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18 August
Afghanistan and the alliance
What is taking place in Afghanistan sits uncomfortably between history’s echoes and an uncertain future. Despite comparisons to the despondency and desperation of previous US military withdrawals from history, President Biden stood by by his decision stating, 'After 20 years, I’ve learned the hard way that there was never a good time to withdraw US forces.'
Arguments abound as to whether President Biden deserves criticism or praise, whether more could have been done or whether this outcome was inevitable. These questions notwithstanding — and as confronting as the scenes from Afghanistan are — a 20-year, post-9/11 chapter for the United States and its allies appears to have finally closed.
Next month, Australia and the United States commemorate 70 years of the Australia-US alliance and 20 years since the 9/11 attacks. Many anticipated ANZUS would only be invoked in the face of a territorial threat to Australia. Yet it was Australia that was first to activate ANZUS, joining US-led troops in Afghanistan following the September 11 attacks.
Both Australia and the United States have long recognised that with the rapid pace of geostrategic change in the Indo-Pacific of much, the importance of challenges much more proximate than Afghanistan hold more relevance to Australia’s interests.
Perhaps this painful, tragic extrication from Afghanistan might also hasten a new chapter for both Australia and the United States, the alliance serving the interests of both countries in ensuring the security and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific.
To both help commemorate 70 years of the Australia-US Alliance — and to reflect on the recent shift of the alliance’s focus towards the Indo-Pacific — the United States Studies Centre (USSC) is honoured to be hosting former Prime Ministers Julia Gillard and John Howard for a special event on 1 September at 5pm AEST.
TOP READS
Afghanistan top reads
The war in Afghanistan: America’s longest conflict in photos, The Washington Post | Published upon the 13 April announcement of President Biden’s decision to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan, this photo essay captures the evolution of America’s longest war in evocative images. READ MORE HERE
Why Afghan forces so quickly laid down their arms, POLITICO | In his national address this week, President Biden admitted that the Taliban insurgency ‘did unfold more quickly than anticipated’. The Taliban seized control of the country both faster and with far less violence than many anticipated. This essay by a former journalist who reported from Afghanistan in the 1980s gives insight into likely reasons why that occurred. READ MORE HERE
August turns into a month of crises, CNN | Presidential historian Jon Meacham says for many US presidents, ’history happens in August.’ President Biden clearly maintains this trend. Facing the greatest drop in approval in his presidency so far, the Afghanistan evacuation is just one crisis in a sea of difficulty for Biden. This article continues the discussion of the nationwide COVID-19 surge and dissenting House Democrats threatening to derail infrastructure talks. READ MORE HERE
An Afghan woman in Kabul: ‘Now I have to burn everything I achieved’, The Guardian | No single demographic is expected to suffer more at the hands of the Taliban than Afghan women and girls. Responding to the US withdrawal from Afghanistan, former President George W. Bush said, ‘I’m afraid Afghan women and girls are going to suffer unspeakable harm.’ This article reveals the fears of one young Afghan girl returning home from what she knows will be her last university class. READ MORE HERE
After Afghanistan falls, the blame game begins, The Washington Post | President John F. Kennedy popularised the notion that ‘victory has a hundred fathers and defeat is an orphan.’ This article gives insight into a Washington that was expecting to soon be celebrating bipartisan legislation on infrastructure but is instead engaging in blame-shifting across and among party lines. READ MORE HERE
We all lost Afghanistan, Foreign Affairs | Upon the announcement of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan earlier this year, USSC Senior Fellow Jared Mondschein asked ’what was it all for?’ recalling that Biden himself said on announcement ‘our reasons for remaining in Afghanistan have become increasingly unclear.’ This essay outlines how that strategic haze came to hang over the US 20-year involvement in Afghanistan. READ MORE HERE
We went to Afghanistan almost 20 years ago. Now, our mission is to get our people, our allies, and vulnerable Afghans to safety outside of the country.
Vice President Kamala Harris
VP Twitter | 18 August 2021
WEBINAR | 20 AUGUST
The Australia-US alliance: Views from the region
As it celebrates its 70th anniversary, the Australia-US alliance continues to evolve in response to a changing regional context in the Indo-Pacific. How do Australia’s neighbours in Southeast Asia understand the purpose of the alliance in 2021? Is the alliance seen as limiting Australia’s autonomy, or enhancing its influence? Is the alliance seen as distracting Australia from engaging its neighbours, or as contributing to regional security?
To discuss these perspectives from the region, United States Studies Centre Research Fellow in the Foreign Policy and Defence Program, Susannah Patton, will be joined by three leading Southeast Asian foreign and defence policy experts: Sarah Teo, Assistant Professor and Coordinator of the Regional Security Architecture Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University in Singapore; Evan A. Laksmana, Wang Gungwu Visiting Fellow at the ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute in Singapore; and Shahriman Lockman, Director in the Chief Executive's Office of the Institute of Strategic and International Studies in Malaysia.
WHEN:
Friday 20 August, 1pm AEST (Sydney) 11am AWST (Perth)
COST:
Free but registration is essential.
You can also subscribe to have event invitations and reminders sent straight to your inbox, so you never have to miss an event!
ANALYSIS
On Afghanistan
What should Australians take away from 20 years of war in Afghanistan? What are the implications of the withdrawal from Afghanistan for Australia and other US allies?
A selection of USSC experts below give some brief analysis. Click here to read further analysis from USSC experts on this topic.
