Tactical Retreat Or Total Defeat?

The US led coalition troops have scrambled in recent weeks to get out of Afghanistan, before the arbitrary 11th of September 2021 deadline for their withdrawal, a date set by US President Biden in April 2020 .....

The US Embassy Evacuated At The Fall Of Saigon 1975.

 

.... but also before the inevitable Taliban takeover of Kabul completed its victory ... they have failed the second part, when the Taliban took over on Sunday the 15th ... but it was hardly a surprise was it?

We created a corrupt state, with any social gains made only with our money and our NGO's. I posted that we should never have stayed after expelling the Taliban and Al Queda, over 10 years ago.

When the Afghan President and vice President fled (they recall the fate of the last President the Taliban caught), but other politicians stayed, they reportedly stole $169 million of dollars of state funds, however Kabul still fell, and the last NATO troops (in fact just a small reaction force to help evacuate the embassy, civilian and NGO staff out .... if the Taliban advances allowed it), were left at risk of attack as they tried to get their citizens and Afghan staff out. 

And now with the city in Taliban control, and the evacuations not completed this week, one couldn't help being reminded of the last days of Saigon in South Vietnam. However US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, denied any comparisons with the situation in Kabul last weekend, to the 1975 fall of Saigon, and insisted that the Afghan mission had been "successful. This is not Saigon," he said ... but it sure looked like it to many.

US Chinook's Flying Over The US Embassy In Kabul On 15th of August ....

 

There was also a terrible whiff, reminiscent of the abandonment of Kabul by the Soviet Union back in 1989, which was actually a far more orderly event than this collapse, but which still resulted in a mass scramble by foreign embassies to get the hell out of the apparently doomed city. 

Back then all British residents were then sent a letter warning them that they had to leave before the normal flights stopped. Of course we all know now that the socialist regime of  Mohammad Najibullah, abandoned by the USSR, actually held on for three years before falling to a coup in 1992, and its Mujahideen coalition successors in Kabul, held out for four more years before it finally fell to the Taliban in 1996 after a long civil war. 

But the Afghan regime in power in Kabul this time, did not last even 4 months after western troops (they were largely training troops, but their presence held the Taliban back), started leaving following Biden's announcement. The collapse, which was mainly because of the surrenders, desertions and simple running away of its army, which apparently lacked any will to fight, meant it will not have lasted even up until Biden's September deadline. This looks like a massive political and military miscalculation by President Biden, who on the 8th of July, said "the likelihood there's going to be the Taliban overrunning everything and owning the whole country is highly unlikely."

So all those embassies that closed in 1989, and reopened in the last two decades, likely had little chance to be issuing emails, or letters, on the same lines as those sent out in 1989 (pre email) .... so it was too late for many, to stop the complete panicking stampede of both foreign nationals, and Afghans who fear execution, towards the evacuation airport, as the collapse has been so rapid. 

Unicef the Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières amongst other NGO's were all reporting that they hoped to stay on, but this seems to be a little optimistic to many, as the Taliban rules on women, seem to preclude them travelling and working. 

The Run Away Letter of 1989 ... None This Time

 

The US decision to evacuate its 2,500 - 3,000 forces from the country (which has caused the collapse), means that few, if any, foreign embassies will remain fully or even partly staffed within a short time (even if Unicef do stay), as it seems impossible to foresee them being safe in a country being run by the Taliban, and with Kabul under their complete control. 

In 1996 only Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates recognised the Taliban government and had diplomatic representation with the violent regime, and that is very likely to be the position again. Although as usual, Iran, China and Russia are rumoured as being prepared to keep their embassies open and recognise the Taliban (for geo-political and regional economic reasons).

Ethnic Map Of Afghanistan

The promise of US air power, and special forces raids from outside the country, has also been shown to not have propped up the regime, especially one with no armed forces prepared to actually fight. Possibly, another civil war will result in some areas under some form of anti-Taliban coalition, as those terrified by the Taliban, organise to fight on a ethnic, tribal or clan basis against them under local warlords. However as it currently stands, it looks increasingly as though this time round there is not going to be any organised resistance for quite some while (if ever), and that the 7th century barbarism of an Islamic Emirate has been totally reimposed on this benighted land.

