As the U.S. removes its significant diplomatic and military presence in Afghanistan, a nearly 20-year-old bandage has been ripped off causing many to deal with some old wounds.
Some are the people who remember the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. and how it led to the war in Afghanistan.
For those who remember, and are still scarred by the end of the Vietnam War, the bandage is more than 45 years old, but those scars have come back just the same.
For the friends and family members of the nearly 2,500 U.S. service members killed during Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, our nation’s longest war, this also hurts.
But let’s not also forget, according to the Associated Press, these numbers of people also lost in Afghanistan: Almost 4,000 U.S. contractors, more than 400 aid workers, more than 1,000 other allied service members, 72 journalists, and also 66,000 Afghan national military and police, more the 45,000 Afghan civilians, and more than 50,000 Taliban and other opposition fighters: 51,191.
A lot of people lost their lives during the conflict in Afghanistan in the past nearly 20 years.
After all that, we’re leaving Afghanistan. I don’t know if the mission was “accomplished,” but apparently it’s done.
Dealing with memories
As I watched the news coverage of the “fall” of Kabul and the Taliban taking control of the capital city and Afghanistan as a whole, I realized we’re nearing the 20th anniversary of said 9/11 attacks.
The obligatory memories emerged of being a senior in high school on September 11, 2001, hearing the principal announce over the PA of a plane hitting one of the World Trade Center towers, hearing from another teacher one classroom over that a plane had hit the Pentagon, and spending most of the remaining day in school watching the continuing news coverage.
Later that day, there were the long automobile lines at the gas station, the Hollywood-esque newspaper front pages looking like something out of a disaster movie, and a general uncertainty over what was next.
The world was changing and I didn’t fully realize it at the time. The average teenager goes through a lot of changes during those late teen years. It’s hard to grasp what’s a life change and what’s a world change.
But for a brief moment, I was mentally back when this all started. Was this really going to be how this whole thing ends 20 years later?
Moving on
From 9/11 to now, a lot of things have gone wrong.
Any world leaders whose plans included such acts of death, destruction, fear, chaos, and inhumanity should lose their positions of power as soon as humanly possible.
What kind of a people are we if what is going on right now is the best we can do?
Is anybody better off than we were nearly 20 years ago?
At this moment in history, everyone, on all sides, has a choice, make things better or make things worse.
How soon can we move on from a blame game, realize there are serious situations to consider, and strive to improve those situations?
A lot of wrong has been done. Let us not continue making the same mistakes.
Let us pray
Most of us cannot do anything directly to improve the situations in Afghanistan or in the U.S. The best thing we can do right now is to pray.
Let us pray for all of the citizens of Afghanistan whose lives will face some new challenges.
Let us pray for the new leaders of Afghanistan that they will open their hearts to leading with actions that promote the common good.
Let us pray for our leaders here that their actions are truly reflecting goals for the common good.
Let us pray for the U.S. citizens who are coming home, or have come home from Afghanistan and are forever changed.
Let us pray for those friends and family members of those who were lost in Afghanistan and are also forever changed.
Let us pray for the world and everyone else affected by the last 20 years and those who will be affected by what is yet to come.
Let us pray.