High value assets are already largely gone, or so one is told. Looking to develop greater ability to control the ground and showing patience does us little harm.
Of course stopping bombing and just sitting with thumbs up the butt doesn’t do much good.
As to why halt? (That is reduce to support of NA) Because there’s another target. Al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda doesn’t = Afghanistan. Outside of Afghanistan is important. Perhaps more important than Afghanistan in the long run.
A question, and not an easy or clear one, is does one gain more on focusing on Afghanistan than one loses elsewhere. If an Afghani campain results in more fragile and ultimately collapsing gov’ts in the Mid East then we may not have gained a thing.
Now, I’m not necessarily convinced by this, or rather fully convinced. However the framework is necessary: myopic obsession with Afghanistan mistakes a target, a battle for the war.
Because most of al-Qaeda exists as undergrounds elsewhere. Mid East governments are in fragile states. Destroying ObL et al in Afghanistan at the price of creating new havens doesn’t advance the destruction or attenuation of al-Qaeda et al.
Now this I agree with in part, although only insofar as it goes to not targeting front line. On the other hand a serious problem is lack of good intelligence. We may be having trouble telling who’s Taleban and who’s not.
Swift and merciless, yes. But not clumsily and blindly like a stupid giant. Patience and taking the time to develop a good strategy will be worth more than a rushed attack.
I thought the game plan was ‘surgical strikes’ – that means to me helicopter-Special Forces raids on specific locations identified as being the potentially boltholes of the top table.
I understand you’re not advocating WW1 style marching towards their trenches/emplacements but I think we could think a little more imaginatively – besides, why would we want to topple the entire regime without having a replacement lined up ?
:: paging Kofi Annan ::
Elucidator, don’t put words in my mouth. War has NOTHING to do with “glory,” and I am well aware that “war is sheer hell,” as General Sherman put it. I am talking about the determination, patience, and endurance to follow through with the total destruction of Al-Quaeda. If it takes 20 years to find and kill OBL, then it will take 20 years. The American public seems to lose patience and the govrnment sems to abandon focus in our military actions, given the pattern of our post-Vietnam fighting.
Collounsbury, I note objections 1&4, but 2&3 would, it seems to me, be more beneficial to the Taliban than to our side. I am aware of the danger of Pakistan’s governemnt being swept away by a fundamentalist Islamic coup, but I’m not sure what we can do to support Musharraf’s government. We don’t want him to look more like a puppet of the US. I don’t see other MENA governments being in danger of collapse. Egypt and Saudi Arabia are the most vulnerable, but Mubarak and Princh Abdallah seem to have strong control right now.
Folks, I know that this is petty but can everyone stop putting a “u” behind the Q in al-Qaida/al-Qaeda/al-Qa’eda etc.? It just drives me batty and I know it’s meaningless over-correction and it shouldn’t bother me … but it’s driving me nuts.
(Yes, I know I’m going to be mocked but…)
I for one have the impression that the planners are not so stupid, per elucidator’s sketch. Although on the other hand, I also have the impression that the public is far too conditioned by action movie scenarios to understand this.
I’ve argued elsewhere and will do so here, a massed invasion and occuption of Afghanistan is a terrible mistake. The risks and downsides (local, regional, global) are far greater than the sketchy benefit (supposition that it will get us Bin Laden and that getting ObL solves the al-Qaeda issue.)
I disagree strongly. Frankly, it seems clear to me that we have distressingly little in the way of on-the-ground intelligence or assets. For Afghanistan and for MENA generally. We need more lang. speakers with on the ground exp. in place.
Fighting blind (and I am strongly of the opinion that to achieve what actually needs to be achieved satellites and LD imaging do not cut the cake, over-reliance on this shit is part of our problem.) does us more harm than good.
In order to use Special Ops and certainly larger but mobile units properly, I am certain we need to have good intel. With good intel, I don’t see the Taleban being capable of out-smarting our targeting (ground not air) or ObL being able to hide long-term. W/O good intel, we have morass, we have invasion and nationalist reaction, we have long-term probable gains for al-Qaeda.
A limited Ramadan pause may (uncertainly in all things now are high) give us cover also in Ouzbekistan. Ramadan is really important. Of course it’s rank hypocrisy on the part of many Muslims to pretend fighting is not done in Ramadan, but if we can turn it to our advantage, then exploit the opp.
I further am of the opinion that the most important things to be done now (in the next 3 months) are external to Afghanistan. Shoring up Pakistan cooperation --getting some further moves to shut down the border which may be impossible with Ramadan full-out bombing-- is probably more important for denying Taleban material than using expensive bombs on cheap trucks that happen to move.
I repeat then, Krauthammer et al are misiconcieving this war as WWII bis or perhaps Korea bis. It ain’t.
Care. And understand that his government could go the other way (w/o perhaps so declaring). Not clear to me either, in the end.
Short term, no. Medium term, I am not at all convinced. But I’m suggesting a pull-back and cessation of coop rather than collapse. Egypt in particular is sitting on a mountain of anger. That I can tell you from personal observation. Mubarek is not playing a cagey game for nothing. Cairo was already seething over the intifada.
Not to argue for paralyzation, fuck no. But serious thought.
Final note in guin and the NA not being ‘good guys’:
I said it once, I’ll say it again. There are no good choices in Afghanistan. Only bad and worse. Nobody in Afghanistan has virgin births. No one we’re going to deal with is going to be nice, even by the low standards of MENA, and those that are PC don’t got the oomph on the ground.
** Fuck ** whether NA is “better” – by what bloody standards? What does one expect in a country that’s been at war since 1979?-- than the Taleban. They ditch al-Qaeda, are open to hunting down ObL for a cool few mill? Marhaben bikum ya Ikhwani. We don’t have many good choices. Obviously taking time to develop assets in the Pashtun areas is necessary --although I hope we are not going to be slaves to Paki prefs, delicate balancing there.
I’ll state up front, in my career in MENA I’ve had to deal with -directly but more often indirectly- bad people. People that I am sure are responsible for things so bad I don’t want to imagine them. Well, that’s part of the region. Even the good guys usually have skeletons. And those that don’t usually have no power. So what do you do?