The reasons for this dramatic US Afghanistan pull out (which forced its allies to leave as well), despite the obvious military and diplomatic risks, are both economic and political (domestic), and from a US point of view have some merit: 

1. President Trump could see no political or economic return on the big bucks being spent (wasted money in his view), and he thought there was some political capital to be gained at home, by taking US service personnel out of harms way ... so he started the process of getting 'a deal' (as per President Nixon and the North Vietnamese?) with the Taliban. The deal probably gave the Taliban too much, and also advance notice that the US was trying to leave, so with no incentive to stick to it ... so they didn't (but they wisely respected the part about not attacking allied forces).
   
2. While President Biden apparently determined a decade ago, that nation building in Afghanistan was a waste of time, after initially saying in 2003 that "alternative to nation building is chaos, a chaos that churns out bloodthirsty warlords, drug traffickers and terrorists", and thought that instead, the US should focus on an approach of using air strikes and Special Forces raids to counter terrorism in that region. An approach which is likely make even more enemies in the Islamic world. However its more in line with US counter terrorist policies elsewhere in the world such as West Africa, The Sahel, Middle East, Asia etc, where there are no permanent military deployments, and definitely no nation building attempts.
   
3. But whatever their individual reasons, both were apparently now in agreement that the military involvement was unwinnable, and probably unending, and had already gone on far too long, and in any case was not the original mission aim (which was to prevent Al-Queda etc operating in Afghanistan), and not to attempt nation building in the 'Graveyard of Empires'. In any event, they thought that whenever the US ended its military involvement (whether now, or in another decade), the Afghans still would not be able to resist the Taliban for any length of time.
   

Its fair to say that many in the US military totally disagreed (rightly or wrongly depending upon your viewpoint), with first Trump, and then Biden, and believed that the withdrawal was wrong, and sending out the wrong message to other allied states (and also many NATO states feel let down, as they have been forced to leave as well, without the US military support)  .... which is very much like the US militaries feelings expressed at the end of their presence in Vietnam. 

But the counter argument is that the US was using its military, in the USA's 'longest war', just to prop up the regime with its own soldiers lives, and wasting vast amounts of money, that detracted from spending money on the USA's vital interests elsewhere; such as the Persian Gulf, China Sea, and counter terrorism actions from more active areas of the world. This argument also suggests that the Taliban will be wary of actively backing terrorist groups, which might draw the US military back (albeit only with raids and bombings), and that they will be content with keeping their backward lifestyle in their own lands.

But despite any political capital President Biden may have hoped to get from this withdrawal at home, (but the chaos, and the wasted loss of US lives it represents, means that he may not get as much now, as he hoped for), where opinion polls originally suggested it was a popular move, it also carries a lot of external risks for the US in the short to medium term. In the UK an Ipsos poll indicates that 39 percent thought getting the troops out was right, 40 per cent thought it was wrong, while only 32 per cent thought we should give asylum to those who had worked for our troops.

Former US Defence Secretary Robert Gates in his memoir, said that Mr Biden was "wrong on nearly every major foreign policy and national security issue over the past four decades." Which may be a fair point, as President Biden apparently not only believed (wrongly) that there would be no immediate or total Taliban takeover, but also believed it when the Taliban said that they had cut their ties to al-Qaeda and IS, and won't let them operate in Afghanistan again. No US Intelligence analyst worth their salt seriously believes that to be literally true .... this after all, is a tribal and clan based society, where personal ties between members of all these groups are historic, marital and tribal, and often pre-dating the 9/11 attacks by several years, or decades.

Afghans Trying To Stop A US Transport Leave Kabul

Now in Vietnam in 1975, the US withdrawal led inevitably to the pictures beamed around the globe of US helicopters evacuating the rooftop of the US embassy, with all those frightened South Vietnamese civilians faces at the embassy gates, trying to force their way in and on to the helicopters, even as North Vietnamese tanks rolled into the city .... the US wanted to not see those scenes repeated again in Kabul.

