3 curiosities concerning Ashraf Ghani’s exit
by Dr. Piyush Mathur
If until August 18 the Number One curiosity regarding the Afghan turmoil was Where is Ghani?, by today—with all the carnage that we have seen since—that seems like a very minor, best forgotten, theme somehow. A whole host of other thorny questions of far greater importance have popped up in the interim—and the scope of the challenge that the world faces in relation to Afghanistan would become clearer only a bit too slowly, in the coming weeks and months, for everybody’s patience. Nevertheless, three tiny curiosities related to that Number One curiosity persist even now—and they are as follows:
Ashraf Ghani
1. Were the Russians wrong in their characterisation of Ashraf Ghani’s unceremonious exit from Kabul?
Right after Ghani’s escape from Kabul became news, Russia had claimed that he had fled with ‘four cars and a helicopter’ stuffed with cash, and had to leave some money behind, on the tarmac, as it would not all fit in. (The Russian claim was followed by a report that the Afghan ambassador to Tajikistan had claimed that Ghani had taken USD 169 million with him while leaving Kabul.) The Russian claim was an awesome allegation that made Ghani look like a drug overlord making his last dash rather than a beleaguered state head going into an unavoidable exile. And while we had no reason to doubt the Russian allegation then, we also had no proof of its truth.
But then, on August 18, Ghani would release his first statement, via Facebook Live, since reaching his destination. In that statement, he would reveal his location to be the United Arab Emirates (UAE), and refute the allegation that he had smuggled out any money or valuables from Afghanistan. On the same day, the UAE would also confirm his presence in that country via a statement of its own—and it would not contradict his rejection of the Russian allegation. Meanwhile, a Washington Post (WaPo) report published on August 29 would also reinforce Ghani’s refutation (as well as his tortured claim that he did not flee but was forced out of the palace).
This WaPo report indicates that Ghani’s faults aside, he was misinformed by a senior advisor that the rebels had entered the palace and were baying for his blood. Under these circumstances, the report points out,
[t]he president wanted to return home to gather his belongings but was told by advisers that there was no time. Early that afternoon, wearing plastic sandals and a thin coat, the president — along with the first lady and a handful of top aides — lifted off from the palace grounds in military helicopters.
In other words, as far as the Russian allegation is concerned, it finds no support from an odd collection of Ghani, the UAE, and The Washington Post. This leaves us with the following curiosity: Were the Russians wrong in their claim—and if yes, then how and why? It seems useful to pursue this curiosity because the Russians would not have been so outspoken and emphatic about a witness testimony to a parting act of loot on the part of Ghani unless they had truly believed in it: This type of an allegation would not have been easily credible about a person with an image and a background like his (and the Russians would have been expected to appreciate that).
We must keep in mind that Ghani was no mafia boss on the run nor even some ousted corrupt dictator who would have needed loads of cash to buy his way across the world as a dangerous criminal. He could have demanded safe passage through a lot of countries and would have been granted the same; he could have asked for temporary or permanent shelter also, and would have got that, too, from many countries. Other than that, both his offsprings are well-to-do American citizens-cum-residents—and, so, it is not as if he is some destitute, or a man without a family home outside Afghanistan.
It won’t even be incorrect to assume also that Ghani has enough retirement money—from his élite pre-political and political careers—saved up somewhere outside Afghanistan (most likely in the United States, whose citizenship he held on to until 2009); and he would have had access to these accounts via phone, the Internet, or through any of his associates (including family members) while making his escape and upon reaching a destination outside Afghanistan. Meanwhile, he is 72; and cannot even eat a full meal in one go owing to medical reasons.
And while cash is always useful to most humans, an unusually large amount of cash—if taken just for personal usage—would have been a liability for an individual like Ghani, who not only has a ‘clean’ academic and professional career behind him but who has also tried to project a political image of anti-corruption crusader and peacenik for himself. (Even his well-known written message to the public, posted on Facebook from an undisclosed location during his escape, was sanctimonious and dovish rather than vengeful.) And yet, the Russians made their allegation.
