The white flag with its black Arabic lettering flies everywhere in Kabul. The symbol of the Taliban’s triumph flutters on the American Humvees in which long-haired fighters cruise around sporting purloined Oakley sunglasses and M16 rifles; above Aimuddin’s ice-cream shop in the bazaar; atop Wazir Akbar Khan hill.
One year after the takeover it is hard to absorb the fact that 20 years of international efforts to reinvent Afghanistan at a cost of a trillion dollars and tens of thousands of western and Afghan lives lost, led only to the Taliban returning to power.
In and done from now on. No more bothering with “nation building” which seems to be code for plundering the tax payer.
