Counterinsurgency Strategy Not Working in Afghanistan, Critics Say
01.12.2011 at 01:44pm
Counterinsurgency Strategy Not Working in Afghanistan, Critics Say by David Wood, Politics Daily. BLUF: “Experts on Afghanistan and on counterinsurgency, among them active-duty and retired military officers, analysts and academics, are pushing to have the U.S. mission in Afghanistan significantly narrowed in scope. Their message, in brief: Drop the hearts ‘n’ minds stuff. Go kill the enemy.”
The premise of this criticism is false:
“There are alternatives” to the current strategy, Gentile said in an interview. “But they are hard to articulate with an Army and senior leaders who’ve been doing this for nine years and are morally committed to it because we’ve shed blood and they believe they can make it work.”
We haven’t been doing “this” for 9 years. In Afghanistan, we have only just begun the proper campaign with adequate troops. The troop levels never even approached an adequate level for an effective COIN strategy in Afghanistan until August of 2010. So the idea that “this” has been going on for 9 years is complete bunk. We were treading water for the first 8 years while the Bush administration went off to Iraq and flushed any international legitimacy associated with Afghanistan down the toilet.
So give this new phase and new strategy that’s just got barely the adequate number of troops a chance to work. The next assessment is in July. That’ll have given them about 9 months to show progress.
Dick:
Well if you read what American commanders from company up to Division and higher have been saying about what they were doing since early 2004 then yes actually the operational framework of counterinsurgency has remained essentially the same. A new history out from CSI at Leavenworth and authored by historian Don Wright argues that in early 2004 then LTG Barno put into place a “classic counterinsurgency” campaign. To be sure there were fewer brigades back years ago, but arguably the Taliban enemy was much weaker then too.
But in order to create the perception that success is happening in Afghanistan it requires a point of transformation from when things were being done wrongly (pre -2009 and the arrival of Gen McChrystal)to a point where finally as is often said “the right inputs are finally in place.” Of course if there hasnt been any kind of radical shift in terms of operational framework or in the overall quality of generalship then the problem is not with tactics but with strategy; but that is not an answer that many folks want to hear (or discuss).
gian
“COIN”: It is quite possible that never before in the annals of military operations has a concept been so thoroughly abused as this one. After all, the COIN described in FM 3-24 is really “Colonial Intervention” rather than Counter Insurgency.
Those who look at the past six months of operations in Afghanistan with an experienced eye can see a very deliberate scheme of engagement to suppress the symptoms of the insurgency there in a manner to meet specific metrics to support a withdrawal IAW political timelines. General Petraeus has his mission and he is executing it. But it isn’t COIN; and it really doesn’t get us to the Ends set for us by the President either.
The President set the Ends as “to disrupt, dismantle, and eventually defeat al Qaeda and to prevent their return to either Afghanistan or Pakistan.”
President Barak Obama, 2010
Okay, fair enough. That won’t remove the base of support that sustains AQ in so many other areas, so the mission will continue, but it is clear what he wants done in AFPAK region. The Means for doing this are ISAF. To find the Ways we need only look to the ISAF Mission statement; and this is where the disconnect from Ways to Ends occurs:
“In support of the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, ISAF conducts operations in Afghanistan to reduce the capability and will of the insurgency, support the growth in capacity and capability of the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), and facilitate improvements in governance and socio-economic development in order to provide a secure environment for sustainable stability that is observable to the population.” ISAF Mission Statement
We go from talking about denial of AQ sanctuary straight into a complex scheme of sustaining in power an illegitimate government that is the primary source of causation for the insurgency. This is good Colonial Intervention, but it is not good COIN, and it does not go very directly toward denial of AQ sanctuary.
AQ’s primary source of sanctuary is the Taliban, and the Pashtun populace within the FATA that support the Taliban leadership there. The key to the Ends provided by the President are in the hands of the Taliban.
Frankly, I am not sure how the suppression operations going on currently in Afghanistan or a ramped up CT program either one get us to the specified Ends. I suspect this is but one more false choice in a sea of such false choices.
I was reading some of the press releases from 2006 and re-reading some of the things we worked on in 2007 and, honestly, you can replace the dates (and many times leave the names in place- but add a star or two) and they look the same as what we are doing today.
I don’t think just adding the 30k means we are doing it “right” today. Other than that and some “STRATCOM” (propaganda?) emphasis, plus tons of added bureaucracy, rank, and staffs- I’m not sure what we have “better” today than in the 9 years previous. And I didn’t see much appetite with really looking at metrics at any point and changing direction. Metrics were used to reinforce the STRATCOM.
But- I don’t think this is all necessarily bad. If we are setting the conditions for a politically-viable withdrawal, then maybe that meets the “real” policy objectives (get out starting in 2011). We just need to communicate this to the guys on the ground in my opinion- as many are still trying to do pop-centric COIN, win hearts and minds, intervene colonially- or whatever you want to call it. I don’t envy the ORSA guys either that have to assess these activities that might not be logically supporting a withdrawal and somehow spin them to say they do.
Grant Martin
MAJ, US Army
The above comments are the authors’ own and do not reflect the position of the US Army or DoD.
I’m not saying things are going famously there.
I’m just saying they finally have enough troops to give the population-centric COIN strategy a reasonable shot. They’ve never had this many troops there. And they’ve stood up a significant ANA component.
So you can say they were doing the same things years before, but they didn’t have this many troops doing those same things.
And the reports from the operational commanders say that gradual progress on security is apparent. Granted, governance and development are lagging behind. But the State Department surge won’t be complete until July 2011, so it’s too soon to judge that as well.
I’m not saying don’t criticize. But if you do, make sure you note the context. Broad, BS statements like “we’ve been there 9 years and nothing’s worked” are patently false. And I’m not going to make any broad statements like “victory is around the corner” ‘cuz that be patently false too.
What you cannot deny is that for the first time in OEF-A, they have over 100,000 troops coupled with over 100,000 ANSF, and they have shown reasonable progress with Operation Hamkari over the past 4 months.
@ Dick Hoffmann: I really wish you’d included Colonel Gentile’s setup line: “People are so set on the current strategy that they become bothered and angry by a serious questioning..” Funny, but it’s hard not to agree with Gian when I see a comment such as: “Broad, BS statements like “we’ve been there 9 years and nothing’s worked” are patently false.”
You don’t like “nothing’s worked?” How about, “we’ve been there 9 years and have made no discernible progress”? That better? Or is it your position that we have in fact made progress? If so, I’d be interested in hearing about it.
From my view in the cheap seats, Robert Jones’s “colonial intervention” seems far closer to the mark than COIN or CT or any other military buzz phrase. It seems we are indeed waging some kind of bizarre colonial exercise, but not doing a very good job at it. It also seems we’re not very good imperialists after all, no matter how our military leadership may wish it so.
IMO, supporters of ongoing operations in Afghanistan, no matter whether they fancy themselves COIN experts or imperialists are in deep denial. The reality is that after nine years of bloodshed and of flushing our national treasure down the toilet, we are no closer to attainment of the fundamental goals than we were nine years ago. There has been no progress.
Afghanistan is a failure. Of course the counterinsurgency “strategy” isn’t working. It can’t. Wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time. Not to mention wrong host government. The bitter truth is that domestic politics and military pride are the fundamental drivers. You might want to ask a Vietnam vet about these things sometime.
