#39 Farewell Fallen Friend:
Democratic Afghan Republic
2001-2021
– Dr Regeena Kingsley
The tricolour flag, political leaders, military personnel, and civilian citizens of a dead democratic country, the Democratic Afghan Republic. This stabilising and emerging nation was abandoned to die by the so-called ‘Leader of the Free World’ the American President, Joe Biden, and his Democrat Administration, and assisted in this tragic, political, strategic, national and international decision – with profoundly dire security consequences in the global struggle against Islamist terrorism – by collectively complicit and complacent NATO allies and leading intergovernmental organisations around the world including the United Nations, in their mutually shared if short-sighted preoccupation and desire for a fast and final end to the long but vital Afghan War against terror forces in Central-South Asia.
‘Joe Biden has blood on his hands and his presidency will not recover’
– The Telegraph
‘Joe Biden now has not only Afghan, but American, blood on his hands. And it will stain his presidency forever.
Had the retreat from Kabul just been a shambolic mess his reputation could feasibly have been salvaged, slowly, over the next few years as attention returned to domestic affairs. But the names of 13 brave US troops who died in Thursday’s suicide bomb attack will be indelibly linked to the man who sent them there.
Kabul airport will be Biden’s Saigon. His Iran hostage crisis. His Watergate. And it is no one’s fault but his own. We are slowly learning the full extent of Mr Biden’s culpability for the Afghanistan debacle.
There were those who opposed closing Bagram Air Base, which could have been used for evacuations. The CIA told him the Afghan army might collapse to the Taliban in a matter of days. Retired General David Petraeus, who knows a lot more about Afghanistan than Mr Biden, and many others, told him to leave 2,500 troops in the country. But no, the president didn’t listen to any of them.
For political reasons, Mr Biden was determined to have everyone out before the 20th anniversary of 9/11. Throughout this chaotic operation, and despite dissent from allies, he seemed to have an unshakable belief that he was right. As one national security official told me, Mr Biden believed it was “my way or the highway”. For nearly 50 years he has been wrong on a host of foreign policy issues. Now, we have a deadly new chapter in that long litany of failure.’[1]
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg: Taliban Takeover Related to NATO Allies’ Decision to End the NATO Military Mission in Afghanistan
– The Telegraph
‘Mr Stoltenberg said “many questions” should be asked about whether Pakistan or its military had aided the Taliban’s efforts, as he said that the “special relationship” between the country and the Taliban “of course… is part of the story”.
His intervention comes after senior EU figures said that the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan showed that the EU needed to be able to act independently from the US.
Mr Stoltenberg acknowledged that the Taliban takeover was “of course…related to the fact that Nato allies decided to end this military mission in Afghanistan…I think the lack of logistics support for the Afghan security forces was one of the main reasons why we saw this sudden collapse. And that’s a leadership responsibility.
… The former Norwegian prime minister, who has been taking part in G7 leaders’ discussions on Afghanistan, also claimed that failures by the country’s former political and military leaders were a key factor in the “sudden collapse” of Ashraf Ghani’s regime, saying…“The brave soldiers, many of them trained by Nato so we know them very well, who have proven again and again that they’re willing to risk their lives in combat against the Taliban, they didn’t get paid, they didn’t get ammunition, there were no clear plans to defend the country. And then the president left the country. And of course, then all of that led to the sudden Taliban takeover.
So we were aware of the risks of the Taliban returning, but no one anticipated the speed” [emphasis added].’[2]
In the final reckoning, there was an appalling shortage of political will among the NATO ally governments participating and contributing forces to the NATO-led Coalition of the Willing in Afghanistan.
