On Friday, Feb. 16, 2024, professor Elisabeth Leake of Tufts University gave the 148th Foreign Policy Seminar (FPS). It was open to attend both virtually via Zoom call and in person.
“The FPS is a series launched by now-retired professor Thomas Paterson in 1985. Professor Leake’s talk will be the 148th lecture in this series, which is funded by the Department of History and by the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences,” said Board of Trustees Distinguished Professor Frank Costigliola.
Costigliola gave a short history of the FPS, including the fact that this particular FPS had the highest turnout historically thus far. He acknowledged the loyal returners of the FPS series as well as the current students. He then introduced the speaker, Elisabeth Leake. As stated in an email description by Costigliola, “[Leake] was educated at Yale and at Cambridge University in Britain. She has published two books, the second being ‘Afghan Crucible,’ which is on the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and the international reaction.” Leake’s goal is to make complex histories accessible.
Leake began the lecture discussing how the United States ended its invasion of Afghanistan in 2021. Leake acknowledged the phrases “graveyard of empires” and “roadkill of empires” when some refer to Afghanistan. Kevin Baker coined the latter phrase in a 2021 Politico article entitled “The Old Cliché About Afghanistan That Won’t Die”: a more dismal take on Afghanistan’s history and politics. Some people would even consider Afghanistan to be a “failed state” or a state that was “never meant to be,” according to Leake. However, as she argues later in the lecture, Afghanistan is a multiethnic, multireligious, multilingual society despite the harmful stereotypes associated with it abroad.
Afghanistan is often excluded from the historical conversation, but Leake wants to change that. She claims that we can gain a lot of valuable information from understanding Afghanistan’s place in global history and events.
Leake then referenced the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan from late 1979 to 1989, later explaining in the Q&A session that it was due to how the Soviet Union desired to support the socialist regime but underestimated the resistance. Leake acknowledged how the Cold War shaped Afghanistan and other third-world countries.
Kabul University hosted students with Marxist-Leninist beliefs. Furthermore, the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) identified as Marxist-Leninist. Leake noted the parallels between the PDPA and other socialist and communist organizations.
There were also the Islamists, a political party that believes in Islamic fundamentalism and usually opposed socialism and communism. Hezb-e-Islami, an Islamist organization, focused on one-party rule and was one of the most feared and hated resistance groups, according to Leake. On the other hand, Jamiat-e-Islami, another Islamist organization, tried to build a multiethnic coalition.
Leake proposed that the resistance groups looked at the past and the future. Nonetheless, none of the groups wanted a pre-modernist Afghanistan; they wanted a revolution.
Leake then shifted the focus to India, where a lesser-known activist in the Gandhi era by the name of Abdul Ghaffar Khan was highlighted. Khan formed the Khudai Khudmatgar, a key party of Indian politics focused on equal rights and multiculturalism. He was eventually imprisoned in Pakistan until he became sick, after which he was exiled to Afghanistan. Following the discussion of Khan, Leake took some time to explain how the United Kingdom and the Muslim League (as well as some other organizations) feared the balkanization of South Asia. An example of this can be seen through in the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, which led to the independence of Bangladesh.
Leake closed off her lecture by defining decolonization. Leake classifies decolonization as a persistent form of dissent in both belief and practice due to nothing being done in their favor. It is a political transfer of power that is mobilized for the sake of critique. It is worth noting that decolonization evolved to mean something different in the 21st century, according to Leake, as it’s used more metaphorically.
In the Q&A session, the audience asked about several topics concerning Leake’s presentation. These questions included the topics of women’s role in Afghan history, Saudi Arabian and Iranian influence on Afghanistan (Iran and Pakistan give the Islamist political party money), Afghan national identity, Abdul Ghaffar Khan’s legacy (India loved him, Pakistan hated him) and Afghan intellectuals to name a few.
Leake’s lecture was incredibly engaging and accessible for historians and people generally interested in history. It doesn’t hurt to learn more about foreign policy, although at first, it may seem boring because all human beings are a part of one connected world. If that wasn’t enough to convince you; however, the FPS offered a buffet-style dinner after the Q&A session.