Two Arguments for What to Do in Afghanistan

[progressiveGI]

Source: TIME

There are four main prescriptions for a more realistic strategy in Afghanistan. First, stop trying to do the impossible, i.e., build an effective government in Kabul and enlarge Afghan security forces. Corruption, inefficiency and addiction are endemic to Afghan society. We should instead focus on forging a smaller army, say 75,000 or 100,000, that can and will actually fight, and concentrate on arming and training local warlords and tribal leaders who can defend themselves. This, backed by good U.S. logistics and intelligence, could block a Taliban reconquest of Afghanistan.

Second, divide and rent the Taliban. Like the British, we can propose deals that split the moderates (those content with exerting power in Afghanistan alone) from the fanatics (those obsessed with global jihad). We can also attract Taliban fighters by paying them more than the Taliban leadership can afford.

Third, surge about 10,000 new combat forces on top of the 68,000 already authorized and create an additional 5,000 dedicated trainers. Such a surge should be sufficient to handle immediate troubles.

Fourth, start doing what the U.S. does well — deterrence and containment. To deter, we must maintain a small, residual capability in Afghanistan for a few years, as well as offshore air and missile capabilities to inflict harsh punishment when necessary. To contain threats, Washington needs to form alliances with neighboring states like Pakistan, India, China, Russia and even Iran, which supported us in the early days of the war. All share an interest in combatting Sunni-based religious extremism as well as the drug trade.



Read more: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1927095-2,00.html

[notesdev]

1. What's the goal?

Can't have a strategy without having a goal first.

Unless some can articulate a goal that is worth more than the lives of the soldiers that will die to achieve it, there's only one strategy option: bring them home.

[blues90]

9. I don't think they even know what to do .

I say lets just get the hell out and figure out some other way rather than continue with a lost cause.

I think they knew Bin was not there when they attacked , I think the goal is the pipeline and if so let the corporations who prifit from this build their own military and when time comes for the pipeline to flow we don't buy on drop of fuel from it.

Hell by the time we have electric cars and fucking jobs and healthcare so people can even think about buying a new car most of us here will be dead and dust in the wind.

I think we missed the chance long ago to change things when we did have a fair economy and american workers. Instead we let it all go right to hell when we could have built on what we had and evolved , now the entire machine is cracked and broken down.

We had the auto companies working hand in hand with big oil and let it go like this and no one seemed to even notice where we were headed. Now out of the clear blue sky suddenly the auto comps grew a conscience and are our best friend , I don't buy it for a second.

Hell GM killed the electric car and why was that and this was not long ago and everyone seemed to forget that.

[eridani]

2. There is no difference between the warlords and the Taliban

Train warlords, and you ARE training Taliban, one way or another.

[Igel]

5. People say that and either

don't mean what they say or don't say what they mean.

I, for one, would rather live under a warlord than the Taliban, I'd rather live under a fairly capricious monarch than under an ideologically-driven state.

In the former, the important thing is the Supreme Leader and his person, plus whatever hierarchy of thugs he has to enforce his will. The dangers at the personal level are suspicion of plotting to overthrow the Leader, or false allegations of such plots. Beyond the usual things, of course--general thuggery and possibly excessive taxation and expropriation of stuff. Leave the Supreme Leader alone, and you're usually able to get along. The Golden Horde is this kind of thing. Don't pay tribute, don't recognize the leader's authority, you're smacked with a lot of bloodshed and violence. Yield and pay and acknowledge his power, all's fine. Most of these look fairly RW, but I don't think they fit into our left-right continuum very well at all.

In the latter, the ideology is paramount. You must conform your life to the ideology. You must actively praise the ideology and show that you have made it part of your inner life. Violations of the ideology are met with punishment, and usually instead of just being made to admit the violation you're forced to admit that what you did was sinful and to repent of your crime. Danger at the personal level involves anything that departs from the established ideology. That can be implied or explicit. Note that there are very few false allegations of impropriety--given such a system, it's highly unlikely that you've failed to seriously violate the rules, and all your personal enemy has to do is find something you actually did and report you. What you did might be innocent, but since it's not the act but the thinking that's being punished, it's a nasty situation. You don't just yield and pay and acknowledge the ideology's power: Thre is no part of society that the ideology doesn't alter behavior and limit your thinking, and to complain is an evil. Bloodshed tends to be endemic and cyclical: Heresy, real or imagined; as the ideology is developed people who don't change immediately and repent are under the gun.

