You can put Afghanistan down as yet another issue that seems to divide neatly along party lines, with Democrats backing President Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw the remaining U.S. and NATO partner forces after 20 years of war and Republicans warning it’s a blunder that will once again allow Afghanistan to become a haven for terrorists and require the United States to return in greater numbers and at a greater cost at some future date. We asked Washington Examiner defense reporter Abraham Mahshie to analyze why the withdrawal is a strategic and policy error. Separately, Washington Examiner national security reporter and senior writer Jamie McIntyre presents the positive case for withdrawal from Afghanistan.
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The Taliban have not broken with al Qaeda:
The chief reason cited by detractors against the Biden decision to withdraw from Afghanistan is the fact that the Taliban have not yet broken from al Qaeda. The assessment is buttressed by the intelligence community and the congressionally appointed special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction.
Rep. Mike Waltz, who fought in Afghanistan as a green beret, said the vacuum will allow al Qaeda to grow. “The Taliban have not lived up to their commitments to break away with al Qaeda and have strategically planned for a total U.S. withdrawal in order to take back power,” he said after the Biden decision was announced. “The intelligence community has made it clear that al Qaeda and other terrorist organizations will grow in the coming vacuum.”
U.S. Central Command Gen. Frank McKenzie said on Tuesday that he knows that the Taliban have not broken ties but that the group promised not to allow al Qaeda to operate in Afghanistan and that the U.S. military will hold them to that promise. “With the Taliban, I’ve learned to not listen to what they say but rather to watch what they do, so we will watch closely what they do,” he said.
The Sept. 11 date is arbitrary:
Security experts argue that giving the Taliban a date by which the U.S. will withdraw instead of holding to conditions there amounts to a win for the group. Knowing the U.S. will withdraw regardless of the conditions, all they must do is wait.
Former Kabul correspondent and author of Eagle Down Jessica Donati told the Washington Examiner that setting an arbitrary deadline is a complete U-turn from past U.S. policy and risks gains made. “The problem is that there was never going to be a condition that allowed the U.S. to leave comfortably,” she said. “The other surprise was that they would pick the Sept. 11 anniversary, just because they’ve spent so long saying we’re not going to set arbitrary deadlines. I don’t think you could get much more arbitrary than an anniversary to decide to end your engagement in a war.”
Senate Armed Services Committee ranking Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe made the case that abandoning the conditions-based approach risks U.S. investments in the country and puts American lives at risk. “Arbitrary deadlines would likely put our troops in danger, jeopardize all the progress we’ve made, and lead to civil war in Afghanistan — and create a breeding ground for international terrorists. We’re talking about protecting American lives here,” he said in a statement. “This date shows this decision is political and is not conditions-based. An arbitrary withdrawal also sends the wrong message to our allies and adversaries.”
The Taliban will overthrow the Afghan government:
Many lawmakers say the Afghan government and its 300,000-member security force are not yet strong enough to fend off the Taliban, which can topple key cities and take control of the government. They point to President Barack Obama’s withdrawal from Iraq in 2011 as a mistake to learn from. In the vacuum created, the Islamic State formed, and a beleaguered Iraqi government begged for the United States to send troops back in.
“I know what is most likely to happen: a reigniting of the Afghan Civil War and reversing all gains for Afghan women and children,” South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said in a statement. “I think it is insane to withdraw at this time given the conditions that exist on the ground in Afghanistan. I know people are frustrated, but wars don’t end because you’re frustrated. Wars end when the threat is eliminated.”
Donati, who witnessed U.S. Special Forces fight the Taliban and ISIS between 2013 and 2017, wondered if the U.S. will try to prevent a Taliban takeover. “At the end, you could see attacks on cities. Perhaps a couple of Afghan cities might even fall,” Donati said. “Are they just going to let things collapse as they leave?”
The U.S. will lose its strategic footprint:
Military strategists planning the Afghanistan withdrawal are simultaneously negotiating with neighboring countries in search of positions to house intelligence and reconnaissance equipment such as MQ-9 Reapers. The unmanned aircraft are vital gatherers of intelligence and may be armed, but they lose hours of airtime when they are positioned far out of range. Their very presence is a deterrent to terrorists and bad state actors, McKenzie said on Tuesday as legislators worried how the U.S. would even get back into Afghanistan if Bagram and Kandahar air bases were overrun by the Taliban.
“If you’re out of the country and you don’t have the ecosystem that we have there now, it will be harder to do that. It is not impossible to do that. It would just be harder to do it,” McKenzie said of intelligence-gathering with assets in the country. “You will have to base your overhead [intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance] from no longer within Afghanistan, where an MQ-9 can take off and be over its target in a matter of minutes to perhaps much further away.”
Waltz called the withdrawal a giveaway to America’s adversaries. “This move will create yet another terrorist safe haven, abandon the Afghan security forces, and give away a strategic base to Russia and China,” he said. “We also must maintain the Bagram air base to ensure we have basing options for great power competition with Russia, China, and Iran.”
Afghanistan has rare earth elements:
One of the lesser rationales for staying in Afghanistan is so that America’s great power competitors, particularly China, don’t move in and angle for valuable natural resources. China already has made valuable inroads across Africa to secure natural resources for its continued growth. The U.S. Geological Survey estimates that Afghanistan has 1.4 million tons of the rare earth elements vital for applications such as microprocessors and rechargeable batteries. Legislators and security analysts say China has no scruples about who it does business with, implying it will befriend a Taliban government if it means access to mineral rights.
Armed Services Committee Rep. Joe Courtney made the case for rare earth elements on Tuesday, noting how China is cornering the market. “From a security standpoint, I think there is now a pretty widespread recognition that China has been very methodical and successful in terms of cornering the market in terms of critical minerals in Africa,” he said. The National Defense Authorization Act for 2021 calls for increasing America’s domestic production capacity for the vital minerals. In the meantime, China is already finding and cornering global markets, and Afghanistan could be next.
