The United States demanded that Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar “deliver to [the] United States authorities all the leaders of al-Qaeda who hide in your land” immediately following the September 11, 2001, bombings of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Officials in the United States began implementing a war plan when he refused.
The United States began with a covert campaign that collaborated with Pashtuns opposed to the Taliban and the Northern Alliance.American and CIA agents were joined by British special forces.
When the United States began a bombing campaign against the Taliban on October 7, 2001, the covert campaign became open.
The Northern Alliance’s troops marched into Kabul on November 13. In the final days of November 2001, Taliban leaders began to communicate with Hamid Karzai, who would soon take over as Afghanistan’s interim President: They had a deal in mind.
“The Taliban were defeated completely; Barnett Rubin, who was a member of the United Nations’ political team in Afghanistan at the time, said, “They had no demands, other than amnesty.”
However, the United States refused.
On December 6, 2001, Kandahar, the biggest city in Southern Afghanistan, fell, which successfully finished Taliban control of the country.
The United States of America then launched a significant search for Osama Bin Laden.He was thought to be near Pakistan’s border.Bora Bora was attacked by Afghani troops in December 2001, but Bin Ladin evaded capture.
In the eastern province of Paktia, a significant battle known as operation Anaconda took place in March 2002. It was the first battle in which forces from other NATO nations participated.
It appeared as though victory had been achieved. Then, on May 1, 2003, Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense of the United States, said that “major combat” in Afghanistan would end.
At the time, 8,000 US soldiers were stationed in Afghanistan.The first free election was held on October 9, 2004, and 80% of those who opposed the election chose Hamid Karzai to be Afghanistan’s president.
However, Karzai was thought to be a weak leader, and efforts to build the country were hindered by corruption.
In 2005, the Taliban came back, this time following the Iraqi insurgents’ lead. However, they used suicide bombers and IEDs (improvised explosive devices) rather than directly attacking U.S. troops. 64 suicide attacks were committed in Afghanistan between January 2005 and August 2006.
Those attacks kept getting worse. In Baghlan in November 2007, 70 people, many of them children, were killed.
During his campaign, President Obama promised to end the bad war in Iraq and focus more on the good war in Afghanistan.
In addition to the 36,000 U.S. troops and 32,000 NATO service members already stationed there, he approved the deployment of an additional 17,000 U.S. troops on February 17, 2009.
The surge’s objective was to provide enough troops to take control of Afghanistan’s territories and persuade Taliban fighters to switch sides.A victory over the Taliban in the Marja region of the southern province of Helmand at the beginning of 2010 marked the beginning of the surge.
However, Obama’s initial increases were insufficient to meet the objective, and soon 100,000 troops were stationed in Afghanistan.The Afghan government and the Obama administration attempted to negotiate with the Taliban but were unsuccessful.
U.S. casualties significantly increased as a result of the troop increase, reaching 496 in 2010 and 412 in 2011. Osama Bin Laden, said to be the terrorist leader and responsible for the 9/11 attacks on the United States, was discovered and killed by American forces in Pakistan in May 2011.
In June of 2011, Obama made the announcement that the gradual withdrawal of U.S. forces, including 30,000 soldiers, would begin by the end of the year.
At this point, tensions existed between American troops and the Afghans, who were conducting overnight raids and taking prisoners. In March and April of 2012, the governments of the United States and Afghanistan reached agreements that addressed both issues.
In May 2014, an arrangement was arrived at that predetermined that the U.S. what’s more, NATO would keep on supporting the Afghan government after battle assembles left 2014. At the end of September 2014, Ashraf Ghani took office as the next president.
He fulfilled his obligation to President Karzai by signing the bilateral security agreement.
On December 28, 2014, the U.S. and NATO formally ended their combat mission in Afghanistan, but they continued to support and train Afghan troops with a smaller force of approximately 13,000 troops.
In February 2020, the Trump administration reached a withdrawal agreement with the Taliban that did not include the Afghan government; The agreement stipulated that the Afghan government had to release 5,000 Taliban soldiers who had been imprisoned and set a certain withdrawal date of May 1, 2021.
