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      The Afghanistan Papers review: superb exposé of a war built on lies

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      BooksThe Afghanistan Papers review: superb exposé of a war built on lies Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post used freedom of information to produce the definitive US version of the warJulian BorgerSun 5 Sep 2021 02.00 EDTLast modified on Sun 5 Sep 2021 02.02 EDTIn the summer of 2009, the latest in a long line of US military commanders in Afghanistan commissioned the latest in a long line of strategic reviews, in the perennial hope it would make enough of a difference to allow the Americans to go home.‘The intensity has not changed’: Jason Kander on the fall of Afghanistan – and trying to get friends outRead moreThere was some excitement in Washington about the author, Gen Stanley McChrystal, a special forces soldier who cultivated the image of a warrior-monk while hunting down insurgents in Iraq.Hired by Barack Obama, McChrystal produced a 66-page rethink of the Afghan campaign, calling for a “properly resourced” counter-insurgency with a lot more money and troops.It quickly became clear there were two significant problems. Al-Qaida, the original justification for the Afghan invasion, was not even mentioned in McChrystal’s first draft. And the US could not agree with its Nato allies on whether to call it a war or a peacekeeping or training mission, an issue with important legal implications.In the second draft, al-Qaida was included and the conflict was hazily defined as “not a war in the conventional sense”. But no amount of editing could disguise the fact that after eight years of bloody struggle, the US and its allies were unclear on what they were doing and who they were fighting.The story is one of many gobsmacking anecdotes and tragic absurdities uncovered by Craig Whitlock, an investigative reporter at the Washington Post. His book is based on documents obtained through freedom of information requests, most from “lessons learned” interviews conducted by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (Sigar), a watchdog mandated by Congress to keep tabs on the hundreds of billions flowing into Afghanistan.In the Sigar files, and other interviews carried out by military institutes and research centres, Whitlock found that soldiers of all ranks and their civilian counterparts were “more open about their experiences than they likely would have been with a journalist working on a news story”.Blunt appraisals were left unvarnished because they were never intended for publication. The contrast with the upbeat version of events presented to the public at the same time, often by the very same people, is breathtaking.The Afghanistan Papers is a book about failure and about lying about failure, and about how that led to yet worse failures, and so on for 20 years. The title and the contents echo the Pentagon Papers, the leaked inside story of the Vietnam war in which the long road to defeat was paved with brittle happy talk.“With their complicit silence, military and political leaders avoided accountability and dodged reappraisals that could have changed the outcome or shortened the conflict,” Whitlock writes. “Instead, they chose to bury their mistakes and let the war drift.”As Whitlock vividly demonstrates, the lack of clarity, the deception, ignorance and hubris were baked in from the beginning. When he went to war in Afghanistan in October 2001, George Bush promised a carefully defined mission. In fact, at the time the first bombs were being dropped, guidance from the Pentagon was hazy.It was unclear, for example, whether the Taliban were to be ousted or punished.“We received some general guidance like, ‘Hey, we want to go fight the Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan,’” a special forces operations planner recalled. Regime change was only decided to be a war aim nine days after the shooting started.The US was also hazy about whom they were fighting, which Whitlock calls “a fundamental blunder from which it would never recover”.Most importantly, the invaders lumped the Taliban in with al-Qaida, despite the fact the former was a homegrown group with largely local preoccupations while the latter was primarily an Arab network with global ambitions.That perception, combined with unexpectedly easy victories in the first months, led Bush’s defense secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, to believe the Taliban could be ignored. Despite offers from some leaders that they were ready to negotiate a surrender, they were excluded from talks in December 2001 on the country’s future. It was a decision the United Nations envoy, Lakhdar Brahimi, called the “original sin” of the war.Rumsfeld declared there was no point negotiating.