Winning the War in Afghanistan

[S-2]

I appreciate that you offer your views or, at least a personal summary of other views, instead of some article devoid of personally attached commentary/context.

They argue that the Taliban only has nominal support in Afghanistan, especially since some Pashtuns are unwilling to support them. Maybe 20% support on a national level.

Yup, if the ABC/BBC/ARD poll from last February is any indication. Most of that 20%, btw (and oddly), belongs to foreign irhabists-not the taliban. Taliban support is creeping up-all the way from about 4% to 7-8% range. They've no traction to speak of. Further of those taliban, probably only 20% or so are committed ideologues for their movement. The rest are a mish-mash of disaffected and revenge-motivated souls, unemployed, and those whom are criminally-inclined.

Yet we know that a.) the marines, for instance, have had a profound impact in the Nawa area and, b.) the taliban are telling the Nawa locals (whom are asking our marines if it's true) that we'll be shortly leaving. BG Nicholson, himself, has wondered at the possible tenuousness of our presence.

Thus, in part, Dorronsorro argues to pull out of Pashtun areas to limit the strength of that message, while bolstering national power projection capabilities (the Army).

What a roller-coaster we've put those people (and our own) upon. Can you or Dorronsorro contrast those thoughts against our massive infrastructure buildup that's currently taking place along with our troop expansion.

Seems the momentum to expand our effort is far out in front of Dorronsorro's comments. He's behind the eight-ball and waaaay late. Hate to vietnamize my comments but we're building a veritable Cam Ranh Bay in Kandahar for ourselves and eventually an army that's nowhere close to even the ARVN that we left behind.

Finally-

...there is greater support for them on that basis than as just another minority in contention in a civil war.

Well. There IT is. Somebody finally said it.

You've read about our helicopters transporting taliban to the north as fed by PRESS TV (Iran) to the willfully gullible afghans, correct? You've therefore seen the duplicitous reactions of both Karzai and Abdullah. Both agree publically with this sickening assertion-for differing reasons. Karzai clearly promotes such to deflect attention away from his terminally corrupt regime. Abdullah agrees with this contention but does so to separate himself from Karzai on a matter that affects his base of support in the north where, supposedly, these insurgents are being transported.

The factions, it would seem, have lined up and are ready to go. Further, I can't imagine Karzai suggesting as much if he thought his support from America hinged on more lucid and rational perspectives from his office.

I have to personally face facts, though. As much as I see the U.N./ISAF/U.S. presence in Afghanistan as utterly pointless for a variety of reasons (IMHO, all sound), the larger momentum is that our withdrawal from this fiasco isn't happening anytime soon. Instead, our escalation is widening.

Others will withdraw, of course. With each ISAF soldier whom departs without an ISAF replacement, that soldier's place will be absorbed by us. Obama's ratcheting of troops at whatever size he ultimately selects will be offset by these soldiers departure.

Net? Less than we publically sell now which STILL isn't what our ground force commander has projected as a baseline minimum (40,000 minimally with 80,000 his preferred troop augmentation).

Y'all at SWJ are SMEs of the first order. You see the individual trees really well and have all the buzz words and catch phrases down. You are collectively well-paid for such.

Who's seeing the forest, though? Further, who cares to see it? Our NCA? They seem to be relying on the likes of folks at the Jamestown Foundation, AEI, CSIS, CNAS, IISS and SWJ to provide the supporting analysis leading to that mythical light at the end of the tunnel.

I've watched SWJ's nat'l relevance grow in the three years plus I've been a member. I fear, as much as anything, that the membership here and those aforementioned think-tanks are convinced that we've boxed ourselves into no other recourse but to keep on keepin' on.

Thanks for your thoughts.

[tequila]

The SWJ is well paid? Man, where's my check?

Dorronsoro is a genuine expert on Afghanistan, but I'm afraid of his prescription for the country. Every time I've heard him speak, he is prescribing, in essence, the division of the country --- reinforce in the north and the cities, protect non-Pashtun areas, and essentially concede that Pashtun areas are beyond help.

He also insists that the "McChrystal strategy just died in Helmand." I think that statement's more than a bit premature.

[S-2]

The SWJ is well paid? Man, where's my check?

Hmmm...

I see a need to elaborate.

O.K.

I guess I presumed SWJ is a hobby for professionals from related arenas. If sole-sourced from here, that might be a bit of a bummer...

