A former Marine Corps captain with combat experience in Iraq, Hoh had also served in uniform at the Pentagon, and as a civilian in Iraq and at the State Department. By July, he was the senior U.S. civilian in Zabul province, a Taliban hotbed. But last Full Story »
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An informative article that conveys both the character and experience of Matthew Hoh and the situation on the ground in Afghanistan. What the article does not provide is adequate context: Why did the United States, after 9/11, decide that invading Afghanistan and deposing the Taliban was so essential? And, if it was so essential eight years ago, why is leaving now a viable option?
Unlike most Americans I was not convinced that our invasion of Afghanistan in the wake of 9/11 was a good idea. There is no question that we needed to dismantle the al-Qaeda training camps, and our distaste for the Islamist rule of the Taliban was understandable. Yet I was too familiar with the Soviet experience, especially their fierce and unending conflict with the very localized tribalism that this article discusses, to believe that a countrywide occupation could be successful. If we are to stay in Afghanistan, I believe we must define strictly limited objectives and leave the mountainous tribal villages to their own devices--even if this means al-Qaeda once again manages to establish training camps in the tribal areas. (BTW, I supported our invasion of Iraq to a greater degree, largely because I knew that during the 1980's the U.S. had provided Saddam with biological weapons starter kits that could be passed on to terrorist cells (http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2002_cr/s092002.html) . The WMD threat was real, though it was never nuclear.)