Afghanistan doesn’t have to be Obama’s Vietnam

Wednesday, 11th March 2009

Eric Ellis presents his seven-point plan to halt the country’s eight-year decline

6. Stop bombing weddings

No one likes bombs going off in their country, let alone in the name of ‘helping out’. Civilian casualties are clearly a bitter pill for Afghans to swallow. Bombing by Britain’s enemies supposedly hardened civilian resolve during the Blitz, but how must it feel to get the same treatment from foreigners who still haven’t figured out how to get the electricity running after eight years? They calculate the cost of close tactical support and figure out how many power stations or bridges or miles of new road could be purchased instead.

7. Seal the border with Pakistan

True, easier said than done. Much of the border is mountainous, inhospitable and porous. But with more hands at the wheel, it would be possible to at least limit unauthorised cross-border traffic of Taleban and insurgents. Pakistan is the problem here. Its putrid political culture has allowed corruption and fundamentalism to fester. So if Pakistan is unwilling or unable to stop the flow, you stop it for them, with extra international troops.

Americans have some history of sorting out extremism in fractious countries, methods they could apply to addressing the fundamentalist cancer in Pakistan’s armed forces and intelligence agencies. In my experience of meeting Pakistani military mullahs, about 10.30 at night is a good time. That’s when they’re drunk on whiskey pani in the officers’ mess. Their resistance would be futile, and you’d quickly see the difference in Afghanistan, and maybe Pakistan too. They might even find Osama and Mullah Omar too.

It boils down to the three real enemies: desperate poverty, crime and incompetent management and leadership.

Glib? Easy to say, tough to execute? Probably, but given how far Afghanistan has descended since 2001, the alternatives clearly aren’t working. And we’ve seen what neglect can do.