Now, I’m not particularly old by any stretch of the mile, but the United States has been in Afghanistan since before I was born. For most of my generation, U.S. presence in the Middle East, and specifically Afghanistan, was a fact of life for families, and a serious factor in considering a career in the armed forces. Now, while facing bipartisan criticism, Joe Biden has accepted the country’s fate.

While part of me is applauding an end to the war in Afghanistan (I believe that we have no business policing other countries, especially ones half-way around the world,) another is worried about the future to come. What happens to all the people that worked with the U.S.? Are foreign translators left to rot? Is it just another middle-eastern country the west has plundered? 

I can’t be the only one to remember U.S. troops seemingly guarding Afghan poppy fields. What happened to that? Have the pharmaceutical giants found another country to exploit? 

There are so many questions left unanswered, and the shadowy powers that be seem to like it that way. 

I think people rarely look back on events transpiring and think “Wow, this is history!”, but it should be more common. As just some high school student, I can only educate myself further and wait for things to happen.