{"id":192526,"date":"2021-08-23T12:01:16","date_gmt":"2021-08-23T11:01:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=192526"},"modified":"2021-08-21T08:30:48","modified_gmt":"2021-08-21T07:30:48","slug":"as-kabul-is-retaken-papers-look-back-in-erasure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2021\/08\/as-kabul-is-retaken-papers-look-back-in-erasure\/","title":{"rendered":"As Kabul Is Retaken, Papers Look Back in Erasure"},"content":{"rendered":"

19 Aug 2021 – <\/em>Corporate media coverage of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan and the collapse of the country\u2019s US-backed government has offered audiences more mystification than illumination. I looked at editorials in five major US dailies following the Taliban\u2019s retaking of Kabul: the Boston Globe<\/b>, LA Times<\/b>, New York Times<\/b>, Wall Street Journal<\/b> and Washington Post<\/b>. The editorial boards of these papers consistently trivialized South Asian lives, erased US responsibility for lethal violence, and made untenable assertions about Washington\u2019s supposedly righteous motives in the war.<\/p>\n

Uncounted civilian cost<\/b><\/h3>\n
\"NYT:<\/p>\n

The New York Times<\/strong> (8\/15\/21<\/a>) ran the next best thing to a photo of a helicopter taking off from the Kabul embassy roof: a photo of a helicopter flying over the embassy roof.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The editorials evince a callous indifference to the toll of the war on civilians in Afghanistan and Pakistan, where the war has also been fought. The New York Times<\/b> (8\/15\/21<\/a>) referred to \u201cat least 2,448 American service members\u2019 lives lost in Afghanistan,\u201d and to \u201cAfghan casualties so huge\u201460,000 killed since 2001<\/a>, by one estimate\u2014that the government kept them a secret.\u201d The link makes clear that the authors are talking about deaths among Afghan police and soldiers. Yet, as of April, more than 71,000 civilians<\/a>\u2014over 47,000 Afghans and more than 24,000 Pakistanis\u2014have been directly killed in the US-initiated war.<\/p>\n

The Boston<\/b> Globe<\/b>\u2019s piece (8\/16\/21<\/a>) described \u201ctwo decades of the United States propping up Afghan forces to keep the Taliban at bay at the cost of more than $2 trillion and more than 2,400 lost military service members.\u201d Tens of thousands of dead Afghan and Pakistani civilians evidently aren\u2019t significant enough to factor into \u201cthe cost\u201d of the war.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe war in Afghanistan took the lives of more than 2,400 American troops,\u201d said the Los Angeles Times<\/b> editorial (8\/16\/21<\/a>), which went on to add, \u201cFor decades to come, America will be paying the medical bills of veterans suffering from the emotional and physical toll of their trauma and injuries.\u201d The authors ignored dead, wounded and psychologically scarred South Asian civilians, though the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) logged 3,524 civilian injuries<\/a> in the first half of 2021 alone, and 5,785<\/a> in 2020.<\/p>\n

The Wall Street Journal<\/b> (8\/15\/21<\/a>, 8\/16\/21<\/a>), meanwhile, didn\u2019t mention any deaths that took place during the war.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome 66,000 Afghan fighters have given their lives<\/a> in this war during the past 20 years, alongside 2,448 US service members,\u201d the Washington Post<\/b> (8\/16\/21<\/a>) pointed out, declining to spare a word for noncombatants. US troops, the article assured readers, \u201cendured very modest casualties, since 2014,\u201d without noting that the US inflicted a great many on Afghan civilians in that period: For instance, a 2019 Human Rights Watch report noted<\/a> that, in the first six months of that year, the US and its partners in what was then the Afghan government killed more civilians than the Taliban did.<\/p>\n

