"I have lost this battle because my force was too small... The Government has not sustained this army... If I save this army now, I tell you plainly I owe no thanks to you or to any other persons in Washington. You have done your best to sacrifice this army."
Those desperate words were written by General George B. McClellan in a telegram to Secretary of War Stanton in June 1862, after McClellan had decided to retreat before the Confederate Army during the Seven Days Battles outside Richmond. McClellan believed his 120,000 men were facing an army of 200,000 Confederates, rather than the actual 85,000 in Lee's army, and blamed the government for not reinforcing him.
I find it impossible to read all the current "woe is us" reporting on Afghanistan without thinking of the dashing young general who went into a state of panic when his constant calls for more troops went unheeded and his wildly overblown estimates of the enemy forces failed to impress the administration.
"Quaker guns" (logs used to imitate cannon) in former Confederate fortifications at Manassas Junction. McClellan was severely criticized for his failure to move promptly against these fortifications, where there were no cannon, only logs in the embrasures.
Let it be said that McClellan had reason to worry: Even if the enemy he faced was outnumbered, it still presented a real threat to the existence of the United States. It's a bit more difficult to see why so many people are in a state of panic at the prospect of some modest gains for the Taliban in Afghanistan.
The New York Times' Roger Cohen has had some refreshingly independent views on Iran and Israel in the past, so it's a bit disappointing to see him join the choir to whine about the impending disaster in Afghanistan today:
Special relationships are forged in blood; the U.S.-British bond is no exception. So, as President Obama hesitates, his decision on American troop levels ever “weeks away” as the weeks pass, the British view of the war offers as good an indication as any of what Obama will do. An hour-long conversation with David Miliband, the British foreign secretary, suggests reinforcements are on the way.
When I asked if the mission needed substantially more troops, Miliband said, “What I think that you can see from the prime minister’s strategy is that we believe in serious counterinsurgency. Counterinsurgency is a counterterrorist strategy.”
He continued: “The Taliban has shown what it means to provide safe space for Al Qaeda.” Describing the fights against the Taliban and Al Qaeda as “distinctive but related missions,” Miliband said “the badlands of Afghanistan and Pakistan are the incubator of choice for international terrorism,” adding that, “Ceding ground happened in the ’90s and then we all know what happened.”
That’s a clear rebuttal of the ever-larger school, most often identified with Vice President Joe Biden, advancing the view that Al Qaeda is the real threat, the Taliban much less of one; and so the United States should not commit more military resources to a nation-building struggle in Afghanistan that’s an expensive diversion from core U.S. strategic interests.
Wrong. Counterinsurgency in the “Af-Pak” theater is indeed a counterterrorist strategy. I see no workable distinction.
As Prime Minister Gordon Brown has noted, three-quarters of all terrorist plots uncovered in Britain in recent years had links to Islamic extremists in Afghanistan or Pakistan. The defense of the West begins in the Hindu Kush and Helmand. Would-be bombers must be kept off-balance. To believe otherwise is wishful thinking.
Oh, dear. Someone as sensible as Cohen should recognise what any salesman knows: If you want to make a sale, you should force the buyer to make his decision quickly. "This article comes with a discount of 5% this week, so I don't think there will be any left in a few days. You'd better act now!" Who among us hasn't fallen for that one? But we should not allow ourselves to be pushed deeper into war by a false sense of urgency.
I say this as someone who doesn't favour an immediate pullout from Afghanistan. My view is that we took on a responsibility for our allies in that country when we first moved in, and I think we should make an effort to ensure that they will be safe from Taliban's revenge when we leave. It really is the least we can do. But that doesn't mean that we should automatically buy whatever the generals try to sell us. As the famous saying goes, war is too important to be left in their hands. It is the citizens of a nation who, through their elected representatives, should set the goals of our foreign policy. The generals will have to do their best to carry them out with the means we give them. And it is not always the case that these goals should get priority above all other things.
Cohen's column is a neat summary of the hawkish conventional wisdom:
- All Muslim fundamentalists are engaged in a war with the West. There's no meaningful difference between the Taliban and Al Qaida.
- If we fight these people in the Middle East, this somehow makes it impossible for them to carry out terror attacks in the West.
- "Resolve" means a willingness to send more troops, while any decision to reduce troop numbers or keep them at the present level is a sign of indecision and cowardice.
- We are facing an urgent crisis - so get those troops over there already!
Funny how that works out. Cause the way I see it, none of those points are what I would consider obvious truths.
First of all, I don't see any evidence that the goal of the average Taliban member is to invade Washington or become the Emir of London. It seems that most of them care more about controlling their own home province - and control over Kabul would obviously be nice, too. Terror attacks on the West are frequently planned and executed by people who are living here among us, and even if they do require a training camp, that can be arranged in a million different places in the Muslim world. If some of these terrorists have fought in Afghanistan in the past, it is usually because they followed our troops there, enraged by the invasion. Their contacts with groups like Al Qaida in many cases amount to little but some advice on bomb-making and other encouraging words via the internet.
