Clark in Newsweek on Afghanistan: "make no mistake. We are not winning."

[Tom Rinaldo]

Newsweek's International edition has a short but powerful commentary by Wes Clark regarding Afghanistan slipping back toward Taliban control. In it he makes some concise and damning points about Bush's foreign policy:

What We Must Do Now
Success is possible. But make no mistake. We are not winning.

By Wesley K. Clark
Newsweek International

Oct. 2, 2006 issue

"In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, U.S. forces achieved a rapid, high-tech victory over Afghanistan's terrorist-supporting Taliban government. Five years later, the Taliban is back. But this is a different fight. Not only Afghanistan but NATO itself is at risk. Fingers are pointing. Washington didn't commit enough forces. The Europeans are too timid. The central government is weak. All that might be true. But the real problem grows out of how the United States defined its mission to begin with. That was to strike the Taliban but not get stuck in Afghanistan. We don't do "nation-building," American leaders declared, as if that were something to be proud of. Besides, the troops would soon be needed in Iraq.

The fact is that Afghanistan was a tribal country savaged by 20 years of war and further brutalized by the fundamentalist Taliban. Its infrastructure, educational system, agriculture—all was gone. With the Taliban in retreat, traditional warlords reestablished themselves. Vital political and economic assistance never arrived. Neither did a sufficiently strong international security force. Instead, a few thousand U.S. troops were inserted to pursue the remnants of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The government of Hamid Karzai, pieced together, was never able to extend its reach much outside Kabul. The results today are a mockery of early optimism. Despite the presence of almost 40,000 NATO troops, security has worsened. Opium has again become a major business, infrastructure redevelopment lags, schools remain closed—and across great swathes of the country the Taliban is resurgent...


...All of this is a far cry from the lessons NATO and the United States gleaned from their successful peacekeeping operations in the Balkans. There we learned that we needed strong legal authorities, overwhelming military power, a comprehensive political and economic plan and close coordination with a high representative or special representative for the U.N. secretary-general to link nation-building activities on the ground with our military security operations. We put more than 40,000 troops into tiny Kosovo in 1999, with one tenth the population and one sixtieth the area of Afghanistan. In Bosnia, we had an international donors organization that measured progress and held contributing nations accountable. We knew that if the political-economic mission failed, NATO would fail. And we were determined not to fail."

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/14973488/site/newsweek/

There's more at the site and it is worth reading. This stuff can't be talked about too often. It helps give the lie to Republican attempts to say they know how to keep America safe. With Clinton in the White House and Clark at N.A.T.O, the U.S. was effective and respected in our dealings with the world.

[IndianaGreen]

1. Is it such a bad thing if NATO loses in Afghanistan?

Consider this: NATO was established as a defensive alliance at the beginning of the Cold War. NATO should have been disbanded when the USSR collapsed. It wasn't! Since then, NATO has been used as an extension of American military aggression, a European version of the French Foreign Legion. NATO is also a conduit for American arms merchants to sell their wares to the member nations on the pretext of standardization.

NATO members provided troops often against the popular will of their people. A NATO defeat in Afghanistan or elsewhere, will make NATO members think twice before they commit troops to another American military adventure.

[Tom Rinaldo]

2. Yes it is. The task of the people in Democracies...

...is to make Government accountable to the people, not to undermine the entire institution of Government when it is hijacked and misused. Governments have functions, so we have to take them back and use them right, not destroy them. Alliances serve valid functions also. In my opinion NATO served a valid function in Yugoslavia, which of course was inside Europe. The people of the various Democracies that make up NATO must insist on a responsible NATO mandate.

But in an American context N.A.T.O. serves a very valuable political function for those of us who believe that the United States, as the world's only Super Power, has a tendency to become reckless if left to it's own devices hobbling together custom made "Coalitions of the Willing" whenever it wants to engage in military actions in the world. NATO has a consensus decision making structure. Any American President who wishes to engage NATO in support of a policy objective must deal with real international diplomacy in order to win that consensus.

And in the case of Afghanistan the Taliban were both internal oppressors and willing hosts to Honest to God (pun intended) international terrorists. No good would be served by having N.A.T.O. fail now in Afghanistan.

[IndianaGreen]

3. We took the side of the religious wackos over the Marxist Afghan government

We deserve the whirlwind we have sown!

Afghanistan is already lost, the only thing to be determined if the final body count.

[Warpy]

5. Don't forget, the Taliban were welcomed as liberators

from the oppression of warlords and armed gangs. They actually represented an improvement in security for a lot of people, even women.

