Former Danish Ministers on Afghanistan Efforts: 'Predictable Tragedy, Defeat, Failed Project'

According to Denmark's former Foreign Minister Per Stig Møller, the Taliban's takeover may signal the defeat of western values in the country, where all progress may soon be eradicated in what historian Claus Bundgård described as a "descent into barbarism".

Several former Danish ministers and historians have addressed the Taliban* takeover as a major failure of the western world, signalling the futility of the decades-long involvement in Afghanistan.

According to historian Claus Bundgård of Roskilde University, there is no doubt that future researchers will see the almost 20-year effort in Afghanistan that came to an abrupt and panic-stricken end as "a defeat and a failed project", Danish Radio reported.

Mogens Lykketoft, who was Denmark's foreign minister at the time of al-Qaeda's* 9/11 terrorist attack against America, which spurred the US into entering Afghanistan in 2001, called the result "a predictable tragedy”.

"I don't think we'll be pressured into that kind of warfare again, yet I don't think that the Americans will get rid of it", Lykketoft mused about the repercussions of the West's inglorious defeat and whether Denmark will contribute its soldiers once again. "We must participate if the UN asks us to, and it is a peacekeeping mission", he admitted.

Per Stig Møller, his successor, admitted that the effort ended badly for Denmark as well as for the entire coalition.

"This is, of course, a military defeat. There is no doubt about that", Per Stig Møller told Danish Radio.

Møller placed the blame for the chaotic scenes in Kabul, where the Taliban's flag was hoisted after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country, on the White House, where, he argued, major foreign policy mistakes have been made by both the current and former president.

According to Møller, while the western coalition "managed to defeat al-Qaeda*, created education for girls, improved healthcare, and trained 300,000 Afghan soldiers", the Taliban's takeover may signal the defeat of western values, where all progress will be washed away.

He personally voiced hope that owing to the "20 years of freedom", the Afghan population is "vaccinated against the Taliban's fundamentalism".

Historian Claus Bundgård painted a darker picture.

"We do not know how deep the country will sink into barbarism under the new regime, but we know at least that everything that the Danish military was involved in fighting for is lost now", Bundgård concluded.

The rapid advance of the Taliban, in which the provincial capitals of Afghanistan fell like dominoes in a matter of days before the ultimate surrender of Kabul, has been called a fateful moment that could haunt Joe Biden's legacy as US president.

*The Taliban and al-Qaeda (ISIS/ISIL/"Islamic State") are terrorist groups outlawed in Russia and many other countries.