Afghans gather on a roadside near the military part of the airport in Kabul on August 20, 2021, hoping to flee from the country after the Taliban's military takeover of Afghanistan. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP via Getty Images)

The U.S. military's abrupt withdrawal from Afghanistan has produced one of the gravest humanitarian and geostrategic catastrophes in the history of American foreign policy.

This is a gift not only to the Taliban, but to America's strategic adversaries and terrorist organizations like al-Qaeda. Beyond the immediate crisis as thousands of Americans and Afghan partners struggle to escape the country, how will the Taliban's takeover and likely reestablishment of Afghanistan as a terrorist safe haven impact global security?

Hudson experts have been sounding the alarm on the devastating ramifications of the Taliban takeover, including former National Security Adviser and Lieutenant General (ret) H.R. McMaster, Pakistan's former Ambassador to the U.S. Husain Haqqani, former Treasury Assistant Secretary Marshall Billingslea, and Ravenel B. Curry III Distinguished Fellow in Strategy and Statesmanship Walter Russell Mead. 

Read key quotes below, and join us next week for a discussion with Lt. Gen. McMaster, Robert Greenway, Ambassador Haqqani, and former Deputy National Security Adviser Dr. Nadia Schadlow on how the U.S. can prevent further calamity in Afghanistan and repair the strategic damage that has been done.
 

Hudson Experts Weigh In on Afghanistan

1. Afghanistan's Humanitarian Catastrophe Will Embolden Terrorists and US Adversaries:

H.R. McMaster in the Wall Street Journal: In Washington, leaders described the jihadist threat as having moved on from Afghanistan. But the Afghanistan-Pakistan region remains an epicenter for terrorism. More than 20 U.S.-designated terrorist organizations call the region home, and many remain determined to murder Americans and our allies.

Self-styled strategists still rationalize the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan as necessary to focus on China and great-power competition. But the refusal to provide the Afghan people the support necessary to stem a humanitarian catastrophe emboldens China, Russia and other adversaries eager to proclaim the U.S. an unreliable partner and a declining power.

2. Pakistan's Support of the Taliban Remains Misunderstood by US Policymakers:

Husain Haqqani in the Wall Street Journal:  Pakistan’s military dictator, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, helped to arrest many al-Qaeda figures, but as he later admitted, he also continued to support the Taliban, to hedge against Indian influence in Afghanistan after an eventual U.S. withdrawal. Musharraf expected the U.S. to leave within a couple of years and was instrumental in helping the Taliban attack foreign forces in Afghanistan to expedite their departure. By 2006, American officials started speaking of a Pakistani “double game” and tried using aid and diplomatic bullying to end it, but they never recognized that Pakistan’s policy was shaped by its insecurities about India, and thus was unmoved by those strategies.

3. America's Indo-Pacific Alliances Are at Risk:

Walter Russell Mead in the Wall Street Journal: Nothing is more vain than the hope that somehow this debacle will help the U.S. in the Indo-Pacific.

For more than 70 years India, whose massive population and economy make it a linchpin of any American strategy in Asia, has seen the world through the lens of its competition with Pakistan. Now, as Islamabad cements its ties with Beijing, the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan hands Pakistan a strategic victory and strengthens the most radical anti-Indian and anti-Western forces in its government. Few in New Delhi will perceive this catastrophe as a sign of Washington’s competence or reliability. If a third-tier country like Pakistan can tie the U.S. in knots, Indians will ask: What chance does Washington have against China?

4. Chinese Influence in Pakistan Will Increase:

Husain Haqqani in Foreign Affairs: Pakistani officials have, over the years, chosen to flatly deny Pakistani actions in Afghanistan [supporting the Taliban] or to explain them away. This has led to charges of double-dealing from the Americans, spurring further mistrust in the bilateral relationship.

Relations with India and the rest of the world have also suffered, and Pakistan has come to depend excessively on China. Of its $90 billion in external debt, Pakistan owes 27 percent—or more than $24 billion—to Beijing. It has also been forced to rely on lower-quality Chinese military technology after losing U.S. military assistance.

5. Future Generations Will Pay for Biden's Strategic Blunder:

Senior Fellow Marshall Billingslea on Hudson's podcast Making a Killing: The abdication of responsibility in Afghanistan by the Biden-Harris administration has led to the establishment of an Islamic emirate that is the size of Texas, has as many resources as ISIS had at its at its height, and has the potential to greatly expand its ability to export Islamic jihadism around the world.

The recalibration [to Asia] cannot happen in full as we'll now have to continue investing far greater resources into the counterterrorism fight. We're entering a phase where we will see a resurgence of al-Qaeda and their ability to conduct worldwide terror attacks. We're entering a very, very, dark period. Our children and likely now our grandchildren will be coping with this.

Quotes have been edited for length and clarity.

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