The Other War

It looks as if we're failing in Afghanistan as well. Apparently, the terms of debate are essentially the same as those in Iraq. On the one hand, are people who say you only achieve "success" when you achieve your goals, whereas on the other hand are people who think something else:

This judgment reflects sharp differences between U.S. military and intelligence officials on where the Afghan war is headed. Intelligence analysts acknowledge the battlefield victories, but they highlight the Taliban's unchallenged expansion into new territory, an increase in opium poppy cultivation and the weakness of the government of President Hamid Karzai as signs that the war effort is deteriorating.

The contrasting views echo repeated internal disagreements over the Iraq war: While the military finds success in a virtually unbroken line of tactical achievements, intelligence officials worry about a looming strategic failure.

Not to belabor the point, but if the "tactical achievements" are leading to "strategic failure" then there's a need to rethink the tactics not just pound the table.

Comments

Yeah, I read that one too and wondered whether we learn anything at all from our own relatively recent history. This was the line the military used in Vietnam as well, that we won every significant tactical engagement we ever had with main-force VC and NVA units. Which kinda missed the point about how they could initiate or disengage from contact at will to fight another days and did quite well recruiting from the local population based on disaffection with a corrupt and unpopular government. We don't fight wars for sport, we fight them in pursuit of political and economic objectives. If we do really well at killing lots of foreigners but don't achieve our political goals, that means we've lost. Don't they fucking teach Clausewitz at the military academies? Jesus.

Posted by scott | November 25, 2007 11:33 AM

"The contrasting views echo repeated internal disagreements over the Iraq war: While the military finds success in a virtually unbroken line of tactical achievements, intelligence officials worry about a looming strategic failure...

"Over the past year, all combat encounters against the Taliban have ended with 'a very decisive defeat' for the extremists, Brig. Gen. Robert E. Livingston Jr., commander of the U.S. task force training the Afghan army, told reporters this month. The growing number of suicide bombings against civilians underscores the Taliban's growing desperation, according to Livingston and other U.S. commanders.

"But one senior intelligence official, who like others interviewed was not authorized to discuss Afghanistan on the record, said such gains are fleeting. 'One can point to a lot of indicators that are positive . . . where we go out there and achieve our objectives and kill bad guys,' the official said. But the extremists, he added, seem to have little trouble finding replacements.

"Although growing numbers of foreigners -- primarily Pakistanis -- are joining the Taliban ranks, several officials said the primary source of new recruits remains disaffected Afghans fearful of opposing the Taliban and increasingly disillusioned with their own government...

"At the moment, several officials said, their concern is focused far more on the domestic situation in Afghanistan, where increasing numbers are losing faith in Karzai's government in Kabul. According to a survey released last month by the Asia Foundation, 79 percent of Afghans felt that the government does not care what they think, while 69 percent felt that it is not acceptable to publicly criticize the government.

"While U.S. and other NATO forces have maintained a firm hold on major cities, they have been unable to retain territory in the vast rural areas where 75 percent of Afghanistan's population lives, several sources said. Ground hard-won in combat has been abandoned and reoccupied by Taliban forces, which establish dominance over local governmental bodies.

"There is widespread agreement among administration officials that the Taliban has suffered heavy losses this year. But the U.S. military has also suffered losses, with deaths already past the 100 mark, compared with 87 over all of last year -- making this the deadliest year for U.S. forces in Afghanistan since the war began. Afghan civilian deaths also reached an all-time high of 5,700 this year, according to an Associated Press tally.

"The strategy is 'clear, hold and build,' said Seth Jones, an Afghanistan expert at the Rand Corp. 'You clear the Taliban out, then you hold it for a period of time. You keep forces there, including Afghan forces, then you begin to build, then expand and go into neighboring districts. The problem has been that when you move troops into neighboring districts, you don't have enough to hold what you just cleared.'

"Although the competence of the Afghan army is improving by all accounts, U.S. military officials acknowledge that the goal of turning captured territory over to Afghan forces has been hampered by training delays and insufficient numbers.

"In last year's Operation Medusa, Jones said, Canadian combat troops fought hard for control of the Panjwai district, south of Kandahar. 'Four weeks ago,' he said, 'the levels of Taliban in Panjwai . . . were back up to pre-Operation Medusa.'

"Experts said the Taliban's control has extended beyond the group's traditional southern territory, with extremists making substantial inroads this year into the western provinces of Farah, Herat and others along the Iranian border even as they regularly challenge eastern-based U.S. forces."

____________________________________________

All VERY familiar, for those (like me) above a certain age. Evidently, when Bush compared the Iraq War to the Vietnam War, he was wrong yet again: the better analogy to the Vietnam War is now the Afghan War. (The main difference seems to be that, in this case, the neighboring nation that serves as a safe haven for enemy troops is still officially described as an ally of ours.)

Posted by Bruce Moomaw | November 25, 2007 1:38 PM

I think we need to bear in mind that we went to Afghanistan for one reason only, and that was to remove the nation-state platform from Al Qaeda. That was done in splendid fashion. The casualties we have sustained, and those we've caused among civilians, are tiny fractions of those suffered during the Russian war by all parties, ditto for Vietnam which was different in lots of other ways too.

Bringing complete peace, stability, and development to Afghanistan is something that hasn't been accomplished by anyone since the before Alexander the Great tried it. It is a wild, appallingly poor country usually contesting with Bangladesh for the bottom in most categories of development, and probably unmatched anywhere for the war-like, anti-foreigner qualities of its people. We (including the Karzai government) have probably made more progress and done more good than anyone in centuries, but if this is to really amount to something long-term it will be because our allies, every one of whom agreed on the invasion and have promised troops for stabilization, keep their words. Our troops are doing what they're supposed to be doing, and while we might could use a few more, we should be under no illusions that duplicating the Soviet tactics of sending lots of regular troops banging around the Hindu Kush would have any other result than the one they experienced.

