Bram Janssen/AP Photo
People wait to receive cash at a money distribution event organized by the World Food Program in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 3, 2021.
More than 20 years ago, the United States invaded Afghanistan, promising Afghans peace, freedom, and democracy. Today, nothing of that is left. For the last half-year, the country has again been governed by (or been under the control of) the very same Taliban the Americans once brutally toppled. Contrary to the 1990s, today’s Taliban exercise control of all of Afghanistan, and appear to be stronger than ever before.
Last August, U.S. troops and their NATO allies left the country, together with the deeply corrupt Afghan elites installed by Washington, who looted the country during the last two decades. After the withdrawal, the U.S. placed sanctions against Afghanistan—no doubt largely motivated by a wounded ego after losing the “longest war” in its history and presiding over a chaotic military withdrawal. Washington decided to punish Afghans collectively, creating a humanitarian catastrophe.
Along with the sanctions, the Biden administration froze the reserves of the Afghan Central Bank, which at one point totaled $10 billion but which the U.S. now describes as a little more than $7 billion. Originally, the assets were meant to preserve Afghanistan’s economy, providing a backup to the local currency and maintaining a certain level of liquidity. Ideally, they should have been transferred from the U.S. to the country’s central bank. Yet everything changed. The American-backed regime of Ashraf Ghani in Kabul fell apart, Ghani himself fled, and the Taliban took over as Kabul threatened to descend into anarchy. A shortage of cash precipitated a surge in food prices that led to warnings of a famine, and many Afghans lost what remained of their savings.
That this would happen was obvious to many observers. Long before the return of the Taliban, it was well known that Afghanistan could not survive without financial aid from foreign countries. This was an unpalatable reality that threatened to undermine the rosy narrative of a developing Afghanistan. Although trillions of dollars found their way into the country during the American occupation, most of that money never reached the average Afghan, instead pocketed by American allies, primarily warlords. Large sums also found their way back into the gigantic military apparatus that conducted the occupation itself, a self-perpetuating but vicious cycle. Money belonging to the Western taxpayer, reinvested to cause more war and destruction.
Not a single Afghan was responsible for the September 11 attacks in New York and Washington.
As if sanctions and political instability amidst a new and unrecognized government were not enough, Joe Biden made things worse. Last week, his government announced it would unfreeze half of the Afghan assets and distribute the money to the families of the victims of the 9/11 attacks. According to the White House, the other half should not be handed over to Afghanistan’s Taliban government but should be used for humanitarian aid in the country. Nobody knows how to make this happen. Many observers, foremost among them Graeme Smith from the International Crisis Group, explained that such a move is almost impossible considering the realities on the ground. Working together with the Taliban is necessary to distribute aid and save the lives of millions of Afghans, who have been hit harshly by sanctions over the last several months.
It is ridiculous that almost 40 million people have to pay for the American empire’s loss in Afghanistan and the return of the Taliban, itself a direct result of the American-initiated war on terror. Large parts of Afghanistan were controlled by the Taliban for years, and the insurgents gained support thanks to Washington’s brutal policies and its Afghan allies in Kabul. Last but not least, it was Donald Trump, Biden’s predecessor, who started talks with the Taliban, inadvertently legitimizing them in the process. For that reason, some critics believe that he and Biden, who continued Trump’s path, co-orchestrated the Taliban’s return to Kabul.
“It feels like last August. That’s not a good feeling,” a good friend of mine told me recently after he heard of Biden’s decision. He is an Afghan who grew up in Germany and currently lives in Switzerland, where he is practicing as a medic. Like many other Afghans in the diaspora, he tries to support his family in Kabul and elsewhere by sending remittances home. Without the diaspora’s hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash flow, the situation inside Afghanistan would be even worse. Yet thanks to Biden’s move, it might become even more difficult for Afghans abroad to send money to their home country.
A total financial collapse might happen in the near future. The consequences would be fatal. For that reason, many Afghans are both sad and angry.
One of the perfidious things among the recent developments is the fact that the U.S. government decided to hand over large parts of the Afghan assets to the families of 9/11 victims. Not a single Afghan was responsible for the September 11 attacks in New York and Washington. All culprits had an Arab background, and conducted their pilot training in the United States. Al-Qaeda head Osama bin Laden held ties to Afghanistan long before the Taliban appeared in the mid-’90s. According to different reports, it was Abdul Rab Rasoul Sayyaf, a well-known warlord and former mujahideen leader, who brought bin Laden back to Afghanistan after he participated in the war against the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. Other sources claimed that Burhanuddin Rabbani, another well-known figure among the anti-Soviet rebels, was also responsible for bin Laden’s return. Ironically, both men became close American allies when the war on terror started.
In 2011, ten years after the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan began, Osama bin Laden was killed by Navy SEALs in Abbottabad, a Pakistani garrison town far away from the Durand Line, the official border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Today, it is still a question how bin Laden could hide that safely in a city that hosts Pakistan’s premier military academy and is renowned for its strong presence of security personnel. However, the circumstances of bin Laden’s death underline how wrong it is to punish Afghans collectively for a crime they did not commit.
“Most people in this country were not even alive when 9/11 happened. Why do all these young people have to pay such a heavy price? This is cruel and inhuman,” a relative who still lives in Kabul told me recently. I did not know how to answer, but I knew that Biden’s decision will not just lead to Afghanistan’s economic fall, the country’s isolation, and the tragedy of starvation. It will also push the Afghan people further into the hands of the Taliban.
