Thursday, 15th October 2009

The Afghan question

James Forsyth 7:33pm

We are into least-worst options territory in Afghanistan as the New York Times Magazine’s brilliant profile of General McChrystal, the US and Nato Commander there, makes clear. As McChrystal says, “if we fail here, Pakistan will not be able to solve their problems — it would be like burning leaves on a windy day next door.” But how do you succeed in a country where the government is increasingly illegitimate, only one in four adults are literate and whose terrain and size offers succour to any insurgency?

The legitimacy question is a very hard one to answer. When pressed on this, McChrystal tells the Times that the US and Nato will “have to avoid looking like we are part of the illegitimacy”. But that is far easier said than done. The literacy question is relevant because it makes it so much harder to work with Afghan forces. To quote the American in charge of training them, “When I was down in Helmand, where the Brits were training police officers, they said not only could none of them read but they didn’t understand what a classroom was. How can you train officers if they can’t write arrest reports?” While the only way to try and mitigate the size and terrain problem is to have a lot more boots on the ground and to concentrate on the protecting the most populated areas.

There is no doubt that McChrystal has thought deeply and creatively about the problem. If we accept that pulling out is not an acceptable option because it would destabilise Pakistan, offer al Qaeda a sanctuary and be a huge boost to the jihadi movement everywhere, then we have to do things as McChrystal suggests which involves placing a premium on protecting the population. This is going to require a more select use of airpower and more troops. It will need as much of the insurgency as possible to be peeled off. But McChrystal is right that you are not going to see a large number of Taliban changing sides or putting down their arms until they decide that they are not going to be successful and they won’t make that call until they see that the US is committed to the fight.

But Obama is still stalling on whether to give McChrystal the resources he has asked to. Instead, the president seems to be reviewing the strategy that he set out in the Spring and second-guessing the Commander he appointed.

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DC

October 15th, 2009 8:47pm Report this comment

I've recently returned from the country. Yes illiteracy is high but the desire to learn is higher. The poor state of the roads and mobile phone networks stifles communication and permits the insurgency to flourish in the absence of a better perceived alternative.

Marbury

October 15th, 2009 9:58pm Report this comment

Aaargh! For most of this post you seem fully aware of just how incredibly difficult this decision, or series of decisions is. But then at the end you glibly imply that Obama should simply follow his general's advice, and/or follow the broad strategy laid out in March. Let's be clear: it does not really matter who Obama second-guesses (and by the way, the situation has changed considerably since McChrystal wrote his report, and his still changing, and McC's position was more nuanced than is generally reported). It does not matter, really, whether or not Obama goes back on his earlier decision - that is now, if you like a 'sunk cost' in political terms. The ONLY thing that matters is getting this pivotal decision right, right now! You call it 'stalling'. I call it very careful deliberation. Which is exactly what Obama (and Gates, and Jones, and Clinton et al) ought to be doing.

JohnBUK

October 15th, 2009 10:11pm Report this comment

"But how do you succeed in a country where the government is increasingly illegitimate, only one in four adults are literate..." Oh sorry, you mean Afghanistan!

JohnAnt

October 16th, 2009 1:31am Report this comment

This is an old problem
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/lords/1898/mar/07/the-north-west-frontier-of-india
and where Waziristan belongs to has never been a clear case
[see map of 1898]
http://homepages.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~poyntz/India/images/AfghanFrontier.JPG
But the recent events in Pakistan show that we need to support the government there, which is our successor. If they fail, we fail.
And - as in 1898 - we cannot afford to do that.

callingallcomets

October 16th, 2009 1:33am Report this comment

Illegitimate govt....since when has any govt in Afghanistan been legitimate? This is only the second election in Afghan history. Fraud? Intimidation? Of course - just like Chicago...
There is a small core of the ANA which is reliable and respected by US and UK soldiers according to Michael Yon. McC obviously wants to build on this. Remember how the doom/gloom merchants were saying the same thing about the Iraqui army in 2005 yet within 3 years it was able to operate fairly effectively on it's own.
The biggest mistake was to big up on the poppies. We should have ignored that and sorted out the drugs trade from our end....moral policing once again from the UK and USA, two countries unable to control criminals in their own backyard...

porkbelly

October 16th, 2009 2:15am Report this comment

All the attention the McChrystal report is getting is misplaced: Obama will make his decision based on his assessment of the domestic political situation, especially as regards his shaky hold on the hard Left, and not on the merits of this or that military strategy. He wants the war to go away - whether it ends in victory or defeat is immaterial to him.

martin sewell

October 16th, 2009 10:18am Report this comment

I keep coming back to the idea that if you can destroy the source of the finance - the drugs trade - you will make the task of defeating the insurgency so much easier.

I find it hard to believe that finding and eradicating a static crop is that hard, particularly with all our technology. Plainly we need to bring the farmers on board, if needs be, by buying their alternative crops with subsidy.

We also need the public space saturated with the message that drugs purchase fuels the Taliban killing our soldiers. Where is that connection ever made in our liberal media?

Brian E.

October 16th, 2009 10:23am Report this comment

Personally I believe it is a mistake to try to get a unified Afghanistan. We should have supported the local tribal chiefs to keep order in their own areas, forcing out any who didn't "see things our way". It might not be democracy as we know it, but this technique worked in Imperial India and there is no reason to believe that it wouldn't work in Afghanistan where most people owe their loyalty to the tribal chief, not to some remote figure in Kabul. And we should remember our aim is to prevent terrorism, not to bring women's rights or impose western democracy or any of the other objective beloved by Harriet Harman and the left wing.