Grant Martin: Chilling, and I fear all too accurate, observations.
Dick Hoffman:
No, I suppose that is undeniable. I can, however, deny that any of that number represents the right tool with which to approach this situation.
One school of thought is that we should train the ANA to be able to support and defend themsevles. From an outsider looking in we can see large numbers that look great on a spreadsheet. 130,000 ANA Soldiers are trained, equipped and ready to defend Afghanistan. More are on the way. However, an insider looking out scratches their head in amazement. These numbers are great but they can’t sustain themselves. Without the Big Green Machine here and other coalition forces, the ANA and ANSF can’t support themselves at all. There is no point of sending a BN of BDE of ANA to the fight if they only have enough equipment and support to fight for a few days and then leave the area. Logistcally the ANA and ANSF is years possibly even decades away from being able to support themselves operationally.
A Small surgical coalition force is needed partnered with a training force is needed (and present) In addition to that there needs to be a logistics and supply school house that trains the ANA and ANSF in the methods of supporting themselves.
My favorite anecdote on the ANA/ANP:
We deployed a kandak to RC-S in about a week in order to meet a short-notice change in the operational requirements. They hit the range for about three days, we gave them all the equipment they were supposed to already have, and they traveled down pretty much on their own from their HQ location (two days travel). No ambushes on the way. But, the deployment didn’t look good because they were rushed, had no movement plan, we had to give them a lot of equipment, etc.
The next kandak had more time- so they had more training and had a movement plan (like many of their plans- it was all ours, they just briefed it). The result? Multiple ambushes along the way to RC-S (same route).
That was a positive metric for us. Why? The 2nd kandak had a movement plan.
These anecdotes can be repeated for so many examples: logistics system being another good one as is the force we are building (more like us, less like the traditional Afghan fighter).
The bottom line is that numbers of ANA and ANP can be spun to be a positive, but because we measure them like we measure ourselves, they constantly look bad to us- so we concentrate on the numbers growth. I’d submit that the truth is somewhere in-between: they are (or would be) very effective at doing what they WANT to do AND their capability is very low (measuring them like we measure ourselves). The question will be whether their leadership (and GIRoA’s) will want to deploy and fight them like we have been deploying and fighting them.
But- if an Afghan soldier “falls in the forest” and there’s no Western media around to “hear him fall”- will our populations care? Many of us have concluded- “no”.
Grant Martin
MAJ, US Army
The above comments are the authors’ own and do not reflect the position of the US Army or DoD.
Ok, call it COIN, call it CT, call it colonialism, whatever…I think those labels are all interesting but can largely be distractions. To be most accurate, what’s occurring in Afghanistan right now is a Phase IV occupation that we are trying to transition. For the first 8 years, we tried to convince ourselves that we were not occupying, we were liberating or something; and we never had adequate forces to properly assume the policing functions an occupying army must assume after Phase III when they have dismantled the existing government infrastructure and their local police and security forces. This is also true in Iraq. The Revolution in Military Affairs got Phase III right, but it low-balled Phase IV, and this is why OIF Phase IV and OEF-A Phase IV have gone so poorly.
I am not a proponent of staying in Afghanistan per se. But the current plan represents a reasonable approach to stabilize the population centers at an Afghan pace with an Afghan face by 2014. If the Afghan pace is too slow, too bad. The deadline helps them realize they only have this limited opportunity to take advantage of ISAF’s assistance. After 2014, we can pull out knowing we gave them a reasonable opportunity to govern themselves. If the Afghans fail to take advantage of this opportunity, so be it. That will be the Afghans’ problem.
In other words, our end state in Afghanistan as with Iraq as with any Phase IV transition, should be to set the conditions that provide the host population a reasonable opportunity to govern themselves. It should not be the US nor NATO nor the UN’s mission to make Afghanistan successful. That is for the Afghan people.
If you want evidence of the progress, read the SECDEF report to congress for the December assessment. It won’t satisfy either side though. The results are mixed, but in general, trending positive in many districts. http://www.defense.gov/pubs/November_1230_Report_FINAL.pdf
One interesting factoid for Afghanistan: 22.5% economic growth in 2009. Granted, a third of it is unsustainable foreign aid, but still, a good portion is legitimate growth.
Publius,
You make a good point. I do sound angry about the criticism of the current strategy.
Rest assured, I’m not irritated at the criticism because I’m wedded to the strategy. I’m irritated about the criticism’s lack of validity. It overly generalizes and masks important events that have occurred in the past 9 years:
1. We divert US forces to Iraq (2003).
2. Rumsfeld is gone and Gates is SECDEF (2007).
3. Bush is gone (2009).
4. Bush’s mistakes in Iraq settle enough to allow the US to shift emphasis and capabilities back to Afghanistan.
5. McCrystal then Patraeus is in (2010).
6. 98,000 US forces RSOI’ed and conducing ops in OEF-A (AUG 2010).
Also, I would disagree with your point that we have made no discernible progress. That depends on your definition of “discernible.” Again, the 1230 reports to Congress seem to describe discernible points, if you bother to read it.
I think the plan for Phase IV in Afghanistan has always underestimated the efforts it will require to “stabilize” this largely rural country with a fiercely independent, self-sufficient population that is not looking for any government to help them, not even their own. But we can’t ignore the larger problems in that region and the opportunity a stable Afghanistan nestled between Iran and Pakistan would provide us.
“friendly force phases” in insurgency are moot. It is insurgent phases that define the situation, and the insurgent can prevail in any phase.
The goal of an intervening force is to assist in reducing the violence and improving the governance to the point where it comes within the capacity of the Host Nation COIN/governance mechanisms. It will still be far from peaceful, and governance will remain flawed, but the causal factors will be moving in the right direction.
The convenional concept of moving through a tunnel from A to Z to get to success is a dangerous obstacle to clear understanding of such operations.
(And appreciating that what we currently think of as “COIN” is really not COIN at all, but rather a mix of Euro/US Colonial intervention TTPs colored by a few years in Iraq is much more than quibbling over words.)
Robert,
I agree that what is occurring in Afghanistan is not strictly COIN, but here’s my quibble for the sake of argument. So what?
Define the insurgency in Afghanistan. You have mostly criminals in the northwest, drug traffickers in the southwest, Afghan Taliban in the south (although each cell varies from tribe to tribe and valley to valley), the Haqqani Network in the east with a mix of Pakistani Taliban and Afghan Taliban too, the HIG and Uzbeks rebels in the northeast, and various other malcontents throughout. So with that, explain to me what phase this “insurgency” is in right now.
ISAF operations are a mix of COIN, CT, UW, FID, SSTR, counter narcotics, law enforcement, yada, yada, yada… but the overarching focus is to build Afghan security forces so they can fill the role of the previous public safety and security forces that Phase III destroyed or dismantled.
If ISAF tried to build a COIN strategy that focuses specifically on all the various anti-coalition militias in response to all their various phases, you’d have chaos. Chaos during phase II and III is good. Chaos during phase IV is bad. In phase IV the objectives shift from destroying the enemy to building a friend.
