Afghanistan War Objectives

In Understanding The U.S. Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, edited by Beth Bailey and Richard Immerman, the work analyzes the United States objectives in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. These wars were crucial to American international relations and foreign policy. It examines the period of war whose outcome has been unknown for decades. Despite some wins and losses, the lasting effects of the war is relatively unknown. Evidence shows that the United States had success in meeting their objectives of toppling the Taliban government and destroying Al Qaeda, but had a difficult time rebuilding and stabilizing the Afghanistan government, because of corruption, security, and drugs.
As I mentioned in my introduction, The United States achieved their initial objectives. The main objective of ending the Taliban government and destroying Al Qaeda. The Taliban had fled to Pakistan, which for the remainder of the war, gave them no control over the structure of Afghanistan’s government. After destroying Al Qaeda’s bases, they were left with no network of organization in Afghanistan. Finally taking out one of Al Qaeda’s main leaders, Osama Bin …show more content…
The government being one of the main areas. Creating a stable government looks to be nearly impossible, “from political alliances with warlords and malign power brokers to incentives for corruption” (page 112). Currently, the government is extremely autocratic. Autocracy is a form of dictatorship. Meaning the ruler has absolute power, therefore the citizens have zero say in the way government it run. The president has the task of appointing all provincial governors and all 400 district governors. The United States thought taking out Al Qaeda would change the way the government ran things. Instead, Afghanistan is now worse off. Calling corruption, a challenge or a problem, is an extreme underestimate of the problem at hand. Corruption influences nearly everyone living in the