So while I think it's sad the way it came out, I hope people take pride in what they tried to do.ĪNDY SERWER: What could we have done differently, Stan? And because you said we didn't succeed because we didn't do everything that we could have and should have. And the Afghan people struggled to develop the confidence that a sovereign, united nation needs. Successive Afghan administrations struggled with legitimacy and corruption and other issues.

And so we try to create security.īut we also tried to bring forward governance. I think the hard part, of course, was we were trying to not only create security in a troubled nation, which when we entered in 2001 had been at war essentially for 20 years. I don't agree with that because I believe that that would give us an excuse for not getting the mission done that I think we could have done and would have been good. There is a certain narrative that people say it was impossible. So I don't think those who served there, either military or civilians or media, should take anything except a sense of pride.īut because it didn't come out the way we want, we ought to spend some time thinking about it. At the same time, I would say that Afghanistan changed a lot from 2001 to 2021. I think it was a failure because obviously things didn't end the way we wanted. When did you realize it was a failure? And what do you think specifically went wrong? And you recently acknowledged that the mission there had been a failure. So Afghanistan withdrawal, of course- it's still fresh on our minds.

But first, I want to ask you some news of the day questions a little bit. And please call me Stan.ĪNDY SERWER: We'll call you Stan. And welcome to our special guest, General Stanley McChrystal, retired four star general, former top commander in Afghanistan, and author of the new book, 'Risk, A User's Guide.' General McChrystal, thanks so much for joining us. And welcome to 'Influencers.' I'm Andy Serwer. STANLEY MCCHRYSTAL: So while we can't control the threats, we can control to a great degree our vulnerability to them.ĪNDY SERWER: In this episode of 'Influencers,' I speak to General McChrystal about some of the biggest risks we face today and how we can better prepare ourselves to face new risks in the future.

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