Was Afghanistan worth it?

We are coming up on the 20th anniversary of 9/11, the year when this country was rocked to its core by cowardly terrorist attacks that killed thousands of Americans. In the aftermath of that attack, coordinated by extremists from the Taliban, the United States quickly grouped together and invaded Afghanistan.

It didn’t take long for us to defeat the Taliban, and many of them then retreated into the mountains and hidden places that make up the hinterland of that country. What followed next has been a strange, often tragic war in which our enemies were hard to define and harder to stop.

I look at the kids I cover for Colby and Abbotsford, and many of them are younger than both the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. They have never known a world without war. Indeed, for over half of my life, the United States have been at war in Afghanistan.

As of this month, that has all changed. President Trump and President Biden both discussed plans these past few years about withdrawing our troops from the country. If you’ve watched any bit of news, on any news station, you know how well that has been received.

In the wake of Biden’s withdrawal, it’s been absolute chaos. It took literally days for the Taliban to reclaim all the territory they had lost upon our engagement and subsequent occupation in 2001.

It forces me, and so many others, to ask: What did we gain? Was it worth it? Will the price paid in blood ever be worth it?

Afghanistan has often been called the Graveyard of Empires. Alexander the Great could not conquer these lands, even the mighty Genghis Khan and the Mongols had difficulties keeping Afghanistan, and certainly the Russians could have told the United States about the folly of going to war in Afghanistan.

There were really only two options when it came to Afghanistan — get out, or be prepared to stay forever. The United States certainly had no intention of staying forever. Instead, we put our trust in the Afghan people, who my brother and cousins and friends that served over there say are mostly good.

I’ve had friends who are alive today because of the sacrifice of the Afghan peoples. Many Afghans have paid a heavy price in bloodshed and loss because of their willingness to help us. They’ve been on the front lines for years, and are often ill-equipped and woefully short on ammunition, fuel and assistance.

So when I hear people say “Why don’t their own people fight for their country?” The answer is, they are, and they have been. But as the will of our own country has faltered in this seemingly never-ending con- flict, so too have the Afghanis lost faith in a nation that really had no intention of staying. And I don’t blame the U.S. for pulling out — Afghanistan is very much a foreign and strange land. It’s a bleak, windy landscape punctuated by mountains and poppy fields.

It’s very different from the rolling green hills and plains and vast rivers and lakes of the United States. Many of my friends who were there had their share of experiences, but they could not wait to return stateside.

Now, with the Taliban reclaiming what they see as theirs, there are Afghans who wish to join their American comrades stateside.

I say let them come. They’ve proved their loyalty to us, andweowethem.If webackdownonthisnow,theworld will never trust us again. Reputations take a lifetime to build, and can be destroyed in moments, and nothing sullies a reputation more than a broken promise.

Now is a desperate time for our Afghan allies, especially their women. If there is a chance to make some good of this decades-long war, and have something to be proud of, it is this — giving someone a better tomorrow. M USINGS AND G RUMBLINGS

ROSS PATTERMANN REPORTER