Yes, they were hideously oppressive by our standards and by the standards of the rest of the world. The face mask in the buqa should be eliminated as a safety hazard and violation of human dignity. However, they were still better than armed gangs looting homes, kidnapping, raping, and murdering at will.

That is probably why they are being welcomed again. It's a tradeoff between one form of oppression and another, beetween a suspension of all law and the imposition of oppressive law that restores order.

My sympathy is with people who have to make this choice.

[Jai4WKC08]

16. Not the way I remember it

Would like to see your sources.

What I recall is that the resistance fighters of various factions were seen as liberators when the Soviets finally left, but in the political vacuum left behind, those who would become the Taliban rose to the top. In some places, they did so by making truce with the warlords, and in others, they left it to the local tribal leaders. They also murdered many of their former allies.

The Taliban did help clean out the gangs and restore order, as would have any new govt imo, but of course it's always easier for a totalitarians to establish order more efficiently. For that the Taliban looked attractive to many Afghanis, but that's to be expected. It made Hitler popular, and Mussolini make the trains run on time, right? I have spoken to older Russians who sometimes wish for Stalin back, because he controlled crime. For that matter, too many Americans are willing to let Bush do anything as long as he keeps them safe from suicide bombers -- it's really no different.

In any case, it's just plain wrong to suggest the Taliban are "an improvement" or even an acceptable alternative. These are people who beat women and girls to death for nothing, allow them ZERO education, and treat them as prisoners in their own homes. They are the people who harbored Osama and al Qaeda.

[Warpy]

18. Agreed that they're a stench in the nose of the civilized world

but they did represent an improvement over the armed gangs and complete lawlessness that filled the power vacuum after the Soviets left.

I've been in a few riots and I did not like them. I might see a totalitarian regime as an improvement over riot conditions stretching over many months.

That doesn't mean I wouldn't work to improve the system and to overthrow them and replace them with something more moderate once order had been established.

[RandomUser]

6. Consider the alternative

The alternative to NATO is a go it alone policy like the one espoused by Bush. I believe that while international organizations like NATO and the UN may not be perfect, such organizations are preferable to the Bush doctrine of screw everyone else, because it requires some degree of organization and thus cooperation and accountability.

The US may hold clout in NATO, but it is not the only nation, nor is it able to unilaterally dictate the agenda of the alliance. NATO was wise enough to stay out of Iraq when Bush launched the war, forcing him to cobble together a flim-flam "Coalition of the Willing" which included some NATO members but not other all of them, thus denying them the organization's imprimature.

There are two different world views in play here. There's the Bush view that we're only interested in ourselves and will make up a "Coalition of Soup-of-the-Day" for whatever interests us this week, to provide PR cover for our go it alone attitude. And then there is the multilateral view that believes in fostering international organizations like the UN and NATO, believing that alliances and any forum that requires discussion and consensus helps strengthen diplomatic bonds and retard any rash idiocies like invading Iraq.

These organizations may not be perfect but they do function to some degree in that role. Witness the fact that neither the UN nor NATO endorsed the invasion. And some of the most strident criticism came from NATO members like Chirac of France. Discussion and input from different points of view beat living in Bush's bubble any day. But such organizations are anthema to Bush who requires citizens to sign loyalty oaths just to attend his townhall meetings.

You might say that there is a third alternative of neither attacking Iraq alone nor with the aid of the UN or NATO. But that is a false alternative because it's different discussion altogether and does not impact the NATO issue in any way. NATO forces can be used to invade Iraq or to help in reconstruction after a tsunami in Asia or stop genocide and keep the peace in Darfur. That is a matter of intent, direction, and leadership, not one of fundamental structure and unilateral/multilateral worldviews, which is the real issue when discussing things like the UN and NATO. We can use international organizations for good or evil, but the basic impetus to be inclusive and create bonds of dialogue via these organization is better than the isolationist, imperialist, cowboy wannabe attitude that infects the current administration.

[IndianaGreen]

7. NATO is an appendage of US foreign policy

There is no true multi-lateralism with NATO for it is the US, and the US alone, that determines NATO's course of action.

NATO is no substitute for the UN. NATO should be abolished, barring that, NATO's military defeat in Afghanistan and its unsung quagmire in the Balkans, will make it as irrelevant as the Warsaw Pact.

[Tom Rinaldo]

9. Spain and Italy already held their leaders accountable

for defying the popular will with imposed military action. NATO is no longer a U.S. rubber stamp, not with the growing anger in most of Europe with how the U.S. flouted the U.N. and the Geneva Accords and brought about disaster inside Iraq.

