The ‘Graveyard of Empires’ and the American Exit from Afghanistan: the End of the Great Game?

Rudyard Kipling, the prolific writer, prodigy and genius, brought to life the nature and experience of Empire in, what may be called his Magnus opus, Kim. The central character and main protagonist of the novel was Kimball O ‘Hara: an orphaned child of an Irish soldier and an English mother and the novel is built around his adventures. Kipling made the exotic accessible to his readers and weaved a narrative of India –its smells, sights, bazaars, superstitions and backwardness- against the backdrop of , what came to be known as the Great Game- the strategic and political rivalry between contending Imperiums: Great Britain and Tsarist Russia.  The premise of the ‘Great Game’ was the vying for spheres of influence in Central Asia by the British and the Russians respectively. The aim was to forestall Russian influence into what was believed to be the ‘jewel of the crown’ of the British Empire: India. From the convolutions of this Great Game emerged the formulation and what in retrospect is a myth. That is, deeming Afghanistan as the ‘graveyard of Empires.

 It was widely believed that Afghans would never countenance foreign rule and that any foreign venture in Afghanistan was doomed. This myth gained poignancy after the ignominious Soviet defeat and withdrawal from Afghanistan in that momentous and historic year, 1989. Both the ‘Great Game’ formulation and the graveyard of empires myth entered into the political and media lexicon after the United States attacked and invaded Afghanistan as a response to the September 11 attacks. It was held that the United States and its allies had a similar agenda akin to the Great Game protagonists and would meet the same fate as their predecessors did. And now, given the United States, or broadly speaking, the West’s exit from Afghanistan, this prognostication is said to be coming true.

This raises a whole host of questions: Is the current condition of Afghanistan with an imminent American exit an eerie echo of the Great Game? Does the American exit validate the ‘graveyard of Empires’ formulation? Or does the exit forebode disinterest in a crucial state as Afghanistan by western powers? What implications would this have? And what impact would this have on world order, peace and stability?

Profound structural transformations in the international system, structure and world politics have occurred since the inception of the Great Game between Russia and Great Britain.  World War II, for instance,  led to the graveyard or break up of empires and a wave a decolonization that gave short shrift to the concept and practice of empire. It paved the way for structural bipolarity known as the Cold War wherein two superpowers, the United States and the erstwhile USSR , competed for influence and supremacy. This strategic rivalry could be said to have been an echo of the Great Game. However, with the dissolution of the USSR, and the advent of unipolarity,, with the United States at the apex and pinnacle of its power, ended this strategic rivalry. This led to the diminution of Afghanistan in the strategic and political calculus of the sole superpower, the United States. In the process was incubated the Taliban and Al Qaeda. Non state actors became a factot in world politics and Afghanistan morphed into a failed state: an incubatory laboratory for Al Qaeda and global jihad.

This period was characterized by the aberrant condition of unipolarity and western disarray. As such, there were no structural factors or conditions that could have led to the Great game. This then gives short shrift to the notion of the Great Game being played out in the so called ‘graveyard of empires’, Afghanistan. What then accounts for the American, or broadly speaking, Western exit from Afghanistan? Is the west caving into the resistance of the ‘intrepid’ Afghans?

The answer to the both questions is a resounding no. The west’s exit is premised on domestic compulsions, electoral cycle of the United States and fatigue accruing from factors other than attrition or the Afghan resistance. This is pregnant with danger and has immense negative consequences for Afghanistan, the region and the world. Why?

Afghanistan is a failed state and this status has led to insalubrious factors, the salient of which are Pakistan’s meddling into Afghanistan, premised on its ‘strategic depth’ formulation and the country’s morphing into a staging ground for global jihad. Western exit and the attendant disinterest in Afghanistan is likely to recrudescence and recidivism. Forces inimical to peace and Pakistan may , once again, decide to turn Afghanistan into an incubatory laboratory for Jihad nd Afghanistan will once again turn into a global security problem. The question that should be nagging the minds of western powers should be how to pre-empt this outcome.

This would mean continued interest and perhaps even military presence in Afghanistan, with pledges from Pakistan that it would review its strategic depth formulation and not meddle in Afghanistan. Concomitantly, this would also mean taking steps to democratize Afghanistan and enable its economy to stand on its own. The stakes are too high and the alternative too bleak to countenance. Let the hackneyed and in the final analysis, flawed and false ‘Great Game’ formulation give way to the Great Transformation. Afghans deserve this and it is contingent on continued western interest and engagement in Afghanistan.