Rory Stewart: Time to end the war in Afghanistan
HTML-код
- Опубликовано: 9 фев 2025
- www.ted.com British MP Rory Stewart walked across Afghanistan after 9/11, talking with citizens and warlords alike. Now, a decade later, he asks: Why are Western and coalition forces still fighting there? He shares lessons from past military interventions that worked -- Bosnia, for instance -- and shows that humility and local expertise are the keys to success.
TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at www.ted.com/tra....
2021 was the long awaited decisive year.
This aged well
I literally just said it didn't aged well.
@@seanriopel3132 i mean, its said commonly
@@Miltiades178 it's all good. Just depends how you phrase it. I was looking at it not asking well because it came true which is sad because of the lives wasted and over a trillion spent.
like spoiled milk and hot trash
Stewart's statement about the Taliban not being a threat to take over Kabul was based on the premise that there would be a minimal military presence.
I am a huge admirer of Rory Stewart. I read his book a few years ago "The places inbetween" about his walk across Afghanistan and it shows someone who is incredibly brave, intelligent, inspirational and above all, humble. I wish more people would listen to him... he really could change the world for the better if they would.
I wish he was PM. So much candour, understanding and real life experience. A great loss to Government.
Seven years ago and we are still there. Outrageous
Update: the US pulls out, Taliban and afghan government have a civil war
@@trolllovindaddy US and UK (for a second time) got kicked out. :)
This talk given in 2011, now in 2021 seems to resonate with the current situations.
ten years later we finally got our decisive year
To think that the Tories would choose Boris Johnson over this man...
A sad indication of the state of the Tory party!
Rory Stewart is worth 10 BoJos.
@@JJ-te2pi I fear you have really overestiamted the value of BoJos
I disagree with your assessment. As a politician Rory Stewart was wasted and was at times frankly odd. However, in this field he is eloquent, knowledgeable. What an indictment of our FO when its Afghan dept had nobody with firsthand knowledge of the country. Find a place for him where his real talents can be used.
Tories are very very FOOLISH
Was just thinking the same. If he was the face of England the UK union would be safe
Despite being a conservative (in his words, "a different kind of conservative") I am a huge admirer of Rory Stewart. I read his book a few years ago "The places in Between" about his walk across Afghanistan with his dog, and it shows someone who is incredibly brave, intelligent, inspirational and above all, modest and humble. I wish more people would listen to him... he really could change the world for the better if they would.
I watched his documentary about Afgh. Mostly accurate, but thanks to Chalmer Johnson's books (the empire trilogy) I could see where he's partly wrong.
not possible to be PM at this stage....at least he should be the Secretary General going forward.
@@sengleekoay2343 sadly I think he’s got too much honesty and integrity to be made Secretary General. Though he’s exactly who the UN needs it would NEVER appoint him.
in a better world political alignment shouldn't have anything to do with one persons admiration for another person
he just said highly unlikely that the Taliban will take control again😂😂😂
UK got kicked out of Afghanistan... again! He needs to do a follow up talk.
Nope, British troops had left by 2014. A small contingent rained with the permission of the Afghan government. Recent events are purely down to the US government
19 August 2011, this seems more than a little prescient ...
Dear Rory Stewart me as an Afghan young really appreciate your solution for ending this tragedy
How do you feel about the present situation?
Time to book this guy again TED.
" The great game".....best doccie on afghanistan ive ever seen. Rory Stewart.
As an Afghan you have my respect🙏
RORY STUART
Thanks for bringing the truth out.
May Allah reward you the best life in both worlds.
:| I believe you misspelled Stewart ;) Inshallah our withdrawal agreement holds. I'm American and just like most Americans I think we should not be there. History shows the Afghan people cannot be conquered. خير په مو شپه
this guy knows what he is talkinga bout, he is pin point accurate of his evaluation on afghanistan.. The greedy corporations with their contracts ruined the security in afghanistan.. the taliban didn't fight but what lead them to fight and pick up arms were because of indiscriminate Ariel bombardment. The simple thing to do with afghanistan was not do much but very little in political settlement and good infrastructural development.
"It is extremely unlikely the Taliban would be able to take over the country. It is extremely unlikely they would cease Kabul" 3:07
That was in 2011. His point is exactly that the strategy was emboldening the taliban. If you put more troops and fuel corruption in a country whose population mostly don’t want you to be there, you’d be strengthening the determination of those who want to “liberate” their country.
His point about humility is what westerners don’t usually get. You are overly confident of your own analysis, even when told otherwise by people who are infinitely more qualified than you are.