Thanks.

[Steve the Planner]

S-2:

You hit it right. I presented their views, not mine.

Dorronsorro may, in fact, be directly or indirectly arguing for partition, or at least, substantial independent regional alignments that beg the "nation" question. Don't know whether, however, that is his "final answer" but only the one that he believes is relevant to the current circumstance. Moreover, I believe that his deeply nuanced understanding of where to withdraw from particularly might not include Pashtun places where we are not in conflict.

As for Semple, I stand in deep reverence for what he knows, but a little skeptical about his "final answer." He is an Irishman deeply committed to bigger picture stuff, as he sees it, out in the field. How that may or may not relate to US interests is, I think, a jump ball. Especially where US interests may, for example, be fractional to the overall international interests at play there. Who knows what deals are being sketched out between the US and Pakistan? I don;t, but can't see the big picture without it.

Fortunately, I have the time and access to a lot of the DC think tanks, so it is fun to make this stuff available to our members for review and comment.

Jump in all you want.

Steve

[davidbfpo]

A KOW academic has been on the ground in Helmand and has written:

(Opens with) The news from Afghanistan has been grim. The collapse of the second round of the national elections; Hamid Karzai's government tainted by corruption; and, last week, five British soldiers killed by a rogue Afghan policeman in Nad-e'Ali.....However, on the ground in Afghanistan things look a little more optimistic. I have just spent two weeks in Helmand, talking to dozens of civilian stabilisation advisers and military officers.

(Ends with)There is much to be done in Helmand, especially in towns such as Sangin and Musa Qala, where the Taliban still threaten security. But on the ground, one can begin to see the green shoots of progress and, in Garmsir, the conditions of stability and Britain's eventual withdrawal.

From:http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisf...and-us-marines

davidbfpo

[slapout9]

He will according to this Article from the new Military Review! he dose not have the right Strategy to win according to this article.

http://usacac.army.mil/CAC2/Military...231_art004.pdf

Is there any merit to this article?

Moderator's note post copied to seperate discussion on the MR article: http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=8975

[Steve the Planner]

Slap:

Johnson and Mason are not far off where my lines are crossing, but coming around it from the civilian side.

So many folks in Iraq were preaching "Democracy" out of a very naive school book version. In Maryland alone, there are 23 counties and the city of Baltimore, and hundreds of individual "towns" and community associations with varying authority. Interwoven into that are hundreds of independent and interagency bodies with special authority, from local school boards to regional transit authorities. It is indeed a complex and locally engaged web of legitimate governing relationships that actually make the tribal, valley-by-valley thing look simplistic.

Sure, OK, there is a supposedly strong national government, but aside from some often-contested "must do's" (the Consititution), most actions from the top down are driven by carrots and sticks of payola and buy-offs. Else the idea fails to stick.

In Iraq, for a lot of immutable reasons, the power and rational of national ministries was inherent in the system---the DNA that operated in the background no matter what the US tried to do for reconstruction under a new "provincial" governance model.

By contrast, Afghanistan is two inherently conflicting fields of public---urban vs. rural, and the rural is tribal/district/sub-district.

Military and foreign service, on one year assignments, are not going to be able to grasp and engage these rural areas' leaders and formal and informal structures. Instead, any PRT cadre assigned to these areas (more like CORDS than PRTs) need to be something different than, for example, the PRTs deployed in Iraq.

I never understood the mishmash of Subject Matter Experts assigned down to PRTs in Iraq. Instead, the handful of Senior SMEs, in my opinion, should have been circuit riders to better support less top-heavy, younger, and more aggressively deployed PRTs (more like on an EPRT model as far as flexibility and local reach).

It would be far easier for me, for example, as a Senior Planning SME, to mini-train and coordinate programs and resources down to an engaged DRT System than to waste mine and their time and resources doing so for a few small villages.

What I took away from Johnson and Mason, as an organizational matter, is that a cadre of minimally cross-trained, but highly supported, DRTs, probably military for some time to come, would provide the best penetration/connections to the Pashtun (and other) rural villages---all as the necessary backstop to prevent Taliban encirclement of those urbanites.

Somewhere in the middle, you try to bridge gaps, whether by diplomacy or other means.

Is that about right?

Steve

Moderator's note post copied to seperate discussion on the MR article: http://council.smallwarsjournal.com/...ead.php?t=8975