Afghanistan Peace CampaignSpeaking at the annual Shangri-La Security Dialogue in Singapore, he emphasized that the United States is shifting away from this approach.
Pete Hegseth, the United States Secretary of Defense, stated that Washington will no longer repeat the mistake of engaging in “aimless” wars like those in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Speaking at the annual Shangri-La Security Dialogue in Singapore, he emphasized that the United States is shifting away from this approach.
The Defense Secretary said: “We became distracted by open-ended wars, regime change, and nation building. I had a front row seat as a soldier in Iraq and Afghanistan. These costly diversions lacked clearly defined goals and were not tied to vital and core American interests. President Trump is changing that. We are not making the same mistakes. Not this generation and not now. We are done with that approach.”
Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump, speaking at a meeting in the White House, once again called the withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan “shameful.”
Trump said that with America’s exit from Afghanistan in 2021, military equipment worth billions of dollars was left behind.
“We had the embarrassment in Afghanistan, where we gave up billions and billions of dollars of military equipment — the most embarrassing moment in the history of our country, I believe,” Trump said during a press conference with tech entrepreneur Elon Musk.
Some political analysts said that Washington now leans toward a more pragmatic approach regarding Afghanistan.
Mohammad Aslam Danishmal, a university professor, said: “The United States’ distrust toward the interim government is now significant. America is trying to act based on safeguarding its interests. The interim government must strive to gain a good understanding of America’s regional interests.”
Previously, Trump had repeatedly criticized the US military’s strategy, stating that for the past two decades, under the banner of nation-building missions, the military had been deployed to countries where there was no real need for an American presence.