Our Lack of Commitment in Afghanistan

A year after the chaotic scenes at Kabul airport, the outcome of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan is heartbreaking and tragic for many Afghans and devastating for their country. The Afghan government that fell, leading to the return of the Taliban, was maddeningly imperfect, full of frustrating shortcomings, and, in various respects, corrupt. Yet it was also an ally in America’s effort to combat Islamist extremists in Afghanistan and the region, it celebrated many of the freedoms we cherish, and it wanted to ensure them for the long-suffering Afghan people. It was certainly preferable to what replaced it.

Recent decisions by the Taliban, particularly its treatment of women and girls, confirm the trajectory of a regime that seems intent on returning Afghanistan to an ultra-conservative interpretation of Islam. It will be incapable of reviving the Afghan economy, which has collapsed since Western forces withdrew. Although the Kabul strike that killed the al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri was a tremendous achievement by our intelligence and counterterrorism communities, Zawahiri’s very presence in Kabul demonstrated that the Taliban is still willing to provide sanctuary to Islamist extremists. In short, a country of nearly 40 million people—individuals whom we sought to help for two decades—has been condemned to a future of repression and privation and likely will be an incubator for Islamist extremism in the years ahead.The fact and manner of America’s departure also enabled our adversaries to claim that the United States is not a dependable partner and is instead a great power in decline. In an era in which deterrence is of growing importance, that is not trivial (though our efforts to support Ukraine following Russia’s invasion show that the U.S. can still lead effectively when it seeks to do so). Nor is it trivial that we left behind hundreds of thousands of Afghans who shared risk and hardship with our soldiers, diplomats, and development workers, and whose lives are now endangered, along with those of their family members.

https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2022/08/us-withdrawal-afghanistan-strategy-shortcomings/670980/

 

Nato, quella nuova con Svezia e Finlandia sulla pelle dei curdi

Da un dittatore all’altro. Il memorandum d’intesa trilaterale firmato il 28 giugno da Finlandia, Svezia e Turchia per acconsentire al loro ingresso nella Nato premia un personaggio pericoloso: Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Il presidente turco è infatti più vicino a Vladimir Putin – con cui d’altronde durante la guerra civile siriana si è spartito il paese – che a qualsiasi omologo occidentale. Si tratta da una parte dell’ennesimo tradimento dei paesi occidentali ai danni dei curdi turchi e siriani e della più ampia causa del Kurdistan, dall’altra di una sanguinosa concessione alle pretese del “dittatore”, come lo chiamò solo pochi mesi fa il presidente del Consiglio Mario Draghi. Anche in questo caso si tratta dell’ennesima occasione del genere, basti ricordare i miliardi di (nostri) euro versati dall’Unione europea per bloccare i migranti, in gran parte proprio siriani.

https://www.wired.it/article/nato-svezia-finlandia-turchia-curdi/

 

Les deux visages du djihad

Tout événement lié au monde musulman se mesure désormais à l’aune de la notion de «terrorisme». Après la chute de Kaboul en août 2021, les médias et nombre d’observateurs occidentaux n’ont eu de cesse de se demander si le retour des talibans au pouvoir allait entraîner un regain d’attentats islamistes dans le monde. Mais ils ne s’interrogent guère sur deux autres points : pourquoi les talibans ont-ils pu s’emparer de la capitale afghane sans pratiquement tirer un coup de feu? Ont-ils jamais été directement impliqués dans un acte violent en dehors de l’Afghanistan? Certes ils ont donné asile à Oussama Ben Laden entre 1996 et 2001, et ils en ont payé le prix en étant chassés du pouvoir au terme d’une guerre de quelques semaines. Mais ils n’ont jamais été accusés par les Américains d’avoir eu vent de la préparation des attentats du 11 septembre 2001 à New York et à Washington.

