Barack Obama 'risks Suez-like disaster' in Afghanistan, says key adviser

[clear eye]

Source: The Guardian

Leading authority on counter-insurgency fears US is heading for 'irresponsible' fudge on extra troops
Ewen MacAskill guardian.co.uk, Thursday 12 November 2009 21.56 GMT

"Time is running out for us to make a decision. We can either put in enough troops to control the environment or we can credibly communicate our intention to leave. Either could work. Splitting the difference is not the way to go,"{David Kilcullen, one of the world's leading authorities on counter-insurgency and an adviser to the British government as well as the US state department} said.

"It feels to me that all these options are dangerously close to the middle ground and we have to consider whether the middle ground is a good place to be. The middle ground is a good place on domestic issues, but not on strategy. You either commit to D-Day and invade the continent or you get Suez. Half-measures end up with Suez. Do it or not do it."

The White House line at present is that leaving is not an option. But Kilcullen said there was a vicious cycle that began with government corruption, creating the space for the Taliban to expand. There were two ways of getting leverage: one, of having enough troops in the country, and the other threatening to leave, as the US had done in Iraq.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/12/obama-us-troops-afghanistan-kilcullen

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1. k&r

''Splitting the difference is not the way to go''

''You either commit to D-Day and invade the continent or you get Suez. Half-measures end up with Suez. Do it or not do it."

[aquart]

2. Suez?

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

3. Yeah, I'm unsure what that's referring to.

Failure of the Egyptians to keep the initiative during the Sinai campaign of the Yom Kippur War, maybe?

[clear eye]

6. Refers to the "Suez Crisis" spanning 1951 - 1957.

Decent exposition in Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis .

Kilcullen is thinking of it from the point of view of the UK.

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8. or about the way that Egypt emerged from their defeat

. . . and Israel assumed their posture, tempered by the insistence of the U.S. and the Soviets that there be some effort toward peace (and peacekeepers). Syria aligning with Russia. Troops to Lebanon in '57 . . .

[lurky]

4. The British lost the Suez Canal in a humiliating

military defeat in the 1950s. Since he's British, I'm sure he is referring to that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

7. Actually, it was a complete military victory

After Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal, French, Israeli, and British troops absolutely crushed the Egyptian army in the Suez war. While the military victory was overwhelming, it was a political disaster. The United States and the Soviet Union joined their voices to demand a stop to the military actions through the United Nations.

I'm not sure what this guy means when he compares the Suez Crisis to Obama's situation in Afghanistan.

[anigbrowl]

9. Correct - not unlike the Soviets in Afghanistan

I think Kilcullen's point is that we need to either call a halt and pull out, or commit to our objectives (like defeating the Taliban once and for all), declare victory, and then pull out or otherwise adjust to the new situation. Right now we are the dominant military power in the area but the strategic situation is a stalemate so we're getting dangerously close to just occupying the place without any any strategic change, ie just keeping troops there because we can, without any specific end goal. Nobody knows whether bin Laden is really alive or dead, and unless we can bring about some distinct change in the strategic situation then we're wasting our time.

When Britain was involved in the Suez conflict there was no question they could defeat the Egyptians and hold the territory, but there was no answer to the question of 'what's next'. Obviously they didn't want to actually invade and take over Egypt again, but as long as they kept large forces there on a military footing then it was like lighting matches in a gas station, nobody wanted to deal with the enormous uncertainties created by the situation.

basically it comes down to whether the US can make a deal with Pakistan to squeeze the Taliban from both sides and make the border between those countries into a peaceful area (quite difficult to actually do because of the mountainous geography and centuries-old tribal politics). If we can't, then we're better off letting Karzai sink or swim on his own.

[bigtree]

12. the defeat (and the big powers' interjection) actually sparked a wave of 'Arab nationalism'

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10. Maybe he's saying that if the UK either brought in overwhelming force

when things started going sour in 1951, or signed it over to Egypt immediately w/ a treaty allowing shipping rights, that a messy war causing political trouble could have been averted? That by merely occupying the canal area and getting sniped at and trying to resolve things w/ the least change of the status quo for the first 5 years led to much unnecessary loss of life, huge monetary expenditure, and unpleasant politcal repercussions?

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5. I imagine he's referring to a colonial-type struggle for Afghanistan

. . . like Eisenhower and John Foster Douglas grappled with during the Suez crisis.

"There are only two Great Powers in the world today, the United States and the Soviet Union . . . The ultimatum put Britain and France in their right place, as Power neither big nor strong."
– Anwar Sadat, then a propagandist for the Egyptian state, November 19, 1956, reacting to Egypt’s defeat of the UK-France-Israel invasion force, which is considered by many historians to be the end of the colonial era and then beginning of unquestioned US-Soviet world leadership

[clear eye]

11. Crummy analogy aside, I think we know what he means. n/t