LEARN THE LESSON; DON'T TRY TO TEACH ONE:

The Taliban won the war in Afghanistan. Perhaps it was inevitable, perhaps it was not. But it is in any case a reality. And the consequences of the international withdrawal are horrifying. Half of the nearly 40 million people in Afghanistan are now at risk of famine and starvation. COVID-19 has spread across a country with next to no vaccination or medical ventilator capacity. The economy is broken. Prices and unemployment are soaring. Health care systems are disintegrating. And there is no coherent long-term strategy to prevent a major terrorist threat from reemerging.

Yet all is not lost. Despite the debacle this summer, the war's end came with remarkably little bloodshed. That was not the result of any U.S. or NATO policy but it was a welcome and surprising outcome. Moreover, despite having been bitter enemies for two decades, NATO and the Taliban found a modus vivendi this summer, as the latter even helped us (imperfectly) evacuate more than 120,000 people at risk as Kabul fell. That tacit cooperation suggests a path forward for counterterrorism policy as well.

Alas, these silver linings to the withdrawal are both at dire risk. It will prove little solace that civil war and massive revenge killings were averted this year if many hundreds of thousands of Afghans suffer preventable deaths from starvation and privation this winter.

Tweet   @brothersjudd