So Much for a ‘Foreign Policy for the Middle Class’

The fall of Kabul is a major disaster.

It is a major disaster for the people of Afghanistan, who will now have to live under a theocratic regime that suppresses their most basic liberties, ruthlessly punishes dissenters, and . It is a major disaster, in particular, for the tens of thousands of Afghans who helped Western journalists and diplomats in an attempt to build a better country, then looked on in impotence as promises of harbor were shamefully abandoned, and now face the deadly wrath of the Taliban. It is a major disaster for many countries in the region, which will now have to deal with the deeply destabilizing effects of yet another massive refugee crisis. It is a major disaster for the credibility of the West, whose promises to stand up for the safety of allies threatened by authoritarian competitors such as Russia and China will now sound even more hollow. And it is a major disaster for the United States, which will be much less secure now that the Taliban has freed a significant number of al-Qaeda operatives, and may once again allow terrorist groups to establish training grounds in Afghanistan.