蘑菇视频

Dec 4, 2025 By Nick Jacobs 4 min read

From Bush to Obama, Trump to Biden, and now Trump again, we’ve had 20-plus years of bad decisions in a “ready, fire, aim” scenario of expensive choices. Both American and Afghan citizens were caught in the crossfire. The truth is, nothing is black and white. Politics is often just a blur.

George W. Bush ordered the invasion of Afghanistan after 9/11 with a mission to just get the bad guys. Later the war morphed into a failed nation-building experiment. Barack Obama inherited that mess, promised to wind down the war, but tried to keep enough troops there to maintain stability. Twenty years and trillions of dollars later, no positive outcome.

Then came the first Trump administration and the Doha Agreement. That deal was meant to be polite and optimistic. We were supposed to pull out troops, get the Taliban to play nice, and release prisoners on both sides. About 5,000 Taliban fighters and 1,000 Afghan soldiers were released. The talking heads predicted this decision would strengthen the Taliban, and they were right.

Biden inherited the Doha Agreement, extended the withdrawal to 2021, and watched the Afghan army collapse in 11 days. Cities fell one after another. When Kabul fell, the Afghan president fled the country. Then ISIS-K detonated a suicide bomb, killing 13 U.S. service members and more than 170 Afghans.

Operation Allies Refuge airlifted over 120,000 people, but tens of thousands of our Afghan allies were left behind. Over 100,000 Afghans were resettled in the U.S., and the people who risked their lives for us found themselves waiting months or years for visas while some of their families remained in danger. That caused more collateral damage.

Now, National Guard troops are patrolling cities like Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and Chicago, and courts are busy reminding everyone that domestic troop deployment isn’t the same as fighting terrorists overseas.

Then came Nov. 27, the day an Afghan man who had worked with U.S. forces allegedly ambushed two D.C. National Guard members. Specialist Sarah Beckstrom, 20, died; Specialist Andrew Wolfe remains critical. The attacker’s motive was frustration over family reunification delays and bureaucracy.

In a reciprocal action, the administration paused Afghan immigration processing altogether and they cited national security concerns as their reason. Tens of thousands of Afghan refugees are now in limbo, in fear that they will be returned to Afghanistan and killed.

Here’s the real problem. None of this was entirely preventable. It’s the tragic, expensive result of a 20-year conflict, compounded by every administration inheriting the previous guy’s challenges. So, what is the lesson out of all of this tragedy, wasted treasure, and lives?

No president has all the answers, no policy is perfect, and every decision plays off decades of history, mistakes and unintended consequences. Bush attacked Afghanistan post 9/11. Obama tried to stabilize it, Trump negotiated Doha, Biden attempted to execute the withdrawal, and Donald Trump is now again dealing with the fallout at home. Each action created more death, each decision created new risk, and the people most affected – who never asked for it – are usually the collateral damage.

Specialist Beckstrom’s death is heartbreaking, but it also reminds us that our Afghan allies who helped American troops are still in danger. It also reminds us that politics is messy, war is expensive, and most importantly, there are no perfect leaders, no perfect endings, and the choices we make in our elections are never confined to November.

The Afghanistan story is a story of decisions made under pressure, unintended consequences, and human collateral. It’s tragic, expensive and complicated. Above all, it tells us that every election matters and every choice carries a human cost, whether we see it or not. Will we have allies in our next conflict, or will they remember what happened to the Afghans?

Nick Jacobs lives in Windber.