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Last modified on Sat 17 Apr 2021 16.01 EDT When the government announced the final 80 Australian troops would be home from Afghanistan by September, bringing to a close Australia’s longest military engagement, John Bale was filled with “a mix of emotions”. Bale, a former army officer who was deployed to Afghanistan twice in 2008 and 2010, says: “When I read the news … I was a lot more emotional than I had expected. We knew this was coming but it hit me.” Now active...

‘We lost our way’: ex-soldiers regret how Australia got bogged down in Afghanistan Daniel Hurst Foreign affairs and defence correspondent © Provided by The Guardian Photograph: Australian Department of Defence/AAP When the government announced the final 80 Australian troops would be home from Afghanistan by September, bringing to a close Australia’s longest military engagement, John Bale was filled with “a mix of emotions”. Bale, a former army officer who was deploy...