The Long War: The Inside Story of America and Afghanistan Since 9/11

by David Loyn Narrated by Steven Crossley

Overview

Just as U. S. soldiers and diplomats pulled out of Afghanistan, supposedly concluding their role and responsibility in the two-decade conflict, the country fell to the Taliban. In The Long War, award-winning BBC foreign correspondent David Loyn uncovers the political and military strategies?and failures?that prolonged America's longest war.
Three American presidents tried to defeat the Taliban?sending 150,000 international troops at the war's peak with a trillion-dollar price tag. But early policy mistakes that allowed Osama bin Laden to escape made the task far more difficult. Deceived by easy victories, they backed ruthless corrupt local allies and misspent aid.
The story of The Long War is told by the generals who led it through the hardest years of combat as surges of international troops tried to turn the tide. Generals, which include David Petraeus, Stanley McChrystal, Joe Dunford and John Allen, were tested in battle as never before. With the reputation of a “warrior monk,” McChrystal was considered one of the most gifted military leaders of his generation. He was one of two generals to be fired in this most public of commands.
Holding together the coalition of countries who joined America's fight in Afghanistan was just one part of the multi-dimensional puzzle faced by the generals, as they fought an elusive and determined enemy while responsible for thousands of young American and allied lives. The Long War goes behind the scenes of their command and of the Afghan government.
The fourth president to take on the war, Joe Biden ordered troops to withdraw in 2021, twenty years after 9/11, just as the Taliban achieved victory, leaving behind an unstable nation and an unforeseeable future.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

"Loyn’s pages are steeped in tragic misinterpretation and always with a sympathy for ordinary people who deserved much better. A well-executed and dispiriting study of imperial overreach and cultural collision." —Kirkus (starred review)

"This deeply reported chronicle of America’s “forever war"...offers blunt and persuasive assessments...Distinguished by its granular detail and insider access, this is an authoritative study of where things went wrong." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Praise for In Afghanistan:

“It would be naive to suggest that the odds favour success. Loyn's excellent primer explains why, and should be slipped into President Obama's Christmas stocking.” —Max Hastings for The Sunday Times (UK)

“The US will have a new leader by 2009, as perhaps will Britain. He should read this superb book before he makes matters worse.” —Daily Telegraph (UK)

“[There are] terrific—and terrifying—tales in this short, sharp book. . .In Afghanistan targets the educated general reader, but it could educate generals.” —New York Post

“I could not have enjoyed it more and think it quite excellent. It is a great pity some of those who involved us in what is going on now did not understand what we would be up against.” —General Lord Guthrie, Head of Britain’s armed forces when the Afghan war was launched in 2001

“Gripping” —Daily Mail (UK)

“Excellent” —The Times (UK)

“This is a terrific reminder of how effective a book can be when the place it depicts is beyond the average traveller’s reach” —Irish Times

Library Journal

09/01/2021

Award-winning foreign correspondent Loyn (Frontline: The True Story of the British Mavericks Who Changed the Face of War Reporting) offers insight on the motivations and tactics of insurgents, government officials, and the military as the United States leaves its longest war. Drawing on interviews with Kabul commanders, Taliban members, and Afghan journalists, as well as his knowledge of Afghanistan as an intermittent resident for nearly three decades, the author endeavors to assist both decision-makers and general readers in the often-forlorn quest of learning from history. Loyn divides his account into five phases, similar to military historian Carter Malkasian's The American War in Afghanistan, which is so far the only comparable study with the same parameters. Phase One (2001–06) featured improvisation and lack of coordination among the military, civilians, and NGOs; Phase Two (2006–09) witnessed the regrouping of the Taliban and a devolution into a shooting war rather than a so-called "peace-keeping" war; Phase Three (2009–11) marked the Obama administration's surge in troop numbers and a return to counterinsurgency; Phase Four (2011–14) saw the continuation of the war after NATO's withdrawal; and Phase Five (2014–21) included the transformation of the role of American troops (from combat, to training and assisting) and the departure of the U.S. military. VERDICT This retrospective (offered rather early for historical perspective, but in time for policy debates) provides valuable insight on the longest conflict in U.S. history.—Frederick J. Augustyn Jr., Lib. of Congress, Washington, DC

Kirkus Reviews

★ 2021-07-14
Former BBC journalist Loyn turns a gimlet eye on the war in Afghanistan, the longest in the history of the U.S.

“This is not a failed nation but a nation that has been failed,” writes Loyn, who was on hand for many significant moments of the war. Afghanistan has been failed, he enumerates, by a confused military doctrine. American forces invaded on the premise that it was best to fight and get out rather than engage in nation-building; the U.S. saw itself “not as an imperial invader but a force for good, spreading enlightenment and democracy.” Some of the other coalition forces were less sure: A German senior officer sharply reminded an American commander that only part of the job was military, the rest political, while “British troops went into Iraq and Afghanistan with a confident swagger, believing that centuries of imperial experience made them uniquely well suited to the complex work required.” As it is, writes Loyn, the U.S. forces turned out to be the more effective, though there was plenty of learning to be done. They had little idea of the political and ethnic makeup of the country and not much sense that they had to focus on stabilizing the country for the great mass of the people as well as on destroying the Taliban, who could have been neutralized early on, given better handling. On that score, Loyn charges that the Taliban were willing to surrender, but Donald Rumsfeld, the U.S. secretary of defense and manager of the war, rejected the offer. While early U.S. commanders asked Rumsfeld to sideline coalition forces, later ones came to rely on their allies, only to fear “a domino effect, where other nations followed France and pulled out early.” Loyn’s pages are steeped in tragic misinterpretation and always with a sympathy for ordinary people who deserved much better.

A well-executed and dispiriting study of imperial overreach and cultural collision.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940176299236
Publisher:	Recorded Books, LLC
Publication date:	10/26/2021
Edition description:	Unabridged

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