This lecture was ten years ago and we just left. 😲 shocker
Wow!! What an amazing intellect. In a parallel universe this guy is our PM and life and world security is so much different. Outstanding Mr Stewart.
Thank you Rory, simply brilliant and simply put. Thank you for reaching the TED audience... maybe others can be reached via the audience members. Every little bit helps - we MUST affect a positive change right NOW! Thanks again.
"If we can often do much less than we pretend, we can do much more than we fear"
While i respect he studied afghanistan and is generally correct, he did get the part about taliban not taking over the country wrong.
To be fair, he did concede he could be wrong about that.
For the record, he said it is unlikely that they should take over the country via military force. The government abandoned it's post and the Taliban walked in.
In fairness who would have predicted this a decade ago
well he did account for it by saying that "even if i am wrong about taliban taking over" in next statement, his point primarily was that taliban does not pose threat to america any longer from the point of terrorism even if they take over the country and rejoined with alqaeda.
Listening to this in 2021, 10 years after his speech, is sad. Our ("western") political system is fundamentally flawed, if such candid, hands-on, informed, brave and humble people get sidelined, not elected. I hope I am wrong and we will see his comeback.
1:55
This aged well and is a fact now..
I honestly never thought I would say this about a Tory, but I would vote for Rory Stewart. He must have sat in despair in Westminster at the muppets around him.
Sadly Rory is not in Govt as Boris threw him out on 3rd Sept 2019 with 20 others who had decades of experience in parliament between them.
Boris wrote to Rory's local Conservative Association warning them not to have Rory back or back him in anything.
Rory resigned from the Conservative Party or should I call it the Boris/ERG party on 3rd October 2019.
He did not run in the general election in 2019.
One of the great “should have beens” In British politics.
The best Prime Minister Britain never had.
He's just another privately educated wanker
I agree
I agree he would be a great PM
@GamerGirl_Millie I think his talking about “a small footprint” has been pretty much consistent.
Ooops. Anyone else here from August 2021? 🤦♂️
October 2021
Aug 18th 2021, today, watching this, everyone knows now at least this man were right about a thing or two. Key messages: there are many paths between all-in or all-out, and with troops, employees on the ground of afghan but not speaking the lauguage, is a indication of how much you understand and can actually help. be humble. one's hot bloodness can harm others not saving others.
Let's get this guy back to lead the UK coherently. How can we do this?
but now he is saying let's stay in Afghanistan :) Politicians!
To be fair, what he’s saying now is that the small force we had there was doing a sufficient job in keeping the taliban out of key regions with very little cost to the US/U.K. be it financial or in lives.
@@aliamjad5513 no if you listen to the entire TED talk you’ll hear his message then is the same as his message now: a very light touch where Western allies are simply aiding the Afghan government to hold back the Taliban (rather then fighting the Taliban themselves) is the best plan of action.
Congratulations to all those commenting ‘this aged well’ on completely missing the point. I would suggest you listen to the whole presentation. You might actually learn something worthwhile.
I like and respect Rory Stewart, but his main contention that the Taliban had no chance of retaking the country certainly hasn't aged well.
I think he's just as hubristic as the Generals, just in a more palatable and humble way.
@@dubbaphatt3368 he’s speaking in 2011 not 2021. Completely different evaluation of taliban capabilities
@@dubbaphatt3368 He was speaking in the context of having air support in Afghanistan. Now it's gone
He is very clear that the problem was the huge amount of money that caused enormous corruption throughout the country and undermined consensus. And he says the Taliban didn't have the military hardware then that was true but where did the Taliban get their weaponry? from that supplied by the US.
Fantastic talk and speaker.
I appreciate you on behalf of every Afghans for bringing the truth out about my beloved homeland. ❤we afghans respect every human being❤ every religion ❤ every ethnicity ❤
This man he know what
He is talking about he
Went to my country
He. Is brave man even
Most of afghan men
Escret to go to Afghanistan what more can I say I hope some day
Peace sttel in my country
Eungh is eungh
Although I appreciate your sentiment for your homeland as everyone should . I am not sure that Afghanis respect every religion and every human being, let alone every ethnicity !!! Having said that , I have no issues with Afghanistan being left alone to mind their own affairs !!!
If you respected all humans then why did the Taliban support a man who killed 3000 Americans and if Afghanistan was so loving towards humans then why do they enforce laws that sometimes call for women and men being beating or killed isn't there a famous soccer field in Afghanistan that was used by the Taliban too execute humans
@@Comedypark9 02:55 Listen again. What do you believe that the meaning of "ALL"?
@@Comedypark9 you cannot equate afghanistanis to the taliban, thats like equating americans to white supremacists.