The biggest obstacle for ISAF is not the insurgency or building the ANA, it’s GIRoA. It’s too early to fix right now, but once there’s reasonable stability, the donor nations need to push GIRoA to amend the Afghan constitution. Right now it’s a democratically elected dictatorship with its patronage system. They need to federalize the provinces so that the provincial governors are elected, not appointed. Same for the district governors. Like I said, it’s too early for that now with bigger fish to fry first, but the patronage system is what drives the corruption. But that’s another thread.
Dick,
Please describe ISAF “UW” operations. I would be curious to understand what UW operations are being conducted in Afghanistan.
ADM Mullen says we are winning; therefore, we are winning.
Dick,
OK, I see where you are coming from, and that is a great lay down of the complexity of the many organizations, representing many distinct segments of the Afghan populace that are rising up in illegal challenge to the current government. You are absolutely right, that to tailor a program to defeat each of these would be chaotic.
But here is my point: Insurgents do not create insurgency. Causation for insurgency radiates out from a government in the form of the design and application of domestic policies; and it is how that is perceived by these many uniques pockets in any populace that determine if the conditions of insurgency grow or shrink. When they grow strong enough, someone will step up to exploit them.
As you point out so well, there are dozens of such groups in Afghanistan. This alone is a powerful metric of how widely the current government is felt to be illegitimat, injust, and biased. This alone gives grim testament to the reality that almost universally the people who have such complaints feel that illegal violence is their only recourse. This too points out why understanding the FM3-24 is Colonial Intervention is so important.
Colonial intervention is about suppressing such challengers in order to sustain such illegitimate governments in power. True COIN is intrastate, and is focused on repairing the failures of government.
Does General Petraeus believe it is within his lane to “fix” the government of Afghanistan? To demand reconciliation and the coming together of all stakeholders to craft a new and effective Constitution designed to guard the futures of ALL Afghans? I doubt it. Yet that is what must be done. It is not a military mission and it is not war. It is a civilian mission, it is a civil emergency, and the military should appreciate their role is merely to enable such civil repairs of governance to occur. But currently no one is focused on the main effort because our current COIN doctrine leads us to believe that GEN Petraus is already on it. He isn’t. No one is.
“Well if you read what American commanders from company up to Division and higher have been saying about what they were doing since early 2004 then yes actually the operational framework of counterinsurgency has remained essentially the same.”
Horseshit!!! That is as close to COIN as Nickle is to Silver. Yes it might have been a framework of sorts but the US and international community as a whole has NEVER committed the necessary forces by either the military or civil service components. We have simply used COIN terms to justify the current actions of the time. We finally as of Aug 10 have the military numbers needed.
“Those who look at the past six months of operations in Afghanistan with an experienced eye can see a very deliberate scheme of engagement to suppress the symptoms of the insurgency there in a manner to meet specific metrics to support a withdrawal IAW political timelines. General Petraeus has his mission and he is executing it. But it isn’t COIN; and it really doesn’t get us to the Ends set for us by the President either.”
What are we missing from COIN in Afghanistan… embedded in the Current Strategy are all the elements of any COIN I have ever read about but I am new to COIN as I only have about 3 years exposure to it. But it has been a passion of mine from then and I have immersed myself in study. So I consider this an opportunity to learn more.
“The President set the Ends as “to disrupt, dismantle, and eventually defeat al Qaeda and to prevent their return to either Afghanistan or Pakistan.”
President Barak Obama, 2010″
A statement to satisfy his base. Nothing more.
“I was reading some of the press releases from 2006 and re-reading some of the things we worked on in 2007 and, honestly, you can replace the dates (and many times leave the names in place- but add a star or two) and they look the same as what we are doing today.”
Really? Because things are significantly different on the ground now than they were in my last deployment here in ’08. The RCs have even been restructured to allow simultaneous focus on Helmand, Qandahar, and RCE hotspots. We have shifted focus significantly to local governance and building village level security. The ANS and ISAF are no long living on fortified FOBs but are now embedded in the villages. They have established a footprint “beyond the berm.” Many places that the Taliban conducted phase III insurgency we have seen revert to phase I. Many TB commanders in the TB heartland have began to reintegrate. There is now a Local Afghan Police institution and a means to reiterate TB fighters. So tell me how this is the same as 2007.
The facts as I see them here are that they ground work has been laid as of Aug 10. Since then we have made headway into separating the INS from the population (population centric COIN). We have continued to make headway through the winter months when normal Taliban fighting would traditional stop.
My assessment is that we will see a spike in violence in the spring (this is normal but may be increased due to increased troops and patrols in previous TB strongholds). Come late summer/early fall during the normal peak fighting season we can take a true look at the success of this surge. Increased numbers of TICs do not indicate lower security. We have to look at INS-initiated attack levels and locations. And if you want to use IEDs as an indicator then do not just rely on IED casualties. Differences in IED design and employment can skew these numbers. Look at the actual employment TTPs and locations in relations to CUOPS.
Anonymous asks me “Please describe ISAF “UW” operations.”
You kinda got me there, but I think I can tap dance my way to an answer.
I said a mix of those things to include UW, but regarding UW, I should’ve been more specific. When you look at what SOF is doing in the rural villages, termed Village Stability Operations (VS0), tactically they are using UW techniques to organize and train local defenses. These units have been legitimized by GIRoA as the Afghan Local Police (ALP). The operational outcome of VSO/ALP is more FID, but the methods are more UW.
Dick: the progress that has been reported is based on an interpretation of metrics. Most of these metrics deal with growth (in numbers) of ANSF, growth in governance metrics like polling data and replacing “bad” officials with good in key districts within Helmand and Kandahar, and growth in development metrics like people employed in key districts in H and K. There’re also metrics based on violence- although interestingly more violence and less violence are both interpreted as “progress”.
The bottom line: I know very few people who thought any of this was sustainable. Pouring money, troops, and attention into a key district simply led to the insurgents leaving the area temporarily (we called it the water balloon effect- squeeze one area, and another area would bulge), GIRoA/ISAF puppets being put in place who the people didn’t trust, and a temporary welfare state being created until the Coalition money stopped flowing. Of course there are some short-term positive metrics, but we’ve seen this before- specifically I can recall Ghazni in 2007: for one month that place was great- it was our focus that month. As soon as we shifted focus, the “insurgents” came back.
If the biggest obstacle to ISAF is GIRoA- then we definitely should not be conducting COIN (I would agree that the biggest obstacle to ISAF “conducting COIN/CT” is GIRoA- but not that ISAF’s biggest obstacle is GIRoA). If ISAF’s biggest obstacle used to be the Taliban government and is now the current government- sounds like to me we need to do some UW instead of COIN…
James:
I disagree with you that we finally have the military numbers needed as of AUG ’10 for the strategy we are advertising. For one- the military asked for more than double what they got. Two- they are still asking for more. Three- ISAF supposedly needs so many more trainers that they are willing to put the securing of additional NATO and EUPOL personnel as a higher priority than actually following COIN tactical principles. The “Key Terrain District” concept comes from the fact that we don’t have enough forces to secure where we need to- so we’ve had to pick some “key” ones and concentrate on those. So to say we finally have enough is ignoring what ISAF is currently doing/saying, assuming we have the right strategy and we just needed more guys- and that we now have the right #. That’s a lot of assumptions and I think there’s plenty of proof that the # still isn’t “right” for those in charge.
