As everyone now knows, a reassessment of America’s strategy in the Afghan War is now underway. Last Sunday, Rajiv Chandrasekaran, in the WaPo, conveniently summarized the options under consideration. There are five. First, is General Stanley McChrystal’s proposal for a major expansion of counterinsurgency and nation-building efforts, including the addition of 40,000 more troops, extensive civilian reconstruction personnel, and expanded and accelerated training for Afghan forces. Second, there is the option, said to be favored by Vice President Biden, of scaling back our effort there, and reducing it to targeted attacks by Special Forces and combat aircraft on al-Qaeda to try to “disrupt, dismantle, and defeat” them, and to do the same to any other groups of international terrorists trying to operate out of Afghanistan. Third, keep current force levels, but have a broad counterinsurgency focus. Fourth, “limit the mission of any new troops to training the Afghan security forces.” And fifth, reduce troop levels while concentrating “on training Afghan forces and targeting terrorists.”
In another WaPo piece last Sunday, Andrew J. Bacevich proposes that we reject McChrystal’s option, and begin to fight another “cold war” to “insulate Americans from the fallout” of the long-term conflict about “God’s relationship to politics.” Bacevich means by this that we ought to “decapitate, contain, and compete.” Decapitation means targeting leaders for elimination using helicopter-borne raids using special forces, but not using missiles that can’t discriminate between those being targeted and innocent non-combatants. Containment means “robust defenses” like “well-funded government agencies securing borders, controlling access to airports and seaports, and ensuring the integrity of electronic networks that have become essential to our way of life.” Containment should also include “comprehensive export controls and monitoring of international financial transactions,” and also encouraging “liberalizing tendencies in the Islamic world.”
Finally, competing means demonstrating that “democratic capitalism” can satisfy human aspirations better than Islamic fundamentalism. We can do this by living “up to the ideals that we profess rather than compromising them in the name of national security.”
Chandrasekaran characterizes the nation-building and scale back/disrupt, dismantle and defeat options as the two clear direction options, and the next three as “middle of the road” options. The main point of his article is that the middle of the road options are pretty much guaranteed to fail and are the most dangerous things the Administration can do, because they would involve lengthy efforts and substantial casualties and costs without any real prospect of the US regaining the momentum against insurgencies.
On the other hand, the nation-building/counterinsurgency operation is also risky, in that it commits us to many more casualties, at least five more years of war, huge expenditures over the likely period of time envisioned, and is unlikely to result in a stable Afghan regime, given the present state of the Karzai Government, the long-standing fragmentation of tribes, and groups underlying the Afghan political system, the resurgence of the Taliban, and the relatively small number of troops and personnel being added compared to the demands of nation-building. Not to put too fine a point on this, McChrystal’s nation-building proposal isn’t practical. It’s a military dream, unlikely to work, because the size of our forces on the ground, even if the request for 40,000 troops is granted, will still be miniscule relative to the area, diversity, and size of population that are the object of nation-building.
This brings us to the Biden et. al. disrupt, dismantle, and defeat option. This is the lowest cost option because it allows us to end most of the Afghan deployment, and to allow Afghan factions to settle their own fate. However, this strategy: 1) while involving a relatively low level of military commitment at any given time, is also likely to be a continuing effort over a very long period until al-Qaeda and other terrorist groupings disperse and/or go elsewhere; 2) may result in the return to power of the Taliban, or another equally unpalatable fundamentalist faction, or a faction of corrupt warlords; 3) may, if the Taliban takes power and cooperates, result in al-Qaeda establishing another safe haven in Afghanistan, and 4) may then result in further attempts at terrorist attacks against the United States or other Western nations.
Bacevich’s proposal is different from the others because it is not just about Afghanistan, it proposes a general, much less violent approach to the cultural clash between Islamic fundamentalism and American and other Western cultures. In the context of the Afghan War however, Bacevich’s proposal overlaps Biden’s in that it advocates targeted attacks on al-Qaeda, but it is also different in that it is less oriented toward defeating terrorists in Afghanistan, while it pursues defensive measures within our own country very vigorously, and also places greater emphasis on disrupting international terrorist networks, and disengaging from dependence on middle eastern energy sources.
Of all the alternatives, Bacevich’s seems the least risky and costly in terms of lives, casualties, and treasure on all sides. It also promises to be more robust than Biden’s, because of its broader scope and applicability as a policy. In addition, Bacevich’s approach is the least disruptive of existing political and social structures in the Middle East. It is the best alternative of those reviewed. The question is, is it the best we can think of?
What if we went even further than Bacevich, and just withdrew from Afghanistan, letting the chips fall where they may there? Would al-Qaeda really come back? Or is their safe haven in Pakistan an improvement for them? If they did come back, along with the Taliban, does it really make sense to continuously decapitate their leaders? Aren’t there new leaders that arise to replace old ones? Aren’t the new leaders usually more radical than the old ones? Wouldn’t a “cold war” strategy minus decapitation be an improvement over Bacevich’s proposal? Certainly, it wouldn’t involve frequent attacks on Afghan territory, or the possibility of killing non-combatants there. It also wouldn’t involve US combat casualties. Would it increase the danger of additional attacks on the United States compared to Biden’s proposal? I really don’t see why it should, since al-Qaeda will probably adjust to our decapitation activities by building redundancy into their efforts and relying less on top-level leadership. They probably have already done this, so perhaps decapitation is also fruitless and our strategy should focus on containment and competition alone.
Finally, in evaluating our options in Afghanistan, we shouldn’t forget the opportunity costs for the United States of our intervention there and in Iraq. Right now, American society is in crisis. Our financial system is a risky construct that can break again at any time. Our economy is hollowed out and needs to be reconstructed adding whole new industries. Our energy dependence on other nations is a continuing threat to national security. Climate change is a challenge we can’t mobilize to meet in a timely fashion. Our public educational system is devolving rapidly. Our health care system is a mess that we can’t seem to fix. Grave problems have developed with our political system in the areas of separation of powers, state secrets, torture, and civil liberties. Our very democracy is rapidly evolving towards a plutocracy, and we can’t seem to stop that evolution. This is the context of our current foreign adventures, and we have to use it to place Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan into perspective.
September 11th cost us three thousand lives and substantial economic damage, and a great psychological shock since Americans have always felt safe in America. But we have to keep in mind that in the eight years since September 11th, the latest estimates suggest that we may have lost as many as 360,000 Americans due to the operation of our flawed health insurance system. In addition, we have sustained many times the economic costs of September 11th in the financial collapse of 2008 and its aftermath. Meanwhile, the various problems mentioned above continue unsolved and carry with them unprecedented risks of death, economic failure, and blighted lives, the longer we let them fester. The truth is, we have very important fish to fry here at home immediately, that dwarf Iraq and Afghanistan in their importance to us. We have our society to rebuild here, and the rebuilding will take huge resources. We need to get on with it, and to forget about nation-building in countries, whose peoples want no involvement with us.
(Also posted at firedoglake.com where there may be more comments)