Looking At Afghanistan One Year Later

 You take the good/you take the bad; you take them both and there you have:

After two decades of insurgency, the Taliban exhausted the world's most powerful military and their NATO allies, which agreed to withdraw from the country in a deal signed in February 2020. As Western troops were concluding their withdrawal last summer, the Taliban oversaw the rapid surrender, defeat or co-option of Afghan security forces — forces they saw as aiding a foreign occupation.

Today, the Taliban's particular interpretation of Islamic law is being imposed in fits and starts, largely over women and girls: Most girls cannot attend secondary schools. They may not travel long distances without a male guardian. Women report being hounded out of their jobs. They've been ordered to cover their faces in public, although the rule is only applied to women on television so far.

There are changes perhaps less noticed outside of Afghanistan: Afghans are living in relative security for the first time in decades. Aid groups reach areas that were previously off-limits. Primary-age boys and girls are attending schools in greater numbers, because it is now safe for them to go. "Of course, it's very cynical of the Taliban to say: We brought peace, I was shooting at you and now I stopped shooting at you," retorted a Western official who closely follows the Taliban, and who requested anonymity so he could speak freely.

Now before people argue that Afghanistan is going backwards, how is their "trade freedom for security" any different than America's "MORE COPS" approach to dealing with nebulous crime (rarely is the type of crime discussed when pundits are arguing over increasing police budgets).  Or the increased surveillance that's been going on since 9/11. Or the reversal of Roe v Wade. I could go on...