What will our expedition to Afghanistan teach us?

[TheCurmudgeon]

I partially agree. I agree that specifically it was a mistake top define "our policy... to spread democracy" insofar there are numerous conditional variables which make such an ambitious project mostly unreachable and it's questionable whether it is in our material interest to do so. However I disagree that it is a mistake to "define a military objective in terms of a political result." Ultimately, the desired "political results" should determine the shape of the military operations, even if not perfectly rationalized or connected, and the military objectives must eventually produce favorable political results to be justified.

I agree with you that the military objectives must produce the conditions favorable for the political result, but military objectives can only go so far to do that. The Army is fantastic at defeating any other comperable ground force. Less good at acting as a occupying force. Horrible as acting as a police force, particularly with the language and cultural barriers. And woefully unprepared to act as a democratic civilian governing agency. Unfortunately, that is what they have been asked to do, with some notible successes. Force only gets you so close to a political objective like a stable, democratic Afghanistan.

As for the discussion on legitimacy, I think we are speaking past one another to some extent. I think that legitimacy is conditional and thus not always relevant (this depends on the selection of the desired political results and the chosen military objectives)..

I agree. For most of history legitimacy on the level I am refering to rarely mattered. A king replaced another king, and the local lord was either killed or he pledged allegance to the new king. In this case there is no question of legitimacy. But when you are replacing traditional legitimacy with democratic legitimacy it is a different story. This has really only become an issue in the last hundred years or so.

My point is that I do not think legitimacy is a fundamental component of our problems in Afghanistan .

Here I disagree. If the political objective is a stable, democratic Afghanistan, legitimacy is the only issue. It does not matter how many Taliban you kill, or how many roads you build, or schools, or hospitals -- if the people still want an autocratic state built on patron-client (warloard) relationships, then you have failed.

And if you are simply replacing one coercive power with a more effective coercive power, you have still failed, even if you are the undisputed power in the country. That is not democracy, that is a military state.