Cette focalisation sur la violence armée empêche de comprendre les phénomènes de radicalisation et de passage à l’acte. Elle suppose en effet une continuité entre radicalisation religieuse, proclamation du djihad et terrorisme international, comme si l’on passait forcément du premier stade au troisième et comme si, inversement, le terrorisme international créait du djihadisme local. Ce raisonnement amène à lire toute référence à la charia et tout appel à la guerre sainte comme le prodrome d’attaques à l’échelle mondiale.

https://www.monde-diplomatique.fr/2021/10/ROY/63638

 

‘Radicalisation’ and the assumption of Muslim manipulability

In an insightful piece for Harper’s Magazine, Joseph Bernstein, a senior reporter at BuzzFeed News, questions the idea that disinformation spread on social media platforms in the last five years, rather than long-term societal conditions, is responsible for the crisis of faith in democratic institutions that has swept the West in the age of Brexit and Donald Trump. For example, he argues that “the mosaic of experiences that form the American attitude towards the expertise of public-health authorities” is a better explanation for vaccine and mask hesitancy, than the hypnotic power of Facebook. “Why have we been so eager to accept Silicon Valley’s story about how easy we are to manipulate?” he asks.

Bernstein traces the presumed power of social media companies to dubious mid-century academic studies, citing sociologist Jacques Ellul who in the 60s wrote that such studies tended to “regard the buyer as victim and prey”. However, conspicuously missing, especially as the anniversary of 9/11 approaches, is the tale of how this view has been supercharged by America’s 20-year Global War on Terror. In a very real sense, this is chickens coming home to roost.

https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2021/9/7/radicalisation-and-the-assumption-of-muslim-manipulability

 

By letting Saudi Arabia off the hook over 9/11, the US encouraged violent jihadism

Two decades after 9/11, the role of Saudi Arabia in the attack remains in dispute despite unrelenting efforts by the US and Saudi governments to neutralise it as a live political issue.

The Saudi Arabia embassy in Washington this week issued a statement detailing its anti-terrorist activities and ongoing hostility to Al-Qaeda. This was briskly rejected by the lawyers for the families of the 9/11 victims who said that, “what Saudi Arabia desperately does not want to discuss is the substantial and credible evidence of the complicity [in the attack] of their employees, agents and sponsored agents”.

Saudi Arabia claims that the 9/11 Commission Report, the official American inquiry published in 2003, cleared it of responsibility for the attacks. In fact, it found no evidence that the Saudi government as an institution or senior Saudi officials as individuals had funded Al-Qaeda. But this is not an exoneration since the Saudi government traditionally retains deniability by permitting Saudi sheikhs and wealthy individuals to finance radical Sunni Muslim movements abroad. A former Taliban finance minister, Agha Jan Motasim, revealed in an interview with the New York Times in 2016 that he went to Saudi Arabia several times a year to raise funds from private donors for his movement .

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/9-11-20-years-saudi-arabia-al-qaeda-b1917890.html

 

9/11 was a test. The booksof the last two decadesshow how America failed.

Deep within the catalogue of regrets that is the 9/11 Commission report — long after readers learn of the origins and objectives of al-Qaeda, past the warnings ignored by consecutive administrations, through the litany of institutional failures that allowed terrorists to hijack four commercial airliners — the authors pause to make a rousing case for the power of the nation’s character.

“The U.S. government must define what the message is, what it stands for,” the report asserts. “We should offer an example of moral leadership in the world, committed to treat people humanely, abide by the rule of law, and be generous and caring to our neighbors. . . . We need to defend our ideals abroad vigorously. America does stand up for its values.”

This affirmation of American idealism is one of the document’s more opinionated moments. Looking back, it’s also among the most ignored.

Rather than exemplify the nation’s highest values, the official response to 9/11 unleashed some of its worst qualities: deception, brutality, arrogance, ignorance, delusion, overreach and carelessness. This conclusion is laid bare in the sprawling literature to emerge from 9/11 over the past two decades — the works of investigation, memoir and narrative by journalists and former officials that have charted the path to that day, revealed the heroism and confusion of the early response, chronicled the battles in and about Afghanistan and Iraq, and uncovered the excesses of the war on terror. Reading or rereading a collection of such books today is like watching an old movie that feels more anguishing and frustrating than you remember. The anguish comes from knowing how the tale will unfold; the frustration from realizing that this was hardly the only possible outcome.

Whatever individual stories the 9/11 books tell, too many describe the repudiation of U.S. values, not by extremist outsiders but by our own hand. The betrayal of America’s professed principles was the friendly fire of the war on terror. In these works, indifference to the growing terrorist threat gives way to bloodlust and vengeance after the attacks. Official dissembling justifies wars, then prolongs them. In the name of counterterrorism, security is politicized, savagery legalized and patriotism weaponized.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/interactive/2021/911-books-american-values/?itid=ap_carloslozada

 

Kabul is only the start: US allies feel the draught as Biden turns his back

It is, perhaps, dreadfully apt that an invasion which began 20 years ago as a counter-terrorism operation has ended in the horror of a mass casualty terrorist attack. The US-led attempt to destroy al-Qaida and rescue Afghanistan from the Taliban was undercut by the Iraq war, which spawned Islamic State. Now the circle is complete as an Afghan IS offshoot emerges as America’s new nemesis.

