It’s been a tough week for President Joe Biden. But it's been a tougher one for the citizens of Afghanistan. In spite of the tragedies that continue to unfold there, however, history will be kind to the president for having the courage to take action and get us out of that endless quagmire.
That’s the most significant long-term takeaway amid all the current human drama and chaos.
The evacuation of Afghanistan has been a long way from perfect, and Biden certainly painted a too-rosy a picture of what this bug out would look like. But it was inevitable. And necessary.
"I will not repeat the mistakes we've made in the past -- the mistake of staying and fighting indefinitely in a conflict that is not in the national interests of the United States, of doubling down on a civil war in a foreign country, of attempting to remake a country through the endless military deployments of U.S. forces," Biden said.
That's indisputable.
Years ago, while covering the fighting in Afghanistan for Newsweek, I predicted that the Taliban would be back in power within weeks of an American evacuation, if not days, no matter when or how we evacuate.
The reason? The Afghans were and are simply unwilling to fight, despite all the training, money and military machinery we've supplied. It was not a hard prediction to make. But even I was surprised how quickly the Taliban pitched its flag in Kabul.
It required political courage to make this call and officially get us out. Donald Trump didn't do it. He had four years and he didn't do it, despite all the promises during his first presidential campaign, and then during the election last year.
Just weeks before the 2020 election, Trump promised he would abruptly pull all U.S. troops from Afghanistan.
"We should have the small remaining number of our BRAVE Men and Women serving in Afghanistan home by Christmas!” Trump wrote on Twitter.
But the Pentagon said it had received no such orders. It was just another of Trump’s thousands of lies.
President George W. Bush didn’t get us out of Afghanistan. Neither did President Barack Obama. The evacuation will ultimately be a positive for Biden's presidential legacy.
Yes, it could have been handled much better. But ending this 20-year, trillion-dollar debacle was going to result in bloody chaos and human tragedy no matter how it was planned. The Taliban waited patiently, as we all knew it would.
The real truth about Afghanistan is that it has been a debacle for decades. The quagmire in that country dates back long before 9/11. Ask the Russians, who occupied Afghanistan in the 1980’s and left defeated and humiliated.
This week, Trump’s pal, Russian President Vladimir Putin, is hinting that he wants to work with the Taliban. No surprise. Lest we forget, last year Russian military intelligence reportedly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing U.S. and coalition troops.
Those who think Trump would have handled this evacuation better than Biden are delusional, at best. The original intent of going to Afghanistan - to wipe out the Taliban, who were hosting Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan - made sense to me. But it has long since morphed into something less defined, more open-ended and untenable.
We kept the Taliban at bay, mostly, but history has shown that trying to do anything positive in Afghanistan is a fool’s errand.
Among the biggest tragedies here is of course leaving behind the translators and many other Afghans who supported our troops. They must be identified, saved and brought to America, somehow, some way, and I believe Biden will work hard to get that done.
But perhaps the greatest tragedy in all this is that women will likely be widely mistreated and diminished once again in Afghanistan. I don't believe for a minute that this barbaric and cowardly terrorist organization has actually changed its stripes when it comes to its opinion of women.
We need to continue monitoring this and doing all we can to keep the Taliban from abusing women and children and planning more terror. And I believe Biden will do what he can, without committing another ground force to move in.
Meantime, thanks to every single person in the military who served in Afghanistan. Your heroism under often horrible conditions will never be forgotten.
But after so many years of aggressive foreign military policy, America needs to focus on counter-terrorism, not occupation. We need a corrupt-free CIA to step up and do what it is paid to do worldwide, and put our primary focus back on domestic issues during this ongoing pandemic.
