Thread by @HammadSGill

—THREAD—

▪️Title: #TheAfghanistanPapers
▪️Genre: War history
▪️Published: 2021
▪️Author: @CraigMWhitlock
▪️Length: 368
▪️Description: Secret history of the US' war in Afghanistan
▪️ Ratings : 4.44/5 @goodreads

#ReadPakistan

Two weeks after d 9/11 attacks, a reporter asked Donald Rumsfeld, “Would US officials lie to media about military ops in order to mislead enemy?”

Rumsfeld responded by quoting Churchill,“In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.”

On Oct 7, 2001, when the US military began bombing AFG, no one foresaw that it would turn into the most protracted war in the US history—longer than WW-I, WW-II
& Vietnam combined.
For the 1st time, NATO invoked Article 5, which states "attack on one(country) is attack on all."

To this day,there has been no AFG version of 9/11 Commission,
which held d govt responsible for its inability to prevent the worst terrorist attack on d UD soil. Nor has Congress convened an AFG version of d Fulbright Hearings, when senators aggressively questioned d Vietnam war.

@SIGARHQ disclosed more than 2,000 pages of previously unpublished notes of interviews titled “Lesson Leaned” with 428 ppl who
played a direct role in the war, from generals and diplomats to aid workers and Afghan officials.They had assumed their remarks wouldn't become public.

U.S. officials confessed to @SIGARHQ that the war plans had fatal flaws and
that Washington had wasted billions of dollars trying to remake Afghanistan into a modern nation.The interviews also exposed the U.S. government’s
botched attempts to curtail runaway corruption, build..

a competent Afghan
army & police force, & put a dent in Afghanistan’s thriving opium trade. Many of those interviewed described explicit & sustained efforts by d US
govt to deliberately mislead the public to make it appear the US was winning the war when that wasn't the case.

“I have no visibility into who the bad guys are in Afghanistan,” Rumsfeld complained in a memo to his intelligence chief—almost two years after the war had started.

The initial success of WOT had surpassed d expectations of even d most optimistic FCs.Victory appeared in hand.The war transformed Bush’s political standing.Although he barely won the presidency in d 2000 election, polls showed 75% of Americans now approved of his job performance

Citing the British and the Soviet defeats in Afghanistan, Bush said,“We’re not going to repeat that mistake.” But the history had decide to repeat itself.

With US help, NA seized control of several maj cities in short order:Mazar-e-Sharif on Nov 9,Herat on Nov 12,Kabul d following day & Jalalabad d day after that.

Peter Pace,d Marine general said,“Now we own d whole country, before Christmas. You go, ‘Whoa,that’s kind of cool.’”

From the very beginning, one thing was clear that d US wasn't going to stay long in Afghanistan. The US Army even refused to import basic amenities for d troops. The mood in the army was we don't “have anything else to do, there’s no more fighting, AFG’s done. We’re going home

The @UN hosted a conference in Bonn, Germany, that set up a governance plan for Afghanistan in December 2001. Hamid Karzai, a Pashtun tribal leader & CIA asset, was chosen as interim leader. The US declared it wasn't in AFG for the nation building but in reality it was doing it.

Within months, even the top leadership had lost interest in the Afghan War. Rumsfeld asked Bush: Did the President want to meet Gen Franks or Gen McNeil, d Cdr of @CENTCOM & d Cdr of d US forces in AFG respectively.

Bust said, "Who is Gen McNeil? Well, I don't need to meet him."

➡On 9/11 the US didn't know anything about al-Qaeda. It was fighting a group it didn't know.

➡ Following the US invasion of Afghanistan, al-Qaeda escaped Afghanistan & for two decades, the US kept wagging war against people who had nothing to do with 9/11.

➡Dangling bags of cash as a lure @CIA recruited war criminals, drug traffickers, smugglers & ex-communists. If these warlords wanted to get rid of their political rivals, all they had to do was to tell the Americans that their foe belonged to the Talibans.

In Dec 2001, the US bungled 2 golden opportunities to win the war :

➡ 1st was the battle of Tora Bora when OBL was within reach of the US forces.

➡ 2nd was Taliban's willingness to surrender & negotiate.

