Like much of the rest of the world, I was shocked when I discovered Joe Biden had ordered the US withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan by the 30th of August 2021, marking the end of a 20 year-long campaign beginning in 2001. The US and a coalition of over 40 countries, primarily made up of UK-US troops, first entered Afghanistan on October the 21st 2001 in response to the terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Centre, with the primary aim to hunt down Osama Bin Laden and punish the Taliban for the safe haven of Al-Qaeda and its leaders, after the deaths of 2,996 innocent civilians in America.
Afghanistan was a Taliban controlled state from 1996 to 2001, following the Afghan War of 1978 to 1992. The government failed to establish civil order outside of Kabul and much of the country was subject to frequent extortion and assaults from war lords and local militias. Many Afghan citizens turned to the religious rhetoric of extremist Islam, promoted by the Taliban. They garnered growing support, ultimately seizing control of the capital in 1996.
Following unanswered demands, for the turn-in of Osama Bin Laden, the US launched airstrikes against Taliban controlled targets deep within Afghanistan. The conflict continued with 176,000 Afghani’s dying, including over 46,000 civilians and 2,401 US troops. The conflict brought about great advancements in UK military personnel carriers, going from antiquated and frankly inadequate Land Rover Defenders to Fox hounds and Mastiffs, capable of surviving direct hits from IED (Improvised Explosive Devices) thanks in part to their triangular shaped under-belly which deflects the force of the explosive device away from the vehicle and soldiers inside. Osama Bin Laden was killed on May the 2nd 2011 when a small US force invaded the compound in Abbottabad, 40 miles from the Pakistani capital and within a mile of Pakistan’s premier military academy. His body was then buried at sea to prevent it becoming a shrine or site of holy sacrament.
The UK forces withdrew from Afghanistan in 2014 and Biden announced that US troops would be withdrawing in April of 2021. NATO, the UK and the US had spent years nation building in Afghanistan to try and put in place a stable, capable and anti-Taliban government; financing vast amounts of the countries non-military budget. When the US troops withdrew, every cent melted away, leaving a skeletal government, unable to function as a state despite over $2 trillion dollars being spent over the last 20 years. The Taliban came out of hiding and within 11 days had retaken the country, once again imposing extremist Islamic rule, showing the ineptitude of the Afghan government and complete failure of coalition forces at rebuilding a broken state. The billions of US dollars invested were almost completely wasted and the cost in lives from all the forces had been for nothing. Over 120,000 US sympathetic civilians were evacuated by US and coalition planes amid concerns of torture, assassinations, and public executions. Resulting in an appalling and ultimately messy withdrawal, with dire consequences for the Afghan people. With Taliban rule now having been reinstated, the risk of Islamic terror has once again returned, they are largely funded and supported by Pakistan, another extremist Muslim state. Trade levels across the country have dropped, with traders being unable to pay for new goods. Men and women are assigned different times to visit historically significant monuments and points of interest ,as according to the Taliban’s understanding of Islam, the mixing of men and women is strictly prohibited, a backwards concept to the average Brit. Women are told to stay at home for their own safety and those studying in mixed universities are separated from male students by a curtain and many worry that more strict laws will be imposed, as shown by the Taliban’s previous control of Afghanistan.
What can be learnt from the 20-year conflict in Afghanistan? To begin with, the world has learnt the lessons of not going to war from conflicts such as Syria, which has now become a war-torn state and a safe haven for terrorist organisations, under Assad who has used chemical weapons against his own people, backed by Russia. Typhoons are stationed in Cyprus and regularly bomb the terrorist group IS, costing the UK taxpayer millions. Conversely, lessons have also been learnt from becoming involved, such as Iraq which has been left as a dysfunctional state after the second Iraq war, and tarring the reputation of UK politicians, like Tony Blair, who were in power at the time. The US has had a dismal record of learning from its recent wars, however significant efforts must be made to learn from the mistakes of Afghanistan, as otherwise the consequences could be extremely dire. There is no easy answer, for future campaigns a conclusive and adaptive plan needs to be formed before going in, to ensure that the country can fully function after the dictator or government has been removed, again aiming to prevent it becoming haven for terrorism, civil war or like in the case of Afghanistan, a resurgence of opposition forces. The governments we set up through nation building, need to be able to operate on their own without the economic aid of foreign countries, with will inevitably cease. Furthermore, a competent military needs to be formed to allow the state to defend itself from hostile powers, hopefully ensuring that in future, the lives lost from coalition forces will not be in vain.