Forever war > withdrawal<\/b><\/h3>\n
\"WaPo:<\/p>\n

The \u201cAfghan debacle\u201d was \u201cavoidable,\u201d the Washington Post<\/strong> (8\/16\/21<\/a>) argued, if only Biden had been willing to commit to an indefinite military occupation.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Two of the editorials were clear that they would prefer continuous US war against Afghanistan to withdrawal. The Washington Post<\/b> (8\/16\/21<\/a>) claimed that<\/p>\n

a small US and allied military presence\u2014capable of working with Afghan forces to deny power to the Taliban and its Al Qaeda terrorist allies, while diplomats and nongovernmental organizations nurtured a fledgling civil society\u2014not only would have been affordable, but also could have paid for itself in US security and global credibility.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Costs such as the harm the \u201cUS and allied military presence\u201d does to Afghans did not enter into the Post<\/b>\u2019s accounting for \u201caffordability.\u201d No explanation is offered as to why Afghans should endure the lack of \u201csecurity\u201d entailed in \u201cUS and allied\u201d bombs falling on their heads. Nor did the authors clarify why the US\u2019s \u201cglobal credibility\u201d is a higher priority than, say, stopping the US from killing Afghan children<\/a>, as it did last October.<\/p>\n

The Wall Street Journal<\/b> (8\/15\/21<\/a>) professed concern for the \u201cthousands of translators, their families, and other officials who are in peril from Taliban rule and didn\u2019t get out in time,\u201d and said that what it sees as the impending \u201cmurder of these innocents\u201d will be a \u201cstain on the Biden presidency.\u201d Yet the authors argued that the US should continue bombing Afghanistan indefinitely, asserting that<\/p>\n

Afghans were willing to fight and take casualties with the support of the US and its NATO allies, especially airpower. A few thousand troops and contractors could have done the job and prevented this rout.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Over the course of the war, that airpower tended to mean the mass death of Afghan civilians: In 2019, for example, US airstrikes killed 546 of them (Washington Post<\/b>, 9\/4\/21<\/a>). In advocating the continued American bombing of Afghanistan to stop the \u201cmurder of these innocents,\u201d the authors are calling for the \u201cmurder of\u2026innocents,\u201d just by the US rather than the Taliban.<\/p>\n

The \u2018American dream\u2019<\/b><\/h3>\n
\"LAT:<\/p>\n

The Los Angeles Times<\/strong> (8\/16\/21<\/a>) praised the US\u2019s \u201cnoble hopes to build a multiparty democracy,\u201d insisting that \u201cthe people of Afghanistan were failed by their leaders.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The New York Times<\/b>\u2019 editorial board (8\/15\/21<\/a>) gushed about the purity of US values, saying that the Taliban\u2019s return to power is<\/p>\n

unutterably tragic. Tragic because the American dream of being the \u201cindispensable nation\u201d in shaping a world where the values of civil rights, women\u2019s empowerment and religious tolerance rule proved to be just that: a dream.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The editors did nothing to explain how they square their view that the US\u2019s \u201cdream\u201d entails worldwide \u201ccivil rights\u201d and \u201cwomen\u2019s empowerment\u201d with the US\u2019s carrying out torture in Afghanistan<\/a> or its propensity<\/a> for killing Afghan women (Guardian<\/b>, 7\/11\/08<\/a>).<\/p>\n

The board went on:<\/p>\n

How [the war] evolved into a two-decade nation-building project in which as many as 140,000 troops under American command were deployed at one time is a story of mission creep and hubris, but also of the enduring American faith in the values of freedom and democracy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That faith in \u201cfreedom\u201d was manifest by such practices as training warlords who killed and abused civilians<\/a>, and propping up an Afghan state that included officials who sexually assaulted children\u2014actions that US troops were told to ignore, as the New York Times<\/b> (9\/21\/15<\/a>) itself reported.<\/p>\n

Similarly, the Los Angeles Times<\/b> (8\/16\/21<\/a>) claimed that<\/p>\n

the US and its Western allies had noble hopes to build a multiparty democracy\u2014with respect for the rights of women and minorities, an independent judiciary and a new constitution\u2014but nation-building was not an appropriate goal.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s anyone\u2019s guess how the paper reconciles the US and its partners\u2019 \u201cnoble hopes\u201d for such things as \u201crespect for the rights of women\u201d with the US working with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan to finance and arm extremely conservative forces in Afghanistan, so as to undermine progressives in the country while strengthening reactionary elements, a history (described in Robert Dreyfuss\u2019 book Devil\u2019s Game<\/i><\/a>) that all of the editorials obscure.<\/p>\n

