Key outlet for the local black market, deprived of 'surplus' goods from Nato military bases, has become like a ghost town

In Kabul's Bush Bazaar, the mood these days is funereal. The black market where pilfered goods from Nato military bases are sold has become a shadow of its former self as the bases close down.

The Bush Bazaar took its name from the US president who started the war after 9/11, and its demise serves as a metaphor for foreigners' dwindling presence in the region.

At its peak, in 2011, Nato had 800 military bases to accommodate its 130,000 troops. By November 2013, that figure fell to 80. More have closed since then, and by the end of this year just five or six bases will remain open.

Barack Obama's announcement on Tuesday that all American troops will withdraw from Afghanistan by 2016 has been met with consternation by many Afghans here. Many had not believed that foreigners would depart so early, leaving so few forces behind – just 9,800, and half that number by the end of next year.

On a recent Monday, the market's alleyways, flanked by rows of shops selling curios, were empty of customers. Scraggy cats hunted for scraps. Tarpaulin flapped wetly in the wind.

Hajji Toor Mohammad, the elder of the market, presided over a pile of stolen food items, a shrine to Nato's failed policies in Afghanistan. His shop was just one of the many manifestations of the corruption that this war had engendered. Most of the items on sale were a few weeks away from expiring.

Mohammad, a portly man with a pakool hat and a forehead comb-over, explained how business came to a halt about a year ago. Just as his fellow shopkeepers started talking about 2014, the year when Nato's mission formally ends, the supply of goods started to dry up. His suppliers began to complain that fewer troops meant a dwindling number of what he euphemistically calls "gifts" from the military forces.

To make up for short supplies, he has begrudgingly begun stocking goods from neighbouring countries. Shelves of Kraft cheese and Campbell's soup have been replaced by Iranian chocolate and Pakistani canned fruit. The customers have noticed the drop in quality, he said, and stopped coming.

"If you sit with me for an hour, you still won't see any customers," Mohammad lamented.

True to his word, in the course of that hour, not one customer entered his store. Among the 1,000 stalls in the market, some owners claimed they hadn't had a customer in three days. At Mohammad's, sales went from 200,000 afghanis (£2,112) a month over the course of last year to just 10,000 afghanis last month, a 95% decrease.

Despite the difficulties caused by the foreign troop departure, however, most merchants said they were glad to see them go. During a decade of war, hatred of foreign forces has been rising steadily.

Among rural Pashtuns, and now in the market, where the tentacles of the US empire can be felt in all corners, with shops selling the most American of items such as jars of peanut butter and copies of Maxim magazine, even those who benefitted from Nato's presence say they want the troops to go.

Mohammad seemed unfazed by the troop withdrawals that were destroying his business. "They have to leave. A guest cannot stay forever," he said. "They have overstayed their welcome."

Another shopkeeper, Abdullah Majid, also excoriated the Americans for putting Afghanistan's culture and honour and lives under siege.

"They are making sexy with our women in their pimp houses," he said, perpetuating one of the most common misconceptions about foreign troops in Afghanistan.

Majid confessed that his 4,000 afghanis a day business was now making 500 on a good day. He had no idea how he was going to support his family, but what he did seem sure of is that he wanted to be left alone.

"We have managed before," he said, of the brief period of peace prior to the Soviet invasion in 1979. "And we will again, if they will only let us be."