Taliban's capture of power How deep a stain on Biden's politics?

Posted on 18th Aug 2021 by rohit kumar

Before the Afghanistan crisis, the Biden administration claimed to have been able to regain its position of leading the world on several important matters.

 

The Biden administration was talking about a successful front against China with its European allies, the economy was showing signs of improvement and the vaccination campaign against the coronavirus was being praised.

 

But the decision to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan and its "reckless withdrawal strategy" has emerged as the first major crisis for the Biden administration and a major embarrassment for the US.

 

President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken are both considered experienced experts on foreign affairs and that is why experts are more surprised at their lapse.

 

What are the experts saying?

Tom Ginsberg, a professor of politics and administration at the University of Chicago, said: "This is a major failure of the plan, although I believe that the Taliban were set to seize power, Biden was in such a hurry to withdraw troops. That they did not even follow the advice to make an exit plan from Afghanistan."

 

Professor Ginsberg blames the Afghan side as well, saying, "Although ultimately no country can be as stable as Afghanistan with a corrupt government for long, the corruption of the oligarchy can now cost millions of women." Is."

 

Michael Hersh, a foreign affairs expert in Washington, says: "For an administration that was proceeding with economic success and boasted of some progress on climate and other foreign-policy issues, the failure of Afghanistan policy could be a failure of Biden. The first big blow for him."

 

And perhaps that is why President Biden is facing heavy criticism both inside and outside America, although he is repeatedly justifying his decision.

 

The political climate in America heats up

The debate in America is moreover how much his decision will have a direct impact on next year's election to Congress and how much it will damage President Biden's political legacy.

 

According to Professor Ahmet Kuru of the University of San Diego in the US, this issue is definitely in discussion in the country at the moment, but this decision of Biden will not affect the Congress elections.

 

He says, "US President Joe Biden's decision to suddenly withdraw troops from Afghanistan is being criticized at home and abroad, but I do not think it will have any major negative impact on the mid-term elections."

 

Professor Kuru argues, "First, American society is completely polarized. Supporters of Biden and the Democratic Party will not change their stance on this. Second, according to public polls, a majority of Americans support ending the military presence in Afghanistan." This war was very costly and the main goal (the destruction of al-Qaeda) had already been achieved. Ultimately, the responsibility for the presence of American troops in Afghanistan cannot be passed on to Biden, before him Bush, Obama, and Trump have been presidents during whose era important decisions were made.

 

Trump's or Biden's decision

Former President Trump has also fiercely criticized the Biden administration and called Biden the biggest erring president in US history.

 

The American public wanted an end to the war, with opinion polls showing that most Americans support America's withdrawal from Afghanistan.

 

The general public has become frustrated with the protracted American war in Iraq and Afghanistan. And that would be a leisurely affair for the president, but President Biden is facing criticism over the way he returned from Kabul.

 

At first, he withdrew American troops and then sent thousands of soldiers again to help with the return.

 

In the longest-running US war, according to US Secretary of State Blinken, "a trillion dollars were spent, 2,300 Americans were killed, and the US made a major investment in Afghanistan." "This led the president to conclude that it was time to end this war," Blinken told the media on Monday.

 

According to experts, now the President's effort will be to present this decision as a public decision. On Monday, President Biden made a similar attempt.

 

He said that he is the fourth consecutive US president to lead America's longest war and that he will no longer delegate this responsibility to the fifth. "I will not mislead the American public by claiming that if we had stayed in Afghanistan for a little more time, everything would have changed."

 

According to the president, his decision to leave Afghanistan was inherited from former President Donald Trump, last year Trump started direct talks with the Taliban in which it was agreed that the US would withdraw its forces from Afghanistan by May this year.

 

The effort of the Republican Party is to build public opinion against Biden. Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said in a tweet: "What we are seeing in Afghanistan is a continuing disaster, the Biden administration's withdrawal is a stain on America's reputation."

 

History of America's humiliating defeat

These days in America, those pages of history are being opened, which are filled with tales of failed American military actions in many countries. It specifically discusses the failure of US military operations in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan.

 

Political analysts are linking the emergency evacuation of Americans from Kabul Airport to the 1975 crisis when people were evacuated by military helicopters from the roof of the US embassy in Saigon at the end of the Vietnam War.

 

Biden was a junior senator at the time and those close to him say that he was not in favor of American war and military actions abroad since that time.

 

During his presidential election campaign, he promised to withdraw US forces from Afghanistan after becoming president.

 

20 years ago today, on September 11, 2001, Al Qaeda attacked America. Osama bin Laden, believed to be responsible for the attacks, was sheltered by the Taliban. When the Taliban refused to hand Osama over to the US, then US President George Bush ordered the attack.

 

After this, the US invaded Iraq, accusing Saddam Hussein of accumulating weapons of mass destruction, both attacks were carried out under the leadership of President George W. Bush, how to end these two wars, was a question for subsequent US presidents. The challenge has been

 

Bush later ignored Afghanistan, instead of turning to a futile and costly attempt at regime change and then nation-building after he invaded Iraq.

 

Barack Obama became president in 2008. He refocused on Afghanistan and his main mission was to find and kill bin Laden, in which he succeeded. After this, he started the work of recalling his soldiers, but he could never do this work completely.

 

After this Donald Trump became the President. He laid the foundation for the withdrawal by agreeing with the Taliban. Now President Biden has accomplished this.

 

Analysts say whether leaving Afghanistan was in the national interest or not, only time will tell. According to him, what is clear at the moment is that a year before the mid-term election, the attack against President Biden has intensified and he has given the opposition a golden opportunity to criticize.