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I was on Politico reading how George Will is about to call for a pull-out from Afghanistan -- not that surprising given Will's somewhat conservative* views -- when I was distracted by this flame war between Glenn Greenwald and Joe Klein. Readers of this blog will be amused to read this vicious take-down of Klein on Greenwald's blog from late May 2007, when Klein had the audacity to conclude al-Qaeda was on the run in Anbar Province. This is amusing, of course, because al-Qaeda actually was being rolled up in Anbar Province at the time, but many on the left were too heavily invested in their opinions on the Iraq War -- formed between 2002 and 2005 -- to notice. There's a lesson there somewhere. On Afghanistan, meanwhile, we're starting to see similar faultlines develop in the Democratic Party, and develop with a speed that has surprised both this blogger and the White House. Time will tell who is on the right side in that debate, but if the Iraq War is anything to go by, we should all -- this blogger included -- be prepared to revisit our assumptions at any time lest they cloud our judgment à la Greenwald in 2007.
*Note the lack of "neo" in front of that adjective. Will is skeptical, like any good conservative, of nation-building and the power of government to transform society.
Be careful with the intellectual honesty and internal consistency or Rachel Maddow may not have you back on ye olde programme.
Andrew, IMHO, I think you've built up a nice little straw man to knock down which doesn't really reflect any similarity to Iraq and the point you're trying to draw. Beyond the fact that the case for staying the course in Iraq isn't a proven certainty yet (even considering the assumed long-term 'success' of the Anbar campaign and The Surge), the point George Will is putting forth (and the point I tried to make in my article you didn't post :o) ) is that this isn't a matter of 'how to get there from here' or which COIN strategy is better than another, it's more fundamental than that. Its about the debate which the USG owes the American taxpayer; the one which tells us why we need to be there fighting a totally different war than the one we knew was necessary in late 2001. Its not that Mr. Will, I, nor a growing number of Americans are 'too heavily invested in their opinions on the [Afghan] War' to notice, but rather its becoming clear that we're pursuing a set of tactics and operations not tied to any clear overarching policy/strategy match. The case for this new war ('new' as in not according to the original objectives of OEF) hasn't been made.
Its totally not that we don't have the best operational and tactical officers and men on the ground in Afghanistan doing the best they can - we do - its that the strategy and the policy it's supposed to stem from hasn't been 1) soberly thought out, 2) clearly enunciated, or 3) proven to be a vital national interest requiring wholesale military nation-building.
If I can be so bold as to paraphrase Mr. Will, its not that he doesn't think we can't win; its that he doesn't know what we are *trying* to win. The fight we *need* to fight can be fought the same way we successfully prosecuted the limited objectives of OEF earlier on. I agree with that warning. Ignoring it, as Clausewitz cautioned, is bringing us into a war we did not plan for, do not need, or set out to establish . . . the kind of war on which [we] are embarking.
Continuing from Kotkin's mention of straw men, Exum sets up another straw man by implying that Greenwald took issue with Klein's having the "audacity to conclude al-Qaeda was on the run in Anbar Province."
In actuality, Greenwald was criticizing Klein for his overuse of anonymous sources who simply parroted the Bush administration party line. The anonymous sources weren't adding anything new that on-the-record sources weren't already saying.
However, it's much easier to write anything when you have a script, and the "liberal pessimist who wants America to lose in Iraq" script is a very easy one from which to crib.
I'm surprised you're surprised. The whole 18-24 month or so timeline has been built upon domestic political considerations from the start. In a very loose analogy its Vietnam 1970 with an incumbent President looking to a "soft landing" for a war started by a predecessor from another party. The million dollar questions are whether McCrystal will get his troops, what happens beginning 1 Jan 2012 and the Presidential election kicks into steam (and to a lesser extent the Congressional elections the next few years), and further out what happens in the next presidential term as no way this will be wrapped up by then. All this of course balanced against the sucess (or failure) of our work over then next 3 years as our strategy, metrics and people are coming into place.
That said, we only get one (more) chance at this. If McCrystal needs the troops and can articulate what he will do with them (which I know he will), I hope he gets them. The last thing this country needs is another hole in the map like Somalia or some other hellholes on earth where terror can breed, although I'd like to see other parties of interest involve themselves, even if we're not on the page (looking at you Russia and China). None of us our well served by a den of drug runners and terrorists.
And building on Jeremy2 Exum sets up a "straw narrative" that implies Iraq was turned around primarily by the application of American military power practicing better population centric Coin tactics; a problematic assertion to say the least. But the Surge triumph narrative underpins the Coin experts hope that what they think happened in Iraq can be replicated in Afghanistan. It is almost as if one can feel their sensibility in action just waiting for the Khost awakening to take place. As Marx said, history repeats itself twice; the first time as tragedy and the second time as farce.
Reasoning historically by analogy is common and understandable; but it becomes dangerous when the historical point of the analog is a deeply flawed understanding of what actually happened. This is why it has been and is important to get the early histories of the Iraq War and the Surge right; unfortunately most of the memoirs and accounts of it so far are half-baked and half-truths at best.
