For all those who truly want to understand the rational for leaving Afghanistan.
In Leaving Afghanistan, U.S. Reshuffles Global Power Relations:
The American withdrawal creates new complications for China and Russia
Updated Sept. 1, 2021 5:40 am ET
By: Yaroslav Trofimov and Jeremy Page
After Afghanistan’s U.S.-backed government collapsed on Aug. 15, Beijing couldn’t contain
its glee at what it described as the humiliation of its main global rival—even though
Washington said a big reason for withdrawal was its decision to focus more resources on
China.
In a briefing, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying highlighted the death
of Zaki Anwari, a 17-year-old Afghan soccer player who fell from the landing gear of an
American C-17 as it took off from Kabul airport. “American myth down,” she said. “More
and more people are awakening.”
In Russia, too, state media overflowed with schadenfreude, albeit tempered by concern
about the Afghan debacle’s spillover into its fragile Central Asian allies. “The moral of the
story is: don’t help the Stars and Stripes,” tweeted Margarita Simonyan, editor in chief of
Russia’s RT broadcaster. “They’ll just hump you and dump you.”
But now that America’s 20-year Afghan war has come to an end, the gloating is turning to
a more sober view of how the war and the withdrawal will affect the global balance of
power.
The stunning meltdown of the U.S.’s Afghan client state marked the limits of American
hard power. The dramatic scenes of despair in Kabul have frustrated and angered many
American allies, particularly in Europe, inflicting considerable reputational damage.
Yet despite their propaganda trumpeting the narrative of America’s weakness, it doesn’t
appear to have escaped Beijing and Moscow that the U.S. isn’t the only one losing out.
In terms of raw military strength and economic resources, the U.S. remains dominant. Its
pivot away from Afghanistan means Washington has more resources to put toward its
strategic rivalry with China and Russia, two nations that want to redraw an international
order that has benefited American interests and those of its allies for decades.
And unlike Russia and China, countries in Afghanistan’s immediate neighborhood,
America is far more removed from the direct consequences of the Taliban takeover, from
refugee flows to terrorism to the drug trade. Managing Afghanistan from now on is
increasingly a problem for Moscow and Beijing, and their regional allies.
“The chaotic and sudden withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan is not good
news for China,” said Ma Xiaolin, an international relations scholar at Zhejiang
International Studies University in Hangzhou, China, noting that America is still stronger
in technology, manufacturing and in military power. “China is not ready to replace the
U.S. in the region.”
In a phone call with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday, China’s foreign
minister, Wang Yi, said the U.S. needed to remain involved in Afghanistan, including by
helping the country to maintain stability and combat terrorism and violence, according to
a statement on the Chinese foreign ministry’s website.
Moscow, too, urged the U.S. and allies not to turn away. Zamir Kabulov, President
Vladimir Putin’s special envoy for Afghanistan, said Western countries should reopen
embassies in Kabul and engage in talks with the Taliban on rebuilding the country’s
economy. “This applies first of all to those nations that remained there with their armies
for 20 years and caused the havoc that we see now,” Mr. Kabulov told Russian TV.
Chinese scholars who advise the government expect the U.S. to refocus military resources
on countering Beijing, especially in the Western Pacific, and to show greater resolve in an
area whose strategic importance is now a rare point of bipartisan consensus.
President Biden, in his April speech announcing the withdrawal from Afghanistan, after a
war that cost hundreds of billions of dollars and took 2,465 American lives, justified the
move by highlighting this imperative: “Rather than return to war with the Taliban, we
have to focus on the challenges that are in front of us,” he said. “We have to shore up
American competitiveness to meet the stiff competition we’re facing from an increasingly
assertive China.”
The U.S. could have enabled the Afghan republic to stave off the Taliban for years, if not
decades, by continuing a relatively small U.S. military presence, focused on air support,
intelligence and logistics rather than ground combat. Instead of a military defeat, like in
1970s Vietnam, the American withdrawal was a deliberate policy move, even if it caused
unintended consequences.
“Serious people in Moscow understand that the American military machine and all the
components of America’s global superiority are not going anywhere, and that the whole
idea of no longer being involved in this ‘forever war’ was a correct one,” said Alexander
Gabuev, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center. “Yes, the execution was
monstrous, but the desire to focus resources on priority areas, especially East Asia and
China, is causing here a certain unease, a disquiet—and an understanding of the strategic
logic.” The main hope in Moscow, he added, is that the fallout from the Kabul withdrawal will
lead to further political polarization inside the U.S., and to new strains in ties between
America and its allies.
These strains are already real, especially after Mr. Biden rebuffed European requests to
extend the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline so that allies would be able to airlift their
remaining citizens and Afghans allies out of Kabul. Tens of thousands of such people,
eligible for evacuation, remain stranded.
Even the closest of America’s allies, such as the U.K., have openly criticized the U.S.
withdrawal. Tom Tugendhat, chairman of the foreign-affairs committee in the U.K. House
of Commons and an Afghanistan war veteran, compared the debacle in Kabul to the 1956
Suez crisis, which bared the limits of British power and precipitated his nation’s strategic
retreat.