I wasn’t in all areas of Afghanistan- so your experience may have been different than mine. In 2007 in RC-E we cleared areas, put ANSF in, and then had to re-clear them months later. In RC-S we just cleared and re-cleared. We stayed on FOBs and didn’t do much with the ANSF. GIRoA wasn’t interested in “our” war and Kabul was dangerous. The North was relatively calm and the West was calm because the Italians weren’t interested in “our” war either. The South was violent, but so was the East.
Today- other than Kabul being much safer (although you wouldn’t know it from our FORCEPRO posture)- my experience has been exactly the opposite of yours: we weren’t just living on the FOBs- we were locked up inside of them and partnering was mostly very shallow (there were definitely exceptions, but if you include the police- we’ve got lots of “uncovered” ANSF units). A few districts in RC-S and SW were exceptions- but they were definitely the exception and not the rule.
Anything to do with RCs making structural progress gives me pause: I viewed the RCs as entities that almost guarantee future Coalition presence since little on the Afghan side matches the RC structure.
The reintegration effort is probably the 6th such effort with a new name. I think it is way too early to tell if the new one (APRP) will be any different than the past ones. To be fair- some changes have been made- but it remains to be seen whether it will bring about lasting change. Early signs are mixed. The “Local Afghan Police institution” is another entity with a new name- I think the fourth in the last year alone? Again, way too early in my opinion to make an assessment on this. GIRoA isn’t a fan of that “institution” and neither are our European allies. If we more than triple the number of villages under that program I would be very surprised if we have the same level of quality/oversight/success as we’ve had with the others.
Lastly- using metrics to measure progress is so “McNamara-esqe” I can’t believe I keep hearing it from our leaders- didn’t anyone read Summer’s “On Strategy”? and the failure of our metrics to do anything for us? I understand using metrics to show the politicians and media that things seem to be trending a certain way- but we actually have come to rely on them as well (and use them to “prove” progress- as opposed to give us feedback on what we may be doing wrong). We are now an “Army of Whiz Kids”. No matter what the metrics show in AUG of ’11- the reality on the ground won’t- in my opinion- be an aggregate of those metrics. We’ll see what happens when we start to pull out. If some areas fall to local power brokers (including the Taliban) and AQ doesn’t automatically come back- then I’d submit many of the assumptions backing up the logic of our metrics is flawed.
Grant Martin
MAJ, US Army
The above comments are the authors’ own and do not represent the position of the US Army or DoD.
“one- the military asked for more than double what they got. Two- they are still asking for more”
If I remember correctly the number Gen McChrystal requested was 25-40K… he got 34K with a 10% increase without having to once again get presidential approval (~3K). That with the NATO increase of 5K. Those numbers combine are 42K. They didn’t ask for twice what they got… they got above the top number they asked for.
I have seen nothing of them asking for more. What I have seen is that they are deploying the troops authorized in the extra ~3K. If you have any references for that claim then please share.
“In 2007 in RC-E we cleared areas, put ANSF in, and then had to re-clear them months later.”
That supports my argument that we were not conducting COIN. I love the analogy earlier about placing your fist in a bucket and then taking it back out. You can do all the clearing operations in the world but unless you hold the terrain and enter the building phase of COIN you are wasting effort. In 2007-2009 this was the norm in Afghanistan though. The difference now is that we ARE holding the terrain. That is what the increased troop levels in Afghanistan are intended to allow us to do.
“we weren’t just living on the FOBs- we were locked up inside of them”
I assume this is referring to 2007? If so then I agree. We had full control of that real estate… but nothing really beyond the wire. Now we have FOBs, COPs, FBs, and CPs littered through the valleys. This is part of the ink blot approach… There are areas that we don’t have FOM but we have started somewhere and are expanding from that.
I kind of agree on your point about the RCs; however, right now ISAF is the primary counterinsurgent. The importance of simultaneously building GIRoA/local governance capacity is the ability to transfer that responsibility to them once we have reduced the insurgency to a manageable law-enforcement level. So the restructure of the RCs will help us do that, IMO.
“The reintegration effort is probably the 6th such effort with a new name.”
Yes but this is the first one that I have seen that allows the fighters the ability to provide security to their village. Previously we have reintegrated a few members and worked them back into society as unarmed noncombatants only for the TB to either intimidate them back into the insurgency or kill them. This was the major flaw in the previous systems.
I completely agree about the metrics… metrics are VERY important but most people do not even know how to use them. “Increased TICs? Must mean the insurgents are gaining momentum.” Not necessarily. It depends on the contexts… if the TICs are o/a the “FEBA”(if you can call it that in COIN) but TICs on the blue side of the FEBA are significantly reduced then that would indicate progress; however, increased TICs well within the blue side might indicate the opposite, again depending on context. You have to look beyond the “on paper” metrics and look at the “big picture.”
In 2008 what I saw left me very pessimistic about our future here. But what I see now has really reversed that.
Grant,
You’re spot on. The results are all mixed. Hard to tell if we are measuring the right metrics in the right context etc. And many of the “new” things that are showing some promise are really just repackaged and minor variations of old things that didn’t work before. Although, some might say they are improvements, not variations or repackaging.
The biggest difference between now and last year and the 8 years before is Patreaus with more troops. He is good, and with more troops, we reduce the balloon-effect of pressing and then leaving. With more troops the RC’s can press and stay or move ANA or ANP in to stay. You guys never had adequate support. Now they are close. I wouldn’t say they have enough to convincingly succeed, but they have enough to show progress.
Bottom line for me: AUG 2010 began a new period in OEF-A to provide the Afghans a reasonable opportunity to govern themselves, and 2014 is a fair deadline for the Afghans to respond positively. So for all those who want to pull out, I’m with you, in 2014.
James- I’ll have to surf to see if there’s anything on the troop level request- but my buds on the DA G-3 and ISAF staffs at the time told me they asked for 80k. There were scenarios for what we could accomplish with less- no doubt- and the President accepted those risks and went with the lowest amount (which I don’t disagree with)- but 80k was DoD’s “most preferred” surge amount. I was even in on a discussion on capitol hill in 2009 that was discussing 100k+, but the political will for that high of a number just wasn’t there on any side. Some Army reps were arguing that since Afghanistan had more people and more land than Iraq- shouldn’t we get at least the amount of troops that Iraq had–? That none of the reps/senators knew those facts of Afghanistan- nor knew what HIG and HIK were- shows you where we were as a country in ’09- less than 2 years ago…
I disagree we are holding terrain. If you read the op reports on the Arghandab, RCs N, W and, E- and the non-key terrain districts in RCs S and SW- we are not holding- we are still clearing and re-clearing. The only places we have enough troops to hold are the key terrain districts in RC-S and SW (and arguably not even all of them). Add to that fact that there is a debate within ISAF about what “hold” is supposed to look like (ANSF holding or ISAF holding- or a mix? and who among the ANSF?)- and it gets murkier.
IJC would like to move on after clearing- to the next KTD and leave ANP in place (AUP)- but they can’t because of the capability (or will??) of the ANSF. So- we haven’t moved much beyond holding a few districts in Helmand and Kandahar. Kind of hard to hold if your HN force’s government doesn’t want to hold and/or the forces are unable to hold (unless we do it ourselves- but we don’t have enough forces to hold every district we clear ourselves).