“The only thing you can do is to bomb them and try to kill them,” he said in March 2002. “And that’s what we did, and it worked. They’re gone.”Not even Rumsfeld believed that. In one of his famous “snowflake” memos, at about the same time, he wrote: “I am getting concerned that it is drifting.”In a subsequent snowflake, two years after the war started, he admitted: “I have no visibility into who the bad guys are.”’The Taliban had not disappeared, though much of the leadership had retreated to Pakistan. The fighters had gone home, if necessary to await the next fighting season. Their harsh brand of Islam had grown in remote, impoverished villages, honed by the brutalities of Soviet occupation and civil war. The Taliban did not represent anything like a majority of Afghans, but as their resilience and eventual victory have shown, they are an indelible part of Afghanistan.Bruised Biden tries to turn the page after US debacle in AfghanistanRead moreWhitlock’s book is rooted in a database most journalists and historians could only dream of, but it is far more than the sum of its sources. You never feel the weight of the underlying documents because they are so deftly handed. Whitlock uses them as raw material to weave anecdotes into a compelling narrative.He does not tell the full story of the Afghan war. He does not claim to do so. That has to be told primarily by Afghans, who lived through the realities submerged by official narratives, at the receiving end of each new strategy and initiative.This is a definitive version of the war seen through American eyes, told by Americans unaware their words would appear in public. It is a cautionary tale of how a war can go on for years, long after it stops making any kind of sense.TopicsBooksAfghanistanSouth and Central AsiaUS militaryUS foreign policyUS national securityGeorge BushreviewsReuse this content More

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      ‘I’m not Rambo’: Republican unrepentant about attempt to enter Afghanistan

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      US politics‘I’m not Rambo’: Republican unrepentant about attempt to enter AfghanistanCongressman Markwayne Mullin, criticized for rogue rescue effort, says he would do it again ‘without hesitation’ Edward Helmore in New YorkSat 4 Sep 2021 11.31 EDTLast modified on Sat 4 Sep 2021 11.36 EDTThe Oklahoma Republican congressman Markwayne Mullin has said he has no regrets about trying to enter Afghanistan on a rescue mission last month, saying that though he is “not Rambo” he would make such an attempt again “without even hesitation”.Afghanistan: militia endure ‘heavy assaults’ from Taliban in Panjshir ValleyRead moreMullin, a former wrestler described on his own website as “a former mixed martial arts fighter with a professional record of 5-0”, told Fox News he tried to enter Afghanistan as thousands of westerners and their Afghan allies attempted to flee the Taliban.“I wasn’t trying to go over there and be a cowboy or anything like that,” Mullin said. “It was just, ‘What else do you do when you see a problem? How do you say no if you can be an asset?’”Afghanistan fell to the Taliban last month, nearly 20 years after the US-led invasion. The Biden administration has said it evacuated about 124,000 American citizens and Afghans deemed at risk under Islamic militant rule.Mullin said he received requests to help thousands of people. He also said he was asked to accompany people with US military connections – “Delta [Force] guys” and “special forces” – into the war-torn country.“I’m not Rambo,” he said. “Never pretended to be Rambo. We were surrounded by great people. Out of all the guys I was working with, I’m the low man on the totem pole. And I understood that.”John Rambo is a character played by Sylvester Stallone in a series of action films first made in the 1980s, one concerning a mission to find Americans left behind after the Vietnam war.Mullin said he planned to help his companions by “open[ing] the doors for them, making phone calls and being able to take in the [special immigrant visa applicants] or the [American citizens] as they came onto the plane. That was the plan.”But, he said, “that plan changed. And it changed when we wasn’t allowed to get into Afghanistan.”According to the Washington Post, Mullin first attempted to enter Afghanistan via Greece, only to be denied permission by the defense department.He then reportedly called the US ambassador to Tajikistan with a request to help transport a large amount of cash into the country, saying he would be going on to Afghanistan to rescue a woman and her four children, all US citizens.Mullin told the embassy he planned to fly to Dushanbe in Tajikistan from Tbilisi in