The Withdrawal from Afghanistan

David Hilfiker

I’ve been feeling depressed, anxious and even guilty about President Biden’s decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan.  My despair has been somewhat ameliorated by his follow-up decision to return some troops, hopefully to extricate people who cooperated over the years with the US and are now in danger for their lives.  Nevertheless, it’s going to be bad.

I’m surprised by my strong visceral response since I’m not usually emotionally impacted by terrible news, even terrible mistakes, especially if I can come to some understanding of what happened.  I feel guilty, I suppose because I’m a progressive who campaigned in 2001 against going into this longest of American wars and who has wanted us out since.  I’ve identified strongly, therefore, with Biden’s desire to get out.  As irrational as it seems, I feel somewhat responsible for his decision.  I’m depressed about the suffering that is coming, anxious about the impact on the next elections and guilty as one who would have done the same thing.

No one should be surprised by Biden’s decision to withdraw.  While he was Vice-President, he argued, forcibly if unsuccessfully, for withdrawal.  He signaled his intention throughout his campaign.  I favor his decision.  Like many, I am critical of how he withdrew, especially leaving so many Afghans who helped the United States to the mercy of the previously unmerciful Taliban.  I wish he had started the process as soon as he became president to allow time for Afghani emigration while US forces were still there.

I am aware, however, that arranging emigration would have been a slow and difficult task.  How would those who had previously helped us be identified?  Few would have proof and documents could easily have been forged.  How much help would a person have had to offer in order to qualify?  What would keep tens of thousands who had stood on the sidelines from claiming the right to a visa?  Getting a visa is ordinarily a long and arduous process.  How could it have been responsibly speeded up?  That’s not to absolve the US from responsibility, only to say it would have been harder than it might appear.

Some History

Within weeks after 9/11, President George W Bush invaded Afghanistan claiming the only purpose was to extract Osama bin Laden and disable Al Qaeda.  

Bush quickly signed into law a joint congressional resolution authorizing the use of force against those responsible for attacking the United States. Despite its narrow focus, this resolution was later cited by Bush’s administration (and Obama’s and Trump’s) as legal authorization for its continuing decisions to take sweeping measures to combat terrorism, including the war in Iraq.  Although it was not widely reported at the time, shortly after our invasion of Afghanistan, the Taliban volunteered to hand Osama bin Laden over if the US would stop the bombing.  While it is unclear how serious this offer was, Bush rejected it summarily, apparently without follow-up.  Had Bush been serious about wanting primarily to extract bin Laden, he could have dispatched US Special Forces — as Obama did ten years later — to bring al Qaeda’s leader to justice.  The real goal, never explicitly stated, was to punish and destroy the Taliban and rebuild Afghanistan … nation-building, despite our initial denials.

Especially after the Soviet withdrawal in the 1980s, Afghanistan has been called the “graveyard of empires.”  Since the War in Vietnam, large, organized armies have generally lost “asymmetric wars” to the much smaller indigenous opposition.  As recent excerpts from Craig Whitlock’s The Afghanistan Papers make clear, US military and intelligence sources knew from the beginning that the war was unwinnable.  Eventually, they predicted, the US would be forced out of Afghanistan, almost surely leaving the country in disarray.  Yet the US government lied for twenty years, claiming continually that were winning.  Whether we pulled out in 2005, 2015, 2021 or 2035, we were going to leave chaos behind and those in charge knew it.  

Like most observers, I am aware that one result of the Taliban take-over will almost certainly be the cruel oppression of women.  I say “almost” because Taliban leaders have promised a different practice regarding women.  That probably needs to be taken with a grain of salt since they have also promised to govern under Sharia law, but the Taliban will now be governing Afghanistan and the leadership is certainly aware it will need to join the community of nations if it is to survive.  If it is not to be a pariah, its policies toward women will have to be different.  All that is speculation, of course, and, at this point, the Taliban’s promises cannot be trusted.

As horrible as the future of Afghani women is, however, that does not change the fact that decades of the war and almost 200,000 deaths have not made things better.  Decades more would likely bring the same result.  Are we willing to stay there indefinitely?  Should we?

Biden’s exit has been sloppy, resulting in the unnecessary suffering and loss of lives, but the leaving was always going to be chaotic, the people were always going to suffer, the women were always going to be terrorized, and the country always left in tatters.  That is not Joe Biden’s responsibility.  

I know all that … intellectually!  Usually, my understanding a tragedy is enough to keep me from getting sucked in emotionally.  But not this time.  This time it brings me close to despair.