If the insurgents move to the neighboring “non-KTDs”, just to wait until you leave- then what are we really holding? That is EXACTLY what I saw in 2007. I do agree with you that we weren’t conducting COIN- but I don’t think much has changed. Just because we are in a few KTDs in S and SW now doesn’t convince me that what we are doing will be effective in the long-term. I submit we are effectively locked down in those KTDs- we can’t leave them for fear they’d revert back and then we’ve “failed” because of bad metrics. If we don’t start clearing/holding other KTDs in the next year- then what? What KTD have we “held” so far- that have no Coalition in them anymore? The answer is “none”.
And being locked up on the FOBs is my experience NOW- this year and last. The experiences I had in Kabul, RC-S, and RC-E (admittedly not the entire battlespaces of RC-S and E, nor the whole country) showed me we were locked up on the FOBs. The bottom line of my experience: BSOs were too scared of anyone dying to trust Coalition mentors to travel with their ANSF counterparts, mentors too worried about their “combat OERs” to accompany their Afghans off of the FOBs, Coalition “partners” worried about Afghans filling out power point slides and signing Coalition-written policies, ANSF unpartnered or partnered by “drive-by”, and FORCEPRO requirements that made changing any of the above tantamount to a UCMJ action. Your experiences may be different- but those were consistently mine. I am sure that a few units in RCs S and SW were different and some SOF as well- but I’d submit those examples were not the rule.
I agree we have to work towards transition- I just don’t see the RCs as the vehicle to do that- I see them as a hindrance (their structure not matching the Afghan structure) to transition to Afghan lead.
Your comment on the APRP is a common misunderstanding of the process. APRP has NOTHING to do with providing security to one’s village. It simply is a program to allow village-nominated people to be reintegrated into society. There is a possibility they could go into the ANSF or ALP- but no guarantee- the two processes are completely separate. This misunderstanding has led to several negative events where local fighters are manipulating the system to “reintegrate” so they can receive government backing to go and kill their local enemies. The bottom line: if every reintegree was allowed to join some kind of local police force- we would have little to no oversight of them, MoI would have no oversight of them, they’d be little more than militias, and most likely more than half would be guys we don’t want to arm. The major flaw in the previous system was that “bad” guys were able to game the system. That is still a flaw in the current system.
The only differences I saw between ’07 and today are that Kabul is much more secure. Other than that- what we are doing in Helmand and Kandahar was done to a degree in ’07 in different areas- there’s just more bubbas doing it and more money pouring in to those areas (neither of those are sustainable IMO). Oh- and RCs W and N are now more dangerous (water balloon effect?).
Many of the planners at IJC, ISAF, and NTM-A that I interacted with agreed that the solution is to follow the NATO concept of transition and make that priority #1- explaining to our political masters of the need to accept some short-term set-backs as the Afghans takeover (and/or adjust our metrics to stop measuring a Western expeditionary force and instead start measuring progress towards a garrison-occupation force). Stop clearing and holding- stop all combat ops now- and only support the efforts GIRoA dreams up (as long as we agree with them) and MoD/MoI write the plans for (without our initiative and power point requirements- let them brief off a map like they like to do and we used to do). Transfer the bulk of our combat forces to trainers/mentors/partners and send most of the rest home today- leaving only those needed to support MoD ops. Leave enough SOF to do CT and irregular force development- but make sure the CT is clearly connected to a U.S. threat- stop having SOF chasing down targets that have nothing to do with our domestic security. And lastly, get out of the governance and economic development realm. Those efforts are creating welfare dependencies and non-Afghan solutions that won’t be sustainable and are hindering their own development.
I can’t take credit for all of those solutions- and I don’t think it would be easy to do or perhaps politically palatable. And it is based on the assumption that Afghanistan will revert to something wholly different than what we are driving for right now in 2014 (Kabul having a lot less influence than we’d like in the countryside). It is also based on the assumption that the Taliban won’t necessarily harbor AQ and won’t take over the country if we leave.
Grant Martin
MAJ, US Army
The above comments are the authors’ own and do not represent the position of the US Army or DoD.
Grant Martin
MAJ, US Army
The above comments are the authors’ own and do not reflect the position of the US Army or DoD.
Oh- and to them asking for more- I can’t go into specifics, but suffice it to say that ISAF is asking for more. The main “more” right now are trainers and staff- and the number is in the thousands. It is just interesting to hear people blog about having the right number now and yet sit in on staff meetings daily where we conclude we need many more folks.
MAJ,
We will just have to agree to disagree on this one. While I respect your perspective on this what I am seeing is different. I realize that a lot of what we are doing is very similar to what we were doing a few years ago; however, the differences, no matter how suttle they may seem, are what I think will have strategic impacts.
Disarming and reintegrating a TB commander without providing him true security through whateven means neccesary is ineffective. One of 3 things happens: 1 he is intimidated into rejoining the TB, 2 he is intimidated into exile, or 3 he is killed. No matter which one that happens he becomes a public example.
The fact that we are pushing out of our FOBs/FBs to establish CPs/OPs throughout the valleys shows that we are holding the terrain. The fact that at any given time there is a foot patrol going through the villages in those valleys that have been cleared also supports this. But simply holding the terrian will do nothing. We are building in these areas. And actually building physical buildings is not what is important. We are building LOCAL governance capacity. We have switched from conducting shuras and are instead now holding jurgas. Most non-Afghan don’t even understand that different but it is huge. I won’t insult your intelligence by explaining it but if you want me to than just let me know. The bottom line is that GIRoA will never rule the country of Afghanistan from Kabul. We have to build that governance that the everyday Afghan living in the village will see.
And the point about the rising insurgent activities in the north/west: without the safe havens in the south and key areas in the east the Taliban cannot sustain any sort of operations in the north. A TB commander from Helmand/Kandahar could never lead there.
The insurgency in the east is totally different than in the south/southwest and likely doesn’t require a troop surge but instead simply a better use of the troops that we have there. The exeption to this IMO is P2K.
OBTW that was me not some anonymous person randomly chiming in, lol.
Anonymous,
Great points. ISAF can beat the Taliban and other malcontents on the security front with more troops. Where Afghanistan has trouble is in local governance. A staff officer described it poignantly: “GIRoA needs to out govern the Taliban.”
At the local level the Taliban shadow governments often still have too much influence. One of the more encouraging developments was the IDLG Afghan Social Outreach Program (ASOP). The important advance here is that ASOP is conducting jirgas to stand up district councils…”we” are not holding the jirgas, GIRoA is. That is a big step in the right direction for local governance. The program is still in its early stages, and there are still a host of local problems with some district governors, but again, mixed but encouraging signs that they are starting to figure things out and stabilize more territory.
Add to this progress in local governance the expansion of their cellular networks, and gradually improving road networks, and now you have local district centers able to communicate with provincial centers and Kabul for development, and with ISAF/ANSF for security.
Nothing watershed here. Just incremental, valley by valley, district by district progress. That’s why it’ll take ’til 2014. There are 364 districts.
Yes, we’ll have to agree to disagree.