Additionally, the Taliban were required to end all ties with Al Qaeda as part of the agreement that was negotiated by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
Even though the Taliban continued to attack Afghan government forces and welcomed al-Qaeda terrorists into the leadership of the Taliban, the Trump administration adhered to the agreement and reduced the number of U.S. troops from approximately 13,000 to 2,500.
At the point when President Joe Biden became President, he ended the withdrawal briefly, and after a survey, set another date:for the complete withdrawal in September 2021.
The Taliban increased their attacks beginning in May 2021 as American and NATO troops withdrew.85 people, mostly students, were killed when a bomb went off at a school in Kabul on May 8, 2021.
The United States withdrew from one of Kandahar’s largest airbases over the course of the month.In the northern provinces, the Taliban seize districts, forcing the government to withdraw.
The border crossing at Shir Khan Bandar, which controls the border with Tajikistan, was taken over by the Taliban on June 22.The United States and NATO will leave Bagram airbase on July 2, which has been the hub of American activities in the country.
The Taliban then take control of Islam Qala, Iran’s largest border crossing, on July 9.The capture of Spin Boldak, a point of entry into Pakistan, occurs on July 14.
The Taliban kill the head of the government media center in Kabul on August 6.They take Zaranj, their first provincial capital, without fighting on the same day.
The provincial capitals of Kunduz, Sheberghan, Sar-e-Pul, Taloqan, Aibak, and Farah all fall to the Taliban on August 8 and 9.
The Taliban also took Pul-e-Khumri and Faizabad on August 11.On August 12, the Taliban finally take Herat and Ghazni.
The Taliban take the southern city of Kandahar without a fight on August 13.
Asadabad, Gardez, and Mazar-i-Sharif all surrender to the Taliban without a fight on August 14.
The Taliban take Jalalabad on Sunday morning, August 15.There was only Kabul left.In early in the day, Afghani President Ghani escapes the capital and the country.
Afghan security personnel appear to vanish from the capital after Ghani’s departure. The Taliban offer the United States the option of maintaining security in Kabul, but the United States decides to allow the Taliban to occupy the city.
United States Central Command Commander General Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr. had met with Taliban leaders in Qatar to reach a deal in which the Taliban promised to keep the airport open for American, foreign, and Afghani passengers until August 31.
The evacuation of the American embassy in Kabul’s downtown began immediately. To get to the airport, the United States used helicopters and a convoy on land.
At the same time, Hamid Karzai International Airport was completely taken over by the United States, and the United States air force was in charge of controlling air traffic.
In addition, the United States sent 6,000 additional troops to the airport to maintain control. At first, the airport was in a state of chaos, with crowds congregating on the runway.
A C-17 was surrounded by people who attempted to prevent the plane from abandoning them, providing a symbolic representation of the events.As the plane ascended, two young people fell to their deaths after climbing into the wheel hub.
On August 17, evacuation flights resumed following a chaotic day in which all flights were halted.By August 23, the allies had reached more than 21,000 evacuees in a single day after dozens of large transports started landing every day within a few days.
On August 26, ISIL-K suicide bombers detonated a bomb near the airport’s Abbey Gate.18 people were wounded and 13 members of the U.S. military were killed.Additionally, more than 150 Afghans were wounded and 130 died.
The British ended their efforts that day, and by the 29th of August, the evacuations had begun to slow down. The last American evacuation flights took place on August 30 and the American soldiers who had been brought in to provide security were evacuated.
Security personnel from Afghanistan were among the last to be evacuated, and their families who had been working with the United States were flown out. During the two-week effort, more than 122,000 individuals were evacuated from the airport.
Major General Chris Donahue, commanding general of the 82nd Airborne Division, was the last individual to board the final C-17.The C-17 took off at 11:59 p.m. local time. After 2,361 Americans made the ultimate sacrifice, the war was over, and the Taliban regained control of Afghanistan.
