Thousands await evacuation from Afghanistan as Biden faces criticism for U.S. withdrawal.
Less than two weeks after the Taliban seized its first provincial capital, the Afghan government is no more. The Islamist group has now retaken Kabul, President Ashraf Ghani has fled, and Western powers are scrambling to evacuate their embassy staff.
Nation building no more. As U.S. officials wake up to a new reality for Afghanistan, the concept of U.S.-led nation building is in tatters, as Afghan National Security Forces funded to the tune of more than $80 billion offered little resistance to the Taliban’s takeover. Questions must also be asked of the U.S. intelligence community, whose June estimate of an Afghan government collapse within six to twelve months of U.S. withdrawal now seems generous, if not outright naive.
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Summing Up
So after 20 years and for a cost of $80 billion dollars this is what we get: people we were supposed to run out of Afghanistan regaining control of it two months after a complete U.S. military withdrawal. And what about all the Afghans that sided with the U.S., the ones who haven’t left? Vietnam, Iraq, and now Afghanistan: this country’s record of leaving friends behind in conflicts it starts continues. We should be ashamed.