In this episode we’re discussing the withdrawal of U.S troops from Afghanistan and how that will affect India and more broadly, what it means for the region around us. U.S. president Joe Biden has declared that he will withdraw all remaining U.S troops from Afghanistan by September 11. It's been 20 years since the terror attack on U.S. soil that precipitated their war in Afghanistan. Biden has said that the U.S. cannot continue to pour resources into an intractable war and expect different results and it does appear there is significant political support in America for ending these forever wars that the U.S is engaged in in the middle east.
At the same time, in the intervening years, Afghanistan has only become a more complicated place. The peace process has been a long and messy affair and several threads of it remain unresolved, with the possibility very high now that the Taliban could be back in the ascendancy. And while the US may be leaving, that would leave the region in a rather worrying state of flux and instability. What does this all mean for India as we move forward? We will alternate in this episode between giving you a broader context on the withdrawal of troops and the peace process as a whole and discussing the reasons why this should be of particular concern now to India.
Guest: Suhasini Haidar, National and Diplomatic Affairs Editor, The Hindu
Stanly Johny, International Affairs Editor, The Hindu