There Was No “Secret War on the Truth” in Afghanistan

[rangerrebew]

There Was No “Secret War on the Truth” in Afghanistan
Jon Schroden
December 16, 2019


It’s easy to criticize the American effort in Afghanistan. Among its many shortcomings, Washington has vacillated across numerous ineffective strategies, failed to fully account for the geopolitical constraints of the conflict, and consistently prioritized expediency over effectiveness. But did U.S. officials pervasively lie to the American people about the war? The Washington Post seems to think so, as evidenced by the first sentence of its “Afghanistan Papers” articles published last week: “A confidential trove of government documents … reveals that senior U.S. officials failed to tell the truth about the war in Afghanistan throughout the 18-year campaign, making rosy pronouncements they knew to be false and hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable.” It’s no surprise that the series has gotten a fair amount of attention.

https://warontherocks.com/2019/12/there-was-no-secret-war-on-the-truth-in-afghanistan/

[Maj. Bill Martin]

Thanks for posting that.  I was skeptical myself about the claim of "lies".

Real-time intelligence isn't perfect, and things you thought might be true at one point may be proven wrong two years later.  That doesn't mean that anyone was deceived intentionally.  Also, counter-insurgency wars are notoriously difficult, and ideas/strategies you reasonably believed might succeed sometimes don't.  Making a prediction that turns out not to be correct also isn't a lie.

I truly believe we've done the best we can all along.  It's just very, very difficult.