Georgia, then to rent a helicopter. The embassy turned him down. Officials told the Post Mullin threatened the US ambassador, John Mark Pommersheim.Mullin told Fox News: “Unfortunately, the ambassador, Pommersheim, was not helpful at all.”Mullin’s attempts to reach Afghanistan followed an unauthorized and widely criticised visit to Kabul by a Republican congressman, Peter Meijer, and a Democrat, Seth Moulton. The two military veterans have defended their actions.US troops completed their withdrawal from Afghanistan this week. The state department says Americans should not visit the country “due to civil unrest, armed conflict, crime, terrorism, kidnapping, and Covid-19”.Congressmen criticized over Kabul visit say they were ‘uniquely situated’ for tripRead moreMullin, who told Fox News he and others had estimated they had “a 50-50 chance of coming back” from their planned mission, wrote on Instagram on Wednesday that he had nonetheless helped Americans out of the country.“I am heading home,” he wrote, without specifying where he was.“Have we been helping get Americans out of Afghanistan? Yes. Is the mission continuing? Yes. Am I missing? No. Did I go dark for a little? Yes, because it wasn’t safe to be communicating. Am I extremely disappointed in how we (United States) left Americans behind … that would be an understatement.”Biden and members of his administration have said between 100 and 200 US citizens remain in Afghanistan. The White House has said it will continue efforts to help any who wish to leave the country. Veteran-led rescue groups have said the official estimate overlooks hundreds of permanent legal residents with green cards.After claiming Joe Biden was “absolutely lying to the American people about Americans and our friends being left behind”, Mullin added a hashtag: #Ordinarypeopledoingextraordinarythings.TopicsUS politicsUS foreign policyUS militaryAfghanistanSouth and Central AsianewsReuse this content More

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      The Guardian view on dealing with the Taliban: no good options | Editorial

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      OpinionAfghanistanThe Guardian view on dealing with the Taliban: no good optionsEditorialStrategic failure has drastically reduced the west’s ability to influence the future course of events Mon 30 Aug 2021 13.30 EDTLast modified on Mon 30 Aug 2021 16.43 EDTAs the final evacuation flights leave Kabul, watched in despair by those abandoned and in peril, the lasting consequences of strategic failure must now be faced. During the Doha peace talks, American diplomats liked to talk of a process towards an inclusive political settlement that would be Afghan-led and Afghan-owned. The “process” turned out instead to be a victory procession for the Taliban. What comes now will therefore be Taliban-led and Taliban-owned. Hamstrung as a result of their own mistakes, the United States, Britain and their allies have little choice but to engage with the new reality.Belated attempts are being made to do so from a supposed position of strength. As the last British forces left Kabul at the weekend, Boris Johnson adopted a stentorian tone to warn: “If the new regime … wants diplomatic recognition or to unlock the billions currently frozen, they will have to ensure safe passage for those who wish to leave the country, to respect the rights of women and girls, [and] to prevent Afghanistan becoming again an incubator for global terror.” It seems clear that Taliban leaders hope to avoid the international pariah status of the 1990s and will soon be in desperate need of cash. Both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank have suspended payments to Afghanistan since the Taliban takeover, and the Afghan central bank’s reserves are frozen in the US. But the notion that, as China and Russia pursue their own agendas, the west can continue to call the shots and impose its terms is wishful thinking.Unfolding humanitarian crises will limit the scope for playing diplomatic hardball. Over the weekend it emerged that, despite the huge evacuation effort from Kabul airport, British government estimates of the number of vulnerable people left behind were far too low. There is no plan in place for what those left stranded should do now, and no route established yet for refugees to neighbouring countries. Demonstrating extraordinary negligence, the foreign secretary, Dominic Raab, failed even to engage with his Pakistani counterpart until a week after the fall of Kabul to the Taliban. On Monday, the German foreign minister, Heiko Maas, began a diplomatic tour of countries bordering Afghanistan, including Pakistan, in the hope of securing refugee agreements which should have been negotiated months ago.According to a joint statement