What did the US do wrong in Afghanistan?

 (Asked on Quora. My Answer).

The initial Afghan attack on the 7th of October 2001, although largely carried out by the United States, occurred under the NATO framework. It was coordinated with the Northern Alliance.

After 911 Al Qaeda had to be punished as did the Taliban for its harboring of Osama Bin Laden and their refusal to hand him over to American authorities. The mission was largely successful within that original context.

The problem is that the operation changed from that of Jihadist elimination to nation building. This mission creep is what turned the Afghanistan mission into a gigantic money pit from an American perspective.

There was now a greater emphasis on winning the hearts and souls of the local population and troops were encouraged to avoid conflict as much as possible. The Taliban exploited this weakness resulting in more troops casualties.

Afghanistan is very much a patchwork country that is fragmented by tribal rivalries that underpin its cultural and geopolitical foundation. Corruption is endemic, religious zealotry runs strong and trust is not easily achieved. There is also a natural disdain of foreign influence as a consequence of a historic legacy of outside intervention.

Add to that the weakness of a pre-Industrialized economy that has a significant component that relies on the production of opium and the pitfalls complicating nation building are dramatically compounded.

Unlike post WWII West Germany or Japan the bulk of the population was still not exposed to post-Enlightenment thinking. Twenty years was far too short a time to change thought patterns that had taken centuries to develop elsewhere.

There is no quick App that will do this and without an even greater commitment by the US the inertia of the past was too great a summit to overcome.

While it is true as a consequence of a botched retreat (which is a topic in and of itself) that the Taliban now has the upper hand in the country, I disagree with the argument that the entire mission was for naught.

For one, millions of girls/women were given the opportunity to receive an education that would be denied to them, if those twenty years were filled with national Taliban domination. Medical platforms were improved and institutions modified. There are many gains that you cannot walk back that easy. The seeds of democracy were sown in the country as were the benefits of enlightenment thought. These are not easily reversible.

While 2001-2021 may be seen as a giant waste by those in the West to the Afghan people I suspect it had a trans-formative effect. How could it not? Don’t forget that a great deal of Afghanistan’s population was born post 2001.

The bigger question to ask is how soon will this impact be realized? The Taliban are inheriting a different country in 2021 than they did in 1996. They will have to adjust accordingly.