Withdrawal from Afghanistan emboldened Russia

It comes as no surprise that in its long-awaited review of the US’s ignominious August 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Biden administration has tried to lay the blame mainly at Donald Trump’s door. But it has been thoroughly disingenuous in doing so about a seminal debacle that has prompted perceptions of the US as an unreliable ally, despite its long and costly commitment to Afghanistan.

As The Wall Street Journal noted: “More alarming than its fake history is the White House’s inability to connect the dots between the US surrender in Afghanistan and increasing world disorder. You can draw a straight line between the debacle in Afghanistan and the failure to deter Vladimir Putin from invading Ukraine.”

Certainly, Mr Trump should not be allowed to escape responsibility for his part in creating the circumstances that led to the shambles. The cynical agreement his administration reached with the Taliban in February 2020 – the so-called Doha Agreement – in which it misguidedly promised a complete withdrawal of all US troops by May 2021, was all about Mr Trump’s attempt to win the November 2020 presidential election by bringing US troops home.

It had nothing to do with any serious consideration of the likely strategic consequences of doing so. Joe Biden won the election after campaigning as an adult who would restore order after the shambles of the Trump presidency.

He was his own man. He was under no obligation to maintain Mr Trump’s deal with the Taliban terrorists, who had anyway largely failed to honour their side of the agreement with Mr Trump. Apart from nudging the US withdrawal date from May to August 31, 2021, however, Mr Biden did nothing to arrest Afghanistan’s remorseless slide into chaos and victory for the medieval Taliban thugs.

If anything, his administration’s decisions accelerated the process. He pulled the air support on which Afghan government troops relied. American troops abandoned the Bagram Air Base that was the pivot of 20 years of involvement in Afghanistan by the US and its Western allies. Afghan troops literally woke up one morning to find US forces had gone.

The claim in the White House’s 12 pages of “narrative gaslighting” is that Mr Biden’s “choices for how to execute a withdrawal from Afghanistan were severely constrained by conditions created” by Mr Trump’s ill-advised Doha Agreement.

The review claims Mr Trump “provided no plans” for the final withdrawal. That may be so. The reality is, however, that once Mr Biden had won the election and been sworn in, he was able to call the shots. He could have countermanded Mr Trump’s deal.

That he did not do so reflects poorly on his judgment and the consequences the shambolic exit has had, and continues to have, on the US’s standing in the world. Astoundingly, the White House review asserts skedaddling out of Afghanistan in the way it did has enabled the US to better focus on the strategic challenges posed by Russia and China. “It is hard to imagine (the US) would have been able to lead the response to these challenges as successfully” if troops were still in Afghanistan, the review posits.

Yet the reality is that the damage done by the manner of the US retreat remains largely undiminished and is being seen not only in Mr Putin’s arrogant assault on Ukraine in defiance of much of the world, but also in doubts about the US as a reliable partner among previously close allies such as Saudi Arabia.

It is also being seen in increasing aggression by China against Taiwan. As he considers whether to run in 2024, Mr Biden faces the reality that his standing in the polls has never fully recovered from the battering it took over Afghanistan.

The White House review speaks of Mr Biden’s “deliberate, intensive, rigorous and inclusive decision-making process” on Afghanistan.

If the shambolic retreat from Kabul is what followed after all that, it does not reflect well on his decision-making processes. No wonder the White House review has tried to shift the blame on to Mr Trump for his no less ill-judged decisions.