The US invasion of Afghanistan was the first of the ‘Forever Wars’ that followed the declaration of a ‘Global War on Terror’ by US President George W. Bush, after the September 11 2001 attacks in New York, Washington DC, and Pennsylvania.
On October 7 2001, the US, supported by the UK, launched a bombing campaign against the ruling Taliban government in Afghanistan, on the basis of the claim that the Taliban was “harbouring” Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda forces, responsible for the 9/11 attacks. Acting in support of the Northern Alliance and other anti-Taliban forces on the ground, this campaign rapidly led to the defeat of the Taliban and their withdrawal from all major cities. Backed by a UN resolution, a US-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), aimed at establishing and supporting a new Afghan government and preventing the resurgence of the Taliban.
Despite the initial success of the invasion, the US-led occupation of Afghanistan, which from the beginning claimed large numbers of civilian casualties, failed to bring peace to the country. Instead, Afghanistan has become the US’s longest war in its history, while the Afghan people have suffered continuous death and destruction at the hands of all parties: The US, UK, and other international forces, the forces of the new Afghan government, and the Taliban and other opposition armed groups. The Taliban turned to guerrilla warfare, and was able to recover and gain influence over large parts of the country, in spite of a huge ISAF troop presence, which at one point reached over 130,000 troops on the ground from 48 countries, including 90,000 from the US and nearly 10,000 from the UK. Most non-US foreign forces pulled out in 2014, and the US has agreed to withdraw its remaining forces in May 2021 as part of a peace deal with the Taliban signed in 2020. Peace between the resurgent Taliban, the Afghan government, and other armed groups, however, remains a distant prospect.
According to the Brown University Costs of War project, the war in Afghanistan had caused the deaths of 157,000 people by October 2019, including 43,074 civilians, 64,124 forces of the post-2001 Afghan government, 42,100 Taliban and other opposition fighters, 6,118 US military personnel and contractors, 1,145 allied international troops, and 491 humanitarian, NGO, and media workers. A further 3,305 civilians were killed in 2020.
