There is a large-scale upheaval in the mountainous landlocked country of Afghanistan. At the crossroads of Central and South Asia, it is bordered by Pakistan to the east and south, Iran to the west, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan to the north, and China to the northeast. Though India’s border does not touch this hilly country, the bit of stress is there.
What Donald Trump decided got easier for the Taliban and Joe Biden paved the way for them. No worry for the U.S. and NATO as it was agreed upon at Doha in Qatar months ago. Here, the Taliban validated their old dig, “You might have the watch but we have the time.”
Ashraf Ghani left the country clearing the threshold to another Abdul Ghani Baradar. The old tribal loyalties are supposed to stay there. Yet the Taliban have to face widely scattered corruption throughout the government.
How will the stronger warlords benefitting from bigger poppy harvests be ably negotiated with? Moreover, penetrable borders and malicious neighbours remain another itch for the Taliban.
Whether the western media represent the entry of the Taliban after a gap of two decades it has been demonstrated by them that they do not exhaust in even running a lengthy battle. America spent a whopping amount of $2.26 trillion on the war in Afghanistan, striving to rehabilitate the Afghan government and equip its military, according to the Costs of War project.
Tackling terrorism is not elective for the West. Does this fall look like Ho Chi Minh city of Vietnam? And for the critics who assert distressingly, if we had just hung around a little longer we would have prevented the disastrous situation.
However, Ivo Daalder, who served as a U.S. ambassador to NATO from 2009 to 2013, maintained if you were not able to do what needed to be done in 20 years, why do you think 21 or 22 years would have done the trick? What is the worth now in speaking about the earlier Afghan state that could not defend itself?