The United States' unpopular withdrawal from Afghanistan raises questions about the future…
Kabul, Tuesday,
Twenty years after being forced away from the throne, the Taliban are back ruling Afghanistan again. Only days after it was announced that US troops would be withdrawn following 20 years of presence in the region, the Afghan government collapsed. Western media then reported breathlessly of the American "humiliation" and, in more sober language, of a return to the worst days of the former Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.
In the US, President Joe Biden faced a storm of criticism for his decision, with the media demanding to know how the world's premier military could have been defeated by a force with fewer soldiers than Azerbaijan. In the UK too, the government of Prime Minister Boris Johnson was accused of betraying the Afghan people, and horror stories of Taliban excesses were splashed across the newspapers.
The collapse of the Western occupation has not, publicly at least, been matched by the recognition that Western values, however fine, could hardly be imposed when at the political level, Afghanistan is still highly tribal, meaning people vote not as individuals but as groups. This is a significant obstacle for any government trying to efficiently run the country and bring in new laws. Which explains why the Taliban, coming from the country's majority ethnic group, the Pashtuns, have attempted to move away from tribal politics and instead project themselves as the true guardians of Islam.
In this sense, the war between the US and the Taliban mostly seems like a clash of civilizations, with the Taliban now able to force Afghans back into the past.
A brief history of Afghanistan.
The prosperous Durrani Kingdom fell due to weak domestic structures, sibling rivalry and polygamy within the royal family. Afghanistan was then taken over by Maharaja Ranjit Singh and after the decline of his Sikh Empire, Afghanistan went into the hands
of the British who used the region for the "Great Game" with Russia and put forward the Durand Line between Afghanistan and British India, which confirmed an everlasting political separation in the region. Such a move undermined the Pashtun concept of nationalism by separating the tribe and downplaying the achievement of a state of Pashtunistan.
of the British who used the region for the "Great Game" with Russia and put forward the Durand Line between Afghanistan and British India, which confirmed an everlasting political separation in the region. Such a move undermined the Pashtun concept of nationalism by separating the tribe and downplaying the achievement of a state of Pashtunistan.
The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was the state first established in September 1996 by the Taliban, and run in an often bloody fashion until 2001, when it was toppled by the United States's military coalition that invaded the country after the 9/11 attacks citing its harboring of Osama bin Laden.
During this time women were forbidden to work, could be killed if they disobeyed their husbands and were subject to numerous cruelties such as having the tip of their thumb cut off if they dared to wear nail varnish.
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