THE US ruling class and its leader President Trump (allegedly much versed in the ‘art of the deal’) are now up to their necks in the Afghan quagmire.
They have discovered, as the British imperialists did before them, that it is much easier to get your armed forces into Afghanistan than it is to get them out after a failed military intervention.
The Afghan people value and have great pride in their independence and have always shown, and continue to show, the maximum hostility to all invaders, whom they have always trapped in Afghanistan during their respective occupations before being either destroyed completely or forced to make an unseemly run for it.
In an interview on Sunday, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that the Taliban had ‘tried to gain negotiating advantage by conducting terror attacks inside the country.’ A shaken Pompeo said: ‘We’re going to walk away from a deal if others try to use violence to achieve better ends in a negotiation.’
However, Pompeo and other administration officials left the door open to a resumption of negotiations, and so did the Taliban. But any new talks may not happen for several months as both sides feel mutual distrust, Afghan officials said. In fact, it will take some time for the US ruling class to get over its latest humiliation!
Despite criticism from several fellow Republicans, including national security adviser John Bolton, Trump has promised to reduce the number of American forces in Afghanistan, saying two weeks ago that their numbers would come down to 8,600 from the current level of about 14,000 – far below the 100,000 troops that were based there during the height of the war.
Hours after Trump called off the secret Camp David meeting on Sunday, Secretary of State Pompeo insisted on NBC that ‘it was appropriate to have the Taliban set foot on Camp David.’
However, the reports of the aborted secret meeting forced a backlash from Republicans. Wyoming Republican Representative Liz Cheney tweeted that ‘no member of the Taliban should set foot’ on Camp David ‘ever’.
‘Never should leaders of a terrorist organisation that hasn’t renounced 9/11 and continues in evil be allowed in our great country. NEVER. Full stop,’ said Illinois Republican Representative Adam Kinzinger.
This was opposed by Pompeo. He declared: ‘The president ultimately made the decision that if we could get that, if we could get commitments and then put in place a verification regime that would give us confidence that we could observe that those commitments were being honoured, that it was a useful effort to try and get all of those parties in one place so that we could have serious conversations about how to reduce America’s risk so that there won’t be other secretaries of state that have to travel to Dover to go see these amazing American heroes who have given so much for our country.’
The Trump administration declined on Sunday to rule out a withdrawal of American troops without a peace accord. The truth of the matter is that the US imperialists will have to make a run for it without a treaty or a deal.
The Afghans will rejoice at the humiliation they have inflicted on the US ruling class. It is clear from this latest episode of US weakness that US imperialism cannot carry out another land war in Asia after the Vietnam and now the Afghan defeats.
The US working class must now take advantage of the weaknesses of US capitalism to bring it down, starting with the Trump regime.
The US trade unions must set up a Labour Party that fights for socialism and a US section of the Fourth International to lead that struggle.
Workers all over the world can now see the feet of clay of the imperialists. The time has come for the working people of the world and the oppressed nations to come together and unite to smash capitalism and imperialism.
The working class in the capitalist states must decide that its enemy is at home, and press forward to smash capitalism and imperialism at its source.
Then humanity will indeed be free!
