Afghanistan: No, we are…sort of…nation-building?
I’ve been looking for some clarity on our strategy in Afghanistan. The President seems to have one foot on each side of the fence. Now it seems the military brass is a bit confused. Here’s Adm. Mullen, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on Meet the Press:
MR. GREGORY: We’re rebuilding this nation?
ADM. MULLEN: To a certain degree there is, there is some of that going on.
MR. GREGORY: Is that what the American people signed up for?
ADM. MULLEN: No, I’m–right now the American people signed up, I think, for support of getting at those who threaten us. And, and to the degree that, that the Afghan people’s security and the ability to ensure that a safe haven doesn’t recur in Afghanistan, there’s focus on some degree of making sure security’s OK, making sure governance moves in the right direction and developing an, an economy which will underpin their future.
Those last couple sentences are actually pretty coherent, although less than eloquent. If we don’t want the Taliban and Al Qaeda to have safe havens in Afghanistan, then our strategy has to extend to political and economic development as well as military action. But clearly, Adm. Mullen knows that he isn’t supposed to call that nation-building.
The President pays constant lip service to how difficult the road ahead will be in Afghanistan. He insists “The road ahead will be long. There will be difficult days.”
Am I for nation-building? Yes, but. Securing the people is the number one objective of counterinsurgency. Politics is integral to counterinsurgency operations and economics are important as well, although our economic objectives have more to do with restoring normalcy than fighting poverty.
‘Nation-building’ is an unfair terms since its connotations are so ambitious. Almost by definition, nation-building is the unrealistic pursuit of Jeffersonian democracy and 21st century capitalism in the backwaters of the developing world. Yet at the same time, he refuses to level about the costs of the war by saying that our purpose is no broader than “to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan.”
Public support for the war is evaporating, mainly on Obama’s side of the aisle. The chances of rebuilding it are low if there’s no straight talk coming from the White House.
Cross-posted at Conventional Folly
7 Responses to “Afghanistan: No, we are…sort of…nation-building?”
The idea of getting rid of terrorist safe havens sounds great, but doesn't hold up logically. I wrote about the issue in April after Matt Yglesias showed me the light:
Instead of nation building in Afghanistan, we should leave and strike terrorist bases there when necessary.
Chris, I read Matt's post and your comment and I'd be curious for your thoughts on one issue that doesn't seem to be addressed. Al Qaeda derived considerable advantages from being able to train large numbers of operatives openly at training camps in Afghanistan while the Taliban were in charge. Sure, you eventually need to get to the US to carry out the attack or get certain specialized training, like flight school. But those camps do essential work. Can they all be taken out with Predator strikes? What if the host country won't allow that?
Matt also avoids a lot of complexity by suggestion that the premise of our current strategy is that we have to control 100 of the land mass in any potential terrorist operating area. The real question is degrees of control. There will always be somewhere safe from American eyes. But safe enough to build up the infrastructure needed to support terrorist operations?
I think it's important to debate this issue, but I don't think you or Matt have a trump card that decides the issue in advance.
“I’ve been looking for some clarity on our strategy in Afghanistan.”
I suppose the President is, too. He and the Dems in Congress have lacked clarity and coherence and gravely harmed their credibility, increasingly so this year, with everything they approach.
There's a substantial flavor of experimentation and out-of-touchness with these people, routinely.
“But those camps do essential work.”
Not to mention that Pakistan is used for much of the work, and that there's constant transit between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Can't this be better patrolled, or mined, for example?
“effective physical control over 100 percent of the world’s land area”
We've never sought that, of course, ever, nor does our strategy need it.
Adesnik,
I dont take it as a given that Al Qaeda achieves much by training terrorists in Afghanistan or having whatever infrastructure you think they had. The entire Al Qaeda model is built on decentralized and independent cells.
That's not to say we shouldn't break up the camps. I just don't think we need a full scale occupation to do that.
While it's certainly true that lots of countries won't like us bombing training camps they would certainly prefer that to an invasion.
The problem is that we have followed up the vacuum left by the fall of the Taliban in 2002 with a military occupation instead of economic development. We've sent more than $22 billion in military aid to Afghanistan – compared to just $16 billion in economic aid (and who knows how much of that economic aid is siphoned off/paid in bribes to warlords…). How can we create a country of peace when so much money is going into preparing for war?