By: Kayhan Int’l Staff Writer

During a visit to Afghanistan this week, U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis said "it’s going to be a tough year” for America’s longest war.
"A tough year” goes without saying in the U.S. war on Afghanistan, and is really an understatement, with the Taliban’s mounting gains across the country giving it control of more territory than at any time since the 2001 U.S. invasion, and the Pentagon regime sending more troops to try to slow the losses from ISIL and Taliban attacks.
Notwithstanding, it is time to end the longest war in U.S. history. Begun less than a month after the 9/11 attacks, the war aimed to destroy the Al-Qaeda network led by Osama bin Laden and take out the Taliban government that had provided them with safe haven. President Bush’s focus, however, was anything but narrow: "Our war on terror begins with Al-Qaeda, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated.”
After 16 years, there are few genuine successes war-party Washington can claim as validation for its efforts. While an American withdrawal won’t remedy the problems of Afghanistan entirely, there’s good evidence to suggest its continued presence is making things worse.
After 16 years of death and destruction, not to mention billions of dollars down the drain, the warmongers have to admit the military option is not working. Their bogus war on terror in Afghanistan has not made that country better off or the world safer.
Nor is that all. The warmongers must recognize that an American military presence and constant war undermine humanitarian and reconstruction efforts. In Afghanistan, as elsewhere, U.S. military occupation and regime change have led to deliberate, some unintended, terrible consequences.
War-party Washington mustn’t forget this truth. They are responsible forever for what they have done to Afghanistan. They are responsible for its destruction and chaos – just as they are responsible for the ongoing bloodshed in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen. They have to stop complaining about the "malign influence” of Russia in Afghanistan or the "malign influence” of Iran in Iraq, Syria and Yemen.
They should also refute allegations of Russia shipping weapons to the Taliban or Iran shipping weapons to the Houthis. They offer no evidence that this is the case, and not any plausible reason why Iran and Russia would conceivably do this, as they are fighting materially the same foreign-backed insurgency and terrorism in Syria and Iraq.
As is, the United States and its allies have caused evil to Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and Yemen, not only by their actions but by their inaction, and in either case they are justly accountable to these unfortunate nations for the injury. Moreover, Iran and Russia have had nothing to do with this never-ending mess. If they are trying to clear it, it is because they have to. The United States and its allies never allow the international community, chiefly the United Nations, to step in and fix these problems. For the warmongers the show must go on – not for Iran and Russia, which want peace and security both for themselves and their neighbors.
As per international law, nothing is wrong with that. But everything is wrong with the United States and it endless war on the Muslim world on the pretext of fighting terror. The world community’s higher souls can do anything, if their higher will is present.