Hi Bob,
Can the US (and NATO) actually be said to be "outside FID provider[s]"? This gets to the heart of the lexical problem I have with this - the US put Karzai and the current gov't in place, both individually and as to its form. This was similar to what happened in Germany and Japan after WW II. But, having done that, it appears as if there is a stepping back and saying that "they" are independant. Put simply, the Karzai gov't and the current GoA is an imposed regime that you are now trying to define as internally legitimate. I sense a paradox here
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You go on to say that "if they are too weak they will be replaced by a stronger force or one with greater popular support" and there are certainly precedents for that. The Taliban (greater popular support) ousted the Soviet backed GoA while the US (greater force) ousted the Taliban. My point here is that just by calling the current GoA "legitimate" and, as a result of that act of naming, saying that they hold the "role of COIN executor" doesn't hold water. It's not FID, although it may be FIDOS (Foreign Internal Defence On Steroids*).
Does that mean that you would work with the Taliban? That's not, BTW, a joke, I mean it quite seriously. The way you have worded your comment implies that you are viewing US FID efforts as an outsourced, stance-neutral provider of military power rather than an effort with a specific, national policy objective.
I agree that it does violate that principle, but that certainly hasn't stopped the US in the past and I doubt it will stop it in the future. If there was a fair and free vote in Afghanistan (not likely, but let's suppose...) that called for a withdrawl of all US and NATO forces, my gut guess is that it would win with a 65% in the affirmative. In that case, would you advocate withdrawl?
I'm really not trying to be a sierra-disturber, here, but I think it is absolutely necessary that people not get caught up in lexical illusions that end up causing major problems with missions.
Cheers,
Marc
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* With, I will note, a whole of government approach as in the whole of the GoA is a foreign creation.
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