September 3rd, 2021
My Dear America:
Perhaps History should have taught us what 20 years of fighting in Afghanistan has now taught us. Many Countries in the world have been conquered and permanently changed by those that conquered them.
Not Afghanistan.
They have had a long history of Invasions by Outsiders but from Genghis Khan, Alexander The Great, Britain, Russia and now the United States, Afghanistan has a long history of kicking the asses of Invaders and preserving their country from what other countries of the world have viewed as "Progress."
Certainly seeing the Taliban take control of Afghanistan after 20 years of fighting with them is not something that anyone in their right mind could view as Progress. The truth is that as hard as America tried to remake Afghanistan in our Democratic Image it was never going to work. They did the unthinkable, just as the North Vietnamese did decades ago. They kicked our asses out of their country.
We can find many reasons to blame why we didn't in the end succeed in Afghanistan. The main reason we didn't succeed was the same reason no outsiders have ever really succeeded in Afghanistan. We were invaders who didn't belong there who were fighting against Afghan citizens who were defending their country. We never really had a chance.
That doesn't mean we never should have gone to Afghanistan. Initially we had a fairly legitimate purpose to go to that country. We were chasing Osama bin laden and Al Quida after 9/11 and when we found them they almost immediately left Afghanistan for Pakistan. Those Terrorists who attacked our country on 9/11 were our enemies. Not the Taliban.
Certainly the Taliban were an organization which treated their citizens horribly and were terrorists themselves in a real sense but it was clear to some like former CIA Operative, Malcolm Nance, who spent time early on in the War in Afghanistan that we were never going to really successfully conquer this country.
Afghanistan was and is a Tribal Society that Nance recognized early on was never really going to be a successful Democracy.
In our defense we tried very hard to turn Afghanistan into a Democracy but like many other democracies that we have tried and failed to remake in our image we only ended up with corrupt and failed Afghan governments which in many cases stole us blind.
We did do some things right in Afghanistan. We certainly improved the lives of Afghan girls and women while we were there. That cannot be denied. We led women in Afghanistan out of the dark ages and into the 21st Century where they could show their faces and could study and work which they could not do before.
Unfortunately, as we leave their country we need to hope that the hopefully new and improved Taliban do not return women in their country to the Dark Ages. As we have left the country we have certainly tried to take a large number of Afghan Girls and Women with us to the outside world. I hope that in the end we are able to see those girls and women progress in their new lives and that the Taliban will follow through on their promise to be a New and improved Taliban that treats women differently in their country and recognizes that they cannot and should not put their women back into a position of slavery to men in Afghanistan.
President Joe Biden was right in his decision to get American troops out of Afghanistan. It was a decision that was way too long in coming. Joe was the one Obama Administration official who opposed the military recommendation to send more troops to Afghanistan. George Bush was also correct in his decision to pursue Al Quida in that country. When bin laden and his crew ran into Pakistan American Troops should have been removed from Afghanistan and gone after bin laden in that country. Instead, we left troops in Afghanistan and put American troops into Iraq falsely claiming that Saddam Hussein was aligned with bin laden.
Now, Clearly Saddam Hussein was a bad guy but there was never any credible evidence presented that showed any cooperation going on between Saddam and Osama. They were, in fact, bitter enemies and bitter rivals.
Bob Woodward in his books indicated that although others in the George W. Bush Administration were often blamed for pushing Bush into sending American troops into Iraq, it was actually George W. who pushed the issue into invading Iraq and by doing so took America's eye off the ball in Afghanistan. It seems to me that George W. was highly annoyed that Saddam Hussein survived the Gulf War after George H.W. Bush, George W.'s Father, wisely chose not to pursue Saddam after American troops drove Iraqi troops out of Kuwait. Papa Bush clearly had the good sense to realize that invading and taking over Iraq would create the kind of shit show that it became once George Junior did what Daddy had wisely refused to do.
What is clear at this point in time is that if Democracy in Afghanistan was not able to survive on its own after 20 years of American Monetary and Military Assistance, The time was right for Americans to recognize what Malcolm Nance recognized 20 years ago.
We were clearly fighting a losing battle and if we continued fighting in Afghanistan we were only going to lose more American lives. It was time to get out.
Clearly our exit from Afghanistan could have gone better but in every way it could have also gone worse. We certainly gave little or no thought to what was going to happen to those Afghans who assisted us during the 20 years war. Before we gave up the Bagram Air Base we should have gotten our interpreters and other allies out despite the red tape bullshit of the Special Immigrant Visa program. Instead we trusted the Afghan Government that begged Biden not to ship out Afghan allies because of what that would look like to Afghan citizens and military members.
So as the Afghan Military fell like dominoes all over the Country the Afghan President and other Government leaders ran like rats from the Taliban. One couldn't blame them. They certainly knew what their fate would be once the Taliban took over Kabul and the entire country of Afghanistan.
Certainly Joe Biden has much to answer for with regard to the American Exit from Afghanistan but I agree with Michael Moore who recognized that the somewhat organized exit of Americans and Afghan Citizens from the Kabul Airport was a "Miracle".
Clearly it was in both America's interest and the Taliban's interest to get Americans out of Afghanistan in recent weeks. It was not necessarily in the Taliban's interest to allow so many Afghan's to escape from Afghanistan. Clearly there was communication and cooperation between the Taliban and the American Military. Based on past history the Taliban could have chosen to make the American Endgame in Afghanistan a bloodbath at the Airport. It was not the Taliban, but an ISIS Afghan offshoot named ISIS K, that killed 13 American Servicemen along with over a hundred other Afghans at the Airport.
It was a shame that 13 Americans were killed at the Kabul Airport but it is certainly a miracle that we got so many Americans and Afghan Allies out of Afghanistan alive.
The details of what happened in those final days in Afghanistan will be debated for many years to come but in the future we will certainly not be sending troops to Afghanistan to die as long as Joe Biden is in the White House.
Thank you, Joe Biden, for pulling off the band aid and recognizing what should have been done a long time ago in Afghanistan and having the courage to do it.
Sincerely Yours
Jerry Gallagher
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