US watchdog blames Washington, Ghani for the fall of Kabul

SIGAR identifies six components that contributed to the collapse of the Afghan authorities and the return of the Taliban to energy.

Taliban supporters rejoice on the first anniversary of the fall of Kabul on a street in Kabul, Afghanistan, August 15, 2022.
Taliban supporters rejoice on the primary anniversary of the autumn of Kabul on a road in Kabul, Afghanistan on August 15, 2022 [File: Ali Khara/Reuters]

The USA sought to construct “secure, democratic, accountable” Afghan governance establishments, but it surely in the end failed, the Workplace of the Particular Inspector Basic for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) concluded in a report revealed on Wednesday.

SIGAR pointed the finger on the US but in addition laid blame on former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, who it stated ruled via “a extremely selective, slender circle of loyalists, destabilising the federal government at a vital juncture”.

This isn't the primary time the US watchdog has blamed Washington and Ghani for the return of the Taliban to energy. In a report revealed in Could, the watchdog stated the withdrawal of US troops prompted the collapse of the Afghan military, whereas one other report launched days after the Taliban’s takeover in August 2021 blamed the US’s failure to “implement a coherent technique” over 20 years in Afghanistan.

The report says the US exit from Afghanistan resulted within the Taliban regaining management of the nation and triggering an exodus of overseas nationals and employees, together with Afghans who labored with worldwide help teams in addition to the US navy.

Regardless of some progress with capability constructing, the US did not resolve problems with corruption; “to legitimise the Afghan authorities via democratic elections; and to adequately monitor and consider the outcomes and impacts of its efforts”, the report stated.

SIGAR recognized six components that contributed to the collapse of the Afghan authorities. These included the failure of the Afghan authorities to recognise that the US would really depart, the exclusion of the Afghan authorities from US-Taliban talks, which weakened it; the Afghan authorities’s insistence that the Taliban would someway be built-in into the nation, and the Taliban’s unwillingness to compromise.

The Taliban took over Afghanistan after a blistering offensive, reaching Kabul on August 15, 2021 and forcing President Ghani to flee the nation.

Furthermore, “the Afghan authorities’s excessive degree of centralisation, endemic corruption, and wrestle to achieve legitimacy have been long-term contributors to its eventual collapse”, the report stated.

The US invaded Afghanistan in 2001 following the 9/11 assaults and after accusing the Taliban, which was in energy, of harbouring al-Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden.

US forces swiftly took over the nation, however they struggled to defeat a guerrilla warfare marketing campaign by the Taliban within the following 20 years.

With the conflict rising more and more unpopular within the US, former President Donald Trump reached an settlement with the Taliban in 2020 that may make sure the withdrawal of the American navy from the nation.

The deal additionally stipulated that Afghan authorities would “stop using Afghan soil by any worldwide ‘terrorist’ teams or people in opposition to the safety of the US and its allies” and known as for “intra-Afghan dialogue” between the Taliban and the federal government in Kabul.

US President Joe Biden, who got here to workplace in January 2021, pushed on with the withdrawal plan, stressing that Afghan forces had the numbers, coaching and gear to struggle off the Taliban. However in early August 2021, with the US withdrawal deadline approaching, provincial capitals started falling to the Taliban with little resistance from Afghan safety forces.

Chris Mason, assistant professor of nationwide safety on the US Military Conflict Faculty, was quoted within the SIGAR report as saying, “US efforts to construct and maintain Afghanistan’s governing establishments have been a complete, epic, predestined failure on par with the identical efforts and end result within the Vietnam conflict, and for a similar causes.”

“The truth that the US had supported Afghanistan for 20 years and that Afghanistan had been extremely depending on exterior assist for a lot of its trendy historical past, made it all of the tougher for Afghan politicians and leaders to examine a future with out such assist,” Mason stated.

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