Afghanistan-The graveyard of Empires (A perspective)

Author: TALHA AHMED

AFGHANISTAN-A Perspective

Landlocked country with harsh landscapes containing mountains, deserted areas, and tribal setup. It is difficult for any foreign settler to occupy the land easily as it’s called the graveyard of Empires. This title is due to the past 200 years of history where Great Britain, the Soviet Union, and now the USA is falling apart. The reason for the current political chaos in Afghanistan reflects blunders by the international powers literally to make their presence in Asia having an eye on the region.

ITS NEIGHBORS

Afghanistan is a landlocked country; they need to have a trade route through its neighbors especially Pakistan. Which plays a vital role in Afghan trade through its ports. Recent instability on Afghan soil started from the Soviet invasion and it’s been 40 years Afghans are still looking for peace. 
Afghanistan doesn’t have friendly relations with its western neighbor Iran due to lack of writ of government as most of the area is controlled by the Taliban. On the northern side Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan have controlled relations, as Afghanistan is chaotic and there is no strong writ of the state. Due to internal fights and international insurgence, everyone has consciousness, is concerned, and monitoring the situation critically to bring the settlement that suits them.

SEPTEMBER 11 ATTACKS

An attack was conducted in the USA simultaneously by 3 groups, where two of them hit the plane at the twin towers and the third one at the pentagon (target was not achieved). The planes were hijacked by around 19 terrorists and strategically conducted their strikes. USA blamed Al-Qaida for these attacks instantly and announced to invade Afghanistan on denial to hand over their leaders especially Usama Bin Ladin. Aljazeera broadcasted Usama as saying, "I stress that I have not carried out this act, which appears to have been carried out by individuals with their own motivation."
These attacked exposed the vulnerability and credibility of the CIA as its failure to comprehend such a big adventure. To cover the mess, USA invaded Afghanistan as a joint venture with its NATO alliance to defeat al-Qaida. USA had different plans as Al-Qaida’s top leadership was killed in the initial years, but USA denied reducing its presence and tried to extract all the resources along with the safe heaven to influence Asia with its might. 
    
AFGHAN WAR ON TERROR

Taliban defeated Soviet Union with the help of the USA, Pakistan, and other gulf countries in the early ’90s and established their government in 1996 after the intense civil war for many years. After the 911 attacks, USA asked the Taliban government to hand over the prime suspect Usama Bin Ladin. Taliban government asked to give proper evidence to prove his involvement, USA thought it was advantageous to invade Afghanistan instead of providing the evidence. 
The narrative that was built on the days after 911 was an attack on humanity and asked for his allies to join for retaliation. Many countries including Pakistan didn’t even have a choice to take either side. As Bush administration threatened to bomb Pakistan "back to the stone age" if they did not cooperate with America's war on Afghanistan.

TWO DECADES-LONG WAR

As the attack on American was not directly from Afghan soil neither state was involved in it, but USA took an opportunity to invade the land called as Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The system of Taliban was in resemblance with the caliphate design with strict implementation of Islamic laws. As a champion of the Western style of democracy, USA always wanted to impose that on every nation. 
In October 2001, U.S. and British forces started aerial bombing campaigns targeting Taliban and al-Qaeda and later invaded Afghanistan with ground troops of the Special Forces. Taliban regime was ended and there were a lot of civil casualties as well, due to lack of strategy and dynamic knowledge of Afghan soil.
There was a mass migration of afghanis to neighboring countries especially Pakistan and Iran during this war. Which created a situation worse as there was a lack of resources for both of the countries to cater to a much larger number of immigrants. USA seemed not interested to take advice from Pakistan for an Afghan issue, as they are the only ones who knew the ground reality. When Pakistan tried to convince US to engage in the political settlement, they always rejected the suggestion with an accusation of helping Talibs.

END OF WAR

After fighting the war for almost two decades, losing trillions of dollars, and hundreds of thousands of people killed, USA finally pursued the Afghan peace process in 2018. In this era of the Afghan war, 80,000 thousand innocent Pakistan civilians were killed mostly targeted by US drones in tribal areas. The situation of Afghanistan was devastating, the exact figure is not there due to lack of communicational means, but a conservative report published jointly by Physicians for Social Responsibility, Physicians for Global Survival, and the Nobel Prize-winning International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War states that in War on Terror 220,000 killed in Afghanistan and millions are wounded.
On 16 August 2021, the capital of Afghanistan is fallen under the direct control of the Taliban. Despite the deadline extension from 5th May to 11th Sept 2021, USA failed to strategize its smooth evacuation. On 5th July USA ran away at 2 am from Bagram airbase without even informing its new commander. 
This uncertainty scared the People of Afghanistan, especially those who helped the US in the war on terror and now hoping for the smooth transfer of power. Taliban announced forgiveness for everyone, but the question is to what extent?? President Ashraf Ghani left the country with his resignation to avoid bloodshed in Kabul. Taliban has taken interim power for a strategic approach to revive their Islamic Emirate taken by them in 2001. Now, A peaceful Afghanistan is the need of the time for the people of Afghanistan and the rest of the world.