The Latest American Hit-and-Run Escapade

"Everybody’s worried about a repeat of the Saigon images."

"But this could change. If you have a parade of horribles continue to unfold in Afghanistan, it could seep into the public consciousness the way Iraq did in 2013 and 2014."

Brian Katulis, foreign policy expert, Center for American Progress

 

"If Trump is the Republican nominee again, I think it would be hard for him to criticize Biden for executing a plan that Trump put into motion,"

"Trump didn’t just open the door [to a withdrawal], what he did was force the issue in a way that it hadn’t been forced before."

"Polls show that a majority of Americans want to leave Afghanistan. But they also show that if you ask Americans about their foreign policy or national security objectives, they will almost always rank preventing terrorist attacks on the United States as number one or two, and they will rank extracting America from military operations overseas far below that."

Richard Fontaine, chief executive, Center for a New American Security

Displaced Afghans at a makeshift camp on Tuesday in Kabul, the capital. The threat of a Taliban conquest and new risks to U.S. personnel and allies in the country could cause Americans to reconsider their views.   Credit...Paula Bronstein/Getty Images

Actually, what President Donald Trump did in pursuing an escape for the United States from the protracted war in Afghanistan against religious fundamentalists who had no trouble recruiting from the local population by force of persuasion or force of arms, was to legitimize the Taliban as a returning potential government. By bringing them to a series of bargaining sessions and treating them like a government-in-exile, meetings that excluded the elected and Western-supported government of Afghanistan under President Ashraf Ghani at the insistence of the Taliban, was to give them an imprimatur of U.S. recognition.

 

It wouldn't have taken too much of a cerebral exercise to gain the insight that the Taliban had no interest whatever in peace talks with the Afghan government. At the same time, it was more than eager to demonstrate on the world stage that it could hold its own in talks with the U.S. administration's representative to Afghanistan, Special Envoy for Afghan Reconciliation Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad at a conference centre in Doha, Qatar. A grand title for a pathetic betrayal of the Afghan people. 

 

The primitive, savagely Islamist Taliban demonstrating their political, diplomatic bona fides. So that they could boast afterward that they had achieved their goal; persuading the U.S. and other foreign NATO troops to leave Afghanistan. Sneering that they had the great United States of America on the run. That would make an impression on al-Qaeda and Islamic State comfortably ensconced in northern Afghanistan.

With the pretense that the United States would be safe from any possible future attacks reminiscent of the horrors of 9/11 when the Taliban solemnly pledged that terrorist groups stationed in Afghanistan with which the Taliban shared a common goal would not be permitted to launch attacks against the U.S., the Biden administration could assure its public that it had extracted American troops from an unending conflict, one whose consequences would never come back to bite the U.S. again. A risibly false premise.

Negotiating with terrorists results in no assurances that can be relied upon for anything. Other than that they will do whatever it takes to gain their upper hand and since they failed to suspend attacks throughout the negotiating period it could readily be taken as an assurance that their promises were conditioned on the need to deceive, to assure a muddle-headed administration that it was perfectly 'safe' for Afghanistan and the Afghan people for the Americans to decamp without so much as a by-your-leave advance notice to the Afghan military and its government.

"We are closely watching the deteriorating security conditions in parts of the country, but no particular outcome, in our view, is inevitable."

"[The Afghans] need to determine ... if they have the political will to fight back and if they have the ability to unite as leaders to fight back ... [their own fate]."

White House press secretary Jen Psaki

A crowd in Kabul this week applying for a special immigrant visa program that resettles thousands of Afghans and their family members.   Credit...Paula Bronstein/Getty Images

 So far, the battles are being won by the Taliban. Afghan forces have a habit of melting away into the night when the going gets tough, and it does get tough. They are well aware that if any members of the Afghan national police or the military are taken prisoner, their tenure as prisoners will be extremely short. As long as it takes for the Taliban to butcher them, a prospect that fails to appeal to the defenders of the country and the nation. 

Outsiders looking in foresee that Kabul may last another 30 days in the hands of its government. An American defence official speaking anonymously talks of a new assessment on how long it would take for Kabul to capitulate to Taliban rule given its rapid gains. "But this is not a foregone conclusion", he states; Afghan security forces could conceivably reverse the Taliban momentum with greater resistance on their part. The U.S. military can provide the Afghan military with resources like arms, but not backbone. Though not for lack of trying.

Inflamed by the fervour of religious fundamentalism and fired by the prospect of conquest the Taliban inspire fear in the minds of those they target; their own countrymen who are prepared to counter them but are unable to muster the same level of ferocity in barbaric slaughter that seems to come so naturally to the Taliban. Now in control of 65 percent of the country with one provincial capital after another falling to them, including border gateways, the Taliban appear unstoppable. And as they advance the populace heads for exits.

The international community is aghast and mindful of the dire need to evacuate their diplomatic missions before the inevitable occurs. With internal refugees streaming into Kabul, among them are most certainly Taliban, indistinguishable from the terrorized civilian population, yet intent on their mission among which most surely are attacks not only on civil arms of the Afghan government but foreign diplomats still ensconced in their embassies.

Taliban fighters patrol inside the city of Ghazni, southwest of Kabul, which the armed group captured on Thursday [Gulabuddin Amiri/AP Photo]