On October 7, 2001, the US and Britain launched Operation Enduring Freedom, less than four weeks after the attacks of September 11, beginning military action in Afghanistan. It opened on a Sunday with airstrikes and cruise missiles and became the longest war in American history, stretching across four presidencies and ending in August 2021. The decision to strike came quickly. After the attacks, Washington demanded that the Taliban government hand over Osama bin Laden and shut down al-Qaeda's training camps. The Taliban refused, offering negotiations but no handover. Within days, the Bush administration had settled on a military response, and planners spent the following weeks moving forces into the region and lining up support from allies and neighbouring states.
In the early evening, U.S. warplanes and Tomahawk missiles launched from ships and submarines hit Taliban air defenses, command sites and suspected terrorist camps around Kabul, Kandahar and Jalalabad. British forces joined in from the start. Shortly afterward, President George W. Bush went on television from the White House to tell Americans the operation was under way and warned that the Taliban would pay for sheltering terrorists.
The bombing was only one piece of the plan. CIA officers had been on the ground in northern Afghanistan since late September, and small Special Forces teams soon joined them, working with Northern Alliance fighters who had been fighting the Taliban for years. Some soldiers ended up on horseback in the mountains, calling in airstrikes by radio, something few planners had pictured beforehand. It worked faster than anyone expected. Kabul fell in mid-November, Kandahar, the Taliban's stronghold, followed in early December, and the leadership scattered, many fleeing across the border into Pakistan. That quick start made the war look easier than it was. In December 2001, Afghan leaders met in Bonn and agreed on an interim government led by Hamid Karzai, but bin Laden escaped from the Tora Bora mountains and the Taliban slowly regrouped. What was supposed to be a short, targeted campaign became a long effort to rebuild a country. NATO took command of the international force in 2003, and by 2010 and 2011 U.S. troop numbers had reached about 100,000. Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in May 2011, yet the fighting continued.
The end came as suddenly as the beginning. The U.S. and the Taliban signed a deal in Doha in early 2020, and in August 2021 the Afghan government collapsed as the Taliban retook Kabul. During the chaotic evacuation, a suicide bombing at the airport killed 13 American service members and scores of Afghans. The last U.S. flight left on August 30. Over the course of the war, more than 2,400 American troops died, along with tens of thousands of Afghan civilians and members of the security forces.
There is no federal day of remembrance for October 7, and the anniversary usually goes by quietly. Veterans' groups, military families and historians still use the date to look back at the war's costs, at those who served, and at the Afghans who worked alongside them, many of whom are still trying to find safety. Twenty-five years later, it stands as a reminder of how much easier it is to start a war than to end one.
On October 7, 2001, the US and Britain launched Operation Enduring Freedom, less than four weeks after the attacks of September 11, beginning military action in Afghanistan. It opened on a Sunday with airstrikes and cruise missiles and became the longest war in American history, stretching across four presidencies and ending in August 2021. The decision to strike came quickly. After the attacks, Washington demanded that the Taliban government hand over Osama bin Laden and shut down al-Qaeda's training camps. The Taliban refused, offering negotiations but no handover. Within days, the Bush administration had settled on a military response, and planners spent the following weeks moving forces into the region and lining up support from allies and neighbouring states.
In the early evening, U.S. warplanes and Tomahawk missiles launched from ships and submarines hit Taliban air defenses, command sites and suspected terrorist camps around Kabul, Kandahar and Jalalabad. British forces joined in from the start. Shortly afterward, President George W. Bush went on television from the White House to tell Americans the operation was under way and warned that the Taliban would pay for sheltering terrorists.
The bombing was only one piece of the plan. CIA officers had been on the ground in northern Afghanistan since late September, and small Special Forces teams soon joined them, working with Northern Alliance fighters who had been fighting the Taliban for years. Some soldiers ended up on horseback in the mountains, calling in airstrikes by radio, something few planners had pictured beforehand. It worked faster than anyone expected. Kabul fell in mid-November, Kandahar, the Taliban's stronghold, followed in early December, and the leadership scattered, many fleeing across the border into Pakistan. That quick start made the war look easier than it was. In December 2001, Afghan leaders met in Bonn and agreed on an interim government led by Hamid Karzai, but bin Laden escaped from the Tora Bora mountains and the Taliban slowly regrouped. What was supposed to be a short, targeted campaign became a long effort to rebuild a country. NATO took command of the international force in 2003, and by 2010 and 2011 U.S. troop numbers had reached about 100,000. Bin Laden was killed in Pakistan in May 2011, yet the fighting continued.
The end came as suddenly as the beginning. The U.S. and the Taliban signed a deal in Doha in early 2020, and in August 2021 the Afghan government collapsed as the Taliban retook Kabul. During the chaotic evacuation, a suicide bombing at the airport killed 13 American service members and scores of Afghans. The last U.S. flight left on August 30. Over the course of the war, more than 2,400 American troops died, along with tens of thousands of Afghan civilians and members of the security forces.
There is no federal day of remembrance for October 7, and the anniversary usually goes by quietly. Veterans' groups, military families and historians still use the date to look back at the war's costs, at those who served, and at the Afghans who worked alongside them, many of whom are still trying to find safety. Twenty-five years later, it stands as a reminder of how much easier it is to start a war than to end one.