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.
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