Across recent administrations, one thing has remained consistent: deception about the Afghan War. 

Veteran Matthew Hoh joins host Chip Gibbons on episode eight of the podcast Primary Sources to discuss the decades of American intervention in Afghanistan and Hoh’s personal experience as a whistleblower—which was met with fierce pushback from the Pentagon. 

Hoh chronicles the 43-year history of the Afghan war and how the United States treated Afghanistan as a country where each administration could gain leverage by funding leaders and manipulating events in a fruitless attempt to attain glory for the presidency through military means. 

History repeated itself again and again as these attempts failed and nurtured further unrest. 

Inaccurate portrayals of the war in both news and entertainment media informed—or rather, misinformed—Washington’s consensus on Afghanistan. Miniscule evidence led to brutal attacks by the U.S. that only brought more death and destruction as well as a very understandable disdain from the Afghan people. 

The biggest lie that Americans were told was that these violent ventures were somehow keeping us safe and preventing another 9/11.   

Hoh worked for the State Department in Afghanistan. When he realized that the war was once again being fought for military victory, he resigned in protest. While others in his field supported his resignation, he was the only one to publicly speak out against the war. The Pentagon even hired a PR firm to discredit him. 

Listen to the full episode here.