Afghanistan

Friday

Kunwar Khuldune Shahid

Pakistan is relishing its role as kingmaker in Afghanistan

The details of engagements involving the head of MI6 are, unsurprisingly, usually kept secret. But not so Richard Moore’s meeting with the head of the Pakistani army, General Qamar Javed Bajwa. Officers from Britain’s intelligence service are also said to have met the Taliban, both in Kabul and Qatar. How do we know? Because hours after Moore met Bajwa, the news was plastered all over Pakistani media, much to the dismay and horror of British officials. Pakistani leaders have spent much of the past fortnight basking in the Taliban’s triumph. Imran Khan lauded the Taliban for breaking the ‘shackles of slavery’. The Pakistani prime minister’s office made special social media banners to advertise calls received from world

Thursday

Katy Balls

‘Britain is not a superpower’: an interview with Ben Wallace

Britain’s evacuation of Kabul began with an admission of defeat. Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, said that the UK would probably leave having failed to assist everyone who had been promised safe passage. ‘Some people won’t get back,’ he said in tears in one interview. When asked why he was taking it personally, he replied: ‘Because I’m a soldier.’ He’s the first defence secretary for 29 years to be able to make such a claim. He served with the Scots Guards in Germany, Cyprus, Belize and Northern Ireland before entering politics. His experience in uniform, he says, has given him different insights into the job: in this case, recognising just

The Spectator

Letters: The agony of the forgotten Australians

A glimmer of hope Sir: After the debacle of the West’s shambolic withdrawal from Afghanistan, it was comforting to read two of the articles in last week’s Spectator (28 August). The first was Rod Liddle’s explanation as to how we got there in the first place (‘I blame Tony Blair’) and the second was John Casey’s piece about Ahmad Massoud and the mention of his late father, the messianic Ahmad Shah Massoud (‘Fatherland’). Very often out of a dire situation something positive can appear. It may be that the arrival of Ahmad Massoud as the leader of the National Resistance Front, the potential he has of being the head of

The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Britain leaves Afghanistan, hurricane hits New Orleans and Gove goes clubbing

Home Britain brought its last troops home from Afghanistan, having flown out more than 15,000 people since 14 August; but the operation failed to evacuate perhaps 1,000 eligible Afghans, some of whom had worked for the government, and 100 to 150 British nationals. Pen Farthing, who runs an animal charity in Afghanistan, returned in an aeroplane he had chartered with 94 dogs and 79 cats; ‘Meanwhile my interpreter’s family are likely to be killed,’ commented Tom Tugendhat, the chair of the Foreign Affairs Select Committee, who has served in Afghanistan. In the seven days up to the beginning of the week, 765 people had died with coronavirus, bringing the total

The Spectator

Pet project: how many dogs and cats are there in Britain?

Escape velocity The evacuation of Afghanistan was likened to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. What were the logistics of that operation? — Although most US troops had left Vietnam, 5,000 civilians remained. Some left during the month, but ambassador Graham Martin gave the order to evacuate everyone only on 29 April. — The only available airbase had been shelled and there were no sea or land routes, so the only way out was by helicopter. In 24 hours 7,000 people were evacuated, including 5,500 Vietnamese citizens. Helicopters took off from the US embassy compound every ten minutes. — It was a 50-minute ride to US warships waiting

Nicholas Lezard

The boys who never grow up: Sad Little Men, by Richard Beard, reviewed

I can’t recall reading an angrier book than this. Richard Beard has written what I hope for his sake is a cathartic denunciation of the private boarding school system, and his rage is on two fronts. The first is how being sent away at the age of eight damaged and twisted him and just about everyone else who experienced the same; the second is about what these damaged children as adults have done to the country. He pays special attention to the Prime Minister and his predecessor but one. I suspect that The Spectator has quite a few readers who went to boarding school, and who even think the government

Charles Moore Charles Moore

Is the world we value falling apart?

From time to time, people get worried and ask one another: ‘Is the world falling apart?’ I imagine this is a universal phenomenon, but my experience of it is largely confined to the West (here meant more as a cultural than a geographical expression). It happened in the 1930s, when the broadly correct answer to the question was ‘Yes’, and in the 1970s, of which more later. It happened more recently, after 11 September 2001 and during the financial crash of 2008/09. Some asked the question after Brexit. I have heard it asked again by many highly disparate people in the few days since the American-led Nato scuttle from Afghanistan.

