Three Years Later, a ‘Report Card’ for the Taliban

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW — Three years ago today, Taliban forces marched into Kabul, as American forces were leaving Afghanistan, and a U.S.-backed government collapsed. The moment marked a stunning and humiliating end to the two-decade American mission that was born in the aftermath of the attacks on September 11, 2001, and the return to power of an extremist group that first ruled Afghanistan in the years prior to the September 11 attacks. Those years of Taliban rule were marked by some of the world’s most draconian policies towards women and education, and the sheltering of Osama Bin Laden and his lieutenants who planned the September 11 terror. 

U.S. forces invaded Afghanistan and quickly ousted the Taliban from power. Nearly twenty years later, when the Americans announced their plans to leave, the Taliban began a rout of Afghan cities that culminated in the capture of Kabul on August 15, 2021.