{"id":47784,"date":"2024-05-22T13:44:37","date_gmt":"2024-05-22T21:44:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=47784"},"modified":"2024-05-22T13:44:37","modified_gmt":"2024-05-22T21:44:37","slug":"americas-disastrous-afghan-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2024\/05\/22\/americas-disastrous-afghan-war\/","title":{"rendered":"America’s Disastrous Afghan War"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reprinted from Bracing Views<\/a> with the author\u2019s permission.<\/i><\/p>\n

Remember when Barack Obama claimed in 2007-09 the Afghan War was the right war, the good one, as opposed to the wrong and bad Iraq War prosecuted by Bush\/Cheney? Of course, they were both disastrous wars, but until the Biden administration finally pulled out, chaotically so, in 2021, the mainstream media was still supporting the idea that America was doing good in Afghanistan.<\/p>\n

I suppose enough time has passed for the New York Times<\/em> to allow for a measure of honesty, if only to support Joe Biden\u2019s reelection this year. See, Biden made the right<\/em> decision to withdraw because now we finally can admit the war was a disaster. Naturally, it wasn\u2019t entirely or even mainly the U.S. government\u2019s fault\u2026<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Of course, plenty of people knew the Afghan War was a disaster; my colleague Matthew Hoh resigned from the State Department in 2009 in protest against Obama\u2019s \u201csurge\u201d there and counterproductive U.S. policy decisions. Democrats in Congress listened to Hoh and a few wanted to change course, but they were brought to heel by Nancy Pelosi, who said no dissent on the Afghan War was permissible when Obama was fighting so hard for health care reform in America. Hoh heard those words straight from Pelosi\u2019s mouth. So we got twelve more years of disastrous war and Obamacare.<\/p>\n

Anyhow, in my NYT<\/em> news feed this AM, the \u201chidden history\u201d of America\u2019s \u201csavage campaign\u201d is finally being covered, though the savageness is largely ascribed to an Afghan ally of the U.S., General Abdul Aziq. As usual, American \u201cadvisers\u201d tried to curb his worst instincts, apparently without success. Well, what can you do with such \u201csavages\u201d?<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how the NYT<\/em> puts it:<\/p>\n

But his [Aziq\u2019s] success, until his 2018 assassination, was built on torture, extrajudicial killing and abduction. In the name of security, he transformed the Kandahar police into a combat force without constraints. His officers, who were trained, armed and paid by the United States<\/strong>, took no note of human rights or due process, according to a New York Times investigation into thousands of cases that published this morning<\/a>. Most of his victims were never seen again.<\/em><\/p>\n

Washington\u2019s strategy in Afghanistan aimed to beat the Taliban by winning the hearts and minds of the people it was supposedly fighting for. But Raziq embodied a flaw<\/strong> in that plan. The Americans empowered warlords, corrupt politicians and outright criminals in the name of military expediency. It picked proxies for whom the ends often justified the means<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

The NYT<\/em> is shocked, shocked!, that there was a \u201cflaw\u201d in the U.S. plan that \u201cempowered warlords, corrupt politicians and outright criminals\u201d in the cause of military \u201cprogress.\u201d Hmm\u2026 sounds more like a feature of U.S. policy than a flaw.<\/p>\n

What about all those U.S. generals testifying to Congress under oath about the progress we were allegedly making in Afghanistan? Are any of them going to be called to account? You can bet your sweet combat boots that they\u2019re not.<\/p>\n

After Aziq, matters grew even worse in Afghanistan, as the NYT<\/em> puts it here: \u201cWhat they [new warlords and supposed U.S. allies] brought under the name of democracy was a system in the hands of a few mafia groups,\u201d said one resident of Kandahar who initially supported the government. \u201cThe people came to hate democracy.\u201d<\/p>\n

So, instead of Operation Enduring Freedom, America brought Operation Endemic Corruption to Afghanistan. That latter operation most definitely succeeded.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how the NYT<\/em> summarizes its new study of the Afghan War:<\/p>\n

Historians and scholars will spend years arguing whether the United States could have ever succeeded. The world\u2019s wealthiest nation had invaded one of its poorest and attempted to remake it by installing a new government. Such efforts elsewhere have failed.<\/em><\/p>\n

But U.S. mistakes \u2013 empowering ruthless killers, turning allies into enemies, enabling rampant corruption<\/strong> \u2013 <\/strong>made the loss of its longest war at least partly self-inflicted<\/strong>. This is a story Matthieu [Aikins] and I [Azam Ahmed] will spend the coming months telling, from across Afghanistan.<\/em><\/p>\n

Echoes of the Vietnam War here. The world\u2019s wealthiest nation invading a much poorer one in the name of \u201cdemocracy,\u201d then spreading corruption and devastation ending in a chaotic withdrawal. And now grudging admission that maybe, just maybe, the U.S. loss in Afghanistan was \u201cat least partly self-inflicted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ya think? Or maybe we can just blame the Afghan people, just as we blamed our \u201callies\u201d in South Vietnam.<\/p>\n

Nothing against Aikins and Ahmed here. I\u2019m sure their \u201chidden history\u201d of America\u2019s war in Afghanistan will be revelatory. Yet why was it \u201chidden\u201d for so long? And why are the \u201chiders\u201d never called to account?<\/p>\n

And was it really \u201chidden\u201d? Matthew Hoh wasn\u2019t the only truth-teller willing to blow a whistle. Why was his honest voice suppressed while worm-tongued generals like David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal were celebrated?<\/p>\n

I wonder when we\u2019ll get the \u201chidden history\u201d of America\u2019s \u201csavage\u201d involvement in Gaza and Ukraine? Perhaps in 2030?<\/p>\n

William J. Astore is a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF). He taught history for fifteen years at military and civilian schools. He writes at Bracing Views<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author\u2019s permission. Remember when Barack Obama claimed in 2007-09 the Afghan War was the right war, the good one, as opposed to the wrong and bad Iraq War prosecuted by Bush\/Cheney? Of course, they were both disastrous wars, but until the Biden administration finally pulled out, chaotically so, in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":290,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-47784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":"Finally a bit of truth from the New York Times<\/I>, but for what reason, and why now?"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/290"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47784"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47784\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":47789,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47784\/revisions\/47789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47784"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=47784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}