“In 1956, we all knew that the British Empire was over but the Suez crisis made it
absolutely clear. Since President Obama, the action has been of U.S. withdrawal, but my
God, has this made it clear,” Mr. Tugendhat said in an interview. That’s not necessarily great news for Russia and China, he added.
“The reality is that Chinese and Russian bad behavior is only possible in a world that is
U.S.-organized,” Mr. Tugendhat said. “You can only be an angry teenager if you know that
your dad is still going to put petrol in the car the next day.”
The U.S. denouement in Afghanistan has raised particular concerns in Taiwan, the
democratic island Beijing seeks to unite with the mainland—by force if necessary. The U.S.
is obliged by law to help Taiwan defend itself. After pro-Beijing politicians warned that
Medical and hospital staff with an injured man after the airport bombings in Kabul on Thursday.
Taiwan shouldn’t depend on U.S. assistance in the event of a Chinese assault, Taiwan’s
President Tsai Ing-wen issued a statement calling for the island to be more self-reliant.
The prevailing view among U.S. allies and partners in Asia is that Washington can now
deliver, finally, on the “pivot to Asia” that the Obama administration promised as a way to
counter China but largely failed to deliver as it was preoccupied with Afghanistan and the
Middle East.
“There’s an acknowledgment of lessons that need to be learned,” said S. Paul Choi, a
former South Korean army officer and adviser to U.S. forces there who is now a Seoulbased
security consultant. “On a more positive note, what Asian allies would like to see is
greater attention, greater human resources, greater training of personnel…that focuses
more on this region rather than, say, counterterrorism in the Middle East.”
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki earlier this month challenged the notion that the
events in Kabul create an opening for Moscow or Beijing to test America’s will in their
own neighborhoods. “Our message is very clear: We stand by, as is outlined in the Taiwan
Relations Agreement, by individuals in Taiwan,” she said. “We stand by partners around
the world who are subject to this kind of propaganda that Russia and China are projecting.
And we’re going to continue to deliver on those words with actions.”
While the chaos in Afghanistan has at least temporarily undermined America’s credibility
with partners and allies, these relationships, from Taiwan to Israel to Ukraine, are based
on a unique set of commitments—and, unlike America’s Afghan venture, don’t have a
preset expiration date. Washington broadcast its intention to leave Afghanistan since
Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen inspected military troops in Tainan in January.
In Leaving Afghanistan, U.S. Reshuffles Global Power Relations:
The American withdrawal creates new complications for China and Russia
Updated Sept. 1, 2021 5:40 am ET
By: Yaroslav Trofimov and Jeremy Page
After Afghanistan’s U.S.-backed government collapsed on Aug. 15, Beijing couldn’t contain
its glee at what it described as the humiliation of its main global rival—even though
Washington said a big reason for withdrawal was its decision to focus more resources on
China.
In a briefing, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying highlighted the death
of Zaki Anwari, a 17-year-old Afghan soccer player who fell from the landing gear of an
American C-17 as it took off from Kabul airport. “American myth down,” she said. “More
and more people are awakening.”
In Russia, too, state media overflowed with schadenfreude, albeit tempered by concern
about the Afghan debacle’s spillover into its fragile Central Asian allies. “The moral of the
story is: don’t help the Stars and Stripes,” tweeted Margarita Simonyan, editor in chief of
Russia’s RT broadcaster. “They’ll just hump you and dump you.”
But now that America’s 20-year Afghan war has come to an end, the gloating is turning to
a more sober view of how the war and the withdrawal will affect the global balance of
power.
The stunning meltdown of the U.S.’s Afghan client state marked the limits of American
hard power. The dramatic scenes of despair in Kabul have frustrated and angered many
American allies, particularly in Europe, inflicting considerable reputational damage.
Yet despite their propaganda trumpeting the narrative of America’s weakness, it doesn’t
appear to have escaped Beijing and Moscow that the U.S. isn’t the only one losing out.
In terms of raw military strength and economic resources, the U.S. remains dominant. Its
pivot away from Afghanistan means Washington has more resources to put toward its
strategic rivalry with China and Russia, two nations that want to redraw an international
order that has benefited American interests and those of its allies for decades.
And unlike Russia and China, countries in Afghanistan’s immediate neighborhood,
America is far more removed from the direct consequences of the Taliban takeover, from
refugee flows to terrorism to the drug trade. Managing Afghanistan from now on is
increasingly a problem for Moscow and Beijing, and their regional allies.
“The chaotic and sudden withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan is not good
news for China,” said Ma Xiaolin, an international relations scholar at Zhejiang
International Studies University in Hangzhou, China, noting that America is still stronger
in technology, manufacturing and in military power. “China is not ready to replace the
U.S. in the region.”
