Brutal honesty meets 'prudence': Canadian and U.K. parliaments dissect the Afghanistan withdrawal

Some moments call for plain language. Evaluating the chaotic end to western involvement in Afghanistan is one of those moments. 

The Canadian and U.K. parliaments recently delivered committee reports on the war in Afghanistan and the tumultuous withdrawal of Western forces. Only one of them offers a searing example of the kind of brutal self-reflection that is supposed to be at heart of our democratic system.

"The international withdrawal from Afghanistan has been a disaster in terms of planning, execution and consequences for the U.K.'s wider interests," wrote the British foreign affairs committee in its final report, released May 22, 2022.

"It was a betrayal of our partners in the country and, worst of all, undermined the security of the United Kingdom by encouraging our enemies to act against us."

And that was just the first two sentences of a blistering 60-page report that unflinchingly dissected Britain's evacuation efforts and the way Afghanistan's allies left it to its fate.

Western military involvement in Afghanistan ended in August 2021 when allied nations, led by the U.S., completed their withdrawal.

The two-week airlift that removed Western troops from the country brought with it scenes of desperation and horror. In the early days, people desperate to flee Taliban rule flooded the airport tarmac in Kabul and some fell to their deaths after clinging to departing aircraft.

"The former head of the armed forces told us that the decision to withdraw was 'strategically illiterate and morally bankrupt,' while the former National Security Adviser has called it 'a bad policy, badly implemented," said the British foreign affairs committee report. "It is an act of strategic self-harm.'"

The U.K. committee report, endorsed by members of both the governing and opposition parties, went on to say that the decision to leave Afghanistan "damaged the reputation of the U.K. and its allies, and will affect the [U.K.] government's ability to achieve its foreign policy goals for years to come."

Imagine hearing that kind of frank assessment from the lips of Canadian parliamentarians or senior defence and security officials.

In fairness, two former Canadian generals, other former members of the military and officials from humanitarian agencies delivered candid and clear-eyed testimony to Canada's Special Committee on Afghanistan over the last several months.

But when it came time for a committee of Canadian parliamentarians to speak truth to power, the result was decidedly more restrained.

"Even if the exact point at which the Taliban's ascendancy became inevitable could not have been predicted with certainty, the Special Committee believes that greater prudence — and, therefore, a more proactive approach — was warranted in response to Afghanistan's clearly worsening trajectory," reads the assessment of the Special Committee on Afghanistan — buried on page 38 of its 86-page report, which was tabled with little fanfare last week.

While the phrase "greater prudence" might sound like fighting words to the Ottawa bureaucracy, it's likely cold comfort to the thousands of Afghans who believed in what countries like Canada were doing in Afghanistan and who have had to flee for their lives. Some of them are still on the run.