by the UK, the US and more than 90 other countries, the Taliban have given assurances that foreign nationals and Afghans with travel authorisation from other countries will be allowed to leave. This seems at odds with reports of house-to-house searches and the intimidation of those associated with the former government and western forces. But in the absence of any leverage in the country, America and its allies must simply hope that the Taliban’s calculation of their self-interest works in the west’s favour. Meanwhile, soaring food prices, prolonged drought in much of the country and the internal displacement of millions of refugees – many of them women and children – are already leading to appalling hardship as autumn and winter approach. It will be impossible to deliver to desperate Afghans the scale of humanitarian assistance required without some degree of cooperation and collaboration with the new regime.On Monday, the Kremlin called for Washington to release the Afghan central bank reserves on humanitarian grounds, while in a phone conversation with the US secretary of state, Anthony Blinken, the Chinese foreign minister, Wang Yi, said that the international community should engage with the Taliban and “guide it actively”. By failing to link military withdrawal to conditions on the ground, the west no longer controls the course of events. In relation to the Taliban regime it inadvertently installed, it has no good options now.TopicsAfghanistanOpinionSouth and Central AsiaUS politicsTalibanForeign policyUS foreign policyeditorialsReuse this content More

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      Biden meets remains of 13 troops killed in Kabul as US promises more strikes

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      Joe BidenBiden meets remains of 13 troops killed in Kabul as US promises more strikes
      Secretary of state to bereaved father: ‘I’m deeply sorry’
      Adviser: US will help people leave after deadline
      Afghanistan – live coverage
      Richard Luscombe and Martin PengellySun 29 Aug 2021 16.03 EDTFirst published on Sun 29 Aug 2021 09.56 EDTThe White House on Sunday reasserted its promise to capture or kill the perpetrators of the deadly attacks on Kabul airport, as Joe Biden travelled to Delaware for the repatriation of the bodies of the 13 US troops who died.Pentagon names troops killed in Kabul – some were babies at time of invasionRead moreThe “dignified transfer” of the remains of the victims at Dover Air Force Base provided the most somber moment of Biden’s presidency to date, punctuating a crisis in Afghanistan that has allowed political opponents to wield the chaotic end to the 20-year war as a cudgel.Biden spoke briefly about the victims during an afternoon visit to Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) headquarters in Washington, where he received a briefing on Hurricane Ida, which made landfall in Louisiana earlier.“We met with the families of 13 fallen heroes in Afghanistan, who lost their lives in the service of our country,” he said.“While we’re praying for the best in Louisiana, let’s keep them in our prayers as well.”As the president was greeting the families of the fallen, his national security adviser was reasserting that the US would continue to be involved in Afghanistan, even after Tuesday’s evacuation deadline.While Biden “does not intend to start a new war in Afghanistan”, Jake Sullivan told CBS’s Face the Nation, the president will continue to deploy drone strikes and to help Americans and Afghan allies leave.As many as 170 Afghans also died in the suicide bomb and gun attack on Thursday. Biden said on Saturday the drone strike which killed two Islamic State targets on Friday “was not the last and we’ll continue to hunt down those involved”.The president also warned that a new Isis terror attack was likely “in 24 to 36 hours”.On Sunday, US officials told Reuters American forces launched a strike in Kabul on Sunday, targeting a possible suicide car bomb thought to be heading for the airport.Reuters reported that the officials said the targets were suspected Islamic State militants, from the group which claimed the airport attack. The agency also said witnesses reported an explosion while TV footage showed black smoke.Sullivan said: “He also is going to talk to his commanders about whatever set of tools and capabilities they need to get the people who attacked and killed our troops at the Kabul airport and to make sure that we are degrading and debilitating the group, Isis-K, that conducted this attack.