The Kite Runner Middle American Conflict Analysis

The Kite Runner: Interactions with the United States-Middle Eastern Conflict
The turmoil of the Middle East today is largely shaped by the perspectives of outsiders around the world. The Kite Runner, a historical fiction piece by Khaled Hosseini, contributes significantly to these perceptions. In the novel, the author uses the United States-Middle Eastern conflict as a foundation for many of the story’s central elements, which in turn have impressed a profound effect on the development of this situation in contemporary history.
The novel’s central conflict takes its roots in the relationship between the United States and Afghanistan following the Soviet Invasion of 1979-1989. The author expresses the passive role Amir chooses to uphold during
The novel’s greatest irony takes place in Amir’s choice not to intervene in Hassan’s rape. Amir aims “to win Baba” by bringing his father the blue kite, offering “Hassan [as] the price [he] had to pay, the lamb [he] had to slay” (77). Ironically, by making this choice, Amir becomes exactly the sort of coward Baba disapproves of, the “man who can’t stand up to anything” (77). Furthermore, the protagonist’s attempt to ultimately achieve happiness by attaining the pride of his father earns him the overwhelming burden of guilt and despair that he carries throughout the novel. This predicament borrows its element of irony from the US-Middle Eastern strife. America “stood by, watched, and did not intervene as Afghanistan was brutalized by one regime after another” because it aspired to preserve lives and other national resources (Hosseini). The country decided based on interests of conserving its well-being. Ironically, in choosing to adopt a passive stance, the United States allowed Afghanistan to fall into a state of utter turmoil; after funding the Mujahideen during the “struggle with the Soviet Union”, America stood by while the regime evolved into an anti-Western establishment, becoming “the people we fight today” (Clinton). This prompted the US to enter a state of tumultuous warfare with the Middle East following the 9/11 attacks, spilling American blood, ultimately leading to the detriment of the country’s well-being. The nation’s realization of the unintended consequences of its actions by politicians and historians alike are reflective of and draw perception from Amir’s analogous experience in his flashbacks of the past. The element of irony interweaves itself into the details of both The Kite Runner’s plot and the US-Middle Eastern conflict, connecting the two occurrences