Losing the War of Exhaustion

BG (ret.) Mark T. Kimmit wrote this essay on Afghanistan for Foreign Policy.

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As Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, awaits a response from the White House on his assessment of the war effort, some would suggest that doubt is growing on Capitol Hill and in towns and cities across the United States about whether America can win this fight.

This doubt is misplaced. The truth is that there are more than enough troops, civilians, money, and operational capability available between the United States, NATO forces, and our Afghan allies to defeat the Taliban and assist in rebuilding Afghan society. There is no reason to fear losing a war of attrition. The major danger in Afghanistan is losing a war of exhaustion.

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I agree with BG Kimmit that AQ has changed strategy to a war of exhaustion; however, I disagree that A'stan is the decisive point. He cites Mullah Omar's Eid speech as one calling for a protracted guerilla campaign to outlast the Americans, but Mullah Omar is the head of the Taliban not AQ. The Taliban has never been an existential threat to the US.

AQ central took a significant blow with the actions of Zarqawi and the failure of the ISI in Iraq. I believe they accepted the loss in that battle and are attempting to regroup. Their strategy is EXACTLY what BG Kimmit is proposing- suck us into a war of exhaustion in A'stan and Pakistan.

We don't have to win in A'stan to defeat, deter, or outlast AQ; however, we could lose big time by throwing too much money and soldiers in A'stan. Ten years from now, we may "win" in A'stan just like we "won" in Iraq, but AQ could just move to another country. Ten years from now, we could be dealing with real war-exhaustion.

On the other hand, AQ central appears severly fractured right now. Increased CT operations could be a tipping point coupled with a much smaller FID/SFA presence in A'stan to help shore up a smaller centralized gov't.

As we continue to debate A'stan, I believe it is imperative to look long term and hollistically to determine the best least-bad solution. If we can find that, then we would certainly win.

v/r

Mike

Citing MIke F

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Their (AQ) strategy is EXACTLY what BG Kimmit is proposing- suck us into a war of exhaustion in A'stan and Pakistan.

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This point has been made before ON SWC, although possibly not so clearly.

I too am concerned that the UK are committing so much effort to the campaign in Helmand first and secondly Afghanistan. A point that IIRC HMG does not comment on. Whether we are falling into an AQ trap is a moot point.

davidbfpo

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Originally Posted by davidbfpo

Citing MIke F

This point has been made before ON SWC, although possibly not so clearly.

I too am concerned that the UK are committing so much effort to the campaign in Helmand first and secondly Afghanistan. A point that IIRC HMG does not comment on. Whether we are falling into an AQ trap is a moot point.

davidbfpo

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David,

I spent the last week or so getting caught up on what AQ's been discussing. You are correct that "an AQ trap is a moot point." The more I consider it, the less and less I see AQ as an existential threat. BG Kimmit's article was interesting, and it followed some of my thoughts over the last week.

v/r

Mike

An interesting piece which reflects me long standing fears on this issue.

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Unlike a war of attrition, where the objective is to defeat the enemy, the objective in a war of exhaustion is to defeat a nation's will to fight. The British Empire was not defeated in Afghanistan by a war of attrition, nor was the Soviet Union defeated in Afghanistan through attrition. Both were defeated through exhaustion. And this is how the Taliban intends to defeat the current coalition efforts in Afghanistan -- by steadily eroding our will to fight.

Just look at Taliban leader Mullah Muhammad Omar's recent Eid speech. "We fought against the British invaders for 80 years," he said. "Today we have strong determination, military training and effective weapons. Still more, we have preparedness for a long war." In Osama bin Laden's Sept. 11 message, he repeated his claim that his fighters will wear down the coalition in Afghanistan "like we exhausted the Soviet Union for 10 years until it collapsed."

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As long the Taliban can more easily sustain the pressure on the Afghan government and the coalition forces than the West can do so with its presence it will have time on its side. A dangerous situation.

CvC brought up the issue in book 1, chapter 2. Combined with his theory of the people's war I presented in this thread it creates a disturbant and bleak outlook for Afghanistan unless overall progress can be achieved at a much faster pace.

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Besides these two means there are three other peculiar ways of directly increasing the waste of the enemy's force. The first is invasion, that is the occupation of the enemy's territory, not with a view to keeping it, but in order to levy contributions there, or to devastate it. The immediate object is here neither the conquest of the enemy's territory nor the defeat of his armed force, but merely to do him damage in a general way. The second way is to select for the object of our enterprises those points at which we can do the enemy most harm. Nothing is easier to conceive than two different directions in which our force may be employed, the first of which is to be preferred if our object is to defeat the enemy's army, while the other is more advantageous if the defeat of the enemy is out of the question. According to the usual mode of speaking we should say that the first is more military, the other more political. But if we take our view from the highest point, both are equally military, and neither the one nor the other can be eligible unless it suits the circumstances of the case. The third, by far the most important, from the great number of cases which it embraces, is the wearying out the enemy. We choose this expression not only to explain our meaning in few words but because it represents the thing exactly, and is not so figurative as may at first appear. The idea of wearying out in a struggle amounts in reality to a gradual exhaustion of the physical powers and of the will produced through the long continuance of exertion.

