Afghanistan has fallen to the Taliban almost immediately after a 20-year-long unsuccessful US occupation. The purpose of the United States being in Afghanistan was to bolster the Afghan Military and Government to fight against the Taliban and any other foreign threat. While the US was there, this plan appeared to be going fairly well. The problem is that the Taliban are not leaving Afghanistan anytime soon. They were ever-present during the time of the US occupation. So as soon as the US announced their withdrawal, the Taliban saw an opening and seized the opportunity.
The United States had been in Afghanistan since 2001 following the attacks of September 11th on the World Trade Center in New York City. George W. Bush announced the invasion of Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks alongside other controversial measures such as The Patriot Act and the creation of the TSA. The purpose of the invasion of Afghanistan was to bring those responsible for 9/11 to justice. Capturing and/or killing Osama Bin Laden in 2011 (in Pakistan, by the way) should have satisfied the stated goal of the Afghanistan invasion. It did not. The goal of the US “occupation” of Afghanistan became nation-building.
President Trump announced his intention to remove US forces from Afghanistan back in September of 2020. He set a date for May 2021. And there were most likely internal talks to leave the country weeks before the announcement made it to the media. So there was plenty of time for generals to make plans for a safe and timely exit. When Joe Biden was elected in November 2020 his official “clock” to devise an exit strategy started. Unfortunately, the Biden administration did not have a solid plan of removal. It’s like Afghanistan is an afterthought. Biden even moved the official removal date to September 11th for optics purposes. US officials and Afghan citizens alike scrambled to escape in the zero-hour after the Taliban had descended upon them in mid-August.
The Taliban are a group of fighters and a pseudo-Governmental force that has been a thorn in the side of many nations around the world. Their objective is similar to that of ISIS, which is to create a hyper-Islamic emirate (in Afghanistan only) by any means necessary. The United States spent tens of billions of dollars over several years training local Afghans to become the security force of their nation against the Taliban. Joe Biden himself expressed confidence in the Afghan security force just last month. Confidence in the Afghan Government was either an overestimation or an outright lie. The Taliban were able to take the entire country of Afghanistan in a matter of days with little to no resistance from any local security force.
SOURCES:
Kabul’s Sudden Fall to Taliban Ends U.S. Era in Afghanistan – The New York Times
US suspends evacuation flights from Kabul airport – YouTube
Carnage on Kandahar Streets After Taliban Pull People from Their Homes and Slaughter Them
Afghanistan latest news as Taliban takes control of Kabul’s presidential palace
White House Scrambles To Contain Fallout From Taliban Takeover Of Afghanistan – YouTube
Jen Psaki ‘out of the office’ as Biden remains silent on Taliban takeover of Afghanistan | Fox News
Taliban Is Using Child Sex Slaves to Catch and Kill Afghan Police
CNN Breaking News on Twitter: “President Biden is expected to address the nation in the next few days about the crisis in Afghanistan, an administration official says https://t.co/iVS0tJWXtj https://t.co/jt4xooilxZ” / Twitter
Biden to withdraw U.S. forces from Afghanistan by Sept. 11, 2021 – The Washington Post
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