The Kabul airport atrocity shows just how difficult it is to break the cycle of violence, vengeance and victimisation. Joe Biden’s swift vow to hunt down the perpetrators and “make them pay” presumably means US combat forces will again be in action in Afghanistan soon. If the past is any guide, mistakes will be made, civilians will die, local communities will be antagonised. Result: more terrorists.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/29/kabul-is-only-the-start-us-allies-feel-the-draught-as-biden-turns-his-back

 

Two Spanish journalists killed in Burkina Faso attack

Two Spanish journalists who went missing in Burkina Faso after their convoy was attacked in the east of the country on Monday have died, Foreign Minister Arancha González Laya announced on Tuesday at a press conference following the weekly Cabinet meeting.

The victims have been identified as David Beriain and Roberto Fraile. Shortly before 4pm on Tuesday, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez confirmed the news in a Twitter message and sent condolences to the families.

https://english.elpais.com/news/2021-04-27/two-spanish-journalists-killed-in-burkina-faso-attack.html

 

The war on terror has displaced millions – this is the true cause of Europe’s refugee crisis

Desperate refugees crammed into cockle-shell boats landing on the shingle beaches of the south Kent coast are easily portrayed as invaders. Anti-immigrant demonstrators were exploiting such fears last weekend as they blockaded the main highway into Dover Port in order “to protect Britain’s borders”. Meanwhile, the home secretary, Priti Patel, blames the French for not doing enough to stop the flow of refugees across the Channel.

Refugees attract much attention on the last highly visible stages of their journeys between France and Britain. But there is absurdly little interest in why they endure such hardships, risking detention or death.

There is an instinctive assumption in the west that it is perfectly natural for people to flee their own failed states (the failure supposedly brought on by self-inflicted violence and corruption) to seek refuge in the better-run, safer and more prosperous countries.

But what we are really seeing in those pathetic half-swamped rubber boats bobbing up and down in the Channel are the thin end of the wedge of a vast exodus of people brought about by military intervention by the US and its allies. As a result of their “global war on terror”, launched following the al-Qaeda attacks in the US on 11 September 2001, no less than 37 million people have been displaced from their homes, according to a revelatory report published this week by Brown University.

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/911-anniversary-war-terror-al-qaeda-iraq-syria-refugees-us-europe-b421989.html

 

Is the Saudi Government Plotting Against Another U.S.-Based Critic?

In early May, officials with the C.I.A. reached out to Ali Soufan, a former F.B.I. agent who served as a lead investigator in the months before the September 11th attacks, to say they had learned that Al Qaeda militants were plotting against him. The officials asked Soufan not to disclose many details, but, he told me, “The information was specific enough that they felt that they had to inform me.”

Two weeks later, Soufan, who lives in the New York area, became the target of a virulent campaign on social media. The campaign, amplified by trolls and bots, featured menacing statements. “Mr. Ali,” one Twitter user wrote, “Make yourself dead, beginning of the end.” Soufan brought the material to F.B.I. officials, who opened an investigation. Cybersecurity experts hired by Soufan traced at least part of the campaign to an official in the Saudi government. The campaign appeared to have involved some of the same people who had targeted Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi dissident, Washington Post columnist, and Virginia resident who was murdered by Saudi intelligence agents in October, 2018.

Soufan is not without enemies. He has been a longtime antagonist of Al Qaeda. As an F.B.I. agent, he pursued the militants who attacked the American Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania and the U.S.S. Cole, in Yemen. He also investigated the ring of plotters who ultimately attacked the World Trade Center and the Pentagon in 2001. His efforts earned him the F.B.I. Director’s Award for Excellence, given each year to the Bureau’s outstanding agents. Soufan’s pursuit of the 9/11 plotters is depicted in the Hulu television series “The Looming Tower.” “He’s a national hero,” Bruce Riedel, a former C.I.A. analyst who is now a scholar at the Brookings Institution, told me.

https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/is-the-saudi-government-plotting-against-another-us-based-critic