What an awful, tragic irony. President Biden in April chose Sept. 11 as the deadline for U.S. troops to withdraw from Afghanistan. Now it’s possible that, on the 20th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the Taliban that once protected Osama bin Laden and that the U.S. ousted from power could again rule in Kabul.
Mr. Biden would like to absolve himself of responsibility for this looming defeat, but he cannot. He could have withdrawn U.S. forces in a careful way based on conditions and a plan to shore up Afghan forces or midwife an alliance between regional tribal warlords and the government in Kabul. The President did none of that.
Instead his mid-April decision to withdraw, on the eve of the summer fighting season, triggered the May 1 start of the Taliban offensive. The rapid withdrawal timetable meant U.S. forces would be preoccupied with that task rather than assisting Afghan forces. His decision to abandon multiple military bases, and withdraw all air power, has denied the Afghan army crucial support it relied on.
We are now watching the consequences, as the Taliban captures city after city. Soon the group could control or contest more than 90% of the country, including traditional anti-Taliban strongholds in the north. Insurgents have seized Kandahar and Herat—the second and third largest cities—and an assault on Kabul could come soon. The U.S. is evacuating all but a bare-bones diplomatic staff and may even move them from the U.S. Embassy.
Even now, however, it’s not too late to stop or slow the slaughter. Outside of well-regarded special forces units, Afghan army troops have retreated willy-nilly as they’ve lost confidence in holding off the Taliban. But allied air power and maintenance assistance were a basic part of Kabul’s defense strategy.
Government forces are more likely to fight, and could stand a chance, if Mr. Biden brings U.S. air assets back to the country. The U.S. will also need to deploy enough troops and contractors to keep the planes flying and Bagram air base secure.
The fall of Kabul may look inevitable, but the Taliban isn’t the Wehrmacht. A display of even modest renewed U.S. support would boost Afghan morale and give the Taliban pause on its march to Kabul. Once a rout is stopped, the U.S. can then work on a strategy that assists Afghans who oppose the Taliban to set up a resistance. This means working with friendly regional leaders who can provide areas of operational control. CIA teams, like Team Alpha that helped to topple the Taliban in 2001, could enter the country now and rally pockets against the Taliban with air power support.
The goal would be to impose costs that would give the Taliban reason to doubt it can regain control of the country. It could also give the Afghan government some negotiating leverage in talks with the Taliban.
Sen. Lindsey Graham suggests reconstituting a version of the bipartisan Afghanistan Study Group to offer ideas for the Biden Administration. In February that group laid out a plan for a small residual U.S. force in Afghanistan that could prevent exactly the kind of rout we’re now seeing. This would need to be done quickly, but there is enough retired military and political expertise on Afghanistan to make it happen.
This would be an admission that Mr. Biden’s withdrawal was a mistake, but that would be a small price to avoid strategic disaster and perhaps a bloodbath that will stain America’s reputation and haunt his Presidency. Even the Democratic media has now picked up the Vietnam metaphor—“Biden’s Saigon”—that we warned about weeks ago.
So far Mr. Biden seems determined to stick with his hell-bent withdrawal, and perhaps he thinks Americans won’t care. But they will care if they see in a few weeks or months the revival of safe havens for al Qaeda or Islamic State. They will care if they think the U.S. homeland is threatened.
And they’ll care if China, Russia and Iran see the U.S. defeated in Afghanistan by a militia like the Taliban and conclude that Mr. Biden will fold if they challenge U.S. friends and interests. Each of them drew that conclusion about Barack Obama and exploited it in the South China Sea, Ukraine and Syria, and the broader Middle East. Mr. Biden’s vision to rally an alliance of democracies will find fewer takers.
We realize that our advice is a long shot given Mr. Biden’s determination to wash his hands of Afghanistan. But the costs of the bloody defeat that now seems likely will be far greater than the President thinks if the Taliban’s flag soon flies over Kabul.
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