Our picks: AfghanistanThe True Lesson of Afghanistan | Why the Afghan Army Folded | Biden Was Right —and Disastrously Wrong, and more
· Will Afghanistan Become a Terrorist Safe Haven Again?
· The True Lesson of Afghanistan Is the Hubris of Nation Building
· America’s Rejection of Its Imperial Burden Leaves Britain Vulnerable
· How Biden Was Right About Afghanistan—and Disastrously Wrong
· Why Afghanistan’s Tribes Beat the United States
· This Is Not the Taliban 2.0
· Why the Afghan Army Folded
· ‘All the Signs Have Been There’ Predicting Afghan Security Force Collapse, IG Says
Will Afghanistan Become a Terrorist Safe Haven Again? (Daniel Byman, Foreign Affairs)
Just Because the Taliban Won Doesn’t Mean Jihadis Will
The True Lesson of Afghanistan Is the Hubris of Nation Building (Philip Johnston, The Telegraph)
While the withdrawal was bungled, the decision to leave was right. We should have done so years ago.
America’s Rejection of Its Imperial Burden Leaves Britain Vulnerable (Nick Timothy, The Telegraph)
The humiliating defeat in Afghanistan means we must reappraise our policies and capabilities.
How Biden Was Right About Afghanistan—and Disastrously Wrong (Michael Hirsh, Foreign Policy)
The president is taking flak from all sides, but the timing of the Taliban takeover could minimize the political damage.
In strategic terms Biden may have been essentially right in saying there was no reason for the United States to stay any longer; the Afghan state and its security forces were plainly an empty husk, utterly unable to operate on their own, and any further U.S. involvement would not have altered the military odds, only staving off the inevitable. That has been Biden’s line all along. As the president said at the White House on Monday: “We gave them every chance to determine their own future. What we could not provide them was the will to fight for their future.”
Why Afghanistan’s Tribes Beat the United States (Jeremi Suri, Foreign Policy)
Tightly bound kinship networks aren’t vestiges of the past. They’re a modern—and effective—form of political organization.
This Is Not the Taliban 2.0 (Graeme Wood, The Atlantic)
The group’s claims of having changed are probably more reassuring to those unfamiliar with its history.
Why the Afghan Army Folded (Kori Schake, The Atlantic)
America has historically struggled to train foreign militaries.
‘All the Signs Have Been There’ Predicting Afghan Security Force Collapse, IG Says (Courtney Bublé, Defense One)
For more than a decade, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction has been warning about “ghost soldiers” and corruption to anyone willing to pay attention.