“So, yes, we will continue to take the kinds of over-the-horizon strikes like we did over the weekend against the Isis-K facilitators and plotters. And, yes, we will consider other operations to go after these guys, to get them and to take them off the battlefield.”The Taliban, which controls Afghanistan, protested the Friday strike. Sullivan said such strikes would be launched regardless of the Taliban’s wishes. He also indicated that such strikes could be implemented outside Afghanistan.Anthony Blinken, the secretary of state, estimated that about 300 US citizens remain in Afghanistan and want to leave.“We are very actively working to help them get to the airport, get on a plane and get out of Afghanistan,” Blinken told ABC’s This Week, shortly after the White House announced that the pace of evacuations had slowed. The US military flew about 2,900 people out of Kabul in the 24 hours to 3am Sunday, less than half the 6,800 evacuated the day before.Blinken was asked how the US mission could continue with its embassy closed and military assets gone. He said: “114 countries have made very clear that it is their expectation that the Taliban will permit freedom of travel going past 31 August, so that is a clear expectation across the entire international community.“We have very significant leverage to work with over the weeks and months ahead to incentivise the Taliban to make good on its commitments. The Taliban have a strong interest in having an airport that functions [and] there are other ways to leave Afghanistan, including by road.”The former CIA director and defense secretary Leon Panetta said this week the US would be forced to send troops back into Afghanistan. Sullivan deflected an invitation to hit back.“We are capable of suppressing the terrorism threat,” he said, “including external plotting capabilities without a large permanent presence on the ground. We have done that in places like Libya and Somalia, places like Yemen. And we will do that in Afghanistan as well as we go forward.”As the military began to withdraw from Kabul, the Pentagon said on Saturday it had evacuated nearly 120,000 Americans and Afghan allies.Asked if all US citizens would be evacuated before the deadline, Sullivan said: “There is an opportunity right now for American citizens to come, to be admitted to the airport and to be evacuated safely and effectively. There are those Americans, though, and this is important, who have chosen thus far not to leave Kabul. Maybe they’ve lived there for many years. Maybe they have extended family there.“Our message to those Americans is that after 31 August, we will make sure there is safe passage for any American citizen, any legal permanent resident. And yes, we will ensure the safe passage of those Afghans who helped us to continue coming out after 31 August.”That would not mean relying on Taliban co-operation, Sullivan said.“This is about ensuring that we use the leverage we have available to us, and it is considerable, to hold the Taliban to its commitments. The Taliban have both communicated privately and publicly that they will allow for safe passage. We’re not just going to take their word for it. We’ve rallied dozens of countries from around the world to stand with us in saying to the Taliban that if they do not follow through on those commitments, there will be significant consequences.”Asked about Biden’s morale in a White House besieged by Republicans and a hostile press, and with a category 4 hurricane bearing down on New Orleans, Sullivan said: “I would describe the president’s approach in recent days in one word: focused.Republicans scent blood as Biden assailed over Afghanistan pulloutRead more“He is laser-focused 24 hours a day on protecting our forces there and getting this mission complete, getting these folks home safely.”Speaking to NBC’s Meet the Press in an interview broadcast as Biden visited Dover air force base, Blinken offered condolences to the families of the troops killed in Kabul, including the father of Marine L/cpl Kareem Nikoui, who on Saturday blamed Biden for his son’s death.“They sent my son over there as a paper pusher then had the Taliban providing security,” Steve Nikoui said. “Biden turned his back on him. That’s it.”Blinken said: “If I were in his shoes, probably I’d feel exactly the same way. There are no words that anyone can say to assuage the grief that a parent is feeling at the loss of their child.“All I can do is take responsibility for my own actions and do everything possible to continue to bring people out of Afghanistan. That’s my responsibility. But as a parent myself I feel deeply what he expressed. All I can say is I’m deeply, deeply sorry.”TopicsJoe BidenBiden administrationUS foreign policyUS national securityUS militaryUS politicsAfghanistannewsReuse this content More

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      The media is lambasting Biden over Afghanistan. But he should stand firm | Bhaskar Sunkara

