Winning the War in Afghanistan

[davidbfpo]

Michael Yon has been embedded with UK troops in Sangin, for fiev weeks and has written an excellent first-hand account: http://www.michaelyon-online.com/bad-medicine.htm Yon is now en route to embed with USMC.

For murky reasons his embed has ended and neither side agrees why.

Stephen Grey, a UK journalist, has written a wide ranging article on the campaigning and whether the local strategy is correct: http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/wp...and/index.html

davidbfpo

[Valin]

Michael Yon has been embedded with UK troops in Sangin, for fiev weeks and has written an excellent first-hand account: http://www.michaelyon-online.com/bad-medicine.htm Yon is now en route to embed with USMC.

For murky reasons his embed has ended and neither side agrees why.

Stephen Grey, a UK journalist, has written a wide ranging article on the campaigning and whether the local strategy is correct: http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/wp...and/index.html

davidbfpo

Thanks for the links


Cracking on in Helmand

(snip)

The public debate has rarely reflected the mixed-up reality of the war. In July, when the number of dead since 2001 overtook the total in Iraq, the debate was couched as politicians versus generals. Our troops demanded more helicopters, reinforcements and money. All of that was true—when Sergeant Johnson’s comrades kept vigil over his body for 24 hours, it was because no helicopter was available to take him off the hill. And a day earlier, many Afghan civilians had died because there were no helicopters to ferry the injured to hospital. But more men and more choppers are not going to win this war, still less address its purpose.

While this may be true, it must be asked if more men and equipment would not have provided the time needed to get the correct strategy?

Neither the air cavalry nor legions of fresh troops defeated the Vietcong.

The writer shows a real lack of knowledge about that damn war by saying this.

[Surferbeetle]

A Canadian think tank paper 'Afghanistan’s Alternatives for Peace, Governance and Development: Transforming Subjects to Citizens & Rulers to Civil Servants', by what appears to be an Afghan scholar in exile in the USA: http://www.cigionline.org/sites/defa...0Paper%202.pdf

Yet to read fully, but as the civil aspects are getting more prominence worth a peek.

davidbfpo

...for the link. Interesting reading this morning, his sketch of various parallel governments in particular. This one calls for another cup of coffee.

By the way, this might be of general interest to the water-centric folks: Water resource development in Northern Afganistan and its implications for Amu Darya Basin

This publication examines increased water use by Afghanistan and its implications for other water users in the basin, including the Aral Sea, both in the short and long term. Topics discussed include: the amount of Amu Darya flows generated in northern Afghanistan; the amount of water presently used in northern Afghanistan, prospective use in the near future, and possible impact of the increased use on the riparian states and the Aral Sea; existing agreements between Afghanistan and the neighbouring Central Asian states on the use of waters in the Amu Darya Basin, their relevance and applicability in the present and in the future; and future directions for water resources development and improved water management in the basin.

[Bob's World]

The UK can barely maintain 8,900. Don't look for any more they are not resourced to do it.

They would take 8,900 KIA and spit in the enemy's eyes; and have a million men on the ground.

Again, while the metrics guys are looking for indicators, we should apply a couple of metrics to the approach of our NATO allies to this sticky mess.

They come primarly to service the national interest of maintaining good relations with the US; not for any national interests they feel are at stake in Afghanistan. I suspect, that many, like the Pakistanis, realize that supporting the American approach to this problem to date too fully is far more likely to create instability at home, rather than the opposite.

Sometimes your friends are the last ones to tell you when you're being a jackass.

[marct]

Sometimes your friends are the last ones to tell you when you're being a jackass.

Yup. Of course, sometimes we do and you don't listen .

[Bob's World]

Yup. Of course, sometimes we do and you don't listen .

Those who are the busiest telling others what to do and how to do it are rarely the best listeners as well. Particularly when they are so damn certain in their "rightness."

[max161]

Those who are the busiest telling others what to do and how to do it are rarely the best listeners as well. Particularly when they are so damn certain in their "rightness."

We should all heed those wise words especially here on the SW Council!!!

I think it would be a great graduate student project for someone to analyze the national security debate since about 2006 to the present and try to assess the major protagonists (and antagonists)and their actual contributions to the debate and discern whether their outspoken positions on everything from the success or lack of success of the "Surge" to the American Way of COIN to the so-called "lily pad" "strategy" has really contributed to our ability to protect US national security. Or are they just peddling their own pet ideas and projects?

Debate is healthy and important but so is the ability to listen, learn, and discern, so that we can prevent the three major failures of all military operations - failure to learn, failure to adapt, and failure to anticipate (Cohen and Gooch in Military Misfortune)

[slapout9]

Yup. Of course, sometimes we do and you don't listen .

