Afghanistan: The Graveyard of Empires - A Perspective
AFGHANISTAN
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.
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