Stop Blaming Afghans for Failed War

In September 1991, the president of Afghanistan, Muhammad Najibullah, a former communist secret police chief turned Islamic nationalist, delivered an emotional speech to the Afghan parliament. Najibullah knew the era of foreign intervention in Afghanistan over which he had presided was ending. The Soviet Union had pulled back from direct combat. Radical Islamist rebels covertly backed by Pakistan controlled much of the countryside. Before parliament, Najibullah begged for national unity. His countrymen faced a stark choice, he believed: They could unite to protect Afghanistan’s political, religious, and cultural diversity—including millions of girls in schools and women in jobs—or they could succumb to an obscurantist revolution carried out by religious fanatics aligned with a hostile neighbor.