First of all, a shortage of political will to fight properly and robustly by conducting necessary combat operations in pursuit of attaining clear mission objectives, as demonstrated by the NATO-led Coalition’s two largest internal problems over two warring decades: (1) chronic under-resourcing of the mission in terms of both manpower and necessary combat and combat support equipment; and (2) the endless plague of politico-military, national caveat red-tape – deliberately imposed by NATO and Partner governments – that obstructed, inhibited, frustrated and hampered the existing but limited ISAF and ORS/RSM forces and capabilities, in their performance of vital combat, security, and ANSF security assistance operations along the most critical Security Line of Operation within the mission.
And secondly, a total lack of political will among the multiple NATO ally governments to endure and continue the globally-significant fight in Afghanistan –
(a) for an allied Afghanistan’s security and stability against the dangerous and destabilising mutual Enemy forces of radical Islamist terrorism, violence, destruction and chaos, in the nation as well as the wider region and the world;
(b) for the democratic freedom and dignity of self-rule of, by and for the Afghan majority population against the totalitarian terror of Taliban tyranny and oppression; and
(c) for decent Afghan human rights, basic liberties and legal protections, and the value of life – including the value and dignity (worthy of honour and respect) of female life – against the toxic and deadly ideology of Islamo-fascism.
This anaemic and apathetic absence of ‘resolute’ political will and resolve to continue to support or uphold the young, anti-Terror country of the Democratic Afghan Republic, by means of sustaining the security and stability mission in Afghanistan long-term beyond the 9/11 anniversary of 2021 into the 2020s, existed among Afghanistan’s allies even if the contribution made was to remain numerically very small.
That is, a small contribution amounting to only:
(1) 2,500 American personnel approximately, and much smaller national deployments by other allies, in a small Coalition force of 10-12,000 total (by way of comparison, there are currently 33,900 U.S. military personnel deployed to a long-term mission in Germany which has been ongoing since the end of WWII in 1945, 12,300 U.S. personnel deployed to a long-term mission in Italy ongoing since 1945, 53,700 U.S. personnel deployed to a long-term mission in Japan ongoing since 1945, and 26,400 U.S. military personnel deployed to a long-term mission in South Korea ongoing since the cessation of the Korean War in 1953 to secure, stabilise and defend that nation from outside aggression[3]);
(2) in a limited, “enabler”, logistic, air support and intelligence supportive role, with Afghanistan’s own coalition-trained and -equipped Afghan National Defence & Security Forces continuing to man and conduct the lion’s share of the operational planning, fighting and dying to maintain the security and stability of the Democratic Afghan Republic, just as they had over the past 7 years since 2014 (at a loss of 50,000 ANDSF casualties).
This torturously tragic shortage of political will in the Biden Administration and among the governments of the NATO allies also remained even given the critical importance to many nations of “mission success” in the post-9/11 context of the Afghan COIN War, that being – to succeed in preventing Afghanistan from ever returning to the Taliban-controlled, terrorist-friendly ‘Terror Safe-haven’ and ‘University of Jihad’ country that had existed prior to the 9/11 Al-Qaeda terrorist attack on the American homeland (killing nearly 3,000 American and international citizens living and working in the USA), a terror attack which had caused the coalition war against Taliban-ruled Afghanistan as well as the onset of the global War on Terror.
For the allies, “mission failure” would hence inescapably mean the ‘return’, ‘collapse’ or ‘descent’ of democratic, anti-terror and multi-ethnic Afghanistan, which they had painstakingly built and supported at great human and financial cost over 20 years, back to the pre-9/11, Islamofascist and xenophobic, Pashtun Taliban-ruled country. The kind of country, in fact, which decades earlier had served as the sanctuary and launch-pad for various terror and assassination plots enacted by diverse terrorist groups between 1996-2001, around the globe in the Middle East, in Europe, in Africa, in Central Asia, South Asia, and in Northeast Asia – finally culminating in the horrific 9/11 attack of 11 September 2001 against the United States of America.
