Bing West's "The Wrong War," on Afghanistan Strategy - Washington Post book review by Chris Bray. BLUF: "... West ends his descriptive and analytical narrative with prescription, in a chapter titled 'The Way Out.' Some of the solutions he offers here raise more questions than they answer, such as his observation that the availability of sanctuary in Pakistan makes it impossible to defeat an enemy that can leave Afghanistan to survive and regroup. This is true and widely acknowledged, but West joins the rest of us in having no particular answer to the dilemma. Most important, though, West argues for Afghans to assume the lead in securing Afghanistan. The time has surely come to take that suggestion - and the book in which it appears - seriously."Also see Small Wars Journal editor Mike Few's The Wrong War: Grit, Strategy, and the Way Out of Afghanistan: An Interview with Bing West.
Comments
Drew, you're sort of hijacking my point.
The criminal neglect I was referring to was the woeful lack of due diligence in the planning and execution from 2001 - 2008.
I have to ask you why you think the air strike in 2002 was "absolutely unnecessary" and what makes you so sure the dam was bombed by the US? Also, $3.5 million is fairly petty in the context of the over $500 million spent on CERP just last year. And CERP is just a small portion of the US money pumped into Afghanistan each year. I hardly think the US is weaseling out of any commitments in Afghanistan currently.
Also, Afghanistan has the fastest growing economy in the world right now. 22.5% growth in 2010. Granted, a lot of that is unsustainable aid, but a lot of that is also real growth and infrastructure development.
Finally, no one is surrendering to the Taliban. 2014 is a fair target for the ANSF to get on their feet and for ISAF to quell the violence to a point where GIRoA has a reasonable opportunity to govern itself. It is not NATO nor the US's responsibility to make Afghanistan a modern, thriving country; that's Afghans' responsibility. NATO and the US are merely setting the conditions where they'll have an opportunity. If Afghans don't take advantage of the opportunity, oh well.
Like it or not, America bears a moral obligation to "fix" the mess they caused by choosing to fight a proxy war against the Soviets in Afghanistan. Add to that, now, the absolute mess we've made of the current conflict, and the damage we will do to our international reputation and the fallout we will experience when we abandon, yet again, another ally and you have a recipe for disaster
I was recently up at Khanabad, and saw an irrigation/hydro-electric dam that had been bombed by the US in 2002. Nearly 10 years later, the German government finally decided to repair the damage the US caused, which will restore electric power to Northern Afghanistan. The total cost of the project? $3.5 million US. That's right; the US has weaselled out of paying $3.5 million of damage that they caused in absolutely unnecessary airstrike.
Criminal negligence is a mild term to describe the US conduct of this conflict, and the desire for Obama and Petraeus to surrender to the Taliban by 2014 is beyond the pale.
In the life's-hard-and-it's-harder-when-you're-stupid category: Afghanistan is harder because of the fiasco in Iraq, which was/is the wrong war, not Afghanistan.
Because Rumsfeld et al completely underestimated OEF-A in 2001, we have the oozing chest wound that is Afghanistan and Pakistan today. That incompetence has made progress there much harder to come by than if the US would've cultivated the overwhelming international support we had in 2001 into a coherent, comprehensive strategy for Afghanistan. Instead, we pissed it all away to launch an unprovoked invasion of a Baathist regime that had no relevance to Al Qaida.
It will take time and expense to fix their criminal negligence. 2014 is a fair target.
Just got done watching a book tour lecture by Bing West on CSPN2. Guess what is one of the main points......it's all about AIRPOWER. Warden's concept of Air Occupation was right 10 years ago when we first started this mess and he is still right,maybe we will finally start to listen him. Soon as I can find a link to the interview I will post it.