But due to the regime collapse they have had to endure pictures of them flying out of the airport leaving desperate crowds below. They have not been able to evacuate every one of their US citizens, and abandon the country completely by the time of this post (another unexpected problem, stemming from Biden's miscalculation), but will hope to have done so in the next week or so, but without doubt some foreign nationals, and Afghans who worked for the USA or alliance, may well have been left to their fates.

Desperate Afghans Try To Storm A Plane In Saigon Kabul

Its this latter scenario that seems to have partly been the case, as the US embassy staff initially fled to the International Airport, which then came under fire. The US flag which had flown over the US embassy, was also taken and removed from the country, with apparently no loss of US lives, but there are reports of Afghan deaths .... and scenes of desperate people trying to get on planes. The USA even temporarily lost control of the airport fences as panicked mobs of Afghans descended, with some armed, and one being shot, before more US/UK troops restored control.

A Repeat Of Saigon And Kabul Again?

 

But now we have to be totally honest, and face the fact that the current Afghan regime has collapsed for good, and that al-Qaeda and Islamic State groups will possibly be covertly operating in the country again soon (if so, then another 9/11 is only a matter of time). Back in the early 1970's the South Vietnamese regime hung on for about 18 months after the US forces left, but that has not proved to be the case in Afghanistan. The question as to why this regime has proved to be so weak, after so much expenditure on bolstering it to resist, is going to be a case study for political/military analysts for decades to come. 

But I would suggest that we simply ignored how that country was ruled in the past, and we tried to impose a democratic pluralistic model, that couldn't be welded on to a ethnically diverse Muslim society that was starting from such a backward state. Pre the Communist takeover (and the rise of the Taliban), Afghanistan was ruled by Kings such as Zahir Shah or as a Republic .... not entirely successfully, for sure (social reformers had usually been killed), but not as a 7th century theocratic state. We should perhaps have looked to a political model that incorporated elements of those regimes, that also respected ethnic groups, and the role of clans and tribal leaders. A slower pace of reform for sure, but a more natural change for a country that has no history of democracy or pluralism. We should have then got the hell out.

The Taliban Show Little Mercy To Their Former Enemies.

 

However we didn't try that, and we are now having to admit that the whole social reform and democratic nation building exercise, with its consequent loss of lives in Afghanistan, has now been rendered a total and utter waste of money and effort. With Afghanistan very probably to revert back to a state similar to it was in before the US led intervention .... but without even the northern warlords, who resisted the Taliban last time round. Women's rights progress, which was perhaps the biggest success of the intervention, will probably reverse fairly quickly, and they will become mere second class male property again (although the jury is out on this).

Of course any reading of history would have indicated that Afghanistan is not exactly fertile ground for foreign occupations or influence and indeed was nicknamed the Graveyard of Empires for good reason. From the Persians, through Alexander the Great, to the British Raj, all who have come to this land of stones and men, has found that eventually they have to leave, because the only way to permanently occupy the land would probably be to wipe the land clean of the Afghans themselves. 

The Taliban Show They Have A Sense Of Humour

 

So its not as though we couldn't have been forewarned or prepared for this outcome, if our politicians had taken on board the lessons of history. Perhaps things could have turned out differently if they had, or maybe the US would have thought twice about putting troops permanently in the country in the first place. 

The financial and human costs involved with reaching this point of failure, have been truly staggering: Estimates vary, but as many as 47,000 Afghan civilians, and somewhere around 70,000 Afghan troops have died (with more to come), in the country. Democracy or nation building has not been established, and the Taliban is now occupying the country again, and its impossible to see any scenario whereby they can be ousted successfully without extensive outside military help, which will not be forthcoming. In fact the US is going to find getting military alliances for action in conflict zones difficult in the future, such is the damage that this retreat from Afghanistan has caused to US political/military credibility.