Yet even the very real possibility of this extremely negative and dangerous national, regional and international scenario playing out to become a concrete reality by the end of 2021, following the multilateral withdrawal (retreat), was not enough to halt or delay the international community’s great if misguided desire to finally end the international mission in Democratic Afghanistan, by rapidly withdrawing all their supporting military forces and financial aid from the young and besieged country.
On 14-15th August 2021, on Pakistan (14th) and India’s (15th) Independence Days, and just like Democratic South Vietnam before it in 1975, the country of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan died and was lost forever to history as a result of a poorly-considered, poorly-judged, poorly-enacted and poorly-executed American-led and internationally-followed exit strategy.
The “Rape of Democratic Afghanistan” – also the literal fate of innumerable thousands of Afghan women and girls in forced marriages with Taliban fighters during the 2021 Taliban Offensive and nationally on these dates above especially – simultaneously occurred (refer to ‘ISAF APPENDIX 2 – Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Warfare: Definitions, Political Nature, 5 False Expectations, Necessity & Lessons from Vietnam & Iraq for Afghanistan‘ for information on the “Rape of Vietnam” following America’s withdrawal of anti-Communist combat forces from Democratic South Vietnam in 1975).
As history has proven time and time again over many centuries and foreign invasions and occupations, until the country of Afghanistan (ancient “Khorasan”) has a permanent, secure and defensible eastern border the full length of the country on its eastern flank – by ceding the mountainous and porous Af-Pak “Hornets’ Nest” territory to Pakistan and either building regularly-placed, strong and defendable forts/outposts or a fortified wall (e.g. the Roman “Hadrian’s Wall” north of England to protect against the “barbarian tribes” of Scotland or the Chinese “Great Wall of China” to protect against the warring and invading Mongols) – from the very top to the very bottom of its eastern, sovereign, territorial border, Afghanistan can never exist permanently as an independent and secure State in the world community of nations.
However, the status quo of an Afghanistan governed and secured by the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA), while simultaneously politically and militarily supported by NATO as it had continuously been over 20 years from 2001-2021 following the 9/11 terrorist attack – even if it was continuously forced to face, confront and fight the combined Pakistan-supported and Iran-supported anti-democratic forces of terrorists, terror-using insurgents and other terrorising, Islamo-fascist armed groups over the next decades in order to preserve and maintain Democratic Afghanistan’s survival – would have been a better and much preferable State in Central/South Asia than the combined Taliban-Al-Qaeda controlled, Pakistan-backed ‘proxy State’ and ‘Terror State’ that it currently is today (with Afghanistan reported to be hosting at least 20 different terrorist groups as of early 2021, representing ‘one of the largest concentrations of terrorist and extremist organizations in the world‘).
Formulas for Failure:
(+ Lasting Shame & Lamentation for All Involved)
- Ignorance of history – what has already taken place or gone before (“The Past is Prologue”)
- Refusal to accept and consider the actual facts (“Facts Don’t Lie”)
- Lack of understanding or appreciation of the real situation
- Lack of clear and achievable political and security goals
- Half-hearted moral, political or military commitment to achieving these political and security goals
- Lack of a practical and workable strategy to achieve these goals (“Half-Baked Methods”)
- Quasimodo, restricted or sporadic efforts and implementation of the adopted strategy, towards attaining the set ‘stepping-stone’ objectives to tangibly achieve the overarching, ‘more abstract but necessary and realistic’ political and security goals
- Premature military withdrawals for short-term and domestic-only political gains (many highly questionable in reality and in hindsight)
- Lack of long-term strategic vision, nationally, regionally and globally
- Inability to foresee, perceive, project or predict the likely future outcomes of current decisions and actions taken now
“A Bridge Too Far”? NATO’s Limitations and Overdependence on the USA
– The Telegraph
‘Joe Biden, the US President has said he has no regrets deciding to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan and has urged the country’s leaders to unite and “fight for their nation”.
Staying in Afghanistan without US forces was a “bridge too far” for Nato and showed the limitations of the alliance, security experts have said. It was “very telling” that a mission involving only 12,000 Nato troops at the beginning of 2021, “couldn’t be done without the United States”.