I am a Wardenfile but Bob is a "Missionary Man" for your listening pleasure and cultural enhancement.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7RMEDBhXh-w

[jmm99]

Mr Will's article I read, but GEN Krulak's letter (linked by Fuchs) got my attention. The pdf doesn't allow cut & paste - so his 5 points are attached. I think they deserve some discussion here.

Buggered up my hand this weekend (so, one finger typing which does the hand no good) - in Internet terms, the lawyer is effectively silenced.

[Steve the Planner]

Went to a Center for American Progress conference today.

Gilles Dorronsoro, Micheal Semple and Joanne Nathan (corrected), all non-US experts who have been in Afghanistan since before 2001.

Each had a presentation on their field. Most of you have heard some of this: Dorronsorro (secure the cities first, etc..), and Semple's work with the Taliban are pretty well known.

Nathan, an Australian, asked: What's this COIN thing about? I read the manual and it said Clear-Hold-Build, but all you ever do is Clear, Clear, Clear. No administrative purpose or capability. Why are you clearing unless you have civilian capacity to Hold and Build? Where has this strategy ever been applied?

Even Andrew Exum didn't take a stab at answering that.

The big question that all were asked to comment on: What do you think of these people who see one small part of the country, then try to exprapolte what they saw there to a bigger picture about the country? (Obviously, the Hoh question).

They were pretty devastating in explaining just a snippet of what they know about the whole country, and why that kind of speculation is not useful.

Like Exum said, DC is usually full of generalists, and it was a rare opportunity to have three leading specialists in one place.

Certainly worth hearing every word yourself to build or assess strategy.

http://www.americanprogress.org/even...streaming.html

Steve

[zen]

Some suggestions (stupid ones very likely) on how to deal with the terrorists in Afghanistan:
- use the lie detector for everyone in 'suspect' villages,
- anyone suspicious plant a mike in their houses and have afghans listen (for example afghan refugees from Europe) and act accordingly.

[Tukhachevskii]

http://www.nrc.nl/international/arti...ght_each_other

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

to consider when pontificating upon Astan.

[Fuchs]

to consider when pontificating upon Astan.

I plead guilty on #26, I think.
Maybe #1, but that's in the eye of the beholder.

[Umar Al-Mokhtār]

are hilarious.

[Firn]

The only thing that's forced us into anything is the cabal of not quite genius in DC that decided we have to transform Afghanistan. Not that the Pak army/ISI haven't exploited that particular piece of stupidity, but people will do that, if we insist on making bad decisions.

And from an European perspective the error was to follow that strategy suit, even if the investment in effort and men was in relative terms mostly greatly inferior and some leeway could be made due to diplomatic issues.

Of course we don't have the alternative history present in front of us, so the criticism comes easier.

[Ken White]

The alternative history proposed by D. Rumsfeld was to leave Afghanistan by early 2002. Unfortunately, G. W. Bush, good Christian he, was convinced by a number of the humanitarianly inclined foreign policy 'elite' ( "fpe" - lower case, advisedly...) in Washington to stay and bring a failed State into the World Community.

In addition to Rumsfeld, there were others who thought that alternate history advisable and that the real history, staying, was a bad idea and said so. Unfortunately they were drowned out by the "fpe" who also insisted on bribing, cajoling and bullying NATO into doing something that is so far outside of NATO's interest (even inimical to it IMO) as to boggle even the Afghan's minds...

Thus yet another humanitarian military endeavor -- great contradiction in terms, that -- leads folks into the abyss. Backsight Foresight knew that as well...

[carl]

Ken:

Anything Mr. Rumsfeld says is primarily intended to make Mr. Rumsfeld look good. In this case it is "See! If we'd done what I wanted to do we wouldn't be in this mess."

There was no chance we weren't going to stay in Afghanistan in some measure after the anti-Taliban forces kicked out the Taliban with the help of US airpower. It was felt that one of the primary reasons 9-11 came was because AQ found a congenial home in Taliban run Afghanistan and one of the primary reasons Taliban was running Afghanistan was because we stopped paying attention to the place after the Soviets left. So we were going to stay on.

If we hadn't stayed on, the Taliban would have been back shortly since they just moved across the border. That would have amounted to trading a raid for a raid leading to more raids probably. Sort of medieval.

I don't think NATO's involvement is inimical to NATO's interests at all. It is critical if NATO is to survive as an alliance. Refusal of the alliance to support its most important member in the face of an attack would have meant the end of the alliance. Involvement in Afghanistan may be inimical to individual country's interests, but to the alliance, no.

[Bob's World]

15 Saudis, 2 UAE, 1 Lebanese, 1 Egyptian; planning and preparing in the sanctuary of Southern California and South Florida; launching attacks directed by an exiled Saudi citizen taking sanctuary in Afghanistan; Launching from multiple locations within the US to attack multiple locations within the US.

An event most Afghans have never heard of; that involved no Afghans; and that quite likely the Afghan (Taliban) government at that time was completely unaware of.