I didn’t hear about any TB commanders reintegrating who were afraid for their security. There were some HIG fighters who didn’t bring their weapons when they “surrendered” because they heard they’d be taken away and/or they’d get new ones. Since they were looking for support against TB and their traditional enemies- this caused a problem- but I didn’t know anyone- outside of a few confused-about-the ALP folks- who supported turning reintegrees into Local Police.
If it isn’t classified- a list of the districts that we have persistent presence in every village and “valley” would be a start in convincing me we are holding anything. Outside of a few key districts in RC S, SW, and E- I am unaware of us “holding terrain”. If “at any given time” we have a foot patrol going through an area means we are holding it- I disagree. Our foot patrols more than not in these areas we are clearing are re-clearing weekly or monthly and we are losing guys to snipers, IEDs, and ambushes. I fail to see that as “holding”.
And if we really think that our building of local governance is going to be sustainable after we leave- I think we are naive.
Lastly- the TB commanders in the North ARE leading and sustaining their efforts since we moved into RC-S last summer. Hundreds of fighters at a time/place are being well-led and engaging with ANSF, Coalition (when they leave their bases), and other insurgents (lots of insurgent-on-insurgent fighting). HIG fighters were getting their butts kicked a few months ago by TB- so I’m not sure where your statement about TB commanders in the north comes from- but it isn’t reflected in actual current events.
http://www.understandingwar.org/files/Afghanistan_Report_8_emailopt.pdf
An Institue for the Study of War detailed account of the clear/hold/build operations in Helmand. There is also one published about Kandahar.
A couple of my key highlights:
“Helmand was the first province in
Afghanistan to receive sufficient force to
engage in comprehensive, population-centric
counterinsurgency operations.”
“In the southern district of Garmser, Marines constructed over fifty outposts, fourteen of which were manned entirely by Afghan forces.In all, Marines and their Afghan partners managed to clear and hold over twenty miles of terrain south of the district center…”
“The Marines constantly patrolled, observed the roads from outposts, and protected villages from Taliban intimidation during the night.”
And that is just one of the districts in Helmand but the same thing has happened in virtually all the districts where clearing ops have taken place.
http://www.understandingwar.org/files/DefiningSuccessinAfghanistanElectronicVersion_email.pdf
Not sure if you have seen this one either.
“The insurgents do not have momentum anywhere in RC(East). Coalition operations continue to disrupt them in Greater Paktia and are increasingly pushing into their safe havens and support zones in Ghazni, Logar, and
Wardak. Insurgents have not been able to conduct a coordinated campaign in Nangarhar or Konar or to make much use of isolated safe havens they retain in Nuristan.”
“Despite alarmist reports from the Intelligence Community and elsewhere, the
insurgency is not gaining strength in northern Afghanistan and is extremely
unlikely to do so.”
“The real test of the security gains in southern Afghanistan will come in late
summer 2011, when the insurgent fighting effort can be expected to reach
its peak. The seasonal nature of enemy activity makes judging the depth of
progress before then extremely difficult.”
And for the record I made my assessment about waiting until late summer/early fall to truely judge attack levels before I read this report. 🙂
I guess we’re not agreeing to disagree! 🙂
The Kagans- yes. I must say they state a lot of assumptions as if they are facts.
I don’t dispute that we may be “holding” in some key districts in RCs S and SW- and maybe even a few in RC-E. I just don’t think that is sustainable or that we will be able to remove ourselves from holding in those areas and shift to other KTDs any time soon- if ever.
But- maybe you’re right and we’ll be long gone from Helmand’s KTDs and Kandahar’s KTDs come this summer- and they won’t see the insurgents come back. We’ll see.
“The real test of the security gains in southern Afghanistan will come in late
summer 2011, when the insurgent fighting effort can be expected to reach
its peak. The seasonal nature of enemy activity makes judging the depth of
progress before then extremely difficult.”
Nope…the real test will come when ISAF, NATO and, above all, the US start to down-size and withdraw and Afghanistan (or elements within it) gets to determine its own path again…
“Henry Kissinger told Chinese Premier Zhou En-lai in 1972 that the United States was prepared to accept the unification of Vietnam under Communist rule. Kissingers only proviso was that he wished there would be a time interval between the American exit and South Vietnams collapse. In short, Kissinger offered Zhou En-lai U.S. withdrawal in return for a “decent interval.” ”
It is pretty clear that the current strategy in Afghanistan is the pursuit of a “decent interval.” This is the problem with the colonial intervention doctrine that we have adopted from the European’s and made our own. It does not work. The pursuit of such concepts as liberty and legitimacy, and self-determination of governance are not well suppressed by the security forces of the illegitimate governments that are challenged by the oppressed or excluded segments of their own populace; nor are they well suppressed by the efforts of the external powers who put such governments in power and work to sustain them.
Efforts to contain ideologies we disagree with (communism in the 50s-80s; Islamism over the past decade) don’t work well. Ideas cannot be locked away in some dark corner; particularly when those ideas are being employed to motivate populaces held under such forms of illegitimate and/or oppressive governance.
The issue was not communism then, and it is not Islamism now. The issue was and is governance. True COIN is domestic, and focuses on the repairs of governance IAW the reasonable concerns of a governed populace. Colonial intervention is led by some intervening power and works to preserve the problem government through some mix of security and effectiveness operations.
“The real test of the security gains in
southern Afghanistan will come in late
summer 2011, when the insurgent fighting
effort can be expected to reach
its peak. The seasonal nature of enemy
activity makes judging the depth of
progress before then extremely difficult.”
“Nope…the real test will come when ISAF, NATO and, above all, the US start to down-size and withdraw and Afghanistan (or elements within it) gets to determine its own path again…”
The statement is in regards to the security gains that we have made. If you make gains in the late fall/winter as we have you have to wait until late summer to find out if you can continue to hold that terrain and protect the Afghans who are now on your side. That is what I see in that statement and my assessment.
As to judging the overall strategy then you are absolutely correct that it will take ISAF turning over responsibility and control of that terrain to the Afghan government at all levels. This is the test of the strategy as I see it.
But it will still remain to be seen whether 10 years down the road GIRoA can continue as the legitimate government of Afghans. The same in Iraq. Can those democracies withstand the test of time.
“The issue was not communism then, and it is not Islamism now. The issue was and is governance. True COIN is domestic, and focuses on the repairs of governance IAW the reasonable concerns of a governed populace. Colonial intervention is led by some intervening power and works to preserve the problem government through some mix of security and effectiveness operations.”
I absolutely agree with this; however, that is why I think that we have to build governance from the village level up. The Top-Down approach of governing from Kabul will not work in Afghanistan. That is why think we have initiative such as the ALP and ADLG and we must continue to refine and improve these.
No matter what governance you have you have to have a secure environment for the populace. Without such these local governance initiatives cannot provide any governance to the local Afghan. Instead they will be intimidated into either leaving the area or utilizing the Taliban shadow governance.
James,
VSO is a great program and I am proud to have had some small hand in shaping and growing the same. However, while “building from the bottom up” is all the guys on the bottom can do, it is not likely to work in a country where the ONLY local government is at the village level. Larger cities? Nope, picked by the President. District? Nope, picked by the President. Province? Nope again, also picked by the President. The President himself? Well, this too is a problem. Initially picked by the U.S.; and then confirmed in an electtion managed by all of these afore mentioned gentlemen who all owed their positions and access to the vast income assocaited with patronage to him staying in office. So, an election regarded across Afghanistan and around the world as fixed.
