have no idea — but, in the early days of the Terror War, we thought, or feared, that terror attacks would be a fact of life.
• In September 2019, I talked with Ryan Crocker, one of the outstanding U.S. diplomats of our time. He served as our ambassador in six Middle Eastern countries — no easy assignments for him. One of the countries was Afghanistan.
Online, I published a piece called “Crocker on Afghanistan.” In our print magazine, I published a piece called “Looking Hard at the Afghan War.” To read these pieces now is almost eerie. To say that Crocker knew what he was talking about is a big understatement.
Maybe I could just excerpt two paragraphs from my print piece. Here’s one:
In Afghanistan, says Crocker, we are spending less and less in blood and treasure. Fewer troops — almost a tenth the number we had when he was ambassador. Fewer casualties. A relatively manageable situation on the ground. “While our involvement is still expensive,” says Crocker, “I think it’s a pretty good insurance policy against another 9/11.”
And the second paragraph, my conclusion:
I have no answers concerning the Afghan War. I don’t envy those — starting with the president — who have to decide. Maybe our withdrawal from Afghanistan would — will, I should probably say — leave us no less safe. But Ryan Crocker has made me think hard. To be honest, I had sort of given up on the Afghan War. Eighteen years, you know? And if you can’t get it done in that time (whatever “it” is) . . . But Crocker has reminded me of some basics, and I suspect — fear — he is right.
• On August 12, Mitt Romney tweeted,
America must not stand idly by as our Afghan friends are brutalized by the Taliban. For honor, for meaning of lives lost, and for simple humanity, the President must urgently rush to defend, rescue, and give and expand asylum. There is no time to spare.
Honor. What a quaint concept. No wonder Romney is so hated, by Left and Right.
• There are heroes and heroines in Afghanistan — one of them is Laila Haidari, whom I met and wrote about two years ago. Full of courage, she has helped many people in her country. She told me that, if the Taliban came back, people like her would be finished — not just suppressed, but dead, to be blunt.
Among the issues I discussed with Ambassador Crocker was the fate of Afghan girls and women. We talked about Laila Haidari, in particular. I would like to quote a little bit more, from “Looking at the Afghan War.”
Online, there are comments — reader comments — underneath the article I wrote about Haidari. The first of them is directed to the woman herself. “Sucks to be you,” says the reader. “And don’t blame the USA for anything.” (She does not, and never has.) “Afghanistan was a hell hole when Alexander blew through there 2500 years ago. Fix you[r] own problems.”
This is a widespread sentiment — understandable, too — though most would probably not express it so obnoxiously. Yet even if you believe we have no obligation whatsoever to the Afghan people, remember: It sucked to be us on 9/11, and we should be wary of letting our guard down, and having to repeat the work we have done at such pain and cost over these nearly 20 years.
Yes. I can guarantee that it does suck to be Laila Haidari, especially right now. But it may suck to be you too, with the Taliban back in power, and their anti-American terrorist partners encouraged and empowered.
With some regularity, U.S. interests and U.S. values coincide.
• About refugees, I will write later. Thank you for joining me today, ladies and gentlemen. And if there has been some bitterness and anger in the foregoing, you will understand. See you later.
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