If they were wrong, as it appears to be the case now, then they must admit it—for mistakes do happen in international affairs—and apologize to Ghani the private individual. The Russians must also take a second look into their sources of intelligence in Afghanistan—or at least that particular witness who gave them the false information about Ghani’s exit. If, however, the Russians are continuing to believe that particular witness of theirs or any other intelligence regarding this type of a loot on the part of Ghani, then they must collect and put out the evidence to support their allegation—because for Ghani to have smuggled out such a large sum of money would likely imply a range of hitherto unknown geostrategic subplots (and not just personal corruption, prosecutable as even that is).
The global citizenry would remain curious about this allegation and its consequences, either way.
2. Why didn’t Ghani seek American support while leaving Afghanistan?
So if you were Ashraf Ghani and were (mis)informed that your palace has been infiltrated by armed militants out to kill you, then what would you do? You would most probably call—or somehow get in touch with—the top American authority available in Afghanistan. Why would that be? Because you already know that as the leader of Afghanistan, you, using your own security apparatus, have failed to protect your palace—and you had otherwise anyway been depending on the American military for stability and security in your country. So, as a hypothetical Ghani, once you have been credibly told that the palace has been breached and you must leave it, then of course you would call the Americans—say, in the hope that they would rescue you and take you to someplace safe—maybe the airport? Either that, or you would rush to some American hotspot inside Afghanistan on your own.
But what did the real Ashraf Ghani do? According to the WaPo report, ‘[t]he president had fled, not bothering to tell U.S. officials or even many of his own top lieutenants on his way out the palace door.’ Now that speaks volumes—about something (or some things). Did Ghani distrust almost everybody around him so deeply that he decided just to quit without telling anybody except a chosen few? If so, then he would have felt mortally threatened not just by the rumoured infiltrators but also by the Americans and many within his own Afghan administration.
That is one possibility. But on the face of it, the above explanation regarding his manner of exit still doesn’t make sense—because there is no chance that he would have been physically harmed by the Americans; at most he would have been asked some necessary questions and monitored for a period of time, no matter the location. So, it is highly improbable that Ghani felt mortally or physically threatened by the Americans. And as for feeling mortally threatened by the Taliban, he has already admitted to it in his video post from the UAE.
Another hypothetical possibility is that Ghani did not believe that the Americans were capable of protecting him on such a short notice. Inasmuch as he would have been likely wrong in making even that assessment, it still should not have prevented him from informing the Americans about his situation before fleeing. The question, then, that we are left with is this: Why didn’t Ghani seek American support before fleeing Afghanistan?
We don’t have any actual answer to it yet—but one plausible answer can be proposed. This answer would fall within political psychology rather than strategy. Supposing that Ghani has no clever tricks up his sleeve, no hidden treasure of embezzled funds—and nor has he lost his mental capacity (which he did not, as his video post makes clear to any reasonable viewer)—then the only explanation that can be supplied is that he wanted to flip the bird at the Americans! Having felt marginalized by the Trump administration, and sensing no reversal—only an acceleration—under Biden of the course of action that Trump had set in place, Ghani finally saw a peculiar opportunity to assert his personal autonomy as a political leader and as an Afghan by exiting entirely on his own.
Notice that Ghani did not seek the help of any other foreign embassy inside Afghanistan, either (that we know of yet anyway); he also sent out a compelling, if inherently irritating, message of reconciliation, peace, and unity among the Afghans (including the Taliban, by default). While it is true that he, unlike his Vice, did not rush off to his own country’s Panjshir Valley (which continues to resist the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan and would have allowed him in at least as an Afghan, if not as a leader), the choice that he did make does not dilute the implication that he simply wanted to defy the United States and claim his personal autonomy in the end.
Nevertheless, all of the above is still a conjecture—and we remain curious about why Ghani ignored the Americans when he could have used their help.
3. Why didn’t Ghani escape to the United States or the European Union?
Enough of Ghani already, you might say; after all, the United States has already said that he is ‘no longer a figure in Afghanistan’. It sure seems that Ghani is insignificant to the geopolitics of Afghanistan now—and his chances of playing any role of political significance there in the future seem to be subzero. The vast majority of Afghans are very likely ashamed of, and angry at, him; to the Taliban, he might be even more pitiable now than he was as the official leader of Afghanistan. Overall, then, Ghani—who would not have had any political position in Afghanistan if not for the helping hand of the United States—appears to personify the West’s failure at managing the Afghan situation in the wake of 9-11. But it is precisely his status as such—as a cowardly, yet eccentric, monument to the failure of the West’s strategic experimentation in Afghanistan—that he acquires the interest of observers of political psychology.
