The Afghanistan War is a loser. America’s longest war ever, 17 years and counting, must be brought to an end. It is not America’s war to fight. America has more important issues to address and fight at home and in other more important geopolitical strategic places in the world.
America must acknowledge that, like Vietnam, the Afghan War is a loser and get out.
Last month, just in one week, 40 high school students were blown to smithereens in their classroom, hundreds of bodies were left abandoned for a week in the streets of the city of Ghazni or dumped in a river, and two Afghan military units, one its elite commando unit, were destroyed almost to the last soldier. In recent days, Taliban fighters killed nearly 60 members of the Afghan security forces in a spate of attacks. And just last Tuesday, 68 people were killed and more than 165 wounded in a suicide attack in eastern Nangarhar province.
Meanwhile, the on-and-off peace negotiations with the Taliban are again scheduled for later this month. Forgetaboutit.
Thankfully, the death toll of Americans these days is minimal — but still, the more than 2,200 Americans killed is too many — and the financial cost of more than $840 billion of wasted tax payer dollars fighting the Taliban, building infrastructure and propping up a corrupt government, could have been put to better use back home.
The Afghan war has become more expensive, in current dollars, than the Marshall Plan, which helped to rebuild Europe after World War II.
The political spin put out by the Pentagon about the effectiveness of the Kabul government, the Afghan military, number of Taliban fighters, casualties and the area they control, is pure “alternative facts” with no semblance to reality. A Vietnam redux!
The Taliban today control more Afghan territory than at any time since the American invasion.
The truth about wars fought in Afghanistan by foreign armies is a subject I wrote about in 2005 in my book Custom Maid War for New World Disorder. At the time I wrote:
Afghanistan is the size of Texas, and like Vietnam has a long
history of fighting foreign domination, the British, Russians
and most recently bin Laden and his al Qaeda. Since its creation
as a state in the 18th century, it has consisted of a patchwork of
ethnic and tribal communities with a nominal central govern-
ment in Kabul. It has always been easy to conquer but impossible
to govern and hold. No country, no matter how strong, has been
able to hold onto Afghanistan alone.….
With the exception of the immortal stand by Leonidas and his 300
Spartans at Thermopylae in 490 B.C., there are few cases of an entire
military force being annihilated. One happened in Afghanistan in
1842 when British forces tried to pull out. The Afghan descendants of
Genghis Khan wiped out a modern European army to its last man. If
America doesn’t want to suffer the same fate, or that of Vietnam,
Lebanon or Somalia, where America pulled out gracefully with its tail
between its legs because the number of body bags coming home got
to be too much for America to stomach, then it has to make a long-
term serious commitment.
America has not made a serious long-term commitment. It can’t. It must therefore make a commitment to end its involvement in the Afghan War and bring every American home.
“The United States will use any means necessary to protect our citizens and those of our allies from unjust prosecution by this illegitimate court,” said John Bolton, President Trump’s National Security Adviser in a speech earlier this week to the conservative Federalist Society in Washington D.C., threatening sanctions against the judges of the International Criminal Court if they proceeded with an investigation into alleged war crimes committed by Americans in Afghanistan.
How about protecting Americans from the unjust prosecution of the Afghan war?
Every American has a constitutional right to be protected by their government, including every soldier and civilian in Afghanistan fighting for their country. Americans were reminded of this precious right last week during the confirmation hearings of Judge Bret Kavanaugh. The best way to protect all Americans is to end this loser war and bring the troops back home NOW!