Afghanistan Archives - Foreign Policy In Focus

How to Forget on Memorial Day

by Tom Engelhardt | May 25, 2012

It’s the saddest reading around: the little announcements that dribble out of the Pentagon every day or two — those terse, relatively uninformative death notices: rank; name; age; small town, suburb, or second-level city of origin; means of death (“small arms fire,” “improvised explosive device,” “the result of gunshot wounds inflicted by an individual wearing an Afghan National Army uniform,” or sometimes something vaguer like “while conducting combat operations,” “supporting Operation Enduring Freedom,” or simply no explanation at all); and the unit the dead soldier belonged to. They are seldom 100 words, even with the usual opening line: “The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Enduring Freedom.” Sometimes they include more than one death.

Morals in the Age of One Superpower

by Adil E. Shamoo | May 9, 2012

Interjecting the consideration of moral values into foreign policy decisions is, unfortunately, often ridiculed by the political establishment of Republicans and Democrats in the United States. For instance, one supporter of Bill Clinton in 1992, Michael Mandelbaum, expressed how foolish it is to construct policies based on moral values.

Leaving Afghanistan Doesn’t Have to Mean Abandoning It

by Jim Cason | Apr 23, 2012

Boosters for the current U.S. war strategy in Afghanistan are predominantly found in Washington, DC.

Our Own Worst Enemy

by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed | Apr 20, 2012

The brazen terrorist assault on Kabul on April 16 was the biggest attack on the Afghan capital in the last decade. For some 18 hours, strategically perched Taliban militants linked to the Haqqani network fired on government buildings, embassies, and foreign military bases. A total of 51 people died, including 36 militants. Some 74 were wounded in Kabul along with three neighboring provinces where government and military targets came under synchronized attack.

The Afghan Syndrome

by Tom Engelhardt | Apr 19, 2012

Take off your hat. Taps is playing. Almost four decades late, the Vietnam War and its post-war spawn, the Vietnam Syndrome, are finally heading for their American grave. It may qualify as the longest attempted burial in history. Last words — both eulogies and curses — have been offered too many times to mention, and yet no American administration found the silver bullet that would put that war away for keeps.