US’ Afghan failure is of its own creation
THE US’s mudslinging against Pakistan continues with the ultimate purpose of pressuring it to toe its line on Afghanistan tamely.
Earlier it was ‘Do More’ to undo Afghan resistance by the Taliban which its troops were unable to quell.
Now it wants Pakistan to play a role, suiting its convenience along with scapegoating Pakistan for its humiliating Afghan defeat.
In words of its Secretary of State, Blinken “The US would assess its relationship with Pakistan in the coming weeks to formulate what role Washington would want it to play in the future of Afghanistan and what it will take to do that”.
It is amazingly strange that US wants a country to serve its interests upon whom it trusts least and charged it for pursuing multiplicity of interests that are in conflict with of theirs.
Before their ignominious exit from Afghanistan, charge was explicit and direct – Pakistan gives safe havens to terrorists, we haunt in Afghanistan. They rest and refit there for actions in Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Now a little modified version is – Pakistan is involved hedging its bets constantly about future of Afghanistan. Even harsh critics of Pakistan have termed Pakistan a factor but by no means a decisive one for win of Afghan Taliban and crash exit of US from Kabul.
The US could vainly hope only in scapegoating Pakistan for its horrendous failure in Afghanistan. Mostly its causes lie within.
No success/failure is an accident. There is always background to it. First one is the result of a carefully selected aim, sound planning, sincerity of purpose/effort and intelligent execution and inverse of all or part of it contribute if failure descends.
The intension of US was faulty and unachievable in a country, known as graveyard of foreign occupation forces. It transcended far beyond from limits of its mandate, given by UN against terrorism.
To be precise, it was uprooting Al-Qaeda only which it accomplished early but stayed there to advance its other global objectives and eventually, had to meet its nemeses.
After suffering huge loss of face, now ultimately, Biden has confessed that US role in Afghanistan had strayed from that essential objective at great cost and changing the political and culture of Afghanistan was always secondary to that.
In July, it was no other less than himself who denied a Taliban take over “inevitable” saying that Taliban forces of 75,000 are no match for three hundred thousand Afghan Security Forces.
Afghan soil does not admit a military solution. Despite warnings to the contrary from world at large including Pakistan, US resorted to muscle its way through.
For a hammer, everything is a nail. Similarly, a country with strong military power tends to go for military solution.
Intoxicated with such a mentality, US also chose path of might. It had very powerful military machine which was technologically superb but considerably lacked intrinsically.
For US soldiers, a cause was not larger than their lives. Most of them have increasingly grown averse to give blood for even a right cause.
In the instant case, cause was artificial too. Consequently, they counted days of their stay in Afghanistan as conscripts do.
Similarly, the hearts of its allies were not in support of what the US intended. Their people holed up most of the time, inside bases and longed anxiously when they return homes.
Conversely, Afghan Taliban had fire in their blood, imbued with faith and history of not letting foreign occupation stay in their land.
This could melt chains and set oceans on fire thus, in comparison, it was a cutting edge which Afghan Taliban had.
There was another dimension involving lack of professional integrity, intellectual incapacity and element of avaricious leadership or leadership susceptible to domestic pressure at the expense of national objectives.
It was collective assessment of the US that Afghan government with Afghan security forces in lockstep would hold itself for 18 months but evaporated as something does in thin air on first touch of the heat for varying reasons.
It is an ominously serious blot on intellectual faculty and professional acumen of its people in the loop.
As revealed by Pentagon papers that many in Washington gave overly sanguine view of reports, others misled the public and Congressional representatives are guilty of failing to do right oversight.
Alone or combined, these shortfalls in the system do not auger well for the prowess of the US as a superpower though it a usual phenomenon when a superpower is on decline.
Precisely this was the reason which prompted UK Defence Secretary, Ben Wallace to call the US as follow” the US is no longer a superpower but a big power only”.
Apart from above, US also committed a series of mistakes which notably, include supporting corrupt regimes, hotchpotch raising/training of Afghan security forces, brutalizing Afghan people, keeping issue of Afghan refugees unresolved and unwarranted strategic bidding of India in Afghanistan.
The US accuses Pakistan of playing double game. No, it was the US which played the double game against Pakistan to pressurise it to serve its interests mutely.
It allowed India in the concert with Afghan NDS to operate terrorist networks from areas under its control to launch heinous terrorist attacks inside Pakistan.
It may be needless to mention that how much Pakistan suffered grievously in human and material terms. Now again it is back on its ugly tactics to pressurize Pakistan in context of Afghan Taliban and its other preferences in the area.
Such an approach may be an exercise in futility rather counterproductive for the US because new dynamics are emerging and its power is waning. Earlier it lost presence, now it may be its influence in the region.
— The writer, a retired Lt Col, is a senior columnist based in Islamabad.
