Episode 348 – Twenty years in Afghanistan and the Taliban are back in power
I am not a military specialist but I am aware of the great Prussian strategist Carl von Clausewitz. Among his many famous statements were this gem: “War is the realm of uncertainty; three quarters of the factors on which action is based are wrapped in a fog of greater or lesser uncertainty.” Afghanistan certainly seems to fit that phrase. What began as an inevitable need to find Usama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda cohorts after 9/11 and punish the Taliban for hosting them, turned into two decades of war, hundreds of thousands of casualties and billions of dollars spent. In August 2021 the US finally left and the Taliban came back to power; so what was the point? I speak with the author of an upcoming book on those years.
About my guest
Dr. Jonathan Schroden is the author of the forthcoming book titled “US Counterterrorism Operations in Afghanistan: Jackpots, Dry Holes, and Collateral Damage.” He is a recognized expert on irregular warfare and special operations who spent 15 years supporting the US military in Afghanistan, including deploying or traveling to the country 13 times.
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Canadian Intelligence Eh
In a world of multiple voices and opinions it can be very hard to know where to turn. One choice is to look to those who actually worked in counter-terrorism in the national security world.
In these half-hour podcasts, 32-year Canadian intelligence veteran Phil Gurski is joined by a fascinating array of individuals with something meaningful to say about these issues as they provide insight into what they mean and what we need to do about them.
About Phil Gurski
Phil worked as a senior strategic analyst at CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service) from 2001-2015, specializing in jihadi terrorism and radicalisation. From 1983 to 2001 he was employed as a senior multilingual analyst at Communications Security Establishment (CSE – Canada’s signals intelligence agency), specialising in the Middle East. He also served as senior special advisor in the National Security Directorate at Public Safety Canada from 2013, focusing on community outreach and training on radicalisation to violence, until his retirement from the civil service in May 2015, and as consultant for the Ontario Provincial Police’s Anti-Terrorism Section (PATS) from May to October 2015. He also ran Borealis Threat and Risk Consulting from May 2015 to May 2025.
He was the Director of Security and Intelligence at the SecDev Group from June 2018 to July 2019 and the Director of the National Security Programme at the University of Ottawa’s Professional Development Institute from 2020-2022. He has also taught on national security issues at George Brown College, the University of Ottawa and Georgian College. Mr. Gurski has presented on violent Islamist-inspired and other forms of terrorism and radicalisation across Canada and around the world and is actively sought by Canadian and international media on national security and intelligence issues. He has written hundreds of op-eds on these matters for several Canadian media since 2016
He is the author of The Threat from Within: Recognizing Al Qaeda-inspired Radicalization and Terrorism in the West (Rowman and Littlefield 2015) Western Foreign Fighters: The Threat to Homeland and International Security (Rowman and Littlefield 2017), The Lesser Jihads: Taking the Islamist fight to the world (Rowman and Littlefield 2017), An end to the ‘War on Terrorism (Rowman and Littlefield 2018), When Religion Kills: How Extremist Justify Violence Through Faith (Lynne Rienner 2019), The Peaceable Kingdom? A history of terrorism in Canada from Confederation to the present (self-published: 2021, republished by Double Dagger in 2022), The Fenians: Brotherhood of fools or Canada’s first terrorist threat? (Double Dagger: 2025) and the forthcoming 9/11: the Unfinished Battle – Why jihadi terrorism is stronger, wider and far from over (Optimum Publishing 2026). He regularly blogs and podcasts (Canadian Intelligence Eh!), and posts on Bluesky (@borealissaves.bsky.social) on terrorism and intelligence matters.
