The Art of the New Cold War Newsletter
Afghanistan Edition
Welcome readers to the Afghanistan edition of The Art of the New Cold War Newsletter.
This week we focus exclusively on the historic events taking place in Afghanistan and their implications and opportunities in The New Cold War.
As always, for more, please check out my book: The Art of The New Cold War
Feedback is always welcomed. Thank you for reading!
Topic: Afghanistan: When life gives you lemons….
Like most prideful and patriotic Americans, I am horrified and disgusted by the scenes now playing out in Afghanistan, as we watch what the Wall Street Journal aptly described this week as a Saigon on steroids.
The situation is made ever the worse by the fact that less than a month ago President Biden assured the American public that our withdrawal would not create another Saigon like debacle. Indeed, Biden led us all to believe that the Afghan army, trained and equipped by the US military over twenty years, and outnumbering the Taliban army 3 to 1, had a better than good chance of winning the war. Thus, all was well. Nothing to worry about.
Biden’s very rosy assessment of the situation was proven spectacularly wrong within mere hours of America’s scheduled departure, with Taliban forces sweeping through the country like a hot knife going through butter, and within only days were in complete control. Winning the war with hardly any resistance at all from Biden’s much heralded Afghan army, which it became clear was thoroughly incapable of fighting without American support, and all but gave up on the battlefield.
This appears to be a monumental failure of intelligence and/or a complete lack of judgement. As the Financial Times wrote scathingly this week: “[E]ither the White House went ahead with the pullout regardless of intelligence warnings of what would follow, or the speed of the offensive was indeed unforeseen — a startling lack of insight in a country where America has had a ground presence for two decades.”
Now, the US is not only faced with scenes reminiscent of Saigon and the ignominious end of the Vietnam War, but also the utterly humiliating sight of the Taliban flag flying high at the US embassy on the 20th anniversary of 9/11. As far as symbols go, it could hardly be worse, and it represents a deep stain on American honor and prestige. It will also be used for propaganda and recruitment purposes by America’s enemies.
Before I proceed further, however, I need to be crystal clear that this not the fault nor the responsibility of our brave men and women in the US military who served and fought honorably in Afghanistan over the past twenty years, and who have in many ways kept us safe on the home front by doing so. They deserve our deepest respect and admiration, and their service and accomplishments should not in any way be diminished by Afghanistan’s fate. This is squarely on the poor political leadership, both Democrats and Republicans alike, along with the high level military commanders that failed to define the mission or what constituted success and ultimately turned a war into some sort of a nation building exercise.
I am reminded by something my Grandfather, a Colonel in the Air Force who fought in WWII and was an all around American badass and hero, once said to me: “You go into a war to win it, or you do not go in at all.” These words have always stuck with me. And I believe it is a lesson our leaders in America have forgotten, as fully illustrated by Afghanistan and Iraq, and Vietnam before them. In the end, so called “limited wars” have proven far more costly than total wars for America. For as Napoleon said: “In war, groping tactics, half-way measures, lose everything.”
I believe—and have argued in my book and elsewhere—that America should have left Afghanistan and Iraq a decade or more ago. Indeed, right after Bin Laden was killed, for example, would have been an opportune time to do so, as it would have provided a successful, logical, and victorious end to the awkwardly titled “Wars on Terror.” It would have also avoided the ill fated business of nation building in the Middle East that proved so utterly disastrous, and which led us to the place where we find ourselves today.
As such, I do not fault Biden, or Trump for that matter, for making the decision to withdraw at long last from Afghanistan. Indeed, I applaud them for doing so. As I firmly believe that even if we stayed there for another twenty years the result would ultimately be the same: the Taliban in ultimate control and/or some form of blood soaked Civil War. Moreover, we have spent resources and focus in Afghanistan, and Iraq, that should have been spent at home. And on our single biggest threat: China. Now we can finally do so. This is the silver lining to the mess we are currently witnessing.
Thus, it is not with the decision to leave that I, and I believe most Americans, take issue. But the incompetent implementation of the withdrawal, which provided the world with a glaring portrayal of abject American weakness. Something that is completely unacceptable and intolerable to all prideful and patriotic Americans, and for which our leaders should never, ever be forgiven. Indeed, heads at the highest levels of government should and must roll.
We must also begin to move forward, and look ahead to the New Cold War with China. And in that context, we must discover whether the failure in Afghanistan will be another Vietnam for America: a temporary setback America ultimately overcame to win the Cold War against the Soviet Union only a decade later. Or, like Afghanistan was to the Soviet Union, a hastener of America’s ultimate demise. What America does at home will largely determine which of these two outcomes prevails. Perhaps the scenes in Afghanistan, coupled with the challenge posed by China, will focus the mind and provide much needed motivation for America’s domestic renewal. We should all hope and do our part to see that this is so.
Afghanistan will also have direct and profound implications in the New Cold War and on China, which we discussed previously in the The Art of the New Cold War Newsletter #1.
Of course, China is already attempting to use America’s failure in Afghanistan to its full strategic advantage. For example, by using it as an illustration to the world of America’s waning power, and even heralding it as a “turning point in the decline of American hegemony.” China is also using it as a warning to Taiwan not to count on American support, as was reported by the The South China Morning Post.
Additionally, China is positioning itself to take advantage of the US withdrawal by making deals with the Taliban, and angling to construct infrastructure in Afghanistan as part of China’s grand and extremely ambitious Belt and Road Initiative (i.e. the Project of the Century). China also sees an opportunity to exploit Afghanistan’s vast natural resources (valued at around a trillion dollars) including all important rare earths.
But as much as China senses opportunities, it has serious concerns as well. As some of Afghanistan’s implications may in the end provide strategic benefits to America in the New Cold War. For example, by freeing up the US to ramp up efforts to counter China on the South China Sea and other places of strategic importance to China.
Afghanistan also borders China’s highly problematic Xinjiang region, where China has imprisoned millions of Muslims, known as Uighurs, and even committed a form of genocide against them. Thus, the prospect of battle hardened Muslim fighters and terrorists operating on China’s borders, without US troops to keep them busy and in check, becomes a very worrying prospect. Understandably, some of them may be rather angry about what China is doing to their fellow Muslims across the border.
And as Afghanistan becomes an increasingly unstable, hostile, and dangerous country once US forces are gone, China may be forced into the “graveyard of empires.” A fact renowned geopolitical strategist Ian Bremmer also made recently in this pithy tweet:
Indeed, it is to America’s advantage for China to become occupied in Afghanistan, and spend some time there getting stung by that perpetual hornet's nest. America should even seek to kick the hornet’s nest from time to time to ensure that China keeps getting stung.
To that end, Mao Zedong famously quipped, “everything under heaven is in utter chaos; the situation is excellent.” Going forward, this is the mantra and strategy that America should adopt in relation to Afghanistan. It is time for America to reprise “Charlie Wilson’s War” and begin to arm Afghan insurgents who are willing and able to fight an insurgency against the Taliban and China. The very same way America once helped the Mujahedeen take down the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.
They say that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade. Time for America to start making some Chinese-Taliban lemonade in Afghanistan.