Panel faults media, military after screening of Afghanistan documentary, Sept 6

Panelists shared insights on the Afghan government's collapse despite the Pentagon's twenty-year nation-building and military investment, after a screening of FRONTLINE's conclusion of their three-part series, "America and the Taliban,"  Sept. 6.

The third installment covers the U.S. withdrawal and how the Taliban seized provincial capitols, leading to former President Ashraf Ghani's escape and the Taliban's ultimate control of the country -- all in a matter of weeks.

"Nobody believed it would fall overnight," said Roya Rahmani in the documentary. A panel member,  she is the first Afghan woman to serve as Ambassador to Indonesia and currently is a distinguished fellow at Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security.

Martin Smith, award-winning reporter and producer for FRONTLINE who narrated the series, drew from two decades of investigations in Afghanistan. On the panel, he described witnessing things going south "immediately." "It was one thing to topple and send the Taliban into the mountains. It was another to believe we could build a nation out of this," Smith said. 

All three panelists agreed the media fell short in the cultural portrayal of Afghanistan. "We saw the Taliban as black and white," said Jason Dempsey, who served two tours in Afghanistan and advised the White House on support for military families.  Rahmani explained there were several indigenous military groups, often splintering families, indicating not all shared the same values or vision for Afghanistan.

Rahmani challenged the public, government and media to question what they want to achieve next. "I advocate for engagement with the people there. Babies are still being born," she said. In a reflection, she added: "There could have been a better outcome. But we are in a place now where the world ignores those 35 million people."

"Americans...similar to Vietnam, [tried] to win hearts and minds," added Smith. "It was a botched operation from the get-go," Smith finished.

There is one triumph in the documentary. "Because we have a free and open media...was the reason the military was ever even forced to confront the fact that maybe we were wrong," Dempsey notes at the end.

However, during the panel, he cast doubt that the military learned any lessons: "They will sanitize, clean it,and move on beyond the Afghan experience." He said military leadership is so decorated, that even members of the media are often hesitant to ask "how" and "why" the U.S. fails in operations, and urged more confrontation.

The docu-series was over eighteen months in the making, and featured interviews with high-profile U.S. military and strategy leaders, experts involved in the Doha Talks between the U.S. and Taliban, civilians affected by the aftermath, members of the Taliban, and international diplomats and policy advisors.

Cary O'Reilly, Sightline Media Group senior managing editor, moderated the discussion,

All three parts can be streamed online here.