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I think that the Afghanistan war/occupation is not discussed enough. Perhaps we are all so used to government failure that we just nod our heads and ignore what happened over there.
The US occupied that entire country for 20 years. It spent an estimated $2.3 trillion. When the US went in there, the place was controlled by authoritarian Islamists who oppress women. Today, the place is controlled by authoritarian Islamists who oppress women.
People's sense of what is important is so delusional sometimes. Here in the US, people often argue over minor issues like who gets to go into what bathroom, or whether there are enough strong women in television shows. Meanwhile, the US taxpayer spent $2.3 trillion on Afghanistan, there was a major opportunity to actually do some real feminism, to actually reshape Afghan culture to make it more liberal, and it just didn't happen. I'm not sure how much it was even attempted.
I get that the original reason for occupying Afghanistan was 9/11, but the US was in there for 20 years. There is no way you can tell me that you can't reshape a society of just 40 million people when you're there for 20 years, you spend $2.3 trillion, and you have overwhelming military force. Societies have been forcefully reshaped in the past and they will be in the future. Take Germany or Japan for example.
Did the US even try over there? Was the whole thing just an excuse to put taxpayer money into rich people's pockets? People just nod and smile about the whole thing, like "of course we spent $2.3 trillion and got nothing for it other than neutralizing Al Qaeda, that's just how the government works". It's kind of weird to me that there isn't more outrage about the whole thing. Neutralizing Al Qaeda did not use up 20 years and $2.3 trillion. One can argue about whether foreign interventionism and nation building is good or bad, and there are good cases to be made for both sides, but that's not really my subject matter. My point is that since there was a supposed attempt at nation building over there, we at least should have gotten something out of it. If the taxpayer supports you to the tune of $2.3 trillion, and you achieve no nation building after 20 years despite having overwhelming military force, then it seems to me that the taxpayer has been massively ripped off.
We did though... we had this debate for the entire 20 years. It went and on, it was miserable and depressing and no one seemed to offer any good solution until finally Biden pulled the plug on the whole ordeal.
No one originally wanted to invade Afghanistan or reshape it into a modern western ally. We just wanted to capture/kill Bin Laden and other Al Qaida leaders, and stop Afghanistan from being used as a terrorist training center. That was accomplished.
Unfortunately, in doing so we also removed their government and created a power vacuum in one of the most violent and unstable countries in the world. Everyone kind of felt bad about that, as well as worried that this would lead to more recruitment of terrorists in the future, so there was a great deal of effort expended to try and keep the country peaceful and stable.
Turns out it's very difficult to change a culture! The people there are really, really religious, so a religious government like the Taliban had a lot of popular support. They're also very poor, so often there were no good options for local allies. If you shut down their money from Pakistan and bin Laden, that pretty much leaves Opium as their only source of money, which was controlled by the Taliban.
On the plus side, after retaking power the Taliban has started to act a little bit more like a real government and less like a terrorist organization. They're doing formal diplomacy with other countries, fighting the Islamic State, and seem to be cracking down on Opium production.
No, it's that the establishment was fanatically devoted to really bad ideas and refused to try anything different, @Dean outlined some of it. The bar was so low it was lying on the ground, they failed at literally the first step of nation building - have an army that will defend your nation. If they succeeded at that, none of what is happening would be happening, and the culture would be completely different relative to what the Taliban is imposing.
Huh. I didn't even remember that post. Did you save it, or just go hunting for it?
I went hunting. When a post makes an impression I tend to remember some turn of phrase that helps me find it later, though in this case it was luck. Where you kept repeating "choice" I remembered you saying "decision", but luckily it popped up anyway on the second page of search results.
Rhetorical repetition theory works again!
Thanks for answering. I sometimes do that for the effect, and it's good to know it worked / was appreciated.
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