- Victoria Cooper | I read Viet Thanh Nguyen’s The Sympathizer this weekend. As the protagonist flees Saigon following the US withdrawal, he details the heat of bodies jammed together in queues, the smell of fire on the tarmac, the cruelty of waiting, the sourness of leaving home and knowing what and
who is left behind, the grief of shouting and being unheard. The Sympathizer animated the still images I saw from Afghanistan. Secretary Blinken said, 'this is manifestly not Saigon', but if nothing else the visual signals are familiar. As a researcher, I feel that I continually run the risk of making stale, emotional-less observations about foreign policy, but The Sympathizer has shaken my propensity for emotional disconnect in a way only good storytelling can.
- Gorana Grgic | The image of Afghans running alongside a US military transport plane taking off from Kabul will not just be seen as one of the defining images of president Biden’s foreign policy legacy, but rather, something that is much greater than his presidency. That photo, accompanied with the president’s 16 August speech on Afghanistan, encapsulates the definitive end of the post-9/11 era. While many are now focusing on Biden's lack of sorrow about humanitarian failures in the last stage of US withdrawal (and rightly so), the core of his remarks was an unequivocal statement on US
foreign policy direction moving forward. Crises such as the Taliban takeover are deemed yesterday’s threats and US-led nation-building abroad a relic of the unipolar era.
- Jennifer Jackett | Afghans are now at the mercy of Islamist fundamentalists. While US interests necessitate a re-focus to the Indo Pacific, to be a credible global power the United States needs to be able to engage in strategic competition with China and support the impending humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. The United States rightly needs to prioritise its efforts and resources in response to the complex array of global challenges this century – authoritarianism, climate impacts, technological change, and terrorism, to name a few. But trade-offs need to be careful not to come at the expense of the
key principles and values that the United States is fighting for.
- John Lee | Given the high likelihood that the Taliban remains as brutal as ever, especially regarding their attitude to women and girls, the pull-out means the Biden administration has lost considerable domestic and international moral standing and authority. But strategic incompetency and moral failure in Afghanistan does not presage how matters will unfold in the Indo-Pacific context. Afghanistan was a legacy issue for Biden which was handled extremely poorly. However, American, and allied interests, equities, and successes in our region are far more extensive. China will not read too much
into events over the last few days and neither should we.
- Jared Mondschein | Opinions on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan seem like a Rorschach test: Views on what occurred this week are often more telling of firmly held opinions on what occurred in Afghanistan over the last 20 years. If the US withdrawal from Vietnam has any parallels to Afghanistan, then this debate is unlikely to result in any overwhelming consensus. Yet the undeniable fact remains that after having lost thousands of US lives and trillions of US dollars, the same Taliban government in power on September 11, 2001, will once again be in power on September 11, 2021. Instead of trying to reach a consensus, perhaps it’s worth asking ourselves a question: Beyond deciding what lessons there are to learn, are we capable of learning lessons?
- Brendon O’Conner | After the US-led coalition invaded and occupied Afghanistan for 20 years and relied on locals to support this occupation the United States, Australia and other coalition partners owe those who worked with them in Afghanistan asylum. In 2002 then Secretary of State Colin Powell told George W. Bush: 'If you break [a state by invading it] you own it.' Twenty years later, many
lives have been lost in Afghanistan and Iraq and over US$2 trillion has been spent by the United States. The lesson we should take from both cases is that invading other nations is nearly always a bad idea.
Ashley Townshend | America’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan after 20 years’ of conflict has been seized on by commentators as a reason to doubt US security commitments in other parts of the world. This is not true. America’s commitments should be judged on the strength of the perceived national interests and priorities at stake. These have been missing in action in Afghanistan for years. But they’re alive and well in the Indo-Pacific. From the perspective of US allies and partners in this part of the world, divesting from the Middle East might enable the US military to prioritise competition with China – provided the humanitarian tragedy in Afghanistan doesn’t become a political distraction. An orderly withdrawal would have been infinitely better both for the people of Afghanistan and America’s own ability to move on.
Bruce Wolpe | The US war in Afghanistan has failed. Vietnam failed. Iran is the biggest winner out of the Iraq War. What are the lessons here? Why does the United States have such an agonising time learning them? The lesson may be not to fight wars to impose democracy from the outside, but to leverage it from the outside with those on the inside who want it. For those who pose existential threats of terror, mass destruction, genocide and naked aggression: meet force with force. But that means you can’t – you won’t – save all who need to be saved from tyranny, oppression and atrocity.
Click here for further USSC analysis of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan
BY THE NUMBERS
775,000 US troops in Afghanistan
Sarah Hamilton
Research Associate for Data Insights
The longest ever US war saw more than three quarters of a million US troops deployed to Afghanistan. The United States alone suffered more than 2,300 casualties and 20,000 troops injured.
Australia saw more than 26,000 of its troops deployed to Afghanistan between 2001-2014 and suffered 41 casualties.
VIDEO
USSC CEO Simon Jackman on the resonance of images in Afghanistan
United States Studies Centre CEO Professor Simon Jackman appeared on Sky News Australia on Monday, saying the images coming out of Afghanistan right now 'will be ones we associate with the Biden presidency.'
He asks, 'where to from here? Does Afghanistan yet again become a safe harbour for terrorist and terrorist organisations?'
Catch more analysis on the United States and the Alliance on the USSC YouTube channel!
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United States Studies Centre
Institute Building H03
University of Sydney NSW 2006
