What Happened in Afghanistan?

Featured in the Fall 2021 Newsletter »

Belfer Center Experts Reflect on U.S. Actions and Impacts

What happened in Afghanistan?

This was the overriding question following the withdrawal of U.S. troops in the war-ridden country on September 11, 2021, following 20 years of American involvement. In four events during October and early November organized by Harvard Kennedy School Dean Douglas Elmendorf, Kennedy School faculty and senior fellows discussed what went wrong (and right) in Afghanistan, how U.S. actions—including the troop withdrawal—impacted the Afghan people and our international relationships, and what lessons we’ve learned or should have learned. A number of Belfer Center experts took part in these discussions to share their reflections.

On October 6, Dean Elmendorf moderated a discussion on Afghanistan in the JFK Jr. Forum with Belfer Center Director and former Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. 

Also in October, the Dean's Chief of Staff Sarah Wald hosted the first of several panels to examine different aspects of U.S. involvement in Afghanistan. Eric Rosenbach, Meghan O’Sullivan, and Farah Pandith—all of whom served in government during some parts of the 20-year war—offered different perspectives on what happened and lessons learned: No easy consensus emerged among experts with decades of combined national security work since 9/11. 

In the second panel in the series, panelists examined why Afghanistan fell to the Taliban and suggested next steps to increase stability. The Belfer Center’s Zoe Marks, along with HKS faculty members Ricardo Hausman and Asim Khwaja, responded to the question of what’s next for Afghanistan: In a discussion as varied as the panelists, a few hopeful themes emerged from an evaluation of how Afghanistan might move forward

The final panel in the series looked at whether the withdrawal of forces was a wise or unwise policy decision. The three Belfer Center-affiliated experts—Graham Allison, Stephen Walt, and Kathryn Sikkink—all argued that while the pullout was messy, it was the right thing to do: Three senior foreign affairs analysts challenge the common view that U.S. credibility was undermined by military departure from Kabul

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These Afghanistan series articles are courtesy of the Harvard Kennedy School Office of Communications and Public Affairs.