With General Stanley McChrystal's proclamationthat the Afghan theater requires more troops or most certainly will end in failure for the United States and its NATO allies, there are two crucial questions that must be addressed. Namely, can the Taliban be defeated and cleaved from the last remnants of al Qaeda remaining in the region without escalating the war by taking ground forces over the border into Pakistan in an attempt to destroy the strategic depth that Pakistan offers? And, perhaps most importantly, is victory (in any form) worth the blood and treasure being poured into the region and is winning the war still in the best interests of the United States and its allies?
According to McChrystal, failure is imminent in Afghanistan without a firm commitment from the United States to escalate troop levels. “Failure to gain the initiative and reverse insurgent momentum in the near term (next 12 months) — while Afghan security capacity matures — risks an outcome where defeating the insurgency is no longer possible,” General McChrystal stated. What the report submitted to the White House does not make clear is how many additional troops will be needed and the strategy behind their deployment nor does it provide a guarantee of success if the troops are granted (this is very different than General Petraeus' pledge prior to the surgein Iraq). McChrystal made this more than clear in his report:
The greater resources will not be sufficient to achieve success, but will enable implementation of the new strategy. Conversely, inadequate resources will likely result in failure. However, without a new strategy, the mission should not be resourced.
What, then, would be the purpose of elevating troop levels in Afghanistan? Stratfor offers a sharp assessment of the veiled meaning behind McChrystal's words.
There is far more than an unequivocal request for reinforcements here. The serving commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan is saying that without more troops, the mission likely will fail. There is no ambiguity here. This alone is worth noting. But the most important point to take from the report is that, though optimistic in places, nowhere does it say that with more troops the United States will win the war in Afghanistan — or even how many more soldiers would be necessary to achieve victory. Adding to this is the logical inference and the implicit statement it entails: President Barack Obama has now been advised by the commanding general of the Afghan campaign that the current strategy cannot win, and the implication of the caveat not to resource the mission without a new strategy is that McChrystal — by most accounts a very sharp and capable commander — will not command them without a new strategy.
So a new strategy is now needed to win the war in Afghanistan, but it is hard to imagine that any new strategic doctrine will be successful unless it addresses the strategic depth that Pakistan offers both the Afghan Taliban and al Qaeda. Without a comprehensive plan to confront this issue, no amount of troops is likely to prevent a resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan. In addition, it is vital to consider the outlook and timeframe of the enemy in Afghanistan. Two days ago, Mullah Omar, the leader of the Afghan Taliban believed to be hiding in Pakistan, released a recorded audio tape that made it clear that the Taliban was prepared to fight a "long war" and it was confident that history would be on the side of Afghans. Fighting a "long war" against an enemy in Afghanistan that has sanctuary in a neighboring state does indeed require a strategic reset but it does not appear clear that increased troop numbers should be part of this reset. Pakistan must be addressed directly and it must be a first-level priority in any strategic recalculation for the Afghan conflict.
Even with a new strategy in Afghanistan, it is becoming increasingly more evident that that conflict may not necessarily be in the best interests of the United States and its allies. Major Jeremy Kotkin, in a paper published on Small Wars Journal, makes this argument perfectly. Kotkin argues that nation-building and democracy creation in Afghanistan has clouded the strategic imperative of fighting al Qaeda not only in Afghanistan but across the globe.
Beyond the supposed and indefensible argument that the Taliban provides us with an existential threat, we have allowed something far more insidious to occur; we have enabled al Qaeda of the 21st century to replace Russia of the 19th century in the way we, and the Victorian British before us, looked at and dealt with the territory and peoples of Afghanistan. Academically, the parallel is illuminating; in reality, it is tragic. Al Qaeda, far from requiring a massive, conventional military deployment (nor a global war on terrorism), should in actuality warrant only local police actions. If that is not possible or within the capacity of local forces, a "low-intensity," small footprint, or otherwise limited US response to negate that threat where present would suffice. This should be the modus operandi in Afghanistan, Yemen, central or northern Africa, Indonesia, or anywhere else. Large-scale deployments or nation building are not the answer. If for no other reason that to point out the fact that we do not see the need to try and "fix" every other un- or under-governed space across the world or forcibly promote our national interests everywhere else they might differ from our own. "Fixing" Afghanistan is not a vital national interest.
Most NATO allies are already working on ways to get their troops out of Afghanistan and the United States may soon find itself slugging away in a fight without any additional support, with no guiding strategic doctrine and with no end-game in sight. So the question needs to be asked - what purpose does winning in Afghanistan serve?
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