The End of the “Forever War” in Afghanistan – Virtual Program

This is a virtual program, instructions on how to join this meeting will be sent the day before the event.

20 years after the United States first sent troops to Afghanistan, President Joe Biden fulfilled his campaign pledge to end the “forever war” and accelerated the planned withdrawal of U.S. troops. The subsequent collapse of the Afghan government and the Taliban's recapture of power stunned the world and left the United States and its allies scrambling to evacuate their own citizens and Afghans now in danger from Taliban retribution. Did it have to be like this? And what happens now in Afghanistan? Join the World Affairs Council on September 13 for a discussion with Ambassador Ryan Crocker, former U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, on the changing situation in Afghanistan.

About the Speaker

Ryan Crocker is a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Other academic appointments have included Diplomat in Residence at Princeton University, inaugural Kissinger Fellow at Yale University, the James Schlesinger Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Virginia, and TexasA&M where he was Dean of the Bush School of Government. He was a career Foreign Service Officer who served six times as an American Ambassador: Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Kuwait and Lebanon. He serves on the Board of Advisors of No One Left Behind, an NGO dedicated to ensuring that America keeps its promises to Afghans and Iraqis who risked their lives to support us.He received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation's highest civilian honor, in 2009. Other recent awards include the West Point Association of Graduates Thayer Award in 2020 and the inaugural Bancroft Award, presented by the Naval Academy in 2016. Also in 2016, he was named an Honorary Fellow of the Literary and Historical Society at University College, Dublin where he was presented the annual James Joyce Award. He is an Honorary Marine.