Mapping the advance of the Taliban in Afghanistan

The Taliban recently entered Kabul, saying they were awaiting a “peaceful transfer” of power. They, in less than eight weeks have swept through Afghanistan took all major cities including Mazar-i-Sharif, Kandahar and Herat among others.

Daily Current Affairs Quiz 2021

The withdrawal of forces by USA is now being likened to the fall of Saigon, a somewhat similar catastrophe that befell the US almost half a century ago when Saigon, the capital of US-backed South Vietnam, fell to Communist-ruled North Vietnam two years after the withdrawal of the American military which had been in the country for 19 years.

Saigon’s capture on April 30, 1975 (it was later renamed after North leader Ho Chi Minh) signalled the end of the Vietnam War, and the Communists consolidated their hold over the entire country in the next few months.

The Vietnam War—the first televised war in the world—was a bloody conflict that left 58,000 Americans and 2,50,000 Vietnamese dead, and ended with the US being thrown out of the Southeast Asian country.

The war lasted from 1954, when North Vietnam’s legendary General Vo Nguyen Giap defeated French colonial troops at the famous strategic spot, Dien Bien Phu, until 21 years later when the same military leader vanquished the Americans and their South Vietnamese protégés at Saigo.