In a phone call with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday, China’s foreign
minister, Wang Yi, said the U.S. needed to remain involved in Afghanistan, including by
helping the country to maintain stability and combat terrorism and violence, according to
a statement on the Chinese foreign ministry’s website.
Moscow, too, urged the U.S. and allies not to turn away. Zamir Kabulov, President
Vladimir Putin’s special envoy for Afghanistan, said Western countries should reopen
embassies in Kabul and engage in talks with the Taliban on rebuilding the country’s
economy. “This applies first of all to those nations that remained there with their armies
for 20 years and caused the havoc that we see now,” Mr. Kabulov told Russian TV.
Chinese scholars who advise the government expect the U.S. to refocus military resources
on countering Beijing, especially in the Western Pacific, and to show greater resolve in an
area whose strategic importance is now a rare point of bipartisan consensus.
President Biden, in his April speech announcing the withdrawal from Afghanistan, after a
war that cost hundreds of billions of dollars and took 2,465 American lives, justified the
move by highlighting this imperative: “Rather than return to war with the Taliban, we
have to focus on the challenges that are in front of us,” he said. “We have to shore up
American competitiveness to meet the stiff competition we’re facing from an increasingly
assertive China.”
The U.S. could have enabled the Afghan republic to stave off the Taliban for years, if not
decades, by continuing a relatively small U.S. military presence, focused on air support,
intelligence and logistics rather than ground combat. Instead of a military defeat, like in
1970s Vietnam, the American withdrawal was a deliberate policy move, even if it caused
unintended consequences.
“Serious people in Moscow understand that the American military machine and all the
components of America’s global superiority are not going anywhere, and that the whole
idea of no longer being involved in this ‘forever war’ was a correct one,” said Alexander
Gabuev, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Moscow Center. “Yes, the execution was
monstrous, but the desire to focus resources on priority areas, especially East Asia and
China, is causing here a certain unease, a disquiet—and an understanding of the strategic
logic.” The main hope in Moscow, he added, is that the fallout from the Kabul withdrawal will
lead to further political polarization inside the U.S., and to new strains in ties between
America and its allies.
These strains are already real, especially after Mr. Biden rebuffed European requests to
extend the Aug. 31 withdrawal deadline so that allies would be able to airlift their
remaining citizens and Afghans allies out of Kabul. Tens of thousands of such people,
eligible for evacuation, remain stranded.
Even the closest of America’s allies, such as the U.K., have openly criticized the U.S.
withdrawal. Tom Tugendhat, chairman of the foreign-affairs committee in the U.K. House
of Commons and an Afghanistan war veteran, compared the debacle in Kabul to the 1956
Suez crisis, which bared the limits of British power and precipitated his nation’s strategic
retreat.
“In 1956, we all knew that the British Empire was over but the Suez crisis made it
absolutely clear. Since President Obama, the action has been of U.S. withdrawal, but my
God, has this made it clear,” Mr. Tugendhat said in an interview. That’s not necessarily great news for Russia and China, he added.
“The reality is that Chinese and Russian bad behavior is only possible in a world that is
U.S.-organized,” Mr. Tugendhat said. “You can only be an angry teenager if you know that
your dad is still going to put petrol in the car the next day.”
The U.S. denouement in Afghanistan has raised particular concerns in Taiwan, the
democratic island Beijing seeks to unite with the mainland—by force if necessary. The U.S.
is obliged by law to help Taiwan defend itself. After pro-Beijing politicians warned that
Medical and hospital staff with an injured man after the airport bombings in Kabul on Thursday.
Taiwan shouldn’t depend on U.S. assistance in the event of a Chinese assault, Taiwan’s
President Tsai Ing-wen issued a statement calling for the island to be more self-reliant.
The prevailing view among U.S. allies and partners in Asia is that Washington can now
deliver, finally, on the “pivot to Asia” that the Obama administration promised as a way to
counter China but largely failed to deliver as it was preoccupied with Afghanistan and the
Middle East.
“There’s an acknowledgment of lessons that need to be learned,” said S. Paul Choi, a
former South Korean army officer and adviser to U.S. forces there who is now a Seoulbased
security consultant. “On a more positive note, what Asian allies would like to see is
greater attention, greater human resources, greater training of personnel…that focuses
more on this region rather than, say, counterterrorism in the Middle East.”
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki earlier this month challenged the notion that the
events in Kabul create an opening for Moscow or Beijing to test America’s will in their
own neighborhoods. “Our message is very clear: We stand by, as is outlined in the Taiwan
Relations Agreement, by individuals in Taiwan,” she said. “We stand by partners around
the world who are subject to this kind of propaganda that Russia and China are projecting.
And we’re going to continue to deliver on those words with actions.”
While the chaos in Afghanistan has at least temporarily undermined America’s credibility
with partners and allies, these relationships, from Taiwan to Israel to Ukraine, are based
on a unique set of commitments—and, unlike America’s Afghan venture, don’t have a
preset expiration date. Washington broadcast its intention to leave Afghanistan since
Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen inspected military troops in Tainan in January.