If the US had acted wisely, the WOT might have ended then and there.

➡UK was assigned to discourage ppl frm cultivating opium poppies.

➡The US was building a strong central govt, despite d history of rebellions against strong central govts in AFG.

➡The US tried to preach democracy in a cntry where ppl didn't know diff b/w American & Russians.

➡In Dec 2001, when OBL was escaping frm Tora Bora, d US mil began planning invasion of Iraq. It needed 13X more troops than AFG

➡ Iraq War restrained logistics for d AFG war. In fact, it became 2ndary. After d Iraq invasion, d plan in AFG wasn't to win, but it was to not lose.

➡When d 9/11 mastermind was mocking d Americans for getting “mired in d swamps of d Tigris & Euphrates", 🇺🇸 decided to launch 3 major offensives but due to troubles in 🇮🇶, they were doomed to fail.
➡But d Bush admin kept repeating that they couldn't be militarily defeated in 🇦🇫

The US had raised 352,000 🇦🇫 forces but the majority of them were ghost soldiers. At the height of the war, it was spending 11 billion USD on AFG🇦🇫 forces annually,nearly 3 billion more than neighboring Pak🇵🇰, which has a stockpile of nuclear arsenals & much more capable military

The US tried to raise an army as soon as she could, resultantly filing the ranks and files of Afghan forces with war criminals, Taliban sympathizers, ex-communists and drug smugglers. "We got the forces we deserved", said the former White House war-czar, Douglas Lute.

The US forces were both unaware & disrespectful towards Afghan culture and the religion of Islam. Even during the war they were given lectures on nuclear and chemical warfare(though AFG had neither of them) but not on Afghan culture and traditions. For Afghans,they were Russians.

The US had a hard time understanding why a large number of Afghans were involved in homosexuality despite prohibition by Islam.On the 1 hand,Afghans wanted their women to disappear. On d other hand, they were homosexual. One day, an Afghan man declared a male US officer his wife.

For the whole war, Washington was unable to decide whether Pak🇵🇰 was a friend or a foe, or both simultaneously.Was Islamabad fueling the insurgency? Was she a victim or an exporter or an insurgency?Was it a state policy or some junior level officers?

Note:These views aren't mine

The so-called promoter of democracy was empowering a dictator in 🇵🇰 to get things done.When @P_Musharraf was assuring the US of his support, many in Pak were "hedging their bets." 🇵🇰 was clearly saying, either u will leave a stable AFG for us or we'll have our own horses to run.

For public consumption, Washington kept "attending d truth with the bodyguards of lies", but in reality war was deteriorating & definitely Iraq was a reason.Since the inception of d war, d US was saying," The war is over, we are leaving." So,Talibans were just waiting the US out.

Let alone strategy, for two decades there was no coherent objective for war in Afghanistan. Was it defeating al-Qaeda? Was it counterinsurgency? Was it nation-building? Was it democracy? Was it women's rights? Was there any objective at all?

The US-made Afghan govt contained warlords like Dostum, Sherazi, S. M. Akhund & Ahmad Wali Karazai (brother of @KarzaiH) who were interested in looting, violating HR & ruling, but governing. But the US continued to give a message, "They are warlords but they are our warlords"

In 2006, AFG was supplying 80% to 90% of total global opium, powering 1/3rd of AFG economy.The only power to curtail the Afghan drugs industry was Taliban under their one-eyed leader Mullah Omer. The US, despite spending 1 bn $ in Op River Dance, failed to stop narco production.

US tried 2 spray herbicide as they had previously done in Columbia but @KarzaiH rejected d plan fearing an uprising, that "might turn insurgency into insurrection."Even efforts 2 pay farmers 2 destroy thr fields went futile.They took money yet managed to cultivate & export opium.

@BarackObama, who used to mock Bush on increasing the number of troops in Afghanistan, on assuming office increased the number of US troops to 100,000 (from 30,000). He also said that the US forces will start returning home in 18 months. Soon he would come to regret his decision.

The Bush administration had spent 1 trillion USD on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Obama said, "the nation I'm most interested in building our own", yet he tripled spending on the Afghan war. So much money was being thrown into war that the generals didn't know how to spend it.