Miércoles, 1 de septiembre de 2021 (Continuación)

Taliban fighters patrol a street in Kabul on Aug. 27 as the final evacuation flights took off from the Kabul airport. (Aamir Qureshi/AFP/Getty Images)

MundoAméricaMundoOriente Próximo,

As the Taliban swept into Kabul after the collapse of the Afghan government, former military and civilian leaders chastised the Biden administration for pulling U.S. troops out too soon. The U.S. military, they argued, could have prevented the disaster and used its might to keep trying to build a democratic state.

To stabilize the country, these critics argued, the United States should have stayed longer, until the Afghan military could stand on its own, until the government was stronger, until the Taliban was defeated.

But the history of great power interventions into insurgencies suggests that efforts to stabilize Afghanistan through democratization would have been futile.…  Seguir leyendo »

Destroyed Afghan security forces vehicles lie on the Kabul-Jalalabad highway on Friday. (Akhter Gulfam/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)

MundoOriente Próximo,

The sudden collapse of Afghanistan’s security forces this month surprised many, apparently including the Biden administration.

Afghanistan’s security forces received more than $80 billion in U.S. weapons and equipment since 2001. They fielded more than 250,000 combatants at their peak, guided by thousands of U.S. military advisers. They had maintained a rough stalemate with the Taliban for more than seven years, after the Obama administration announced the end of U.S. combat operations in 2014.

Then they collapsed in little more than a week in early August.

But this shouldn’t have been a surprise. This kind of collapse is much more common than the commentary on Afghanistan suggests.…  Seguir leyendo »

Canary Wharf. ‘Wage stagnation, precarious work and , rising inequality are inevitable outcomes of the way that western economies are organised.’ Photograph: Ian West/PA

InternacionalEconomía

As western economies emerge from the pandemic, their governments face a choice: do they seek to address the profound problems that Covid exposed, or try to return to “business as usual” as quickly as possible? Their problem is that many of the issues exacerbated by the pandemic, such as wage stagnation, precarious work and rising inequality are not bugs in an otherwise well-functioning system, but inevitable outcomes of the way that western economies are now organised. So a business-as-usual approach simply won’t work. Much more fundamental change is needed.

The US government seems to recognise this. Joe Biden’s economic plans are a radical departure from the era that stretches from Reagan to Obama, when governments sought to keep taxes and public spending low and focused principally on globalised trade and the education and training of the workforce.…  Seguir leyendo »

An Afghan Left Behind Tells His Story

MundoOriente Próximo

For the past two weeks, many of us have been witnessing the agonizing sights of desperate Afghans trying to flee their country after the Taliban’s takeover of Kabul. Many Afghans who helped the United States over the past two decades are terrified. They assumed that when the time came and America pulled out of Afghanistan, they would not be left to the mercy of the Taliban. They were wrong.

More than 124,000 people were airlifted out of Afghanistan — the largest noncombatant evacuation in U.S. military history — but the evacuation was chaotic and hurried, which meant that it was, inevitably, incomplete.…  Seguir leyendo »

An Afghan Left Behind Tells His Story

MundoOriente Próximo

When the last U.S. plane left Afghanistan, celebratory Taliban gunfire rang out through the night in Kabul. The sound told me that all hope was lost.

I am 38 years old; I remember life under the Taliban, the shock of that time. One day when I was young, we were visiting Kabul and staying with family. A young relative suggested we go to the sports stadium to see if we could catch a match.

A big crowd was waiting but there were no sports. A woman was taken out of a car in the middle of the stadium; she was covered by a big scarf.…  Seguir leyendo »

Italian troops leaving Herat, Afghanistan, in June. To become a more capable U.S. ally, Europe must invest more in security and strategy. Credit Italian Defense Ministry, via Associated Press

MundoOriente PróximoEuropaUnión EuropeaPolítica Exterior

The Taliban’s takeover in Afghanistan is, first and foremost, a tragedy for Afghans. The world’s attention is rightly focused on trying to help those desperately trying to flee the country and worrying about those left behind, notably women and girls.

But it is also a severe blow to the West. Europe and the United States were united as never before in Afghanistan: It was the first time that NATO’s Article 5, committing all members to defend one another, was invoked. And for many years, Europeans provided a strong military commitment and an important economic aid program, amounting to a total of 17.2 billion euros, or $20.3 billion.…  Seguir leyendo »