Douglas Murray Douglas Murray

America, the Taliban and a farewell to arms

It was quite the handover at Kabul airport this week. The last American troops to exit Afghanistan reportedly left facing an ‘elite unit’ of the Taliban. In a season finale that the most dystopian screenwriter would have struggled to invent, the elite Taliban unit was itself bedecked in US military kit. That is, they were not only wearing uniforms and protective kit provided by the fleeing US army, but were parading the airport with US-provided guns in US-provided vehicles. This was the culmination of a fortnight that the White House is still trying to present as a success. One of the biggest airlifts in history, they insist. In reality the

Wednesday

Nick Cohen

The delusion of Dominic Raab

Boris Johnson will never sack ministers for being tawdry, lazy and incapable of doing their jobs — if he did, he would have to sack himself. Nevertheless, the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee’s investigation into the Foreign Office’s complicity in the Afghanistan catastrophe showed the consequences of the collapse in standards in ministerial competence better than any public inquiry I have seen. The autopsy was all the bloodier because Tom Tugendhat, who should be foreign secretary, was asking the questions, and Dominic Rabb, who really shouldn’t be foreign secretary, was ducking them. Raab’s demonstration of what he did not know was almost awe-inspiring. Did he, for example, know how many ministers were

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Raab faces an Afghan grilling from MPs

After a week of hostile briefings over his future as foreign secretary, Dominic Raab appeared before MPs this afternoon to face the music. As a blame game gets underway in Whitehall over the chaotic response to the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, Raab has found himself in the firing line. One government source suggested his handling of the crisis meant he ‘has about as much chance of being in a top four position by next spring as Arsenal’ when it comes to a cabinet reshuffle. This afternoon, Raab came out swinging — defending his department’s handling of the situation and pointing blame in the direction of others. Today’s appearance had been billed by

Steerpike Steerpike

Watch: the four most awkward moments from Raab’s evidence

Fresh from his Crete holiday, Dominic Raab appeared at the Foreign Affairs Committee looking tense and awkward. The Foreign Secretary has been dragged to an extraordinary meeting of the panel specially convened in spite of the parliamentary recess to answer questions about the collapse of Afghanistan and rushed evacuation of the Western powers. Raab’s session overstretched to almost two hours and saw a range of hostile questions from right across the House. A glowering Tom Tugendhat ambushed the embattled minister with his department’s principle risks report from July 21 warning of collapse of Afghanistan while a deluge of questions about the Crete holiday were met by Raab’s insistence that such queries were

Tuesday

Gavin Mortimer

Afghanistan could fatally undermine Macron’s election strategy

To nobody’s great surprise, France’s Minister of Health, Olivier Véran, announced last week that the Covid Passport may have to be extended beyond 15 November – the initial expiry date of the government’s controversial measure, first introduced in July. I’ll hazard a guess that come April 2022 the French will still have to show their passport to enter cafes, shopping centres, sports clubs and cinemas. April, of course, is the date of the presidential election and Emmanuel Macron is banking on his response to Covid helping him to secure a second term. His belief is that the electorate, particularly the over-50s, will be reluctant to change presidents in the midst of a

Sunday

David Loyn

How the Taliban will govern Afghanistan

When the Taliban ruled Afghanistan for five years in the late 1990s, the key power lay in a modest room in a house in Kandahar. There was just a simple iron bedstead and a box as furniture, and no door but a curtain separating it from the rest of the house. Sitting on rugs on the floor the Taliban founder Mullah Omar issued orders, made appointments and took money from the box. The ministries in Kabul operated on fiats issued from this room. His successor as Emir, Haibatullah Akhunzada, does not enjoy the same unquestioning authority. He was known as a scholar and ideologue not a fighter, and emerged as