In my view the single most effective thing we could do in this regard would be to de-criminalize drugs. This would cut off the main source of funding for terrorists, improve the lives of millions of small farmers, and cause the drug kingpins to go out of business.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 25, 2007 2:22 PM

This again highlights the strategic fumbling involved in the Iraq invasion. If we had any inkling of an idea (and we sure as hell should have) that the Al Qaeda command and control would seek refuge in Pakistan (think Laos and Cambodia), then we should have pre-planned for a protracted engagement along those lines, AND we should have known at the time (because it was known to anyone who had bothered to read a simple news article about the Pakistani political situation)that the Pakistanis would be unlikely to really help us.

Iraq being an invasion of choice, turned a structured but weak indirect threat into a chaotic and unstable second front where Al Qaeda could find new recruits, and Iran could shore up their regional control and indirectly lock us down while they play cat and mouse with their nuclear program. Now the only out appears to be a quiet withdrawal and a likely concession to civil war once we leave with neither winner being a benefit to us, and an armed an trained Sunni force that will likely go the international jihadi route within a few months of our departure.

..and now the troops rotating out of Iraq can be re-routed to Afghanistan to shore up the job left unfinished while we were busy shooting ourselves in the foot.

Posted by Condor | November 25, 2007 3:07 PM

Andrew Stuttaford over at the Corner has been predicting our failure in Afghanistan for years unless we change course. We haven't.

His hypothesis (more or less):
The DEA is undermining the war effort by having coalition forces burn the poppy fields of ordinary Afghanis, leaving the Afghani peasants with no way of providing for their families other than joining the Taliban.

Until the US gov. realizes that people who blow up other people's buildings are worse than people who provide the material for others to make unpopular choices in isolation, we won't win Afghanistan.

Then again, John P Walter (of the ONDCP) has described success in Afghanistan as "like what we have in Columbia," so maybe Afghanistan's not going to be a failure after all.

Posted by Shinyk | November 25, 2007 3:07 PM

If you think we are failing in Iraq at this point, you aren't paying attention. The lower levels of violence are a really positive sign.

In Afghanistan, there are tow issues, neither of which is easy to deal with:

1) Pakistan
2) The War on Drugs

We could solve (2) ourselves by treating narcotics like we treat alcohol and tobacco, but it's unlikely to happen anytime soon.

Posted by James Robertson | November 25, 2007 3:24 PM

Not one person here mentioned Osama--the reason we're in Afghanistan. Remember, before the invasion, we offered a deal the Taliban turned down--hand over bin Laden and we won't invade.

The only goal was, and should be, OBL--everything else is noise.

Posted by Mel | November 25, 2007 5:00 PM

Robert Powell's 2:22pm comment pretty much nails it. Deposing the Taliban and removing a state sanctuary for Al-Qaeda was accomplished. Accomplishing anything beyond that in such a backward country is wildly backward and anarchic country isn't very realistic, especially while cracking down on Afghans' largest cash crop. Afghanistan is to Iraq what Iraq is to Switzerland.

Posted by Fred | November 25, 2007 5:07 PM

Matt: "Not to belabor the point, but if the "tactical achievements" are leading to "strategic failure" then there's a need to rethink the tactics not just pound the table."

Well, no.

You need to rethink your strategy, not your tactics. Of course, you might need to rethink your tactics as well, but primarily tactics do not lead strategy, but the reverse. So get your strategy right, then think about how your tactics will convey your strategy.

The notion that we "removed the nation-state platform of Al Qaeda" is simply wrong - not to mention ignorant. All we did was shift Al Qaeda and the Taliban into Pakistan - which is now failing - and gave the impetus to Al Qaeda to get bigger and better and more successful.

This is why the invasion of Afghanistan was totally incorrect. The Taliban were never the problem. Al Qaeda was the problem and we could have handled that without invading Afghanistan, let alone trying to rebuild it afterward.

Now we have TWO failed states coming up (not to mention Iraq, which makes three). Meanwhile we're planning yet another war against Iran, intending to add another failed (or at least destabilized and hostile) state to the list. Israel has added Lebanon to the list and intends to add Syria. By the time we're done, the entire Muslim population of the world will be against the US - and the US will lose since there's no way the US is going to defeat a billion people, nukes or no nukes.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | November 25, 2007 7:11 PM

What I don't understand, and would love to read about, is why the Karzai government has proved so damn innefective. I read a piece about the Canadian Army taking up the responsibility of paying the local police forces around Kandahar, because when left to the Kabul authorities, the cash was not making it to the local men on patrol. How are they supposed to remain loyal to a government that does not pay them? Why why why is this so?
The West is investing blood and treasure in Afghanistan, but it wont work without a semi competent partner.

Posted by Northern Observer | November 26, 2007 11:15 AM

Of all the places on Earth one might expect to find "a semi-competent partner", Afghanistan is at or near the bottom of the list. Karzai's doing the best he can, but it's a God-awful enormous task. You will look in vain for a previous Afghan government that was "semi-competent".

Again, if we really want to help, we should stop scapegoating dirt-poor Afghan farmers for the recreational habits of rich Europeans and Americans.

Posted by Robert Powell | November 26, 2007 1:05 PM

Again, if we really want to help, we should stop scapegoating dirt-poor Afghan farmers for the recreational habits of rich Europeans and Americans.

Amen.

Posted by Shinyk | November 26, 2007 5:27 PM