Eight years ago this week, Osama bin Laden watched and then celebrated as a terrorist attack he had authorized brought down the World Trade Center and part of the Pentagon, slaughtering thousands of innocent Americans.
Bin Laden was, at that time, in Afghanistan, which was, at that time, ruled by the Taliban. Soon, US forces and their anti-Taliban Afghan allies would chase bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar across the border into the wild tribal areas of northwest Pakistan. From that base, they would organize an insurgency against US and NATO forces and a new Afghan government.
Conservatives are now divided over this conflict. The debate on the right is interesting but academic. Barack Obama - no conservative - is president. During his campaign for the White House, he blasted President Bush for diverting to Iraq resources needed for Afghanistan, the "good war," the war that, he emphasized, must be fought and won.
If Mr. Obama intends for this mission to succeed, he will have to return to this theme. He will have to use his not-inconsiderable powers of persuasion to make the case that Afghanistan is both worth winning and winnable. If he cannot bring himself to do that - with at least as much passion as he has put into the debate on health care - support for Afghanistan will collapse, and nothing pro-mission conservatives say, write or do will prevent it. Does history offer any precedent of an ambivalent commander in chief leading a nation to victory in war? ...
More at The Washington Times.
Comments
It is worth noting that this author represents an organization that stands for both the protection of democracy and the defeat of terrorism. Nothing bad in either of those positions in general, but it does raise a couple of red flags worth noting, as it as policy based in those two positions that dug the hole we stand in today.
We do well to remember that America is founded not on principles of democracy for all, but rather in the principle of self-determination for all. The key difference being a choice of governance that is right for you, and who gets to make that choice.
A focus on terrorism also leads to a conflation of threats by the tactics they employ, rather than by their distinct legal status and purpose for action. This is important as conflation leads to dangerously flawed diagnosis, such as "global insurgency" where clearly "regional UW" is what AQ is really leading. It also focuses operations on defeating the symptoms of a problem rather than on defeating the problem itself. Finally, it is a term selected for the emotional response it evokes, and for its dehumanizing effect on the opponent. Like the use of "Nazi" to describe Germans in WWII. We couldn't easily switch to working with "evil Nazis" once the shooting was over, and it hindered the peace. How will we ever hope to work with "violent extremist" organizations once they stop acting violently and their views become more mainstream??
Bottom line is that such opinions must be viewed cautiously, as they are rooted in politics and emotion, and we need a calm, unbiased head to properly assess and address the problems that lie in troubled lands such as Afghanistan.
Not sure I agree with everything in the article, but much of it is on point.
The dialogue needs to shift from that of traditional "victory" and "defeat" in war. So many aspects of the conflict in Afghanistan and Iraq )and still the Balkans) are going to be ongoing struggles without clear winners and losers.
Preoccupation with "winning the war" traditional terms both limits our patience but more critically limits our imagination and keeps our focus on purely military tools. The military tools are important to limit the level of violence the insurgents can use against the populations, but we MUST find ways, and the will, to build our inter-agency and international diplomatic, development, and law-enforcement support to these nations.
Yes, these conflicts are closer to nation-building than to traditional war. We have to stop denying this and accept it, as we accept the reality that the US must play a role in such efforts. Not to remake a nation ourselves, but to work with the international community to limit the level of violence and support a nation or region as it finds its own way. This is a long-term interest, admittedly, and Americans are rarely good at thinking long-term.
And this must be an NSC mission, not just a DoD one. Yet I have not seen any comments on the US strategic goals or objectives in Afghanistan beyond those articulated by SECDEF and CJCS. Where is GEN. Jones on this? Where is a discussion on the interagency approach and the call for more focus on building those tools?
"Safe Haven" is indeed a critical requirement for any insurgency (as is an effective ideology that speaks to your target populace, but that takes a position the government is unwilling to co-opt or concede). The problem is, that just as most don't fully understand the role of ideology in insurgency; neither do they understand what makes an effective "safe haven" or "sanctuary."
The time honored cliche' is "ungoverned spaces," and while this is often a characteristic of safe haven, it is not the characteristic that actually offers the safe haven. I.e., we will not be seeing AQ base camps in Antarctica or Northern Canada anytime soon.
So to be able to effectively assess positions in the safe haven debate, one first must understand what safe haven actually is. My take on this is unique, so I'm comfortable with disagreement and am fully prepared to support my case. Sanctuary is a combination of two things: Legal Status and a Poorly Governed Populace. This is important, because if you focus on the "space" where these things exist, rather than the components that actually protect your opponent, you may very well be enhancing his sanctuary through your clumsy efforts to deny it.
Legal status: Often this takes the form of a sovereign border that restricts ones actions. More and more these days it comes from simply acting outside the law, which is what these newly empowered non-state (AQ top example) or quasi-state (Hezbollah top example)actors do with great expertise. AQ drives us crazy because as a non-state actor, they are largely impervious to the tools of state power (DIME). While this has always been true, the difference is that today such organizations can use the information tools of this age to exert global reach. This is what allows AQ to wage their regional Unconventional Warfare campaign (No Virginia, there is no such thing as a "Global Insurgency"). It is also what allows Hezbollah to engage in warfare with Israel with impunity. Deny the legal status, and you take away half of the safe haven. With AQ, this is a tricky thing, but simply understanding the true source of their sanctuary helps. For LH simply recognizing them as a full-fledged representative of the Government of Lebanon is all we need do. If LH acts, Lebanon acts. Make this clear to all, and respond accordingly. LH has little to lose in attacking Israel. Lebanon has everything to lose. It changes the algebra, and allows more traditional deterrence theory to function.
"Poorly Governed Populaces." It is the warm embrace of a dissatisfied populace, not the terrain or vegetation unpatrolled by a government that hides and sustains an insurgency. Bin Laden could hide in Washington DC if such a populace condition existed there, he does not need a cave in Pakistan. This is a two part equation, and has little to do with effectiveness of governmental services or infrastructure. First it requires that some distinct and significant element of the populace perceives that it has a grievance with the government worth fighting for; and second, also perceives that no legitimate means to address that grievance exist, so they must in fact act out illegally to address it. Typically this is rooted in "disrespect" or "injustice" or "outrage," NOT "hunger" or "shelter" or "security."
So, must we be in Afghanistan and launching a massive effectiveness of government campaign coupled with more aggressive actions against the populace to win? Actually, is one applies sound COIN theory, that is exactly the opposite of what we should do.
Here's the problem I have with the "deny safe haven" argument: Even if Afghanistan became the most stable democracy ever, with four-lane highways, a Porche in every garage, and cloned copies of Megan Fox in every Afghan citizen's pool (placed in the back of their crib), will it do anything to disrupt a terrorist cell that has relocated its headquarters a few hundred miles to the other side of the border (and has its franchises operating world-wide)? What does the presence of a stable Afghanistan mean in terms of al Qaeda?
Surely, the mere presence of a prosperous United States (with a strong military and central government) does little to disrupt the pervasive presence of drug cartels in Mexico.
Right now, I think we're just playing a game of world-wide whack-a-mole with al Qaeda, except we've been whacking the same hole (Afghanistan) for the past eight years, and hitting holes where they aren't (Iraq).