Like almost everyone else in America and Western Europe, I have been watching and worrying about Afghanistan. And, like everyone else, I was stunned by how quickly the country collapsed. I was one of those who believed that we were (no. really) justified in military action there after 9-11. And, I thought, the war was winnable.
But, of course, I was wrong on some many levels. My only defense is that I never suspected, back 20 years ago, that the Bush administration would elect to fight the war on a shoestring and invest most of our military resources in a conflict with Iraq…a nation that had absolutely nothing to do with Osama bin Laden. And, let’s face it, the only reason we went to war there was because it had vast untapped oil reserves at a time when Dick Cheney was “the most powerful vice president in American history,” and Halliburton was, perhaps, a bit more influential in the circles of government than it should have been.
Still, I was wrong. And now Afghanistan has become a national humiliation and maybe a serious problem for the United States. I’m afraid that our defeat there will embolden our enemies and unsettle our friends. I fear, as so many others do, that it could lead to yet more 9-11s, yet more more terrorist attacks, and yet more attempts to create “pure” societies, Islamic or otherwise.
We are leaving...
Strangely enough, I do worry as well that the biggest loser in all this will be Islam itself. Once again, a rag-tag band of insurgents has succeeded in driving us off its soil. And, once again, it seems that God was with the revolutionaries…
The problem being that God may or may not have had anything to do with it. Just as likely, secular and material factors were much more at the core of things. The United States had a host of other, more pressing problems to consider. Our economy is in serious trouble. There is a pandemic we need to end. We are polarized politically. Russia and China seem to be seriously considering some kind of military action against us in the near future. All these things made Afghanistan a distinctly back-burner problem.
But God…or fate, or history, or whatever…is not the reason for our defeat, then that’s the way it looks to the winners. Which means that the Taliban and/or other Islamic Jihadists may continue to try their luck. Maybe there will be more attacks on civilian targets in the West. Maybe there will be further attempts to create an ISIS style Islamic state in the Middle East. Whatever. And, for a time, they may succeed.
But eventually their luck will run out. Eventually, they will come up against an enemy whose critical interests are genuinely impacted by their activities. Eventually, they’ll meet someone who cannot afford to walk away from a confrontation. China, perhaps, which has its own problems with a Muslim minority and its own ambitions in Central Asia. Or Russia, which has similar considerations. Or, even, maybe, some future incarnation of the West, one no longer burdened by our current concerns…
And when that day comes…
Well, it could be very serious indeed.
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Until next time.
Onward and Upward.
~mjt
Copyright©2021 Michael Jay Tucker
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