Part of the problem with why Afghanistan is turning into such a clusterf^ck is that we tried to do it cheap. With resources going to Iraq we weren't able to successfully do things like provided adequate security through most of the country. Instead relying upon air power or Vietnam style seek out, destroy and withdrawl tactics we ceded much of the country over to the Taliban. The locals lost faith in cooperating with our forces when we wouldn't follow up with helping them provide security while at the same time the relyance on air power inevitable ramped up the amount of civilians killed. I hate war but a war of this nature can't be fought on the cheap or safely. The strategy to successfully fight a counter insurgency is well known. It requires winning over the civillian population by providing things like safety and infrastructure improvements. We can't do that without a heavy presence on the ground.
Its more than that. Its also having an area where your command and control can operate in relative safety. Its also about being able to present to your followers a physical symbol of your presence rather than just remain in the shadows. Anyway none of this is an either or. I've long said that a war on terrorism needs to be fought with a scalpel rather than a sledgehammer so we need to both continue pursuing enemies using intel and police tactics but at the sametime doesn't mean there aren't going to be times when we are using the military to fight them directly.
Well your thinking is certainly conventional. I'm curious did you support the Vietnam War if you were oold enough? How about Iraq War II?
The key to being able to withdraw is the same thing we did in Iraq with the Sunni tribes and the same thing the British did in India/Pakistan for a couple of centuries. The Taliban is not a monolith, either ideologically or hierarchically. As an example, the Korengal Valley is home to some of the fiercest fighting with "the Taliban". Why are the people of the Korengal Valley members of the Taliban? They created their own little Taliban cell because the people of Korengal have been loggers for generations and the Kabul government outlawed logging and shut down the mill in the valley which eliminated all jobs. They are not particularly interested in the Taliban religous ideology, but if you have a beef with the government, the Taliban is the vehicle for expressing it. Before 2001, the Taliban and al Qaeda were using each other. They aren't joined at the hip. They don't share ideology beyond the fact that they are both Muslim. Viewing them as one whole is like suggesting Mother Theresa and the IRA are one and the same - or even that the Catholic clergy of Northern Ireland were culpable for the bombs that the Provos set off. There are tons of Pashtun Taliban members who are simply fighting for economic freedom, or autonomy to enforce their religious laws as they see fit. Look at each tribal group particular concerns and address it. It is enlightened self-interest. Were the Sunni fighters in Iraq somehow less “hardcore” so that they could be induced by carrots, while the Pashtun can’t? By addressing each group’s interests, you drain the proverbial swamp, so that there is no longer a place for the alligators to live and grow fat. At that point, the alligators that remain become more concerned about day-to-day survival, as opposed to figuring out how to grow their cause.
Whether it is worth doing or whether the internal differences are sufficient in this day (as opposed to imperialism ala the British) to make some of the factions align themselves with 6 foot Anglos. Blacks and Hispanics men and women from 10,000 miles away is another story. However, your post is excellent in that it gets beyond the simplicity that the Pathuns=Taliban= Al Qaeda.
I wasn't alive during most of the Vietnam war and you know my opinion about Iraq II.. That said there is a substantial difference between why are in Afghanistan versus Iraq or Vietnam.
I reall don't know your opinion about Iraq II. As far as Afghanistan, I know we went to go after the perpetrators of 9/11. Why we are there 8 years later, still escalating and seemingly hunkering down for many more years of fighting, I'm not sure if the motivation is that different from Iraq or even possibly Vietnam.
Why? Because we had a fool for 8 years as President. Have you seen Charlie Wilson's War, the flick? See it, if you haven't. We gave the Afghan's the means to defeat the Soviets. We could have helped bring them out of the 13th century, but we threw away the end game. Bush basically did the same thing by having a military victory and then deciding to invade Iraq. He sent all the resources we could have put into rebuilding Afghanistan into an Iraqi dumpster. Obama has had some months, not years. Maybe we should give his policies a chance before deciding that Afghanistan is Vietnam, Part Deux.
Our reasons for being in Afghanistan are vastly different than Vietnam. You know that. If you don't, you should.
I have been pretty open about my opposition to invading Iraq from the beginning and FYI opposed the first Gulf War also. To follow up on your second point. Deckard has answered that that the prior eight years much of the resources and attention have gone to Iraq depriving the Afghanistan mission. To add on that though Afghanistan was never going to be easy or quick and if you suspect that we are staying there out of some imperialist motivation rather than to address the threat of the Taliban and their allies you don't know that much of the history of Afghanistan. This is a land that has fought off empires and the people and land are very tough even for our modern military. Much of our strategy for fighting other wars, even Iraq, doesn't apply to the unique situation of Afghanistan. Also again to follow up on your comparison between Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan the reasons for why we are there are vastly different. As I said in another thread not all wars are fought for the same reaons and while I ingeneral abhor war there is such a thing as a just war and Afghanistan is clearly that case.
No one will ever be able to take Afghanistan unless you want to use Genghis Khan strategies. The terrain is too rough, and it is essentially a lawless land.
No one wants to "take it." As Sishir pointed out, we aren't on some "imperialist mission" and we don't want to "hold" Afghanistan. Our mission, as I understand it, is to destroy the leadership of AQ, along with as many of the foreign fighters who've come to the region to join them (and certainly seen a foreign by the locals) and prevent the Taliban from taking over the country again and providing a safe haven for those responsible for 9/11. Everything I've read about the people there suggests to me that the Taliban is not liked by a majority of the populace. The corrupt "central government" isn't liked, either. The country is a loose patchwork of ethnicities governed locally by tribal leaders, many of whom, but not all, inherited their titles and influence through the historical position their extended families. We might consider them "warlords," but that's too broad and too simplistic, IMO. That's why the titular ruler in the form of a "king" was successful in the past, or as successful as any rule of the entire "country." At least in my opinion. As you point out, taking the country from those who live there, except for a limited amount of time, is damn near impossible. The locals know their areas on the basis of literally thousands of years of knowledge handed down from fathers to sons. The idea that we can know their territory well enough to defeat an insurgency supported by the local population is absurd. We need to define our objectives, meet them, and then get the hell out. I don't think any sane person would disagree with that. The issue is "what are the objectives, how do we meet them, and how do we leave?" I'm glad I'm not in the shoes of the President.
from what I understand is that it has to be an imperialist mission. if you don't protect the people, providing them a police force, you get no help. as a matter of fact, they help the enemy out of fear
I think we are going to have to define what is meant by "imperialist." Generally when people use that term they are referring to that the country will be put under the soveriegnity or outrightly annexed by another. For the most part its never been the US's intention to annex or be a soveriegn to Afghanistan. There aren't many resources there and even the conspiratorial arguments regarding running pipelines through there require Iranian or Russian cooperation. Other than addressing the threat of the Taliban and its allies there isn't much reason to be involved in Afghanistan which is why we quit dealing with it after the Soviets left.
Massive Fraud in Afghanistan Election, but hardly a mention of it in the mainstream media: http://www.juancole.com/2009/10/gross-massive-fraud-in-afghanistan.html
