By Charles V. Peña
Hopes that a peace settlement in Afghanistan would be reached were dashed when a Taliban attack in Kabul killed a U.S. soldier and eleven others on September 6. Less than two weeks later, two separate Taliban attacks killed forty-eight people on the same day, after which the Taliban killed twenty people with a truck bomb at a hospital in Qalat Ghilji city in southern Afghanistan.
There is every reason to think this sort of chaos will continue, but it should not delay the United States’ overdue exit from its longest running war. President Donald Trump called off peace talks with the Taliban following the September 6 attack, but he doesn’t need to negotiate a peace to make good on his campaign promise and bring U.S. troops home.
To be sure, withdrawing U.S. forces from Afghanistan will not magically result in a peaceful resolution—but neither will keeping them there. In fact, the U.S. military presence is part of what fuels Afghanistan’s violence because U.S. troops are a foreign occupation force that breeds resentment with the population–regardless of our intentions, just as would happen if a foreign military was ensconced in America.
This piece was originally published by The National Interest on October 28, 2019. Read more HERE.