America's war in Afghanistan, launched after the September 11 attacks as the first stage of the Global War on Terror, ended in a stumbling, embarrassing withdrawal. Thirteen American soldiers were killed by ISIS during the chaotic evacuation, allies were frustrated and ignored, and the Taliban imposed their own deadline and conditions. The Taliban retook the country almost overnight. America left behind new airports, highways, military bases, hospitals, a nationwide digital communications network, and hundreds of billions of dollars in military weaponry. The Taliban and their radical allies are delighted. Leaving Afghanistan also cost America the on-the-ground intelligence it had grown accustomed to, which makes radical Islamic groups harder to fight, and these groups have grown in number and personnel worldwide since 2001. Together with bungling elsewhere in the Middle East, this retreat has put radical Islam back in the headlines and shown American weakness to a culture that respects power and attacks weakness. The war also brought the Patriot Act and a long erosion of constitutional freedoms and expansion of government at home. The withdrawal is one sign of America's broader retreat from its obligations to global peace and order, a decline rooted in a nation that took God's blessings for granted and turned from Him. By these measures, America, not the terrorists, is waving the white flag.

Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, is one of many cities suffering from too little water. It was originally planned to support about 1 million people, but it now holds more than 4.6 million, according to U.S. government estimates. Several unseasonably dry winters, together with the sprawling population, have strained supplies and caused the water table to fall.

Afghanistan is one of the lands where the descendants of Joktan live today, together with Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, and every other "stan" in the region, which one man calls chaos-stan. These peoples belong to the broader group of Middle Eastern and Islamic nations descended from Cush, Ishmael, Lot, and Joktan, whose lineages are somewhat mixed together and do not follow modern national boundaries. They share almost nothing culturally with the Israelitish nations of America, Britain, and Canada, and many of them, especially the Islamic fundamentalists, hold a consuming hatred of Western ways while loving the wealth God has given the West. Their religion, which in truth worships Satan, teaches ideas diametrically opposed to nominal Christianity, so no reconciliation is possible and relations can only worsen.