Michael O’Hanlon, director of research in the Foreign Policy Programme at the Brookings Institution, said Europe had been attacked more often than the US by violent extremism in the years after 9/11 and, arguably, had a greater interest in remaining in Afghanistan. “The mission was not just about loyalty to the United States,” he told the Telegraph.
“If everybody wanted to make Afghanistan priority number one, they probably still could have mustered those 12,000 troops. But in the absence of it being such a top priority, it seemed as just a bridge too far. It’s puzzling that a group of Nato countries could not have considered continuing this mission without us. Militarily speaking they should be able to do so.
“That’s an indication that Nato needs more capacity” [emphasis added].’[4]
Images from the final August days of Democratic Afghanistan, in the politically and strategically critical Afghan capital city of Kabul – a city devoid of saviours. The whole country and this historically crucial Capital stronghold were both ultimately abandoned to the oncoming Taliban warring offensive, first by its critical supporting and enabling allies, then subsequently by many of its overwhelmed leaders and defenders. The onslaught was a relentless Taliban military offensive of conquest, with the objective of – as always – total reclamation, domination, and control of the territory and multi-ethnic people of Afghanistan.
This final war offensive began months earlier in May during and in contradiction to the ongoing, U.S.-initiated, “peace negotiations” with the Taliban terrorist insurgents in Doha, now fully revealed worldwide as an ugly, mistaken and foolish political exercise, which globally gave political credibility and legitimacy to Taliban enemies and terrorists on the one hand, even while they negotiated deceitfully and in ‘bad faith’, while simultaneously globally excluding, side-lining, diminishing and eroding the political legitimacy of the actual, truly legitimate, and democratically-elected, political leaders and government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan on the other.
As has been repeatedly proven in world history, and now once again most calamitously in Afghanistan, one should never negotiate with, appease, or compromise with totalitarian terrorists and enemies.
‘Afghan military commander predicted Taliban takeover & called on the West not to legitimise Taliban’
19 August 2021
‘British soldiers did not die ‘in vain’, says Boris Johnson, as Taliban sweeps across Afghanistan’
– The Telegraph
‘Britain’s Defence Secretary warned that Al-Qaeda will “probably” make a comeback given the Taliban’s gains.
Ben Wallace said the Taliban had built “momentum” after agreeing the “rotten deal” with Donald Trump’s White House that paved the way for US troops to withdraw, and with them British soldiers.“We will all, as an international community, pay the consequences of that, but when the United States as the framework nation took that decision, the way we were all configured, the way we had gone in meant that we had to leave as well,” he told Sky News.
“I am absolutely worried that failed states are breeding grounds for those types of people – that is why I said I felt this was not the right time or decision to make because, of course, al-Qaeda will probably come back… Failed states around the world lead to instability, lead to a security threat to us and our interests.” He added he was “concerned” about the prospect of new terrorist threats “but we do have capabilities to protect ourselves”.
Johnny Mercer, a former defence minister and an Afghanistan veteran, said Joe Biden made a “huge mistake” completing the withdrawal, but that the UK did not have to follow suit and could have mustered support among other Nato allies.“This idea we cannot act unilaterally and support the Afghan security forces is simply not true,” he told the BBC. “The political will to see through enduring support to Afghanistan has not been there, and a lot of people are going to die because of that, and for me that is extremely humiliating” [emphasis added].’[5]
Saigon & Kabul, Then and Now: A third, politically-driven, ignominious, dishonourable and catastrophic “defeat-through-withdrawal” for America, and all of its supporting NATO and Partner Coalition allies, just as occurred previously following America’s similarly premature military withdrawals from the Counter-Insurgency (COIN) war against Communist insurgents in Democratic South Vietnam over four-and-a-half decades earlier in 1975, and from the modern COIN war against anti-American, anti-Democracy and anti-Global System Islamist terrorists and insurgents in the new Democratic State of Iraq in 2011 (resulting in ISIS and an additional war).