Of course, there are mergers. Many great dictators elevate their ramblings to the status of an ideology, so you get little red or polka-dotted books that you have to quote. Then the bloodshed results not just from real or imagined plots against the secular power structure, but from real or imagined threats to the ideological underpinnings of the state, to a failure to properly worship the state ideology. In fact, most purely ideological states devolve into this, since an ideology, once enforced, accretes a secular power structure. So you get the mental and psychological thuggery and oppression of an ideological state with the secular thuggery of a dictatorship. Then you have Nazi Germany or Mao's China or Stalin's Russia or Kim Il's Korea--all pretty secular, all more oppressive than most theocracies could dream to be. In a society with loose centralization, this usually results in a lot of ideologically driven warlords. This was the Taliban in Afghanistan.

So I don't see much of a similarity between the warlords and the Taliban. True, the Taliban, when they feel the need, have a good point or two: They tend to require the payment and distribution of zakat, and they tend to avoid some sorts of injustice and criminality. On the other hand, they have their own brand of thuggery, very similar to the warlord's kind--except that in the case of the Taliban that's laid on top of the ideological thuggery that requires that you not only acknowledge how they rape you, but actually say how pleasurable and righteous it is on a fairly continuous basis. Warlords are generally content to be feared; you need to show really oppressive dictators that you love them.

[Warren Stupidity]

12. Well you might prefer the warlords, but last time the people of Afghanistan preferred the Taliban.

That is the sad fact. The people were so sick of the endless warfare under the warlords that they welcomed the Taliban, knowing full well what they were and what their rule would be. Under the Taliban, across much of Afghanistan, the fighting stopped. I don't see any good choices. We seem to be preparing to pull back to Kabul and a few other big cities, and then attempt to buy out enough of the Taliban to concoct some sort of bullshit peace. And then what? Then we are faced with the same crap we are faced with in Iraq: when we leave the shit falls down.

[eridani]

13. You are ignoring the fact that in Afghanistan warlords constantly change sides and shift alliances

Today's warlord being trained by the US is tomorrow's Taliban, and vice-versa. The difference between them is only whether or not they see alliance with an invading power as a temporary boost to their own interests, or are opposed to foreign intervention, period. Eight years ago, what was called the Taliban was highly ideological, but that hasn't been true for a long time. Most of the warlords now calling themselves "Taliban" could care less where Mullah Omar is and what he thinks.

[TheKentuckian]

3. Yeah, its hard to say how to do ethereal good stuff using martial power

It seems like its heading for the old build a friendly, self sustained, ally crap again if the military has its way. McChrystal wants a half million troops and is pretending NATO is going to double up and that we can get like 200k Afghans cobbled together and on our side. I think he's smokin the chronic of all chronics.

He also seems to think you can do counter insurgency regardless of having a government or not. Shit, we'd need a couple million to sit over there and guard every mile. McCyrstalmeth, I sez. This kat is daffy.

[gimama]

4. thank You! & WELCOME! nt

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

6. The Chinese have a better, much better, plan.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x6672084

[anonymous171]

7. There will never be an effective governnment in Kabul.

Our best bet would be to split the country up by ethnic/tribal identity or by warlord.

[spanone]

8. fifth, get the fuck out, now.

[mike_c]

10. a better alternative....

Acknowledge the stupidity and futility of invading in the first place, declare defeat, and get the hell out. Trying to salvage anything good from the Afghan fiasco is utterly wrong-headed, IMO.

[Dan]

14. agreed

now or later, the results are going to be the same.... just a question of who will be the last American to die there...

[Warren Stupidity]

11. Why?

Why exactly are we killing lots of people in Afghanistan?