So the war in Afghanistan is not a front in a Grand Unified War on Terror - a silly notion today, as it was on 9/12. The Al Qaida presence in the region is reduced to about a 100 bitter-enders. They are irrelevant, and would pose exactly the same threat to us if they moved to Somalia or Yemen.
We are not in Afghanistan because our national security depends on who rules Kabul. Our mission in that country is first and foremost a humanitarian one, as odd as that may sound. We are there because we would like to see the Afghan people enjoy a better government than they did eight years ago. That's a worthy goal, in my opinion, but not a matter of extreme urgency (at least not for us in the West). Our chief goal should be to bring the civil war in that country to a satisfactory end. And while you may feel like a tough guy when you argue for more troops, some times the really tough guy is the one who refuses to be pressured and keeps his gun in the holster until it is really needed.
Finally: What's the rush? Don't be fooled by the meaningless and hysterical statements about how Taliban controls "80% of Afghanistan". From what I can tell, they only control those areas where our troops currently are not present - most of it presumably wilderness with few inhabitants. The most populous areas of Afghanistan remain in the hands of NATO troops and our Afghan allies. The Taliban can blow up the occasional bomb there, but they are nowhere near actual military control. If the Taliban were to hurl themselves into a major offensive against the big cities, it would probably be the worst mistake they ever made, leading to the kind of bloodbath which almost broke the Vietcong during the Tet Offensive of 1968. That offensive looked good on TV, so it was perceived as a triumph for the Vietnamese guerillas, but in reality they were unable to hold on to any of the cities they invaded and suffered crippling losses. The Taliban, too, are very good at hit-and-run attacks in mountainous terrain. I doubt they would achieve much in a pitched battle with NATO troops in the suburbs of Kabul.
I suspect Cohen is right to predict that Obama will eventually send more troops to Afghanistan - though perhaps not the 40,000 his generals are asking for. But I'm also pretty sure that those generals will be back asking for even more troops next year. And though there may be a pragmatic case for a more troops, I really don't see why that decision must be made this side of New Year's Day.
To me, the current situation looks like a stalemate. The Taliban can't force NATO out of the country, but NATO can't control the countryside. Fair enough. Apart from being utterly predictable, that's not such a terrible situation. When both sides are unable to win, they have an incentive to negotiate. Once we have a new Afghan government in place (hopefully one with a modicum of credibility and decency), we should get on with what should be job number one: Peel off local Taliban groups by making peace with them. We can't wipe them out, so we should try to bring them into the fold. Think about it: The war is currently costing the US about $4 billion a month. You could probably buy the loyalty of quite a few Afghans with the amount of cash it would cost you to send 40,000 more troops. This was the secret behind the success of "the Surge" in Iraq.
That means that some provinces will likely end up with Taliban governors. That's a shame, but it's also inevitable. They enjoy the support of a considerable number of Afghans. Even if we sent a million troops there, it's not given that we would be able to achieve a permanent victory. And such questions are purely hypothetical, anyway. There simply is no will in the West for the kind of massive effort that could conceivably break the Taliban. It's just not going to happen. Only the Afghans themselves can defeat the Taliban.
But we have plenty of time. The fact that the generals ask for more troops should not impress us too much - that's what generals do (viz. George McClellan). But the more troops we pour into that country, the more large and bloody offensives we carry out, the quicker will public opinion in the West demand an end to the effort.
But we have plenty of time. The fact that the generals ask for more troops should not impress us too much - that's what generals do (viz. George McClellan). But the more troops we pour into that country, the more large and bloody offensives we carry out, the quicker will public opinion in the West demand an end to the effort.
If I were the president (aren't you glad I'm not?), I would take a deep breath and ask my generals to come up with the minimum number of troops needed to hang on to Afghanistan's major cities and most densely populated areas. We don't need more than that. And if we can dig in and hold on to that much with a skeleton force, while gradually handing over more and more positions to Afghan troops, we might actually be able to stay long enough for the Taliban to grow tired of their caves and come out to negotiate.
That would be victory in my book.
That would be victory in my book.
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Comments
it turns out slick willy was right on the money when he met terror attacks with targeted bomb attacks, not troops.
I think you're right about him waiting for the runoff elections. He'll probably send more troops once the new government is in place. And like you, I don't think they'll make much difference. If we can't achieve anything with the force that is already there, we won't be able to achieve much period.
al loomis:"i suspect the reason for the war is simply imperial: the barons of the beltway want a pipeline from kazakstan to the sea that does not cross russia."
I think it's more complex than that. I don't support the effort for imperial reasons, and I think that's true for most people inside the Beltway too. But clearly, it does become easier to support war if you stand to gain from it. And it's not difficult to explain why some nations may go to war over oil. It is one of the most important resources in the world, after all - not just a source of personal wealth.