The American withdrawal from South Vietnam in 1975 was an act which also resulted in severe security consequences – as it likewise did in Iraq and Afghanistan – for the abandoned nation itself, nations in the surrounding region, and other Nation-States further afield in the wider world within the overarching context of the “Cold War” global struggle between Democracy and Communism of the mid-to-late 20th century. (Refer to blog ‘ISAF APPENDIX 2 – Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Warfare: Definitions, Political Nature & 5 False Expectations’).
‘In late 1967, for the first time, American support for Vietnamese counterinsurgency became a fully integrated military and civilian effort. [President Johnson’s special assistant for Vietnam, Robert] Komer was sent to Saigon to head the new Office of Civil Operations and Revolutionary Development Support (CORDS)…
Ironically, the 1968 Viet Cong Tet Offensive, which undermined American public support for the war, opened the way for CORDS-supported counterinsurgency success. Generally regarded in the United States as a victory for the North, the offensive was actually a spectacular setback in the insurgents’ ability to continue controlling the Vietnamese countryside. They lost most of their best political cadre and fighting units in Tet and several subsequent smaller campaigns called “mini-Tet,” and significant segments of the population mobilized against them…
By 1972, counterinsurgency had succeeded in pacifying most of South Vietnam with the indispensable and strong support of CORDS. At the time, the CORDS program did not get the recognition it deserved. After the 1973 Paris Peace Accords, instead of a measured transition to full South Vietnamese control, CORDS support was precipitously withdrawn.
Two years later, when, in the absence of U.S. logistical or air support, South Vietnam collapsed in the face of an all-out conventional invasion by the entire North Vietnamese Army, the CORDS story was buried in the rubble—not to be revived until after 9/11 [emphasis added].’
– Rufus Phillips, ‘Counterinsurgency in Vietnam: Lessons for Today’[6]
For more information on the actual progress of the COIN War in South Vietnam at the time of America’s withdrawal from the young democratic country in 1975, refer to Rufus Phillips 2015 AFSA article ‘Counterinsurgency in Vietnam: Lessons for Today’ (https://afsa.org/counterinsurgency-vietnam-lessons-today), and for information on the after-effects of America’s withdrawal from South Vietnam on the surrounding region see ‘ISAF APPENDIX 2 – Counter-Insurgency (COIN) Warfare: Definitions, Political Nature & 5 False Expectations’.
‘Parliament holds Joe Biden in contempt over Afghanistan’
– The Telegraph
‘Joe Biden’s handling of the Afghanistan withdrawal was condemned as “catastrophic” and “shameful” on Wednesday as the Houses of Parliament delivered an unprecedented rebuke to a US president. MPs and peers from across the political spectrum, including Boris Johnson, put some blame for the Taliban’s takeover and the chaos that followed on Britain’s closest ally. Mr Biden was accused of “throwing us and everybody else to the fire” by pulling out US troops, and was called “dishonourable” for criticising Afghan forces for not having the will to fight.
Former defence chiefs who led British troops in the Middle East were among those to speak out, while there were warnings that the West’s withdrawal would embolden Russia and China. The interventions mark a deterioration in UK-US relations almost exactly 20 years after Britain joined America in invading Afghanistan to root out terrorism after the September 11 attacks.
But it was not just Mr Biden who faced criticism, with Mr Johnson and his ministers told they had overseen the worst disaster in British foreign policy for 65 years. The Prime Minister was accused of not doing enough to rally allies to support Afghanistan as the US departure became apparent, including by his predecessor, Theresa May. Mr Johnson began by arguing that America’s decision to withdraw troops from Afghanistan had forced Britain’s hand, saying it was an “illusion” to think other allies wanted to step in to keep the peace. “The West could not continue this US-led mission – a mission conceived and executed in support and defence of America – without American logistics, without US air power and without American might,” the Prime Minister said in a clear swipe at Washington.