Meanwhile don't lose sight of the political point being made before the mid term elections. WE are contrasting the record of leadership under Republicans with that under Democrats, and the Republicans are holding the very short end of the stick.

Gotta run to a fundraiser for Congressman Hinchey. Will check back later...

[IndianaGreen]

13. My criticism of NATO does not extend to Clark's alarm about Afghanistan

Clark thinks that the situation is salvageable. If anyone could possibly salvage Afghanistan, it would be Wes Clark, but he is out of the loop and those in charge now are the ones responsible for Afghanistan's current problems.

[Tom Rinaldo]

15. I understand IG

The way I figure it, trying to be realistic, in a best case scenario it will still take at least a generation to transform American Foreign Policy from where it is now to where it should be in an ideal sense. Between then and now we have to be making some constant measured progress. Right now Europe is acting as a relatively sane counter balance to American interventionist impulses, and as a result I think America's traditional alliances with Europe ("Old Europe" as Rumsfeld would say - Continental West Europe) serve as a slight hedge against American Neo Cons, and thus should be supported.

[RandomUser]

10. Bush would certainly like it to be

But people like Chirac would disagree. The fact that Bush was unable to get NATO to endorse the Iraq invasion proves that there's still some independence left in NATO yet.

I agree with you that NATO is no substitute for the UN, but neither is a go it alone unilateral approach a substitute for a multinational forum like NATO. NATO, UN, even Greenpeace, etc. all have distinct and different roles, and none are interchangeable, nor can they replace each other. More international discourse and input from different viewpoints is better than less.

[Tom Rinaldo]

8. NATO wouldn't have gone into Iraq

Bush never could have won a NATO consensus to invade Iraq when he did. And if somehow Iraq had become a NATO operation anyway at some later point, NATO members never would have tolerated the way the U.S. treated prisoners of war there. There are reasons why Bush always wanted to go around NATO. With the U.S. became totally bogged down in Iraq, he was forced to be a little more humble in begging for NATO help in Afghanistan.

And the thing is, other European Democracies have held their leaders accountable for being reckless with their militaries. Italy and Spain had Bush allies deposed. America working with a strong NATO is a much saner and safer to the world route than a go it alone cowboy United States under neocon control.

[Clarkie1]

21. If NATO loses, the Afghan people lose.

The country will once again be overrun by fanatical warlords and Taliban fighters. Their ruined nation needs to be built, and they can't do the building themselves.

[welshTerrier2]

4. Henry Hyde agrees with that assessment

just for the record, Karzai is nothing more than an oil puppet ...

source: http://www.voanews.com/english/2006-09-20-voa77.cfm

HYDE: "Afghanistan is on the brink of becoming a failed state, and the re-trained Taleban are showing their strength in new attacks that appear to be influenced by a spiraling Iraqi insurgency."

ROHRABACHER: "There have been many of us warning we would reach this point unless something was done, but the Bush administration has continued to fail in its responsibilities to act aggressively to thwart this problem."

Barnett Rubin of New York University asserts that any hope of reversing a growing insurgency depends on the U.S. placing strong pressure on Pakistan.

"While there are many failings, innumerable ones of the Afghan administration, corruption and so on, they cannot be corrected as long as the Taleban have a safe haven in Pakistan," said Barnett Rubin.

Rubin quoted what he described as a letter he received from a U.S. diplomat in the region, whom he did not identify, saying little progress can be made against the insurgency in Afghanistan unless President Bush places overwhelming diplomatic pressure on President Pervez Musharraf to arrest top Taleban leaders in his country.

President Musharraf told reporters in New York Wednesday he opposes U.S. forces entering Pakistan in pursuit of al-Qaida leader Osama bin-Laden.

[Donna Zen]

11. File under: I remember when

Once during a faux appearance, some turkey-butt republican was touting bush's adventure in Afghanistan, and the millions of people now living in freedom. Wes Clark said: "Well, they've now elected warlords into their government. We'll see how that works."

BTW, General Clark has spoken out about the abandonment of Afghanistan after the Soviet forces left. He understands who financed the Mujahadeen...etc. all of it. He sees it as a failure of American foreign policy that we failed to help the people of Afghanistan once the fighting stopped. To the detractors regarding this article (I think I spotted some here) please understand, one article will never contain every possible statement that can be made about very complex subjects.

[judy from nj]

12. Right Donna

The real tragedy of Afganistan is that we used them to fight the Soviets, then abandoned them.

