Biden’s betrayal is breathtaking
RCANWE all just take a deep breath, please? Hold… and exhale, nice’n’slow.The world has not tilted on its axis. Kabul is not the new Saigon.
There has not been the widely predicted, protracted bloodbath as the Taliban, with their Soviet-era Kalashnikovs and shoulderlaunched rocket-propelled grenades, fight through Afghanistan’s villages, towns and cities, street by ruined street.
This has been a largely peaceful handover of power. Hardly a shot fired, mostly by soldiers shooting into the air to quell riots at Kabul airport.Yes, that was an ugly scene. Panic always is. But, to confound all expectations, things may have stabilised BECAUSE of the Taliban, not in spite of them.
Chief of the UK defence staff General Sir Nick Carter, speaking to Sky News midweek, said the former enemy is “not behaving in a medieval way at all”. Sir Nick has been criticised for “joining the Taliban’s PR team” but he is entitled to speak as he finds.
“We are co-operating with the Taliban on the ground and that seems to be a very straightforward relationship,” he said simply.
“They are keeping the streets of Kabul very safe and indeed very calm.They are helping us at the airport... what we’re not getting are reports of them behaving in a medieval way, like you might have seen in the past.”
Yes, I know, I know. Leopards, spots, and all that.And these are
very early days. But Sir Nick is clearly trying to keep his head while many about him are losing theirs.
And so to the “B-word”. Have we “betrayed” the Afghan people? President Biden – there’s another B-word we’ll come to in a moment – was right to point out that the US had fully trained and armed the Afghan army, but left to itself, it had chosen not to fight for its new and hard-won democracy.
That tells you something. Could it just be that other cultures do not revere democracy in the same way as we do in theWest?We think it is the superior system of government, above all others. So why do we keep failing to export it (usually and ironically at the point of a gun)? Iraq... Libya... democracy in
Afghanistan lasted about 10 seconds after the Americans scuttled.
I’ll tell you who’s been betrayed here. Us. By the US, and specifically by Biden. Britain stood shoulder-toshoulder with America in Afghanistan for 20 years, at the cost of much blood and treasure.
We were given no say whatsoever in the timing of the US withdrawal. We weren’t even asked our opinion.
It was a classic fait accompli and a humiliating reminder of what the so-called “special relationship” really entails: America first. Of course any president, or prime minister for that matter, must put their country first. But allies are there to be consulted and, dare I say it, advise.Treat them with contempt and watch the alliance crumble.