A conflict that began on a bright blue September morning in the year 2001, when four hijacked commercial airliners ripped through the heart of American commerce, defense and spirit was ended after twenty years of tortuous war.
The American war on terror was fought in Afghanistan from September 2001 till August 2021, with the aim to eradicate the Taliban, an orthodox and brutish institution which threated to disrupt the peace and the way of life of not only other countries but also Afghan citizens, by promoting and funding terrorists and terror organizations.
The war against terrorism and the Taliban has been arduous. The United States lost 2,448 service members, the Afghan national military and police lost over 66,000 service members combined. The most alarming statistic however are the 47,254 innocent civilians lost to the war.
The Afghan people have not only suffered grave devastation in the form of losing their kith and kin over a war that lasted over two decades, but they also suffered the repercussions of having an almost nonexistent government and effective policies to sustain a functional judicial system, educational system, healthcare system and economic policies, all of which had catastrophic impact on the development of the Afghan people.
The American government did try to prop up the Afghan society and its people by promoting education, especially for the girl child and by trying to induce a sense of democracy. This inkling of hope, of a rejuvenated Afghan government and its people, free of the Taliban and terrorism, was the light at the end of this dark tunnel for the Afghan people and the international community.
As the American troops initiated the process to pull out of Afghanistan at the orders of their commander in chief, President Joseph Biden, twenty years of war and sacrifice was on the cusp of being undone. The Taliban began making brutal progress, capturing provinces across the country. By the 15th of August 2021, Kabul had fallen, the Afghan President Ashraf Ghani had fled and an Army of 300,000 Afghan soldiers had failed to stop the Taliban’s ascent.
Now the fate of 39 million innocent women, children and men lay in the hands of the brutish Taliban regime. Thousands of Afghans who assisted the United States and her allies along with the members of the now defunct Afghan government faced a decidedly bleak future. America and her allies had failed them.
The debacle at the Kabul international airport gave the world images that shall define this era of struggle. Innocent lives, fighting to evade the Taliban’s reign of terror, were seen being forced into making some abhorring decisions. Footage of Afghan parents tossing infants over barbed wires, into the hands of the American troops, just so that they may live a life in a country that respects their right to live a free, dignified life, have been seared into the minds of the international community.
The footage of civilians clinging onto an evacuating American military aircraft and subsequently falling to their deaths symbolized the fall of a nation struck by war being pushed into a dark future and an international superpower falling from grace.
Although the newly established Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan under the rule of the Taliban claims to offer amnesty to the Afghans allied with the US and allow women freedom within the ambit of the sharia law, the evidence has a different story to tell. Footage of high-ranking Afghan military and government officials facing brutal public executions and women’s modesty being outraged to the most inhumane levels imaginable.
Over 570,000 Afghan nationals, mostly women and children have been displaced thus far. 14,000,000 Afghans have no food to eat. 22,000,000 have been pushed into abject poverty. These are just statistics. The sheer human cost of this $2,000,000,000,000 exercise of the American taxpayer’s money, cannot be quantified, justified, or forgiven.
The international community has tried to assist in the evacuation of civilians but with the final American soldier stepping off of Afghan soil, hope is bleak.
Aishwarya Says:
I have always been against Glorifying Over Work and therefore, in the year 2021, I have decided to launch this campaign “Balancing Life”and talk about this wrong practice, that we have been following since last few years. I will be talking to and interviewing around 1 lakh people in the coming 2021 and publish their interview regarding their opinion on glamourising Over Work.
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