This cannot be fixed from the bottom up. One can work hard and perhaps gain a “decent interval” under which to withdraw, but one cannot fix this from the bottom. The COG is the constitution, and that is not in the ISAF Commander’s lane, so it sits there unaddressed. A good COIN effort would zero in on this defect. A good colonial intervention operation executed by a country that has no intent to stay and run a colony has no interest dealing with such issues. We say “That is for Karzai and GIROA to fix.” Right.
“This cannot be fixed from the bottom up. One can work hard and perhaps gain a “decent interval” under which to withdraw, but one cannot fix this from the bottom. The COG is the constitution, and that is not in the ISAF Commander’s lane, so it sits there unaddressed. A good COIN effort would zero in on this defect. A good colonial intervention operation executed by a country that has no intent to stay and run a colony has no interest dealing with such issues. We say “That is for Karzai and GIROA to fix.” Right.”
So true… but I am not a Statey… I am in the military and I brief military leaders on what we are and should be doing. Somtimes I forget that the rest of this forum isn’t looking through that same soda-straw view. As you said the National Governance is not our lane. What we CAN do is the bottom up stuff. The State Department has to do the rest but I would agree that it is equally important in the big picture.
With a rural insurgency, doing the Pop-centric COIN and village level governance initiatives should put into place an environment in which GIRoA/USDoS has the opportunity to fix the rest. To attempt to fix GIRoA’s flaws without security and local-governance would be foolish. Meanwhile the converse of attempting to establish security and build village level governance without creating that link with GIRoA would be equally foolish.
James,
So who at state has authority over Gen. Petraeus?? I have not seen or heard two words from Amb. Eikenberry since McChrystals fall.
So here is the problem, the military has the mission, yet feels it lacks the authority to execute the LOOs that must be addressed to truly resolve the insurgency. State may have the authority, but have either been ordered to stand down, or believe they lack the mission.
As to the “this is a rural insurgency” That is a half-right statement. The rural insurgency is the lower tier of a two-tier insurgency, and is largely a resistance movement. It grows as our presence grows, and the surge has been like “Miracle-Gro” so far. Reintegration efforts are aimed at this, as are development, capacity building, etc. All futilely increasing the causation in their very efforts to address them. The upper tier of the insurgency is more political and revolutionary in nature, and that is the leadership that takes sanctuary in Pakistan. Again, the military feels that is outside their mandate, so they ignore the political reforms, the reconciliation efforts that could resolve the insurgency; and instead hammer away at the resistance movement instead.
This is why Civilian lead is so critical for COIN (an aspect of Galula we conveniently set aside).
The party line is off track, and the results speak for themselves. This is fixable, but we must make a sea change in focus and priority, not just apply more resources.
“This is why Civilian lead is so critical for COIN (an aspect of Galula we conveniently set aside).”
If you look at the PRT structure in Iraq NOW it is lef by DoS. That is likely what will happen here too.
“As to the “this is a rural insurgency” That is a half-right statement.”
When the TB is nothing more than those top-tier guys in Pakistan sitting around in their shura I’d say the insurgency has effectively been squashed. That’s not to say that if the governance piece doesn’t improve that it won’t pick back up or that the Quetta shura shouldn’t be dealt with.
James,
If we’re honest with ourselves, we all look through soda straws to some extent, whether they be pet theories, or a piece of turf called our AO. However, addressing your opinion that you think bottom up will work, please explain how you see any village or even a collective of villages effectively resisting the return of the Taleban after we depart? The village’s mass is the villages mass, whereas the Taleban will be able to bring sufficient mass to bear on the village and likely with State support from Pakistan. If Afghanistan isn’t united (or at least larger parts than the villages), then what will we have accomplished? Maybe as Bob stated a decent interval to allow a withdrawal?
It will take more than just a village… from the security stand point there must be an onion of layers on layers of security. Neighborhood watch, ALP, ANP, ANA, NDS, ABP, etc. They have to all work together when we leave. Most of the governance will be done by the village elders and tribal councils. A smaller amount through the district/provincial gov’t. And even less through GIRoA.
But when you talk about bringing security for the first time it starts at the village level. If we cannot provide security to the everyday Afghan living in the village so that he can make that connection to his village/district leaders then he will never see the “Face” of the Afghan government. To him his village leadership might be the only “face” of GIRoA he ever see. The insurgent is embedded with the everyday Afghans… he sleep with them… he eats with them… and he breaths with them. Its at the village level.
James,
The “bottom up is the only way” crowd reminds me of a true story a friend of mine told me of his experience at the Pentagon on 9/11. A mountain of a man, this Navy SEAL was everywhere, putting his great size, training, and energy to work to save others. He literally caught several people who were forced to leap from a third story gap in the building to escape the growing flames. He later led a party into the burning smoking building to search for survivors they were told were still inside.
As they entered one room, the ceiling suddenly sagged down upon them. This hero immediately reached up, pressing both hands against the ceiling, locking his body in a rigid X, and directed everyone to get out. Once everyone was clear, and he was alone in the smoke filled room with this tremendous weight of a failing building above him, his thought was “now what?”
He knew he couldn’t hold it much longer, and he knew it would likely collapse and crush him once he attempted to withdraw. The best he could hope for was a “decent interval.”
Long story short, God granted him that decent interval and a great man lived to share his story in humble wonder. VSO is much like this. Bubbles of goodness propped up artificially through the extreme efforts of our amazing SOF community. But they can’t hold it up forever, and just like a collapsing building, a collapsing government cannot be saved from the bottom up either until the problems up above are resolved.
You have a good head on your shoulders James, keep up the good work.
Bob
Bob,
First off, thanks for the compliment.
Secondly, I agree with you that the bottom-up cannot be the long term solution because, as you have stated, the governance institution will eventually collapse from the top-down. But the intent of the bottom-up IMO is to provide security and a decent interval for the higher levels of governance to improve. But if we were to continue to try to build the governance institution of Afghanistan from the top down like we did from 2001-2008ish, GIRoA would never earn the legitimacy of the populace. That can only come through those village level efforts. But they must tie back to the top levels to be sustainable. It is pointless to defeat the insurgency and not address the grievances that laid the ground work for the insurgency in the first place.
“It is pointless to defeat the insurgency and not address the grievances that laid the ground work for the insurgency in the first place.”
A true statement, IMO. Just remember that the insurgent is not the insurgency, he just represents a group that emerged to exploit conditions of insurgency that are in turn a reflection of the populaces perceptions of the nature and applicaiton of domestic policies from the government. This is why I developed the concept of “conditions of insurgency.” Address the conditions and the insurgent fades away for want of support. Where it gets tricky is in tracking the causation for such conditions back to the source. The mother lode in Afghanistan is their current Constitution. Dig there for best effect.
Out in the villages? You just panning for dust. You’ll make beer and hooker money, but the real money is found at the mother lode.
“This is why I developed the concept of ‘conditions of insurgency.'”
I am writing a short paper for my own gratification call ‘Dynamic of a Successful Insurgency’ which sounds kind of similar to your idea. Do you have any published works on your topic? I would would like to take a look for knowledge-sake.