So, a third curiosity about Ghani may yet be entertained: Why didn’t he escape to the United States or the European Union (EU)? One might think that the part about the United States is already addressed in the previous section: To the extent that Ghani did not seek American support before exiting Afghanistan, he could not have been expected to escape to the United States. That would be true to some extent; but, in point of fact, we don’t really know why he did not inform the Americans before fleeing. His skipping the United States as his destination, however, simply confirms that his avoidance of the Americans in Afghanistan was nothing accidental.
Nevertheless, even if Ghani had avoided the American contingent inside Afghanistan, he could have still chosen the United States as his destination after fleeing Afghanistan—even if that would have meant a couple of layovers. Not only that, while very comfortable with Western ways, Ghani did not choose a destination in the EU, either. Sure, the UAE is as great a country as any other for a political asylee, what strikes as odd is that Ghani would choose it even though it is the United States and the EU that had been closely involved with the post-9-11 Afghanistan.
Those who have kept up with world affairs over the course of past few years would know that Ghani was already fed up with Donald Trump’s exclusion of him (and the official Afghan government that he had been leading) from the Agreement for Bringing Peace to Afghanistan (Doha Agreement)—which was signed by the United States and the Taliban in Doha, Qatar on February 29, 2020. In many ways, Ghani’s government had already been dismissed by the United States-led North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s forces and the Taliban via their exclusion of it from this agreement; as a corollary, the Taliban had been accepted as the de facto manager of Afghanistan. Ghani had tried hard—but evidently failed—to prevent his government’s exclusion from that agreement and the peace process that had been leading up to it; he had since been anticipating a Taliban takeover.
Since the fall of Kabul, we have learnt from Josep Borrell—the Vice President of the European Commission, and the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign AFfairs and Security Policy—of Ghani’s bitterness regarding his (government’s) growing exclusion at the hands of the Biden administration. While we also learn from Borrell’s comments of the EU’s own bitterness regarding Biden’s course of action, as far as Ghani would have been concerned, the United States was the leader of the West inside Afghanistan. So quite possibly, Ghani is bitter at the West itself—and he avoided seeking shelter in the EU, and not just the United States, for that reason.
The news that has trickled in since tells us that the United States sought and received secret collaboration from the Taliban to ease its own exit after the fall of Kabul; in the future, it further appears that, the United States would in fact ally with the Taliban to keep in check more radical Islamic terrorist organizations—such as the Islamic State (IS). So, maybe Ghani cannot yet conceive of seeking shelter in the West—which would most likely fall in line with the United States’ turn toward the Taliban as an ally. As for other major players in the region—Russia, China, India, and Pakistan—they had all supported the Trump-led Doha Agreement (from which Ghani’s government was excluded). And while Pakistan is the birthplace and clear cheerleader of the Taliban anyway, none of those other geopolitical players now wishes to be on the wrong side of the Taliban. Perhaps Ghani had it all in mind when he sought shelter in the UAE.
Perhaps.
