Donald trump in his Aug. 21, 2017 policy statement talked about stepping up efforts to win the long-drawn-out war in Afghanistan, opening the door for deploying more US troops. The question arises then why Trump, rather than deploying more US troops, signed a peace agreement with Afghan Taliban? World may assert, trump, an insane or a mad man, but the matter of the fact is that he was neither insane nor mad. He had played the best move among all others moves to counter China.
The 2021 Doha peace agreement between the US and Afghan Taliban was the most strategic deal to counter China’s dream of national rejuvenation through BRI. Regardless of the fact that Pakistan repeatedly cautioned Washington of the great consequence that will follow, if US withdrew without a strong government in place in Kabul. That eventually happened with the fall of Kabul in the hands of Taliban on Aug. 31 of 2021. The matter of the fact is that the west achieved what it has wanted to achieve; chaos in Asia.
Since the fall of Kabul, Afghanistan has become a living heaven for the terrorist organisations ranging from middle east, central Asia and south Asia. The geographical trump card that connects Afghanistan with south Asia, middle east and central Asia as well as China has become a geographical liability for the letters. Since its inception, the Taliban government on the one hand sheltered the terrorist organisation and, on the other, has conducted bitter relations with the Asian countries with few exemptions, for instance India with whom the Taliban government is on good terms.
India: US strategic ally
It is important to note that, India is a strategic ally of US, Taliban’s biggest enemy, additionally, the Hindu extremism that is going on in India against its Muslim minority yet the so-called custodians of Islam have good relations with India but usually bitter relations with all those countries that are of strategic importance for China. For instance, Pakistan, that is the gateway of China’s BRI, is on the top list of terrorist attacks. Since the takeover of Kabul, terrorist attacks all over the Pakistan has been intensified. That in result disrupting the Pak-China relations. The April 2022 Karachi university bombing, killing three Chinese academics and their Pakistani driver that resulted in three months termination of CEPC project is the utter evidence of what is at play. And since CEPC phase 2 is going on a Merger speed mostly due to security issues.
Hence, world may hail US withdraw from Afghanistan as a defeat of the biggest military force of the world but in a different and in a long perspective, the defeat has set the stage for the BRI`s decadence thus a defeat to China’s dream of national rejuvenation.