The image of US abroad- from Vietnam to Afghanistan.

 

By Gerald Mbanda 

The US administration started a war against terror in Afghanistan in 2001, after the Sept. 11 attack that killed more than 3,000 people. The Taliban government in Afghanistan was accused of giving sanctuary to Al Qaeda leader, Osama bin Laden who was believed to be the master mind of the US terror attacks.

10 years later, U.S. Navy SEALs raided Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and killed him. Al Qaeda cells were dismantled and other Al Qaeda leaders killed in separate attacks. Despite the successful gains in dismantling the bases and networks of Al Qaeda and killing almost all its leaders, the US maintained a large military presence   in Afghanistan.

 The reasons given for the military presence were to, “rebuild Afghanistan, strengthen its institutions for democratic governance and improve the country’s security.” In the process, the US is believed to have spent a whopping $ 1 trillion in the 20 years of Afghanistan occupation.

The continued presence of US military in Afghanistan reflected the decades long US administration ambition to impose “the American values” in the name of “defending democracy” and “promoting human-rights.” This means therefore, that the prolonged stay was more about American political interest of imposing America social values and western governance traits on the Afghan people. This is a mistake that the US has repeatedly refused to correct over the years, of interfering in the internal matters politics of sovereign countries.

In the 21^st century, the US administration should accept the reality that its efforts to subdue other nations to accept their democracy have been more catastrophic and represents the worst violation of human rights. From Vietnam to Iraq, Libya to Somalia, and now Afghanistan, the US administration should have learnt a lesson to overturn its foreign policy of wanting to “Americanize” the world as well as plotting regime change in many countries.

During the 2009 Afghanistan presidential elections, the US representative Richard Holbrooke, tried to influence the elections to stop Karzai from being elected as president. To US embarrassment, Karzai turned up the winner. The US wish was against the will of the majority Afghan people. Similarly, through a 20 years bitter war, the Talibans were not scared with the US military superiority and huge sums of money to sustain the war, but their determination and resilience has left a permanent dent on the face of the World’s number one super power.

The world has for decades been fed on lies regarding US foreign wars to destabilize other countries. The facts and figures in the war in Afghanistan were reportedly falsified by the US administration giving a wrong impression that all was well on the battle field. “But through the Afghan war, documents show that US military officials have resorted to an old tactic from Vietnam – manipulating public opinion,” wrote  Craig Whitlock,  in his  2019 article in the Washington Post, titled, “The Afghanistan Papers: At War with the Truth. ”

Whereas the US is said to have lost more than 2,400 service members (and thousands of contractors), and more than 20,000 wounded, reports and television networks beamed to the world stories of a successful war. “US officials systematically misled the public about the war in Afghanistan, according to internal documents obtained by the Post,” Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post further revealed. Bob Crowley, a retired Colonel who served as a counterinsurgency adviser in Afghanistan between 2013-2014 also revealed that “truth was rarely welcome” at the military headquarters in Kabul.

Peter Michael McKinley, former US ambassador to Afghanistan (2015-2016) revealed that in 2009 when the US military planned to train Afghan air force, the project “was slower than necessary because of a decision to transition the Afghan fleet from Russian craft to Black Hawks.” This is another commercial side of US wars abroad where American companies that manufacture military hardware   get into lucrative business.  

The fact that poorly equipped Taliban defeated the America forces in Afghanistan is an indictment to the US that the resilience of the people however weak, when defending their right to self-determination, their power cannot not be under estimated. The will and determination of a suppressed people has intrinsic power like water droplets that can drill into a hard rock.  

The UN Security Council continues to keep a deaf ear at   US and its allies ignoring to   prosecute reported war crimes and human rights violations in Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is also under scrutiny for application of double standards exposing the absurd reality of weakness within the United Nations system.  

The writing is on the wall that time for US hegemony and assuming the role of the ‘world police’ has slowly but surely been deflated like a slow puncture. The chaos that was witnessed on television screens globally of thousands of desperate people at Kabul airport showed betrayal and abandonment of the Afghan people who had confidence in the US military. It was a manifestation of US foreign policy misjudgment and failure. It is high time the US re-thinks of a new foreign policy that abides by international rule based order, respects the dignity, political choices and sovereignty of other countries.   America can do better.

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