In Afghanistan, Lies and Delusions to the Bitter End

Justin Logan“There’s going to be no circumstance where you see people being lifted off the roof of an embassy … of the United States from Afghanistan. It is not at all comparable.”That was howPresident Joe Biden responded on July 8 to a question regarding possible parallels between the withdrawal from South Vietnam in 1975 and the then ‐​pending withdrawal from Afghanistan.It is now clear that the administration ’s assessment of the likely consequences was wrong. Three things are worth considering:U.S. policy in Afghanistan has been based on self ‐​delusion and outright lying to the American people and to Congress;Few analysts were surprised by the Taliban ’s strength; most were surprised by the government’s feather‐​in‐​the‐​wind dissolution, which is its own commentary after 20 years, $1 trillion, thousands of U.S. service members killed, and a generation of war; andThe important remaining U.S. interests are counterterrorism and attempting to rescue those who helped the U.S. war effort there.U.S. policy in Afghanistan, and the government ’s message to the American people about it, have been built on lies and delusions for almost the entire course of the war. The American people, having swallowed those lies, are now aghast.Craig Whitlock at thePost has beencovering the issue for years. The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) has been on the record for years. And nobody cared until it was too late...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs