There is a lesson to be learned from the Washington Post's publication of the "Afghanistan Papers," which chronicle the corruption, ineptitude, dishonesty, and strategic disarray that have marked the Afghanistan war since its earliest days.
Granted, Americans have become used to classifying the Afghanistan war as an afterthought.
Having broken the Afghanistan Papers story, for example, the Post is now complicit in burying it, joining the media frenzy that's elevated President Trump's possible removal from office to the status of story of the century.
The uptick of interest in the Afghanistan war triggered by the Post is already subsiding.
Take seriously the contents of the Afghanistan Papers and you'll reach a different conclusion: we have become a nation given to misusing military power, abusing American soldiers, and averting our gaze from the results.
Since the end of the Cold War and especially since 9/11, U.S. forces have rarely accomplished the purposes for which they are committed, the Pentagon concealing failure by downsizing its purposes.
So the real significance of the Post's Afghanistan Papers is this: t.hey invite Americans to contemplate a particularly vivid example what our misplaced infatuation with military power produces.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/learning-nothing-from-the-ghost-of-congress-past/
Granted, Americans have become used to classifying the Afghanistan war as an afterthought.
Having broken the Afghanistan Papers story, for example, the Post is now complicit in burying it, joining the media frenzy that's elevated President Trump's possible removal from office to the status of story of the century.
The uptick of interest in the Afghanistan war triggered by the Post is already subsiding.
Take seriously the contents of the Afghanistan Papers and you'll reach a different conclusion: we have become a nation given to misusing military power, abusing American soldiers, and averting our gaze from the results.
Since the end of the Cold War and especially since 9/11, U.S. forces have rarely accomplished the purposes for which they are committed, the Pentagon concealing failure by downsizing its purposes.
So the real significance of the Post's Afghanistan Papers is this: t.hey invite Americans to contemplate a particularly vivid example what our misplaced infatuation with military power produces.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/learning-nothing-from-the-ghost-of-congress-past/
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