MPs from all sides of the Commons were forceful in their criticism. Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, said: “The US is, of course, an important ally, but to overlook the fighting of the Afghan troops and forces, and the fact that they have been at the forefront of that fighting in recent years, is wrong.” Sir Ed Davey, the Liberal Democrat leader, said: “The American decision to withdraw was not just a mistake – it was an avoidable mistake, from President Trump’s flawed deal with the Taliban to President Biden’s decision to proceed, and to proceed in such a disastrous way.”
Tom Tugendhat, the Tory chairman of the foreign affairs committee, who fought alongside Afghans as a British soldier, called out Mr Biden’s criticism of the Afghan army. “To see their commander in chief call into question the courage of men I fought with, to claim that they ran, is shameful,” he said, to murmurs of approval from other MPs. Labour MP Chris Bryant called Mr Biden’s remarks about Afghan soldiers “some of the most shameful comments ever from an American president”… General Sir Nick Carter, the head of the Armed Forces, accused the US of “shattering” the morale of Afghan troops when they stopped air strikes.
…Khalid Mahmood, a Labour MP and former defence minister, said: “The Biden government have just come in and, without looking at what is happening on the ground, have taken a unilateral decision, throwing us and everybody else to the fire.”…Tobias Ellwood, a former veterans’ minister, said the US withdrawal was “absolutely the wrong call”.
Leading Conservatives in the Lords also made clear their disapproval. Lord Hammond, a former foreign secretary, said: “When I listen to the US president, I cannot help reaching the conclusion that this decision was made out of a sense of political tidy-mindedness – we need to close a file; we need to draw a line; it has gone on for too long.” Lord Howard, another former Tory leader, said Mr Biden’s withdrawal “is, and will be seen by history as, a catastrophic mistake which may well prove to be the defining legacy of his presidency”.
Senior former UK defence figures criticised Mr Biden, with Lord Dannatt, the former head of the British Army, saying: “The manner and timing of the Afghan collapse is the direct result of President Biden’s decision to withdraw all US forces from Afghanistan by the 20th anniversary of 9/11.”
At a stroke, he has undermined the patient and painstaking work of the last five, 10, 15 years to build up governance in Afghanistan, develop its economy, transform its civil society and build up its security forces. The people had a glimpse of a better life – but that has been torn away.”
Lord Houghton of Richmond, a former chief of the defence staff, said: “I think the American decision to withdraw military support was a dreadful one, and the resulting chaos should be of no surprise”’ [emphasis added].[7]
‘Afghanistan: MP Tom Tugendhat gives emotional speech in Parliament on Taliban takeover’
18 August 2021
‘Theresa May gives blistering speech on UK’s Afghanistan withdrawal’
18 August 2021
‘Joe Biden: UK and allies had choice to remain in Afghanistan’
– The Telegraph
‘Joe Biden has hit back at the UK and Nato allies, claiming they “had a choice” to stay in Afghanistan and could have done so despite the United States pulling out.
The US president has faced a torrent of criticism from ministers and MPs over the botched withdrawal, which has left US and British officials scrambling to get their citizens out of the country after the Taliban seized power. His suggestion appeared to contradict the British position that it could not carry on the mission without America. Boris Johnson told Parliament on Wednesday that the West could not continue in Afghanistan without US support and air power.
But on Thursday Mr Biden said it had been a joint decision to leave, and that Britain and other Nato nations had had the option of staying. The president said: “Look, before I made this decision I met with all our allies, our Nato allies in Europe. They agreed. We should be getting out.” Asked whether those allies had a choice, he said: “Sure, they had a choice. Look, the one thing I promise you – in private Nato allies are not quiet.”