The economic and human cost for the US and NATO are also not insignificant: The Costs of War project at Brown University gives the figures for the lives lost as USA 2,442 soldiers, and more than 3,800 US private security contractors, and 1,144 soldiers from the other coalition (NATO) countries. They also estimate that the financial drain of the war has cost the USA a total of $2.26tn (£1.64tn), with the bulk of the money spent on counter-insurgency operations, and on the requirements of US troops, such as food, clothing, medical care, special pay and benefits.

However, US official government data indicates that since 2002, the US has also spent about $143.27bn on reconstruction activities in Afghanistan, which includes $88.32bn spent on building up the Afghan security forces (including the Afghan National Army and police force) ... all of which have taken massive casualty rates, but still not been able to hold their ground (let alone drive back or defeat the Taliban). Another $36bn has been allocated for governance and development, with lesser amounts allocated for anti-drug efforts and for humanitarian aid. With that much money sloshing about, there has also been an estimated $19bn of money lost to waste, fraud and abuse, just for the period between May 2009 and December 31, 2019. 

These figures are actually mind blowing, and would have been unsustainable by any country except the USA, but now even that mighty economy can't keep it up (especially with the cost of Biden's Covid-19 economic recovery measures), which along with the loss of the political will (or realism, depending on your point of view), is another reason why the US is pulling out. Oh they are putting a brave face on it, and spinning it like crazy as the Afghans solving their own problems, confidence in the regimes abilities, peaceful settlements, and a lot of other such sound bites, but make no mistake, its a total defeat. 

Oh not perhaps, strictly speaking a military defeat in a battle sense, the US and its coalition are too powerful these days to be beaten by the Taliban, in that sense of the word as a battlefield defeat, but quite similar to Vietnam, where the US and its South Vietnamese allies lost the countryside, with the cities full of Viet-Cong, and there was no end victory in sight .... so a defeat, because the enemy never went away. Afghanistan is a stone ridden killing field for all who enter it, and that hasn't changed in centuries.

As this is only the second time the deployment of the US military has not been enough to win the political battle, the comparisons with the Vietnam war and its costs in men and materials, are actually very valid, but in Vietnam were in some respects even more horrific: 

• The US lost 58,220 service personnel killed, and another 153,303 wounded ... they also had the issue of the 1,643 servicemen who were missing in action (thankfully not thought to be such an issue this time).  
• While the Vietnamese had a real butchers bill to pay, with 1.1 million North Vietnamese soldiers and 250,000 South Vietnamese soldiers killed, with both sides also losing more than 2 million civilians.
  

As for the financial costs, reliable figures aren't available for the Vietnamese sides (but they both relied heavily on either the USA or Soviet Union for material, or the war would have likely been over in a year or so). But for the USA, the Vietnam War cost $168 billion (or the equivalent of about $1 trillion in current  dollar values). That figure included $111 billion in military operations, and $28.5 billion in aid to South Vietnam. There was also an ongoing (although declining) bill of $22 billion a year in welfare compensation to US Vietnam veterans and their families.

For all the blood and money expended by the coalition forces in Afghanistan, the Taliban now control the country they were ousted from in 2001. So we have to ask what was the point? .... the US could have simply have bombed the place flat in retaliation for 9/11, and then left it to its own devices twenty years ago .... its now never going to be anything but a backward failed state, and thus remain as its always been, "a land of only stones and men".

Where we go from here on forward, is something that all Western countries and those countries bordering Afghanistan, will have to address now .... Western countries are being asked to take in thousands of Afghan refugees (with all the social consequences, inherent from taking people from a socially backward, Muslim failed state), and worldwide refugee numbers will be swelled, as yet another wave of Muslims flee their latest local Islamic paradise on Earth, and the terrorist training camps will likely soon be in operation again in Afghanistan. There can be little doubt that the leaders of the Taliban, Al-Queda and Islamic State, will all be planning international terrorist operations again .... the spirit of Osama Bin-Laden lives on in his adopted land.

But we should try to remember that, before the Communists and then the Saudi inspired Taliban, brought hard-line Islam to its mountains, Afghanistan once had promise of a better outcome.

Note: This post had to be advanced from September, and re-written three times in a few days, such has been the speed of events last weekend and this week .... so sorry if it still looks dated by Friday!