Real images of the US troops flying out without informing anybody from the Bagram airbase are not exactly heroic, despite their romanticised look

Numbers of 300,000 trained and well-equipped Afghan soldiers, up against a ragtag militia of 75,000-odd Talibanis, are bandied with the additional element of considerable airpower at the Afghan Military’s disposal. To rub in the humiliation, even the essentially clueless Joe Biden commented: “The Afghan military gave up, sometimes without trying to fight.” While the bleak commentary on Afghan troops is true, however, the spin doctors in Washington DC have successfully managed to deflect the much-needed criticism of the performance of the world’s most powerful military against a motley militia — despite the $2 trillion bill, nearly 2500 American soldiers returning in body bags, and the unprecedented access to all forms of military wherewithal, air cover and unanswerable military conduct. When the din and dust on Afghanistan under the Taliban does settle, serious questions on the performance and psyche of the American soldier will be awkwardly unavoidable and embarrassing, just as it has been so for the Afghan Army soldier.

Never mind the actual reality of Vietnam earlier or Afghanistan today (as, indeed, many failures in between), the creatively posited virility, ‘heart’ and moral purpose of the quintessential American Rambos dominate the popular imagination. This manufactured reel-life stories tell the tale that the ignorant public wants to believe, not necessarily accept. The pioneer “American spirit” that tamed the wilderness of tropical rainforests and soggy rice fields in Vietnam, to the dustbowl swirls around the sun-baked Afghan swathes, is deceptively charming, but often incomplete. Real images of the fleeing Americans escaping clumsily in a helicopter from rooftops in Saigon or that of American troops flying out without informing anybody from Bagram Airforce Station, are not exactly in the mould of Captain America!

This sophistry of perception creation owes a lot to Reganism-era which rescued, resuscitated and reconstructed the image for the battered American soldier, after the defeat in Vietnam. By the 1990s, during the Gulf Wars, gestures like flag pins, saying “Thank you for your service”, parades and yellow-ribbon symbolism had become the societal norm, and the shift was palpable as the Vietnam Veterans earlier had not been showered with the same fervour, dignity and fanfare coming home from a war that they had clearly lost. The bill for the Vietnam war (like for Afghanistan now) had been prohibitive and the economic consequences of the same were felt by the entire citizenry — the inevitability of the same with the recent Afghan war, with an estimated payout of $6.5 trillion by 2050 in terms of just the cost of interest towards borrowed money for Afghanistan operations will haunt and pinch for long. What the US got for its military operations in 20 years is the shameful return of the “enemy” even before the last American troop had flown away. Special permissions are believed to have been sought from the Taliban to ensure the safe passage of the retreating American soldiers! Unquestionably, the American Military is defeated once again, this time by the disorderly assemblage of the incongruously armed and trained Taliban militia.

Authoritarian countries like China or Pakistan have their own suppressive and repressive formulas to hide their failures and myth-make their Military’s prowess by simply denying the truth. While the 1962 Indo-China war is a reality, but so was inglorious fate of the Chinese Military in 1967 (Nathu La and Cho La clashes) just as it did not own up to its losses in Galwan Valley recently, till almost a year later! The Sino-Vietnamese War (1979) that led to a spectacular performance from the numerically and materially inferior Vietnamese forces is brushed aside in the Chinese narrative. In Pakistan, despite the repeated disgrace of the 1965 Indo-Pak war, even worse fate in 1971 and the more recent Kargil war, the bloated and over-entitled Pakistani Military remains beyond questioning. Murmurs of sub-optimal performance aside, no one can openly doubt the Pakistani Military as it controls all the essential levers of governance and perception management.

In 2021, the post-Afghanistan optics and perceptions of the American Soldier will require a lot more than just Hollywood productions, Congressional bravado or flag-waving ceremonies — hard questions will follow and daily images of the turbaned Taliban mocking its might will impact the institution of the US Military, psychologically and permanently. America’s longest war (Afghanistan) and its second longest war (Vietnam), as also its unsettled status in the Middle Eastern theatre, will be in sharp contrast to the glories of the “Greatest Generation” of World War II, or the soon thereafter Korean War. The hollowness of George Bush’s Texan drawl at the joint session of the US Congress 20 years ago, before sending the American troops to Afghanistan, “The course of this conflict is not known, yet its outcome is certain”, will haunt and traumatise the American soldier and national conscience immeasurably. The entire edifice of the US Military from its intelligence assessment, firepower, planning, cutting-edge technology to the ‘GI Joe’ imagery will be shattered beyond immediate repair.

(The writer, a military veteran, is a former Lt Governor of Andaman & Nicobar Islands and Puducherry. The views expressed are personal.)