Mr Johnson and Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, have pointed the finger at Washington to explain why UK troops did not remain in Afghanistan. The Prime Minister, speaking in the Commons on Wednesday said: “The West could not continue this US-led mission – a mission conceived and executed in support and defence of America – without American logistics, without US air power and without American might.”
Challenged on whether Nato could have continued to provide [to Afghanistan political and logistic military] support, he said: “I really think that it is an illusion to believe that there is appetite among any of our partners for a continued military presence.”
Mr Biden is under increasing pressure from Republicans over what intelligence reports he had seen before the chaos. In his interview, the president said he could not “recall” his generals saying he should leave 2,500 US troops stationed in Afghanistan.
He also denied seeing intelligence that the Afghan government and army would collapse quickly and said there had been suggestions it [the democratic country’s collapse] would happen around the end of the year [thereby revealing that the loss of democratic and anti-terror Afghanistan to the total control of the Taliban and other pro-terror Islamist forces was therefore not only already expected by the Biden Administration at some point after the U.S.-led NATO withdrawal, but also expected to take place within a short time after the multilateral withdrawal and during the year 2021]’ [emphasis added].[8]
‘Former PM Tony Blair criticises withdrawal from Afghanistan’
23 August 2021
‘Gen. Jack Keane points out ‘factual inaccuracies’ in Biden’s Afghanistan speech’
17 August 2021
‘Injured British veterans lament the fall of Afghanistan’
– The Telegraph
‘There are a lot of “broken hearts in the British Army”, injured veterans have said after the withdrawal of Nato forces has seen Afghanistan fall further to the Taliban.
The Telegraph spoke to numerous veterans of the 20-year war after Ben Wallace revealed around 600 paratroopers, drawn from 16 Air Assault Brigade, will be sent to Afghanistan to remove British nationals. The troops will also help to bring interpreters and other Afghan staff to the UK.
… Andrew Fox, a retired paratrooper who underwent three tours in Afghanistan and worked closely with the Afghan national army, said the withdrawal had “dropped the ball completely”. “It boils down to the moral case and from where I’m sitting it looks like we broke it and we have a duty to fix it,” he told The Telegraph. Mr Fox, who suffered PTSD as a result of his tours, said there were different levels of support the UK could still provide to Afghanistan, yet their was an absence of “political will”. “There are a lot of broken hearts in the British Army today,” he added. “A lot of us have spent so much time in Kandahar and Lashkar Gah and to see them fall is awful. When you go to these places you care about them.”
Mr Church said the Paras going back into Afghanistan represented a “final closing chapter” that left him feeling “angry in many ways”. “I’m mostly sad for the Afghan population, particularly the women, who will be left exposed all because of a lack of political solution and we’ve extracted too early,” he said. “It makes me question the validity of all of it. We went in as professional soldiers assuming the political decision made would justify our actions. It’s difficult to come to terms with that.”
For Dave Bentley, who served with 7 PARA in 2006, the news of the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan has left him feeling “broken and empty inside”. “I feel for every person, every single day, who deployed to Afghanistan” he said. “The ones who were killed and injured, the ones who returned home never to be the same again, their families and friends, and of course the Afghan people who were caught up in it all who we went to help.”
Mr Bentley paid tribute to the “heroism, professionalism and courage of those around me who selflessly put themselves at risk for Afghans and brothers in arms”, but seeing the unfolding situation now had left him questioning whether the war was ever worth it.
He said: “All the sacrifices made by our troops and that of our allies. All the lives ruined by this war at home and in Afghanistan. The human cost and effort by all and just to see it was all for nothing in my opinion, the Taliban taking back control of areas that were rid of their cruel regime now turns my stomach. I cannot express how angry this makes me feel, I know I am not alone in feeling like this.”’[9]
‘Joe Biden ignored our advice to keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan, say top generals’
– The Telegraph
‘America’s top general confirmed Joe Biden had ignored military advice to keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan and admitted the withdrawal was a “strategic failure”.
