How America’s War on Terror has Led to Instability in Central and Western Asia

On September 11, 2001 al-Qaeda terrorist group carried out the worst terrorist attack in
U.S. history. More than two thousand Americans died in that mass murder. In response to the
attack, the U.S. government under President George W. Bush declared War on Terror. The twin
goals of the war were to punish terrorists that had carried out the attack and to keep Americans
safe from a similar attack. Launched seventeen years ago, War on Terror was characterized by
military intervention in the Middle East and Afghanistan and attempts at nation-building. This
paper argues that War on Terror has been responsible for the current instability in countries
where its efforts were directed at.
The first American military intervention under the War on Terror policy was
Afghanistan. The intervention succeeded in toppling the Taliban regime that was providing cover
for the main mastermind of the September 11 attack, Osama bin Laden (Watson 18). The
downside of the intervention is that it led to instability in Afghanistan that persists to this day.
Currently the Afghan government controls only a portion of the country’s territory with the rest
being in the hands of Taliban and other non-state actors (Dower 35). Even though the country’s
military has taken on more responsibility for Afghan security, it is still largely ineffective and
heavily reliant on American military for support. To make matters worse, terrorist groups such as

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ISIS have become active in the country. Their regular terrorist attacks particularly against Shia
minorities in Afghanistan have further contributed to the country’s instability (Dower 37). Even
though the Taliban regime was a brutal one, there is no doubt that had America not toppled it
without a clear strategy of filling the vacuum they left, Afghanistan would be far more stable
today.
Another region where War on Terror has created instability witnessed today is in the
Middle East. After invading Afghanistan in 2001, the American government followed up with
invasion of Iraq and toppled its leader, Saddam Hussein. Almost immediately the country
became unstable as it descended into civil war and various anti-American groups became active
in the country (Pauly 21). The most serious of this group was Al-Qaeda in Iraq which later
transformed into Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) when the Syrian Civil War began (Pauly
22). The group has played a prominent role in the current instability in both Iraq and Syria.
Given the fact that the group was formed as a response to America’s invasion of Iraq, its current
destabilizing activities in the Middle East can be viewed as another example of the legacy of the
War on Terror.
The War on Terror, particularly through its policy of nation-building and military
intervention, has been a source of instability that is currently experienced in Afghanistan and
parts of Iraq and Syria. What this instability shows is that policies taken by governments usually
have unexpected consequences that live on much longer after the formal ending of those policies.

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Works Cited

Dower, John W. The violent American century: War and terror since World War II. Haymarket
Books, 2017.
Pauly, Robert J. Strategic Preemption: US Foreign Policy and the Second Iraq War. Routledge,
2017.
Watson, Robert P. America’s War on Terror. Routledge, 2016.