Swallowing official justifications<\/b><\/h3>\n
\"WSJ:<\/p>\n

The Wall Street Journal<\/strong> (8\/15\/21<\/a>) argued that Mr. Trump\u2019s withdrawal deadline was a mistake, but Mr. Biden could have maneuvered around it\u201d\u2014meaning he could have ignored it.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Indeed, the editorials suffered from a basic failure to question the official justifications offered for the war and occupation. The New York<\/b> Times<\/b> editorial board (8\/15\/21<\/a>) wrote that<\/p>\n

the war in Afghanistan began in response by the United States and its NATO allies to the attacks of September 11, 2001, as an operation to deny Al Qaeda sanctuary in a country run by the Taliban.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There\u2019s no place in that narrative for the fact that eight days into the war, in October 2001, the Taliban offered to discuss turning over Osama Bin Laden (Guardian<\/b>, 10\/14\/01<\/a>). The Journal<\/b> characterized the Taliban as \u201cthe jihadists the US toppled 20 years ago for sheltering Osama bin Laden.\u201d But it was in mid-November 2001 (Guardian<\/b>, 11\/17\/01<\/a>) that the US toppled the Taliban, a month after they had said they were willing to talk about extraditing bin Laden.<\/p>\n

In the same vein, the Los Angeles Times<\/b> editorial (8\/16\/21<\/a>) said that<\/p>\n

after the US ousted the Taliban\u2014which had hosted the Al Qaeda terrorist network and refused to turn over terrorists such as Osama bin Laden \u2014 the George W. Bush administration expanded the goals of the mission in ways that in hindsight were never realistic.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This phrasing implies that the US overthrew the Taliban because they \u201crefused to turn over terrorists such as Osama bin Laden.\u201d However, in addition to the Taliban signaling that it could be open to extraditing the Al Qaeda leader in October 2001, according to a former head of Saudi intelligence (LA Times<\/b>, 11\/4\/01<\/a>), the Taliban said in 1998 that it would hand over bin Laden to Saudi Arabia, the US\u2019s close ally; the Saudi intelligence official says that the Taliban backed off after the US fired cruise missiles at an apparent bin Laden camp in Afghanistan and a pharmaceutical factory in Sudan, following attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania attributed to Al Qaeda.<\/p>\n

The outlets thus failed to inform their readers that, had the US pursued negotiations for bin Laden\u2019s extradition, Afghans may have been spared 20 years of devastating war. That US planners might have drawn up their Afghanistan policies with a view to the country\u2019s vast resource wealth and strategic position\u2014and there\u2019s evidence that they did (In These Times<\/b>, 8\/1\/18<\/a>)\u2014is not a perspective that the editorials opted to share with their readers. Neither is the idea that the US doesn\u2019t have the right to decide who governs other countries.<\/p>\n

Engineering forgetfulness about America\u2019s Afghan war, if left unchallenged, will make it easier to wage the next one.<\/p>\n

__________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Gregory Shupak teaches media studies at the University of Guelph-Humber in Toronto. His book, <\/em>The Wrong Story: Palestine, Israel and the Media<\/a>, is published by OR Books.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 fair.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

19 Aug 2021 – Corporate media coverage of the US withdrawal from Afghanistan offered more mystification than illumination. I looked at editorials in five major US dailies: the Boston Globe, LA Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. Their editorial boards consistently trivialized South Asian lives, erased US responsibility for lethal violence, and made untenable assertions about Washington\u2019s supposedly righteous motives in the war.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":112002,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[93,2314,1748,378,1855,484,1365],"class_list":["post-192526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media","tag-afghanistan","tag-corporate-media","tag-fake-report","tag-journalism","tag-mainstream-media-msm","tag-taliban","tag-war-journalism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/112002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}