[Donna Zen]

14. I'm glad General Clark wrote this article

bush (and other crackpots) run around telling America how wonderful, wonderful, the bush doctrine is because 50,000,000 are now free. They are congratulating themselves for this mess they've created. Someone needs to prick their bubble. bush is a failure, and their oft cited adventure in Afghanistan is just another failure by a failure.

People around the world live in misery because of these jerks (and the jerks that vote for them.)

[Auntie Bush]

17. When we went to war with Afghanistan Bush promised not to just

leave them as the Soviets did. He said he'd rebuild it...and then he picked up his little balls and went to Iraq. What a fool! How long will America have to pay for his mistakes/follies/junkets? We must win back congress and with Wes as our future president we can go about restoring America's prestige and finding a way to make things better in Iraq and Afganistan...although I don't know how. If anyone can do it...Wes can!

[FrenchieCat]

19. So in otherwords....as Wes is telling it, Bush didn't only fuck up

Iraq and made us less safe in the process, but he also fucked up Afghanistan too!

Well waddayaknow.....this is supposed to be Republican National Security? To have everyone in the world feeling a hellavu lot LESS secured?

Thank you Wes! Hope those knuckle dragger Bush voters and their Independent cousins understand what you wrote and process it to understand.....GOP on National Security SUCKS LIKE SHIT!

[Tom Rinaldo]

20. This is all part of a deliberate strategy by Clark

Clark has not missed a chance in four years to point out that Bush made a huge and critical error to abandon Afghanistan and invade Iraq, and as a result we are less safe now than we were before. By now that opinion is increasingly widespread, and Clark is certainly not the only one who believes this. But Clark has worked it into virtually every public statement he has made since his 2004 campaign began, and that is the interesting aspect to watch. I have been amazed at how consistently Clark works that theme into every appearance he makes on FOX, no matter what the topic for commentary was supposed to be.

Clark's strategy is to constantly attack the Republican Party in the area where they traditionally have been viewed strongest; keeping America Safe. Clark keeps a laser focus on undermining the Republicans on this because he has always known that this is the fear card that Republicans always fall back on to try to win National elections, when domestic issues are not falling in their favor(which they never are given their coddle the rich and damn the middle class policies).

That's why Clark spent a lot of personal time recruiting and now supporting military Veterans who run for office opposing Bush's aggressive militaristic foreign policy. He knows how Karl Rove plays this game and Clark is constantly moving to undercut his attempt to wrap the Republican Party in a national security banner to market to the public. That's also why Clark's Political Action Committee web site is named Securing America.

Clark knows that once the American public comes to see the Democrats as the most competent party at keeping America safe that the Republicans won't stand a chance in a National Election.

[Donna Zen]

22. Wes Clark: One step ahead

When I first heard Clark, it was during the 2002 hearings. He warned then that a war in Iraq would energize terrorist recruiting, pose a problem with Iran, and weaken our position in Afghanistan. Now at the time, I was already against the war, but equal to my disbelief that Saddam was a threat to the US, was my concern over the very matters that the General was testifying to, what I needed to hear.

I am sorry for America that Wes Clark proved to be so correct, but I've learned to listen to him very closely.

BTW, if others may see what needs to be done, Wes Clark is uniquely qualified to see it through. We are very lucky that history saw fit to manage what might have seemed impossible, a Democratic Four Star Rhodes Scholar Anti-Iraq War War Winning First at West Point Supreme Allied Commander in our midst.

[FrenchieCat]

23. Damned Right, Donna Zen.....

What was today's headlines again in Sept of 2006? oh yeah! "Iraq War has worsened terror threat"!

What was Clark's premonition back in Sept of 2002? "Going into Iraq would supercharge Al Qaeda!"

duh! took long enough! :eyes:

[karynnj]

24. The SRFC spoke to the general in charge last week

his responses to questions show that they admit everything is as bad as Clark says - Afghanistan is a narco state. Several of us in the Kerry group were watching as he is on the committee - the thread has some summaries of other parts of the hearing. It absolutely backs up Clark's comments - so I thought you might want this as backup if you are arguing in less Democratic places. (hope this isn't considered an intrusion.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=273x103508#103538

[Donna Zen]

25. We battle the junta together

Always. Thanks for the heads up.

[karynnj]

27. Thanks, to you and Tom

I was pretty sure that you guys would want the link to the thread - it was a quite scary to hear these characterizations calmly made. It is a mess.

[Tom Rinaldo]

26. Ditto what Donna said. n/t