What an insight and vision...This man had said everything what happens today in Afghanistan atleast 10 years ago..amazing..
This is so awesome. I was pessimistic about this at first, but he impressed me.
Finally we arrived! 2021 is the decisive year... Peace and prosperity for the gallant and proud people of Afghanistan.
Rory's talk on Afghanistan was largely peripheral. He contrasted the problems in Afghanistan with the success of Bosnia and Kosovo while ignoring the elephant in the room: Bosnia and Kosovo were once part of _Yugoslavia._
while i do agree with you on the bosnia kosovo yugoslavia bit which i also felt, he knows a lot about afghanistan which is not reflected in this short 20min ted talk aimed at the general public, watch his documentary afghanistan the great game
In light of the latest development, Rory under estimated the Taliban and the determination of the Afghans to be independent and be a sovereign country.
But the US regime and its allies actual reasons to invade Afghanistan were fraudulent and unjustified in the first place.
Yes, but maintaining the functioning of a real country has hugely limited the Taliban's capability in expanding global terrorism because it has become a much more visible and, in the meantime, much more vulnerable target for repercussions.
@@agumualiuspumm1331 You have conveniently forgotten that the collective west, the US in particular, are the ones who nurtured the Taliban in the first place. There wouldn't be a Taliban without the US godfather.
Is this the same Rory Stewart that’s just been interviewed by Politics Joe?
The RUclips algorithm is smarter than most people
Yes. He said blame Biden rather than Trump. Interesting because it was Trump who originally got the ball rolling on the withdrawal. The things Rory says. Opinions and wind.
@@smith5796 sounds like to didn’t listen to the whole interview, just responded to the clickbait title. All Stewart said about Trump is that he believed Trump would have been persuaded to not actually pull out (ie is inconsistent and capricious)
Yes
"If we can often do less much than we pretend, we can do much more than we fear". Nice quote in this context.
I also think a mythbusters quote is appropriate: "Failure is always an option".
That's a heavy machine gun not a sub machine gun Rory but you did identify Beckham correctly.
I thought the same, how much does this guy know about the military if he thinks what looks like a 50 cal is a submachine gun?
if we do less than we pretend - we can do more than we fear
Mr Stewart was making great sense until he began as most interventionalist do beleiving that interventionalism itself isn't the problem, just that we aren't intervening the "right" way.
"Oh we intervened" what bull, I remember the UN while the war was in my country (1991), allied troops generally guarded stuff and did nothing for the massacring of civilians a few miles away. Nobody comes to help, you just come to keep peoples mind at ease
I never knew he was an intellectual. Big up Rory.
This is th Best Words I have Hier it about My kntry TnX Rory Stewart
Very astute assessment.
A lot of new commenters are missing the point here; Stewart is saying that the 'war' - i.e. smashing tonnes of resources into a corrupt system over and above that the country is capable of sustaining won't work. Instead, you need to have a light touch presence; enough to prevent catastrophe but not enough to stifle the creativity/capability of the country itself.
My God, this guy's metaphore was awesome.
"Its extremely unlikely the Taliban could take over all of Afghanistan and Kabul," Wrong. Took 'em one week. There never was a military solution to building a nation out of a collection of tribal enemies.
Lol even 9 -10 years ago his logic was flawed
They were slowly moving across the country for a few years.
Taliban took over after western air support and maintenance was withdrawn.
His current argument is that Taliban could have been kept confined to the countryside and out of the cities indefinitely, by a light troop presence and air support. All a moot point now of course, because the reputation of western troops is now totally shot to bits and the air bases abandoned.
@@ianstobie Yeah seems like a CYA excuse coming from him though. "Oh yeah well what I meant to say was that it was unlikely the Taliban would take over IF we kept a light troop presence"...........LOL yeah what a bunch of BS. The Taliban had been taking over much of the countryside slowly for years as we drew down troop levels, leaving a small presence in Kabul would have put a target on U.S troops. You would have seen casualties skyrocket if Biden decided to not withdraw and keep 3500 in Kabul.
@@TMAN-hw8ep You might be right, you might be wrong. All is speculation. Very few US casualties in last 18 months. One thing is certain. No empire in history had enough troops to hold down all its territory - neither Rome, nor the Golden Horde nor Britain. They depended on reputation , so most places were in awe of them. So the few troops could move around to deal with the few places causing trouble at any time.
The US now has to survive the next few years with all potential enemies expecting them to give up at casualty levels very low in historical terms - 100 times lower than in Vietnam. Expect a lot of challenges all over the place. Reputational damage is costly to empires.