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But, just because that is a strategy, does not mean it cannot be defeated. Abu M quoted Sir David Richards

"Failure would have a catalytic effect on militant Islam around the world and in the region because the message would be that al-Qaeda and the Taliban have defeated the US and the British and Nato, the most powerful alliance in the world. So why wouldn't that have an intoxicating effect on militants everywhere? The geo-strategic implications would be immense."

He goes on to describe the it as a steroid boost to extremist Islam. I can't argue with his analysis. Attempting a CT only approach in Afghanistan is as risky as our current approach IMO.

Michael, Sec Gates said pretty much the same thing on Tuesday:

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AMANPOUR: And do you believe that should -- not next week or next
month -- but should Afghanistan fall to the Taliban again, that it would
again become a base for al Qaeda to have its operations there?

GATES: I think -- I think the thing to remember about Afghanistan is
that that -- that country, and particularly the Afghan-Pakistan border,
is -- is the modern epicenter of jihad. It is where the Mujahedeen
defeated the other superpower. And their view is, in my opinion, that
they now have the opportunity to defeat a second superpower, which, more
than anything, would empower their message and the opportunity to
recruit, to fundraise and to plan operations.

So I think you have to see this area in a historical context in terms
of what happened in the 1980s and the meaning of the victory over the
Soviet Union in order to understand the importance of this symbiotic
relationship between al Qaeda and the Taliban and -- and the other
extremists, frankly.

AMANPOUR: So you think they would come back if Afghanistan fell?

GATES: I don't know whether the -- whether al Qaeda would sort of move
their headquarters from the Fatah to -- back into Afghanistan, but
there's no question in my mind that if the Taliban took large -- took
control of significant portions of Afghanistan, that that would be added
space for al Qaeda to strengthen itself and -- and more recruitment and
more fundraising.

But what's more important than that, in my view, is the message that it
sends that empowers al Qaeda. Al Qaeda, in many respects, is an
ideology. And the notion that they have come back from this defeat --
come back from 2002, to challenge not only the United States, but NATO
-- 42 nations and so on -- is a hugely empowering message, should they
be successful.

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It seems to be turning into the party line for the administration.

As the Taliban has said:

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"You have the watches, but we have the time"

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Originally Posted by Michael C

But, just because that is a strategy, does not mean it cannot be defeated. Abu M quoted Sir David Richards

"Failure would have a catalytic effect on militant Islam around the world and in the region because the message would be that al-Qaeda and the Taliban have defeated the US and the British and Nato, the most powerful alliance in the world. So why wouldn't that have an intoxicating effect on militants everywhere? The geo-strategic implications would be immense."

He goes on to describe the it as a steroid boost to extremist Islam. I can't argue with his analysis. Attempting a CT only approach in Afghanistan is as risky as our current approach IMO.

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Perhaps the lesson for future conflicts is that we must carefully limit our "public" objectives and end states to those that are reasonably achievable, which in turn leaves us exit options based on when we feel it is in our interest to exit, versus painting ourselves in a box by making grandiose statements of how we're going to bring stability and democracy to various parts of the world. For example, perhaps we should have limited our objectives in Afghanistan to pursuing and killing Al Qaeda to punish them for 9/11 and demonstrate to the world our political will to defend our interests and the vastness of our reach. We can then add that we will conduct some limited humanitarian activities to help the Afghan people get back on "their" feet (their standard of living).

In the background we can tinker with other ideas like establishing a functional state, but never publically define that as our success criteria. If we determine it isn't feasible, then we down play it and exit stage left if we're done.

I agree that America can't be perceived to fail for the reasons articulated above, so now we're in a Catch 22 scenario. I'm convinced that if we're serious we can defeat the Taliban, but it will be a costly fight, and the question remaining is what happens after we defeat the Taliban? Will defeating the Taliban neutralize AQ? We already painted ourselves inside a box this time, so I we can hope for now is that we take the right lessons from this conflict for future conflicts.

I think you could even go so far as to say that one of the very core problems in both Afghanistan and Iraq was the lack of clarity on goals at the outset of the conflict. In Iraq, the reason for the war shifted from WMD to Al Qaeda to ousting Saddam to creating a democracy to leaving a stable state. The confusion in goals contributed to both lack of domestic support at home, lack of internationa support abroad and lack of clarity for the commanders on the ground in Iraq.