The war that never ends

💥How it went wrong for the U.S. in Afghanistan

When the U.S. sent troops to Afghanistan in October 2001 after the September 11 terrorist attacks, the plan was to retaliate against al-Qaeda, take down the the Taliban regime which provided asylum to the al-Qaeda leadership, and install a friendly government in Kabul.

But the war went on. After nearly 17 years, the government in Kabul is shaky, the Taliban controls much of the hinterlands, and al-Qaeda is operating from elsewhere.

Much has been written about this war, exploring what went wrong for the Americans. Carlotta Gall’s The Wrong Enemy: America in Afghanistan, 2001-2014, Mark Mazzetti’s The Way of the Knife: The CIA, a Secret Army, and a War at the Ends of the Earth and Jeremy Scahill’s Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield are some of the notable books that deal with this topic.

Gall, who covered the Afghan war for the New York Times, points a finger at Pakistan for the mess that Afghanistan is in today. Pakistan offered support for the U.S.’s war efforts in Afghanistan but at the same time provided clandestine support to both the Taliban and al-Qaeda. She argues that supporting militant groups was part of Pakistan’s “30 years of strategic thinking”, and the U.S. failed to grasp this reality. By the time the U.S. realised Pakistan’s double game, it was reluctant to take action because it wanted Pakistan’s continued support in the war. Gall argues that the Inter-Services Intelligence, the Pakistani army’s spy wing, had supported Osama bin Laden throughout his hiding since 2001.

Mazzetti’s book offers insights into America’s secret wars in the region. He says the U.S.’s counterterror strategy has gone through major changes in the post-9/11 phase, and that the country became more reliant on intelligence and the secret operations of the Central Intelligence Agency. He says the CIA’s drone war can “carry out killing operations at the ends of the earth.”

Scahill argues in Dirty Wars that this strategy of fighting terrorism through targeted killings is basically flawed. He writes that the drone attacks and the high casualties as a consequence have increased resentment among the local populace, be it in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen or Mali where the ensuing chaos is a boon for militants.

As U.S. President, George W. Bush sanctioned these secret wars and his successor, Barack Obama, stepped them up. The result is a prolonged war with high civilian casualties and with no end in sight.