In comments highly damaging to the US president, General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General Kenneth McKenzie, the head of US Central Command, both said they favoured keeping a 2,500-strong US force in the country.
Asked why he did not resign when Mr Biden went ahead with the withdrawal, Gen Milley said: “The president doesn’t have to agree with that advice. He doesn’t have to make those decisions just because we are generals.”
Gen Milley said US credibility with allies had been “damaged” and the “enemy is in charge in Kabul”.
“I think that our credibility with allies and partners around the world, and with adversaries, is being intensely reviewed by them to see which way this is going to go,” he said.
Gen Milley told the hearing the Taliban “was and remains a terrorist organisation and they still have not broken ties with al-Qaeda. I have no illusions who we are dealing with.“
“It remains to be seen whether or not the Taliban can consolidate power or if the country will fracture into further civil war. But we must continue to protect the American people from terrorist attacks emanating from Afghanistan.”
“A reconstituted al-Qaeda or IS with aspirations to attack the United States is a very real possibility.” He said that could happen in 12 to 36 months’ [emphasis added].[10]
‘Dan Crenshaw: Biden’s ‘incompetence’ made the world a lot more dangerous’
17 August 2021
‘Biden ‘truly owns’ Taliban victory in Afghanistan: Gen. Keane’
17 August 2021
For more information and analysis on the issue of “national caveats” and their impact on the effectiveness of multinational military operations conducted in the interest of establishing and maintaining international peace and security, see Dr Regeena Kingsley’s original doctoral research in Defence & Strategic Studies (2014) entitled: “Fighting against Allies: An Examination of “National Caveats” within the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) Campaign in Afghanistan & their Impact on ISAF Operational Effectiveness, 2002-2012”.
Dr Kingsley’s full Thesis and its accompanying volume of Appendices can be viewed and downloaded from Massey University’s official website here: http://mro.massey.ac.nz/xmlui/handle/10179/6984
Endnotes:
[1] N. Allen, ‘Joe Biden has blood on his hands and his presidency will not recover – We are slowly learning the full extent of Joe Biden’s culpability for the Afghan debacle,’ The Telegraph, 27 August 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2021/08/27/joe-biden-has-blood-hands-presidency-will-not-recover/, (accessed 28 August 2021).
[2] E. Malnick, ‘Proposed EU military force will ‘divide Europe’, warns Nato’s secretary general’, The Telegraph, 4 September 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2021/09/04/proposed-eu-military-force-would-divide-europe-warns-natos-secretary/, (accessed 5 September 2021).
[3] M. Hussein and M. Haddad, ‘Infographic: US military presence around the world – The US controls about 750 bases in at least 80 countries worldwide and spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined’, Al Jazeera, https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2021/9/10/infographic-us-military-presence-around-the-world-interactive, (accessed 31 December 2021).
[4] B. Farmer & D. Nicholls, ‘Kabul ‘could be overrun within months’ as Taliban pushes closer to Afghanistan’s capital – the militants have taken more than quarter of the country’s provincial cities in less than a week, as American troops continue to withdraw’, 11 August 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2021/08/11/kabul-could-fall-within-month-taliban-push-closer-afghanistans/, (accessed 12 August 2021).
[5] B. Riley-Smith & B. Farmer, ‘British soldiers did not die ‘in vain’, says Boris Johnson, as Taliban sweeps across Afghanistan – Government launches Operation Pitting to evacuate Britons as insurgents close in on the capital Kabul’, The Telegraph, 14 August 2021, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2021/08/13/al-qaeda-will-probably-come-back-taliban-builds-momentum-warns/, (accessed 15 August 2021).
[6] R. Phillips, ‘Counterinsurgency in Vietnam: Lessons for Today’, American Foreign Service Association (AFSA), Foreign Service Journal (FSJ) Publication, April 2015, https://afsa.org/counterinsurgency-vietnam-lessons-today, (accessed 31 December 2021).
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