And for the record, the guy in the video has more credibility than you'll probably ever have. Stop reading Atlas Shrugged. "Intellectuals" aren't out to get you. Many of them ARE in fact silly, pompous, hypocritical...even fraudulent. But that's no reason to celebrate anti-intellectualism in itself. I read this mans books on his hike in Afghanistan and his governorship in southern Iraq several years ago. He's a good writer and a sharp guy.
Wow he is a great speaker.
And I learned a lot from this. Good show.
Howdy folks of 2021!
We need to listen to this man, watch on RUclips, ' Afghanistan The Great Game ' both parts and the story of Lawrence of Arabia's docu and how he foresaw this mess and tried to warn governments. Meanwhile may peace and love find their way into people's hearts everywhere. ❤️😘
I watch the whole part btw ,it was amazing.
@@vivekt.2038 I'm so glad to hear that. It makes sense of the nonsense. Try watching the docu on Lawrence of Arabia ( the title has left me, sorry! ), the whole thing will make even more sense. American soldiers who were being posted out to Afghanistan were told to read his book so it would help them make sense of what they would be dealing with. The issues are not new, sadly. Peace and love to you 😘
but he was completely wrong
This aged well...
Need an update now from this expert please.
Search on Rory Stewart New Statesman for recent interview
(3:08) 2011"It's extremely unlikely that the Taliban would take over the country (again)".
2021: "you new here?"
Outside of the politics and ethics of the situation, it is quite impressive what The Taliban have done in less than a month.
Ten years ago it was unlikely. What happened since has brought it about. He wasn’t wrong.
@@sirnippy453 true.. idk why people excluding us-taliban agreement without afghan govt.. Taliban came out to power by usa paving the way from adecade.. failure bought Talibans
This is a beautiful speech.
Watching this video in 2021 and it makes a perfect sense. US is leaving a devastation behind.
And now Taliban controls Afghanistan.
We shouldn’t have gone there in the first place. A good chunk of the mess can be blames on the US
@@mattmcgourty7971 You would let terrorists go unpunished?
He was right years ago.
why does this only have ~90k views?
Weird that he ranks the cash we're spending in Afghanistan as the worst thing about invading Afghanistan
He is a Tory lol.
He argues that the Afghan economy is to small to pump billions into it.
I remember Rory Stewart speaking on this topic in Fairbanks in 2008. It's fascinating to see how back his sentiment has evolved from a tentative conclusion that the US shouldn't be involved in Afghanistan and Iraq anymore to the much more strident case he lays out here. I suppose the issue has become more pressing as the years have passed with little meaningful progress.
I wish mr rory should be the PM of uk. I am his fan now❤️👍🏻 he feels the sufferring of the innocent . He have a kind heart.
@Linda Marzuki - you are so right. He should have been listened to years ago. He has a good brain, supreme insight and knowledge and his huge heart must be feeling very heavy right now.
Very impactful talk. Because of this video I'm changing my name to Khomandan Walim Hajib Mhaksin Han Kalam Gee.
World need to listen to him in order to put an end to ongoing tensions in afganishtan.
There was a choice between this man and boris johnson to be leader of the Conservative party and therefore Prime Minister.
Sadly the MPs went for the leader that could most effectively pander to the electorate and win an election. The Tory party members didn’t even get the opportunity to vote for him in the leadership election.
@@sookibeulah9331 they just had Theresa May. I think they wanted a contrast. I wouldn't vote tory but I was rooting for him throughout the leadership contest, best of a bad bunch.
Fantastic Talk
Brilliant guy!
Lovely speaker. Such a rare thing.
Your Documentary, Afganistán: The Game, was an eye oponer on why no Super Power can overcome this day and barren land
The game or the great game??
In 2021, he was much more critical of the withdrawal.
3:07....Aged this well did not.
He is absolutely correct on Libya. It's very frustrating to see this going on.
For anyone who thinks wow a Conservative MP that thinks continuing the war in Afghanistan is a bad idea, you should see what he's saying now that we have pulled out.
Actually if you listen to the entire talk his message is very consistent. He was advocating a very light touch then, just as he’s criticising the removal of the light touch that’s been working for the past few years.
Brilliant, finally someone who understands
Well, thing have changed. Thanks for your help. Don't let the door hit you on the way out!!
It makes failure inevitable… welcome to 2021
Man knew it since day!!!!
Well, the first impossible thing has happened. Wait for the other two.
Somebody share this video back to him 😂
If anyone in 2021 is wondering - Rory Stewart never dreamed that the US/UK would withdraw air power to allow the taliban to return.
Here he is arguing to strongly decrease “feet on the ground approach” toward a light foot approach which was essentially in place prior to withdrawal.
