The U.S. announced recently that they would be formally pulling out of Afghanistan. Immediately its citizens started panicking, while the Taliban started preparing to resume control.
The enduring tragedies of Afghanistan play like a soundtrack to my life. It’s always been there in the background, guiding my emotions and reactions, while going on almost unnoticed by my conscious thoughts.
I know the story well. In 1963 my father left Afghanistan in his 20s despite the promise of a life of ease and status as the youngest and favorite son of a powerful man, nicknamed “The Governor of Ghazni”. He had finished law school in Kabul, even though his father discouraged him from pursuing higher education as his family’s standing ensured his place within the highest tiers of society. That’s not the life my dad wanted though- he was a voracious learner, an academic, and adventurer. To this day the smell of a library or bookstore immediately takes me back to being back by my dad’s side as a little girl as he excitedly searched the stacks for the book or books that most fulfilled the interest or question of that day.
My mom came to join my dad in 1966, immediately following her graduation from medical school. She had graduated high school at 16 and immediately started medical school. In many countries besides the U.S., medical school is a 5 year program started after graduating high school. She was 21 when she earned her M.D. and moved to the U.S. No one seemed to believe she could be a doctor at her age and so for a long time she just told them she was a teacher. My parents were married in Austin, Texas that April. My mom didn’t speak English at all so it took her years to learn enough to take the US exams and pass, but she did, while my dad pursued a PhD in economics, and they slowly began to thrive on their own.
My sister was born in 1974, and suddenly doing it all on their own became very difficult. When she was nearly two years old they did what many foreign parents pursuing rigorous programs in higher education do, they sent her back home to be lovingly cared for by their family until it would be possible for their schedules to better align to care for and financially to support her.
It was supposed to be a relatively brief stay, but the circumstances in Afghanistan started to change quickly. In the lead-up to the Soviets invading, their allies in the country started conducting raids on homes to weed out those in positions of leadership or high regard to lessen the ability of the citizens to form a coalition to defend the country. It was during the Cold War and harboring an American child would put the family at high risk, and put her life in danger. It became too dangerous for my parents to fly there to get her or for anyone in the family to fly her home to the U.S. My sister told me that the soldiers searched the house once and my aunt and uncle told her to hide under the bed. She was maybe three years old and she hid there, alongside my uncle’s rifle, watching the soldier’s boots walking through the room.
In 1979 my mom’s father was taken by force by the Communist party, from his law office. He was a scholar and community leader, and that made him too big of a risk. As an adult I cannot imagine the pain my mother felt being so far from her family and not knowing what had happened. She is the oldest of six, and had been her father’s right hand for much of her youth. As a child though it just became part of the story as if from a make believe land. I had never met my grandfather, and I had never been to Afghanistan. I regret that in my naivety I was not a greater comfort to my mom, but perhaps it was that innocence that was the greatest comfort and distraction to her during what must have been the hardest days of her life.
The dates are hazy but by most accounts my sister ended up staying there for two years. During that time, I was born, a fact that I’m not sure my sister has ever forgiven me for. We do not have much of a relationship now, and she had a tenuous relationship with my parents, especially my dad, for most of her life. The Soviets invaded in 1979 and throughout much of my young childhood, the war was always in the background. It was difficult to get information, and most of the news coverage focused on the Iran/Iraq war. We usually kept a BetaMax tape ready to go and if there happened to be an update on the Afghan war on the evening news one of us would dash to the player and push record just in case there was some information or an image that we wanted to watch again. Slowly during the 80s more and more of my extended family would flee Afghanistan, mostly settling in California and Florida. I finally had that connection to Afghanistan that had been largely absent before then, but even then traveling from Michigan to visit was only something we did every couple of years.
In 1989, when I was 11 years old, the Soviets finally withdrew from Afghanistan. You’d hardly know it happened though in the U.S. In school other kids still had no idea that it was actually a place. They would look at my tan skin and assume I was Indian. I can clearly recall telling a girl on the playground who insisted I was Indian, that I was in fact from Afghanistan (although I was born in Michigan just like her). She said, “Well, Afghanistan must just be a part of India then.”
All of this changed on September 11th, 2001. Suddenly everyone knew exactly where Afghanistan was, and many of those same kids who challenged my ethnicity were now being deployed as young adults to a country I was “from” but had never been. When the U.S. invaded I remember feeling a mixture of concern and relief. In a country where the life expectancy hovered somewhere around 45 many of the citizens had never known Afghanistan not at war. I honestly believe this is a huge contributing factor to the rise of the Taliban- the culture of Afghanistan had been lost after decades of war and they supplanted it with one of their own creation. Much of the country is illiterate- this is not a culture created by the Quran, this is a world created by men given a taste of power after years of turmoil and poverty. Power corrupts, man.
Circumstances had changed significantly in a short period of time- even during the Soviet war women had many freedoms that the Taliban forbade- driving, not wearing scarves, working, education. It is hard to reconcile the images of women under the Taliban with those of my mom and her friends in 1950s and 60s Afghanistan- miniskirts, high heels, beehive hairdos; fashions that could rival any of those found on the streets of Paris or New York.
A U.S. presence returned a semblance of calm to Afghanistan. While the days of high fashion like those of my parents’ youth are unlikely to return for generations, women once again could aspire to achieve. The people of Afghanistan could once again dare to dream. But after all this work, and risk, and cultivating of the seeds of hope, it has all fallen into a memory as the U.S. has undertaken this hasty retreat. Was it all for naught? Is the U.S. just another fallen giant in Afghan lore?
I understand Biden’s position as the only President who is also the father of a veteran in modern American history. America should not be involved in a never-ending war. We should not be spending endless amounts of tax payer funds indefinitely for a military operation. And we should not be risking our soldier’s lives for a military cause whose metrics for success have largely been met. Find and kill Osama Bin Laden, right? Check. But, after 20 years this is the exit strategy? There was no other way? Maybe, extending it over six months instead of a couple weeks? Making sure all sensitive equipment like facial recognition software was secured so that when the Taliban took over they didn’t have at their fingertips an indisputable way of identifying at every checkpoint, anyone who has ever aided the U.S.?
As I was writing this I paused to read the news- a large bomb was detonated in a crowd of people outside the airport attempting to flee, including U.S. citizens. The casualty count is unknown at this time but suspected to be high. An Italian flight was shot at upon take off. All international rescue flights have been ceased. Afghanistan has been abandoned, again.
This Way Maybe 
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