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      OpinionUS newsThe media is lambasting Biden over Afghanistan. He should stand firmBhaskar SunkaraThe president was right to withdraw the US from Afghanistan – and he’s being skewered for it

      I served with Nato in Afghanistan – it was a bloated mess
      Sun 29 Aug 2021 08.11 EDTLast modified on Sun 29 Aug 2021 08.12 EDTWhen Joe Biden, a conventional politician if there ever was one, said he was concluding the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan this month, in line with plans set in motion by the Trump administration, the response from the mainstream press was hostile. Following the Taliban takeover of the country, the tenor has only grown more hyperbolic.Joe Biden says new Kabul terror attack highly likely in next 24 to 36 hoursRead moreDuring the Trump years, publications like the New York Times and Washington Post presented themselves as the last defenses of freedom against creeping authoritarianism. The latter adopted a new slogan, “Democracy dies in darkness”, and spent millions on a Super Bowl ad featuring Tom Hanks extolling the importance of journalism as a profession.But for all this talk of “defending freedom”, the mainstream media has a history of reflexively defending militarism, foreign interventions and occupations. Biden – who dared fulfil a campaign promise and end America’s longest war – is learning this the hard way.As Eric Levitz recounts in New York Magazine, the media has created a public backlash against Biden, with outlets like the Times calling the withdrawal a humiliating fiasco. For the New York Times Editorial Board, the two-decade occupation of Afghanistan is described as a “nation-building project” that reflected “the enduring American faith in the values of freedom and democracy”.Key to the media narrative is the echoing of “experts” on Afghanistan like former ambassador Ryan C Crocker, who wishes in another Times op-ed that instead of bolting after a couple of decades, US troops might have remained in Afghanistan for more than a half-century, as we’ve done on the Korean peninsula. Crocker regrets that “Mr Biden’s decision to withdraw all US forces destroyed an affordable status quo that could have lasted indefinitely at a minimum cost in blood and treasure”.But as the writer Jeet Heer points out, the status quo was far from “affordable” for ordinary Afghans. The tragic figure of more than 2,000 dead US troops pales in comparison to the more than 200,000 Afghans killed since 2001. Indeed, prolonged civil war has put this year on pace to be the bloodiest for civilians as a failed US client state has overseen plummeting social indicators, widespread corruption and a total breakdown in public safety.The media had ignored the mounting chaos for years, only to laser-focus on it as a means to criticize Biden. They’ve ignored their own role in cheerleading a misguided “War on Terror” and pinned the blame for two decades of imperial hubris on the president who finally made good on promises to leave the country against the wishes of even some in his own party.What’s underlying much of the approach is a mainstream media fidelity to “expert” consensus. Many who presented themselves as fierce truth-tellers in the face of Trump hold the opinions of former intelligence and military officials in higher regard than that of a president democratically elected by 81.3 million people and pursuing a policy supported by 70% of Americans.Not only are corporate media pundits and talking heads wrong to advocate staying in Afghanistan, they’ve been wrong about generations of conflicts that ordinary people have opposed. Contrary to the popular imagination, opposition to wars from Vietnam to Iraq were spearheaded by workers, not the rich and the professional classes that serve them. It’s this general aversion to costly overseas conflict that the president should confidently embrace.Biden has never been a very good populist. For all his “Amtrak Joe” pretenses, he’s a creature of the Beltway, the ultimate establishment politician. It’s no surprise that his administration appears paralyzed in the face of criticism from its erstwhile elite allies. But unless he manages to push back against the narratives mounting against his administration, he’ll risk undermining his popular domestic agenda as well.Joe Biden did something good – and the media want to kill him for it. He should embrace their scorn and defend his actions to the American people.
      Bhaskar Sunkara is the founding editor of Jacobin magazine and a Guardian US columnist. He is the author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequality
      TopicsUS newsOpinionJoe BidenBiden administrationUS politicsUS press and publishingNew York TimesWashington PostcommentReuse this content More