There’s no contradiction between his position here and his position in 2021 following US/UK withdrawal.
10 years later, we finally did. We finally ended the 20 Years War (that's what it needs to be called).
..and Rory think it was a mad decision…. To pull the troops back home.
Rory Stewart is one to watch for the future in british politic. Watch his Documentary : Afghanistan The Great Game.
nah. He's too sensible for the Tories they kicked him out of the party for opposing hard Brexit.
This guy talks sense
Still 7 years later!!
He speaks sense and good vision.
2021 calling in to report. 10 years later, we blew it. If it was possible for us to waste our investment in the country any worse, while disappointing our allies in country and in Europe, I don't know how. Everyone supports getting out but we botched the when and the how. The only thing conservatives and liberals agree on is how poorly this was handled. Afghanistan is a bell we tried to un-ring and it just broke the bell.
Rory Stewart = Best People @ Good Boyz @ Brave Netizen . Street to talk about TRUTH . !!!
@gariadara I keep crying cause unfortunately it's not the last war. Even Vietnam with all its atrocities is till looked at as a war with good intentions that went horribly bad. If the people in power don't acknowledge that Vietnam and Afghanistan were fundamentally wrong to wage, they will keep waging wars under all sorts of pretexts. Rory Stewart is a moderate, but I want to see pacifists. Not defending the Taliban, not denying the progress. But credit for the progress goes least to the armies.
Bravíssimo!
Good talk but 1) another 20 minute talk that could have been 5 minutes and 2) TED: where EVERY talk gets a standing ovation
The drummer from the Gorillaz grew up :-)
The drummer from Gorillaz is black?
Very😎drôle
danke liebe Katja für die Übersetzung
It sounds pretty sensible what this man has to say. I at least makes me believe he's right about his assessment of Afghanistan.
However, I can say from personal experience that what he has to say about the Balkan simply is not true. Maybe because he has been misinformed, maybe because he wants to believe the Balkan intervention was a success (or both).
The biased Balkan intervention has created a disaster that is still ongoing. That he thinks it didn't makes me wonder if he's wrong about more.
@mazdaplz You're right, but this talk isn't about what we did wrong (as he says in the beginning, we shouldn't be asking why we went in, we should be asking what are we still doing there)
He's offering a reasonable solution. You're just reiterating the problem.
Very very true!
Do we have to wait what will be in the next 2 years after 2019 as, we Afghans in 2019 are much anticipating the next catastrophic situation after Talibans return which is why feeble government unlikely to expose it's failure over past 4 years.
I hope peace can be negotiated, I went to Afghanistan before 1978, it was such a lovely place then. I hope it can be like that again.
@@lucky7950 those days were glorious days of Afghanistan, but now thinks have changed from one sight of country you will witness vast population for modern world (fashion, freedom of choice) on the other side you will face Islamic radicals who are funded by sick Arabs and trained by Pakistan intelligence (ISI) ready to murder, burn and destroy any possible construction which leads towards development. Another big issue which brought every one especially Afghans to tension we have many world's super powerful countries hustling to show their strength. If think Talibans (insurgents) are following under one person's order it is a big mistake cause we have (Iranian Taliban) mostly their activities are on West sights of Afghanistan, (Chinese Taliban) mostly their activities are in the southeast sight such as mining fields (Logar) Russian or (Chechnya Taliban with Tajikistan Taliban) activities in north sights their motives to extract gemstones in Badakhshan, Takhar, Balch, Jawzjan and Faryab who are capable of using advanced weapons. Now if (Afghan Taliban) would want to draw their weapons and joins peace process even then we have another one growing terrorist groups called the ISIS of Khorasan that are funded by Arabs and some sources are confirming they are transferred from Syria and Iraq to disturb the region and use their chances of getting from minerals and also never the less we have waged soldiers (Fatimi) funded by Iran Government trained by Iran military personnel in Syria to confront the ISIS in Syria they are also coming to Afghanistan.
@@saye8560 I feel for you and your countrymen 😔
Roy Stewart did a great job. The courageous Afghan people continue to be wronged by outsiders like Pakistan and, yes, even Americans. We forced a constitution on Afghanistan that mandates a powerful centralized government rather than a decentralized system that is more consistent with the tribal, ethnic and village configuratioon of Afghanistan the country. So they end up fighting each other over who'll get all that power to exercise over all those other ethnic groups.
Should have listened to Rory … 10 years ago
I can "like" this video without even watching--I only have to see the title.
He's quite right though. Humility vs. Arrogance, which of these qualities will people you know see in You, for your actions?