References & background material
Al Jazeera (August 18, 2021) ‘Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks from UAE’ (Downloaded from the following URL on August 30, 2021: youtube.com/watch?v=nn56RgezeX0)
Behuria, Ashok (December 2007) ‘Fighting the Taliban: Pakistan at war with itself’ Australian Journal of International Affairs (61: 4), 529-543
Casert, Raf (August 19, 2021) ‘EU foreign chief calls fall of Kabul “catastrophe”’ Associated Press (Downloaded from the following URL on September 2, 2021: https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-europe-environment-and-nature-kabul-f5bc58e60f4b4961035aacb117dc818c)
Daily Thanthi (August 16, 2021) ‘Afghan citizens in Delhi hold Ghani responsible for present crisis(Downloaded from the following URL on September 2, 2021: https://www.dtnext.in/News/National/2021/08/16195206/1312297/Afghan-citizens-in-Delhi-hold-Ghani-responsible-for-.vpf)
George, Susannah; Missy Ryan, Tyler Pager, Pamela Constable, John Hudson & Griff Witte The Washington Post (August 29, 2021) ‘Surprise, panic and fateful choices: The day America lost its longest war’ (Downloaded from the following URL on August 30, 2021: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/08/28/taliban-takeover-kabul/ )
Graham-Harrison, Emma (August 22, 2021) ‘Ghani’s hasty departure leaves anger and bitterness in its wake’ The Guardian (Downloaded from the following URL on September 2, 2021: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/22/ghanis-hasty-departure-leaves-anger-and-bitterness-in-its-wake)
India Today (August 16, 2021) ‘Left to avoid bloodshed, Ashraf Ghani writes on social media after leaving Afghanistan’
Maizland, Lindsay (August 3, 2021) ‘The Taliban in Afghanistan’ Council on Foreign Relations (Downloaded from the following URL on September 1, 2021: https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/taliban-afghanistan )
Maley, William (February 15, 2000) ‘The foreign policy of the Taliban’ Council on Foreign Relations (Downloaded from the following URL on September 1, 2021: www.jstor.org/stable/resrep05667)
National Public Radio (NPR) (August 15, 2021) ‘The governing style of Ashraf Ghani, the departing Afghan President’ (Downloaded from the following URL on August 18, 2021: https://www.npr.org/2021/08/15/1027962001/the-governing-style-of-ashraf-ghani-the-departing-afghan-president )
Ng, Abigail & Saheli Roy Choudhury (August 23, 2021) ‘Three ways the victory of the Taliban might reverberate around the world’ CNBC (Downloaded from the following URL on September 1, 2021: https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/24/taliban-in-afghanistan-fears-of-terrorism-refugees-and-instability.html )
New York Times (August 15-17, 2021): ‘20-Year U.S. War Ending as It Began, With Taliban Ruling Afghanistan’ (Downloaded on August 18, 2021 from the following URL: https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/08/15/world/taliban-afghanistan-news)
Pannett, Rachel; Ellen Francis & Miriam Berger (September 2, 2021) ‘U.S. could work with Taliban against terrorists, Pentagon says’ The Washington Post (Downloaded from the following URL on September 2, 2021: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/09/02/afghanistan-kabul-taliban-live-updates/?itid=hp-top-table-high)
Reuters (August 16, 2021) ‘Russia says Afghan president fled with cars and helicopter full of cash—RIA’ (Downloaded on August 18, 2021 from the following URL: https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/russia-says-afghan-president-fled-with-cars-helicopter-full-cash-ria-2021-08-16/)
Taneja, Kabir & Mohammed Sinan Siyech (August 23, 2021) ‘Terrorism in South Asia after the fall of Afghanistan’ War on the Rocks (Downloaded from the following URL on September 1, 2021: https://warontherocks.com/2021/08/terrorism-in-south-asia-after-the-fall-of-afghanistan/ )
Tribune News Service (August 17, 2021) ‘Panjshir flies flag of resistance again; Amrullah says he is President of Afghanistan’ (Downloaded on August 18, 2021 from the following URL: tribuneindia.com/news/world/panjshir-flies-flag-of-resistance-again-amrullah-says-he-is-president-of-afghanistan-298553)
United Arab Emirates, Ministry of Foreign Affairs & International Cooperation (August 18, 2021) ‘Statement on President Ashraf Ghani’ (Downloaded from the following URL on August 30, 2021: https://www.mofaic.gov.ae/en/mediahub/news/2021/8/18/18-08-2021-uae-statement)
Dr. Piyush Mathur has previously published in The Southasianist, Third World Quarterly, Asia Times Online, and Himal Southasian, among other outlets. He is the author of Technological Forms and Ecological Communication: A Theoretical Heuristic (Lexington Books, 2017), and ‘Understanding post-Covid-19 global politics: A tentative theoretical framework’ (TIGA, 2020). For his other publications, click here. If you wish to contact him, send us a message here.