On Thursday, Fox News reported a “grim end” to the war in Afghanistan with White House press secretary Jen Psaki stating: “We’re not going to have a mission-accomplished moment in this regard.” And with 90% of U.S. troops already pulled from the South Asian country, President Joe Biden said remaining U.S. military operations will cease on August 31.
Now – just one day after Biden defended his troop withdrawal – Taliban officials are announcing they’ve taken control of 85% of territory in Afghanistan.
A ‘grim’ future
Indeed, says Major General Jeffrey Schloesser (Ret.) – former commanding general of the Army’s 101st Airborne Division and NATO’s Regional Command-East in Afghanistan – “the future of the country is grim.”
Despite the continued rhetoric about a peaceful Afghanistan in the months following the so-called peace deal, Schloesser (pictured above) tells One News Now that the Taliban has neither the need for nor the interest in conducting any sort of negotiation with the legitimate government of Afghanistan.
In February 2020, the Trump administration signed the formal agreement between the U.S. and the Taliban that led to the subsequent withdrawal of U.S. troops and NATO allies. But since then, the general points out, “the Taliban have been able to regain ground through military means, fighting against the Afghan army and thereby largely defeating [the Afghans] wherever they are engaging in significant combat.”
In contrast, Biden said in his address to the nation Thursday that “[he trusts] the capacity of the Afghan military, who is better trained, better equipped and more competent in terms of conducting war.”
Schloesser takes exception to the president’s assessment, admitting he doesn’t have much hope that the Taliban can be confined to rural areas and that the Afghan government and its allies can maintain control of major cities.
While he is assured the Afghan army is doing the best it can in combat, Schloesser finds what’s actually being witnessed across the country “very concerning.” Afghanistan is quickly falling into the hands of the Taliban – and the general predicts “a [rapid] collapse of the Afghan army” in a matter of months, perhaps across the entire country or across the major cities.
“Either way,” he says, “the Taliban are going to regain militarily control of the larger part of the country.”
And this, he warns, places the United States and its national interests into quite a predicament.
“Afghanistan will essentially become a safe haven for terrorists, recreated for those that are linked to the Taliban and others wanting to have an area to operate and train from,” he describes. “Al Qaeda will regain strength in Afghanistan, and the Islamic State will try to set a foothold within the country bigger than what it has had in the past.”
The result? A “grim picture” that appears unavoidable, according to Schloesser.
Schloesser: Grateful for their service and sacrifice
Despite the grim picture, the retired Army officer is thankful for the service of each member of the U.S. armed forces, particularly for those who did not come home alive and for their families.
“To all Americans, since 9/11 – since [U.S. forces] have gone to Afghanistan to defeat Al Qaeda and push the Taliban out – there has not been a direct attack of any significance on our country from Al Qaeda or from obviously any linked groups,” he praises.
“The honorable service that soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines provided in Afghanistan was immeasurably critical to the security of the United States of America for the last two decades.” Thousands of men and women fought with honor, the general notes – adding “there’s something very special about that.”
But America’s national security at stake again
While predicting that it’s only a short time before the Taliban fully control Afghanistan, Schloesser urges Americans “to be thinking long-term – and realistically, it’s a matter of a few years.”
And he wonders what the U.S. will do once Afghanistan returns to being a safe haven for terrorists.
“Can the United States be effective from afar?” he asks. “In just a few years, the U.S. could once again either be attacked, or planned to be attacked, on the level of another 9/11.”
Maj. Gen. Jeff Schloesser is author of “Marathon War: Leadership in Combat in Afghanistan.”
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This is highly concerning. There’s something drastically wrong in spending blood and treasure in wars we don’t have an end game for. I’m a Vietnam Veteran but I’m not the only veteran of a foreign war that fought battles but lost wars. There is something totally wrong with strategy when you don’t have an end game with a war other than to just walk away from it. Name ONE war we’ve been in since Korea that we have won the war after winning the major battles at.
The only winners in these wars is the War industries that have government contracts. Is that what it is; politicians and the pentagon making contractors rich?
The effect of a war that didn’t have an end game plan before they started. Much like Vietnam.
Our biggest mistake is trying to implant western ideas of governance in countries that can’t grasp the principles involved. Indeed, our own politicians and bureaucrats seem to have difficulty grasping the principles laid down in the Constitution and Bill of Rights, so it is not hard to understand how those principles are foreign to countries where the idea of representative government is like a pig appreciating opera.
Germany and Japan already had experienced representative forms of government before Hitler and the Imperial Army General staff took charge of their respective countries, so responsible representative government was not a totally new and weird form of governance once those despotic leaders were overthrown after WWII. That experience does not translate in countries where such concepts are akin to learning to speak Vulcan.
The Middle East is still mired in the eighth century and so trying to impose twenty-first century forms of governance is akin to teaching your favorite pig to sing Nessun Dorma.
It only annoys the pig and wastes your time.
As with Vietnam where we micro-managed a half-a_ _ _ d war directed by bumbling civilians in Washington, District of Corruption who had no idea what they were doing and were misled by delusional reporting from the military leadership on scene, we once again were involved in two half-a_ _ _d wars again micro-managed, only this time by a general sitting in his air-conditioned office in Florida, as remote as if he were on the Planet Mongo.
I don’t know when we will stop meddling in the internal affairs of countries where we have absolutely zero interest. If the Iraqis were unhappy with their governance, it was up to them to end that governance. Sure, Saddam was a p.i.t.a., but if we started taking out every national leader who was a p.i.t.a., where would it end? Would we take out the Canadian Prime Minister? The P.M. of Britain? Especially the P.M. of France, perhaps Germany? Certainly Russia, a major p.i.t.a. and China, another major p.i.t.a., Venezuela, Mexico . . . where would it end? Oh, I almost overlooked Iran and Pakistan.
So the Taliban will rule Afghanistan. Does anyone here in this country care? If they are happy under that governance, why should we care. If they are unhappy, then let them do something about it themselves. Should anti-U.S. terrorism rear its ugly head once again in Afghanistan, then destroy the country. Level it. Leave the message that we will leave them alone as long as they leave us alone. Agent Orange all the poppy fields. Salt the irrigation systems so that nothing will grow. Level the cities to dust and leave a note, “Leave us alone or we will be back.”
Don’t try to “nation build”. If they want our form of governance, they will establish it themselves. At least then it will be legitimate, not some foreign form of government they don’t understand and resent because it was forced on them by an infidel country.