What went wrong in Afghanistan?

Washington’s apparent underestimation of Taliban strength and Afghan state weakness amounts to an intelligence failure.

Nearly 20 years after United States forces entered Afghanistan, this is what it has come down to: The government has effectively collapsed and President Ashraf Ghani has left the country. The military has lost its will to fight and disintegrated. A brutal and emboldened Taliban advance, already having instituted draconian legal systems and curbed women’s rights in areas under its control, has taken over Kabul. The population has been plunged into a new humanitarian crisis. And American soldiers and diplomats are sprinting for the exits. The al-Qaeda-allied Taliban is now about to assume the lion’s share of political power – if not total power. Many understandably blame US President Joe Biden’s withdrawal decision for Afghanistan’s current mess. But the reasons are also rooted in the longstanding strength of the Taliban and the fundamental weakness of the Afghan state.