Saturday

James Kirkup

The shameful evacuation of Pen Farthing’s pets from Afghanistan

Two stories on the Afghan evacuation today combine to leave me full of bewildered rage. The first, from the Times: ‘Britain may have to leave 1,000 Afghan support staff behindUp to 1,100 Afghan citizens entitled to come to the UK are likely to be left behind as British forces withdraw from Afghanistan in the next 48 hours.The RAF was expected last night to complete the evacuation of 15,000 Afghan and British citizens from Kabul airport despite the terrorist attacks. The military will have pulled out by the end of the weekend.Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, said that between 800 and 1,100 Afghan interpreters and other support staff were unlikely to

Kelly Jane Torrance

Joe Biden’s empathy failure

Empathy won Joe Biden the White House, we were told. Indeed, as former Republican speechwriter Peter Wehner informed us, ‘In the entire history of American presidential campaigns, there may never have been a wider gap in empathy than between Donald Trump and Joe Biden.’ Sen. Chris Coons said Biden’s ‘ability to comfort and listen and connect with people who have just suffered the greatest loss of their lives’ is his ‘superpower’. That fabled empathy hasn’t been much on display in the last fortnight, however. The president called the images coming out of Afghanistan during his disastrous withdrawal ‘heart-breaking’, but his own heart didn’t seem to be in it any time

Friday

Gabriel Gavin

How will Europe respond to a wave of Afghan refugees?

On Tuesday, Franek Sterczewski made a break for the border. Wearing a long trench coat and carrying a blue plastic bag, he managed to outrun one armed soldier before being stopped by a line of officers. Sterczewski, however, wasn’t fleeing his native Poland — he was trying to help those who desperately want to get in. August 24, 2021 Brussels has accused the Belarusian government of actively shipping in would-be refugees The rebellious 33-year old MP had planned to hand out medicine and water to the line of asylum seekers camped out on the eastern frontier with Belarus. Hundreds of people from countries like Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan have begun

Mary Dejevsky

The descent of Afghanistan

The bomb attacks at Kabul airport were what US and allied commanders overseeing the mass evacuation had most feared. In so far as they could be, they were prepared. They had, it appears, received very specific intelligence — perhaps based on a trial run by the bombers — that such attacks were in the offing. They warned people to stay away from the airport. Guards were doubtless on extra-high alert. And yet the perpetrators got through. More than 60 civilians were killed along with 13 US marines. Dozens more were injured and taken to already overburdened hospitals in Kabul. The carnage of 26 August was the costliest day in the

Charles Lipson

The terrible cost of the tragedy at Kabul airport

America’s frantic, confused exit from Afghanistan was a humiliating shambles even before Thursday’s terrorist attack. Now, it is something much worse. It is a deadly tragedy, leaving victims dead and injured and trapping thousands of Americans and friendly Afghans in a lethal environment, where terrorists roam free. There will be a huge political price to pay for this disaster, and President Biden will pay it. This deadly fiasco didn’t just happen on his watch. It happened because of his decisions, a series of fundamentally bad ones, taken by the President himself. Only a month ago, President Biden privately told his Nato allies that Kabul would be stable during the exit Gone

Thursday

The Spectator

Kabul airport rocked by Isis bomb attacks

At least 60 people are feared dead from two explosions near Kabul Airport, in what appears to be a sophisticated bombing campaign and suicide attack carried out by Islamic State. Two explosions took place around Abbey Gate near Kabul airport – where US and UK forces have been stationed – with the second blast near or at the Baron Hotel. Twelve US servicemen were killed in the attack. Videos being shared online show piles of bodies on the streets of Kabul – it is likely that casualty figures will rise.  In the past week, thousands of Afghans have been gathering at the airport every day in a desperate attempt to flee the country. Many have worked with the United States, UK

Duncan Gardham

Will the Taliban’s victory lead to attacks on British soil?

The security services in Britain have been concerned about the rise of the Taliban for many months. In government briefings they have been telling ministers that it was almost inevitable the Taliban would gain some role in the government of Afghanistan once Western forces withdrew – it was just a question of how much. It is easy to ignore, after the sudden collapse of Afghan forces, the fact that the national army had been losing ground to the Taliban over several years and bloody attacks have remained a constant in the centre of major cities in the country. The Taliban killed 16 people and injured 119 in a suicide bomb