And now this is somehow a mission that demands an enduing commitment by the US and NATO to ensuring that no one associated with a 10-years gone Taliban government (who's primary sin was to not violate their cultural code of Pashtunwali and give up a guest to the demands of the US after the fact), ever rises to power again in a country they have historically ruled???

Their is no rational logic in such an argument. It is purely emotional in nature, and frankly is not Feasible, Acceptable, or Suitable.

We have created a monopoly of governance in Afghanistan, and then enabled the formalization of of that monopoly when we oversaw, supported, and protected a sham of an election that elevated our hand-picked man to the Presidency, and led to the production of the current constitution that vests all patronage from the District level and above in that same man. In this land, such a monopoly of governance and patronage means a corresponding monopoly on economic opportunity as well.

It was only once we had this in place that the revolutionary insurgency growing out of the exiled leadership in Pakistan began to seriously grow. it was only after we began to increase our efforts to suppress that revolution that the resistance insurgency among the people began to grow as well.

We have mis-defined the problem.

We have mis-defined our interests.

We have mis-defined the threat.

We have created and dedicated ourselves to the preservation of an illegitimate monopoly on governmental and economic opportunity in Afghanistan.

To hold NATO to supporting this folly burns the US relationship with those allies and degrades our influence.

To demand that Pakistan act counter to their own interests in the support of this folly burns the US relationship with that ally and degrades our influence.

Both of those actions have served to increase internal instability over the past 10 years in NATO countries and Pakistan.

Now we act as a conduit to bring an increased Indian presence into Afghanistan. Sure Karzai welcomes them, because he knows the US will ultimately depart, and he also knows that India will stay.

That knowledge enables Karzai to continue to avoid the one thing that must be done to bring any hope of stability to this region: Break down the monopoly on governance and allow legal competition for influence and political and economic opportunity in Afghanistan.

In 2001 there were no Afghans involved in the attacks on the US and the primary driving issues were perceptions of too much US influence over Arab countries in the Middle East. To continue the current course of action may very well be a self-fulfilling prophecy in creating the very terrorist sanctuary and dangers in South Asia that we claimed were there to begin with. It is far more likely that future attacks against the US will occur, and will involve issues and actors from the AFPAK region because of our actions there, not in spite of the same.

It is time to act smarter, not harder.

[carl]

Bob's World:

Who thunk up the idea and what were the countries they were hanging around at the time? Where did the money come from and maybe more importantly where was it directed from? Where was the guy who inspired the whole thing living at the time? He wasn't living in Orange County. It was perfectly reasonable for us to assist the anti-Afghan forces toss out the Taliban, especially since they refused to give up AQ after we were attacked, and by the way they were encouraged NOT to give up AQ by our reliable ally, the Pak Army/ISI.

If they had given AQ up, we probably wouldn't have assisted the anti-Taliban forces like we did. It doesn't matter if the Talib didn't know what AQ was up to, they knew after the fact and they didn't give them up. So in we come. That seems reasonable to me.

Now you talk about Pashtunwali. I believe it requires sanctuary be given. I don't believe it requires that the supplicant be allowed to use the house as a base of operations to carry on a war. Also if I remember correctly, if you stay on permanent like you put yourself at under the authority of the guy protecting you. All in all, I don't think the Pashtunwali thing washes.

You mentioned that the Pashtuns have historically ruled Afghanistan. Is that a justification for that pattern to continue? If it is should we not amend our foreign policy to reflect the belief that if this or that ethnic group has been on top they should continue to be on top and we should help them stay there? Besides, the Taliban has always gone out of its way to affirm that it is an Afghan group, not a Kandahari Pashtun group. They themselves don't profess to believe the Pashtuns should run the joint, they say Taliban should run the joint.

The Talib leadership didn't begin to grow because they burned with the desire to redress growing injustice in Afghanistan after they were booted out, it took awhile for them to recover and it took awhile for the Pak Army/ISI to get its nerve back and go back in. I would bet a lot that MO never ever thought he wasn't going to get back in the game as soon as he could.

Personally, I grow weary of appeals to see things from the side of the Pak Army/ISI. They got themselves into the worsening mess they are in and they could get themselves out if they cared to. They take our money and kill our guys with it. It is a little much to ask me to be understanding of the way they view the world and their loony view of Pakistan's interests. Our actions don't burn our relationship with this "ally", their murder of American soldiers does.

How do you figure we act as a conduit for Indian entrance to Afghanistan? How would we stop them? Why would we want to; because the Pak Army/ISI will be cross with us and stop being the reliable allies they are? If we tried to stop the Indians both they and Karzai would tell us to go pound sand and we would have to do it.

You're right it is time to act smarter not harder. It is time for us to force the Pak Army/ISI to decide whether they are friend or foe and act accordingly.