Spy, spot, target and eliminate our enemies via remote control.
The rest is history.
Until, of course, skynet comes on line. Then we need to all run like hell.
The best we can do is buy the allegiance and arms of a few more warlords. Those that are in it for plunder or to maintain the family "dynasty." We did this before with the Northeast alliance and we can do it again.
Then we can send in Special Ops to root out Osama. Even if we have to bribe the entire Pakistan military to look the other way when we cross over into Waziristan.
Do I sound like an incurable cynic? Me who once wanted to go on civil rights marches and suported the Kennedys and Gene McCarthy. Well, we did say "trust no one over thirty." And I'm 62.
We don't owe any country or sect perpetual protection from their enemies. We've supported, mostly, right wing oppressive dictatorships. Afghanistan is no different. We don't owe Afghan women, as one example, the life of an Upper East Side yuppie. It's their country and their religion. It's for them to decide. The fact that these wars, going back to Korea, have been about internal factions fighting with each other, is always ignored, because we back the right wing dictator who makes it easier for us to exploit whatever resource the country happens to have.
Enough is enough. If we really mean America First, then stay here and take care of Americans.
BOKO, Nikki Stern:
I still think the humanitarian mission in Afghanistan is worth some effort. But I agree that it can't go on for long - at least not if NATO forces continue to sustain casualties at the present rate. To the extent that I hope we can stay for a while, that hinges on our ability to shift the mission from a combat role to training Afghan troops. If we can't disengage our troops within a couple of years, we should get out.
Andy Heizeler:
We certainly don't need to keep troops there to fight Al Qaida. If I agreed with Richard Holbrooke that that is the only cause for being in Afghanistan, I would say: Pull out now!
I'm seeing my avatar in a new light today...
Alan Nothnagle:
I don't know much about it, but with the current chaos in that region the pipeline seems little more than - yes, exactly - a pipe dream to me. As far as I can recall, the US negotiated with the Taliban to build it before 9/11, so I don't think anyone went to war just for that reason. The oil business requires stability in Afghanistan, but not necessarily democracy. We probably had a better chance at getting the pipeline before the invasion (though the Bushies may have misunderestimated that one, too).
mr e:
They may not look much, but they're tough fighters. Not very likely to invade the West, though.
Ivan Hentschel:
Actually, the signals coming from the Obama administration seem to indicate that they think a bit like me. If you read today's NYT, you'll see that they are apparently going for a modified strategy which focuses on protecting urban areas. A good sign, in my view.
Upstate: "Do I sound like an incurable cynic?"
I'd say you sound like a realist. And I agree. A reasonably stable Afghanistan, with a weak central government and power-sharing agreements between local warlords, seems a pretty good outcome to me. If an Afghan democracy ever develops, it has to be created from the inside.
John Knight:
Reading the post again I wish I'd spent more time on the Iraqi surge. The thing that worked there were bribes and negotiations, not military offensives. The McClellan thing is more of an oddity, though it does show that generals have a tendency to paint a bleak picture while they ask for more more troops - either because they're buckling under the pressure of command or because they want to preempt any criticism if they fail. We should keep that in mind when we listen to their advice.
Robert Young:
Actually, Roger Cohen has shown a willingness to go rogue on subjects like Iran and Israel before, so I'm disappointed that he swallowed the neocon line so completely on Afghanistan. It seems out of character. But perhaps he's just trying to go with the prevailing winds, as Nikki Stern suggested in her comment.
As for the women of Afghanistan, I certainly would like to do something for them. It would be a shame if all we left behind in Afghanistan was more bombed-out buildings. That said, we have to weigh the benefits against the cost.
Blondehussy:
If my son or daughter was there, I'd be worried sick. But I live in a country that was once occupied by Nazi Germany, so I don't buy the line that US and allied forces fighting abroad never do any good. The question is whether the price is too high. In Iraq, I think it was, which is why I always opposed that war. In Afghanistan, I think we could do some good without exposing NATO troops to too much fighting. But that requires a different strategy. Rather than trying to defeat the Taliban ourselves, we should concentrate on helping our Afghan allies to defend themselves. So our focus should be shifted from chasing Taliban around the countryside to training and equipping the Afghan army. That is a much safer mission.
And I know that's easy to say. I'm not the one who will have to do it. But I do think it's worth a try. The Tajiks and Uzbeks in Northern Afghanistan have gambled their future on cooperation with our troops. I wouldn't want Afghanistan to turn into another Kampuchea or Rwanda when we finally pull out. And as the Bush administration lost interest in this war about five minutes after the first American troops entered Kabul, we really haven't been giving it our full attention until now. So I feel that an immediate pull-out would be to act like a hit-and-run driver. We ran over the Afghans. The least we can do is help them get to the hospital before we leave.