“Where it gets tricky is in tracking the causation for such conditions back to the source.”
I think this is nearly impossible in Afghan society unless you are able to out into the villages and learn what their grievances are. Maybe it is the constitution or maybe it is that their village elder has been marginalized in favor for the district “Shura.” Either way if we simply sit Kabul City we would never even know the grievances of villagers in Surobi, a far district in Kabul province.
Bob,
I think ol’ Blue said it best on his blog http://afghanquest.com/?p=487:
“COIN does not function as a self-standing strategy for resolving instability, it is a methodology for fighting against an active insurgency, but it does not resolve the causes and conditions that gave rise to the insurgency to begin with. Instability is an incubator for insurgency. The military role in the stability operations required to remove these underpinnings is the lesser of the three main lines of effort.”
It seems to be what the two of us are trying to say.
Don’t most great movements start from the bottom?
We keep supporting the top, perhaps we will just get more of the same.
I did not say “support the top” I say one must “Change the top.”
It is our efforts to mitigate the symptoms at the bottom that in fact “support” the top. It is that very support that is dooming our efforts and why the promise of “creating legitimacy from the bottom up” is a false hope. Yes, legitimacy does come from the bottom up, but it cannot do so if the national government is illegitimate and ruled by a constitution that allows no legitimacy above the village level. Just as a thermal inversion traps pollutants in the LA Valley; the “constitutional inversion” in effect in Afghanistan traps legitimacy down below the District level as well.
Insurgencies are waged in the countryside, but won or lost in the Captials. For a colonial-like intervention such as the US is waging in Afghanistan, the principal battlefield is in Washington DC; (and they think that they are in the bleachers watching the game in Kandahar and Helmand).
Are we still trying to implement a template i.e. COIN FM 3-24 into an environment that simply will not be turned by conventional COIN strategy and tactics?
There is very little national coordination of the Taliban, either local or foreign across Afghanistan. We all know the violence and insecurity is perpetuated by a variety of groups and individuals.
Therefore I agree with Robert C Jones’ earlier comments that we continue to come at this from a colonial perspective.
Im still a student of this discipline but werent past insurgencies primarily monolithic or national in form? The insurgencies were working for very specific local goals (like overthrowing a local government), and they derived most of their power from the local population. With such a centralized base of power, previous insurgencies were vulnerable to strong military responses and were countered by triumphant colonial military campaigns.
Given the background of the major counterinsurgency campaigns that are held up as models for the modern day warrior, it does not take a TE Lawrence to work out that Afghanistan is substantially different.
How many Districts, let alone Provinces, has ISAF been able to hand over to the ANSF?
The Afghan/GiRoA side of the counterinsurgency is struggling to present a safe, secure alternative let alone an independently powerful and economically beneficial central government.
In summary local solutions for local problems. Forget trying to hammer the square peg into the round hole.
Yet, I wish you were right about the battle being won in the Capital. Afghanistan is so much a bottom-up conflict. It is the classic environment for “all politics is local.” If the local Taliban in each District agrees not to allow AQ back in or any other foreign extremist/Pakistan based organisation to plan regional or global terror then that is perhaps the best ‘win’ we can expect as opposed to this constant obsession with builing a Western style government.
Jason,
Just like the American Revolution was a bottom up conflict? The fact is, that when a central government steps down hard on a populace, it is the little guys at the bottom that feel the pain most directly in terms of their day to day lives.
But it is the big guys, Like George Washington, one of the largest property owners in the colonies, sliding ever deeper into debt and forced to accept shoddy goods from British merchants, etc, that step up to lead. Or a Mullah Omar.
All of this, however, are reactions that rippled down through society from the domestic policies implemented at the top.
Think about how a prospector finds the mother lode. Far down stream he finds small, rounded flakes of gold. If he stays there and pans he won’t make much progress. So he tracks it upstream, looking for larger and more jagged flakes and nuggets until he tracks it to his source. Then he digs there.
We are out panning for flakes. All of this that we see at the local level are manifestations of the form and function of the current government (driving the revolutionary aspect of the insurgency) and popular reaction to the tremendously unpopular and misunderstood foreign presence (driving the resistance aspect of the insurgency).
If the CIA really wanted to help, they’d park the drones and get out and conduct a little competitive UW among the Pashtun populace to drop AQ and to side with us; coupled with a shift from violent tactics to non-violent tactics to increase the pressure on the Karzai government. We can employ the example of Tunisa as a current model of the power of such tactics. We don’t need to topple Karzai, but neither should we blindly support him. We just need to leverage his populace to squeeze him a bit.
Governments seem to perform better when the leader is ever aware of the firm grip of the populace upon his scrotum. When that dynamic inverts, bad things happen.
Bob and Jason,
I agree that there needs to be pressure on Pres. Karsai to correct the issues in his administration; however, this insurgency is not driven by grief with the national government. Afghanistan is different from virtually any other COIN campaign in history (that I know of) in that the result of the anti-Soviet movement fractured much of the nationalist apparatus in Afghanistan. The institution of a national government left Afghanistan with King Shah and there are not too many Afghans remaining that have first hand memories of that. The fracture of that hierarchal national rule is what allowed the Mujahadeen to defeat the Soviet occupation so this happened much out of necessity. But as a result, Afghanistan for over 50 years now has been ruled by individual organizations made up of the tribal leaders and has been dependent on those leaders to deal with inter-tribal disputes. That system was very ineffective and was very instrumental in the rise of the Taliban to power the first time. A governance system such as that must be avoid in Afghanistan moving forward.
Because of the fractured national unity in Afghanistan to say that the villagers are supporting the Taliban because they are unhappy with Karzai is far from the truth IMO. Even in the heart of the insurgency there is a portion that support Mullah Omar out of loyalty, some out of coercion from those loyalists, and the rest out of the fact that the Taliban provides them power over their rival tribes.
Outside that area the biggest driving factor for the insurgents is that the Taliban has better presence and can more effectively coerce the population. Each village has its grievances and those grievances must be addressed once the population is secured but most of those grievances are not a result of the central gov’t.
I have sat with TB commanders in RC-E and talked with them about why they won’t leave the Taliban and join hands the ISAF in defeating the insurgency. Overwhelmingly response I got was that there really wasn’t anything else for them to do. The Taliban took care of them and their village and that if they left without a way to secure that village the Taliban would make the lives of their villagers worse. So unless we address these local grievances and provide security to the population in some form then fixing Kabul accomplishes nothing.
So to address both previous post: Yes the insurgency in local and will be won or lost local but the building of a strong central government isn’t for today, its for tomorrow. The purpose of fixing Kabul isn’t to solve the insurgency but instead to help reestablish that national rule that was driven out of Afghanistan by necessity over 50 years ago. Once all responsibilities of governance and security is handed back over to the Afghans there needs to be that national government institution in place. There must be transparency and checks and balances to allow the Afghans to feel that they are able to actively engage in their government at all levels and create that “Buy-in” needed for lasting security.
Yes the solutions of this insurgency are very similar to those used in colonial insurgencies but we have to apply them knowing that the initial effects must be achieved at the local level and continue to build the rest of that governance piece all the way to the central government at the same time to better prepare Afghans for their own rule.