The 2022 documentary Retrograde explores the final months of America’s war in Afghanistan, capturing footage from January 2021 until the final withdrawal of U.S. troops in August 2021.
The charismatic figure at the center of the film is Afghan Lieutenant General Sami Sadat.
“The Americans trained me,” Sadat says early in the film. “I just don’t believe that the Americans are going to retrograde.” But U.S. troops began to retrograde on May 1, 2021. On the same day...