By the way, readers of Exum's blog ought to head over to SWJ blog and see the excellent article currently posted by Major Jeremy Kotkin on Afghanistan and strategy.
And Jeremy K I would submit to you that we really have no strategy in Afghanistan but only a clump of pop centric coin tactics, maxims, principles, and tropes that have been lumped rhetorically into the term strategy. A strategy of tactics is what we actually have.
Andrew, prove me wrong. Articulate for your readers what our strategy in Afghanistan is. But if it merely regurgitates phrases like "protecting the population" and "clear, hold, build" I submit to you that that is not strategy at all but simple tactics and operational method.
Remember the haunting words of Sun Tzu: "tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat."
Kotkin, I like your style. You, along with Gentile, give me hope; you make me realize that not all active duty officers are smoking whatever it is that's in fashion these days. Colonel Gentile likes to quote Sun Tzu with good reason. We see lots of noise, but little else other than the foreboding feeling of disaster. After a few years we began labeling our grand expedition in Vietnam as a "clusterfuck." Couldn't trademark it because it became a generic term a la "Xerox," etc.
It would be kind of nice if any Coindinistas, e.g., Exum, McChrystal, etc., would perhaps take the time to enlighten those of us who aren't in the in-group as to just how the U.S. military should not be considered to be clusterfuck HQ. From the cheap seats, it just looks as if you've done it again. Strategy? We don't need no stinkin' strategy. We just make it up as we go along. And those nice politicians just go right along with us.
You all say you're better than we were in Vietnam. You're wrong. You're just the same. Well, actually, that's not true. Today's military is far more irresponsible than ours was. Plus we didn't have an Internet with former military guys and civilians who never actually served beating the war drums and speaking authoritatively regarding matters about which they know nothing. Anybody else having second thoughts about this brave new era of think tank wars?
George Will is a right-wing ideologue, but he's smart. If he doesn't like what you're doing, you might want to think about it a bit.
COL Gentile:
As noted in previous posts, I agree greatly with your criticisms of the matrix. But to take the chapter title from Krepinevich's book, and play devil's advocate to a degree, is there any prima facie reason that "a strategy of tactics" is *not* the appropriate way to conduct a counterinsurgency? We lack the ability to run controlled experiments, but if one had fought the North Vietnamese conventionally but the Viet Cong with contemporary COIN doctrine, do you think we still would have lost the VIetnam War, and why? Perhaps the approach to strategy is a bifurcated one. In conventional war, generals, as you noted, do not concern themselves with the best way to (say) rout (say) Germans from a village. *Perhaps* in an insurgency, they must do precisely that to prevail. There seems no prima facie reason that is false. Does the thought that strategy is *not* bifurcated, according to the type of conflict one is engaged in, constitute a matrix of its own?*
You've criticized the work on Malaya because it portrays the Emergency as having been won by famously winning hearts and minds, not as it truly was, through coercion and brute force. Even if that was the case, though, is there anything to say that British officers were not considering heavily the proper way to use coercion and brute force, in a manner you could consider tactical or operational rather than truly strategic?
Perhaps as well, you are overlooking or rather underemphasizing the work done by, say, GC Marshall in fashioning the groundwork for a citizen army in the years prior to WW II in his time at Fort Benning, or the Louisiana Manuevers. Perhaps if strategy was conceived and executed successfully in WW II, it was because tactics and operations had been, if not perfected, then properly conceptualized prior to the conflict?
Finally, should you care to offer one, I'm curious as to what you think would be a *strategy* (as opposed to a hodgepodge of concepts about tactics and operations) to fight and win a counterinsurgency. To me, Biddle's three centers of gravity from his "Seeing Baghdad, Thinking Saigon" are key. They imply a much heavier degree of political involvement by (the) generals, which accords well with my conception of Eisenhower as a political general; it also accords well with the recent, lengthy Washington Post article on McKiernan's firing being a result of his unwillingness or inability (as I understood the article) to "sell" the war in Washington.
Respectfully,
ADTS
* I think I ask that because of your reference to Sun Tzu. It reminded me of something I read (by Richard Posner, federal judge and prolific - as in *prolific* - writer) that said, essentially, "Just because the Founders said it, does not mean it should necessarily be taken as gospel."
"Will is skeptical, like any good conservative, of nation-building and the power of government to transform society."
AM,
In light of recent events - such as say, I don't know, the Iraq War - should we amend that to, "like any good [paleo]conservative"?
Similarly, if "Will is, like any good conservative, skeptical...transform[ing] society," does that render your boss (Scrooge McNagl?), who has written of transforming societies, a liberal of sorts? I guess CNAS really is a liberal think tank witha clear path to the Obama White House. :-)
ADTS
Ex,
For such a short piece I think your political bias shines bright enough to light up a dark room. If you know so much of the inner workings of the White House then tell them to set the goals. If Republicans are incapable of supporting transforming societies maybe you can come up with a article supporting that. I know many Germans, Japanese along with American people sure would be interested in that logic.
Dear Andrew:
Good torch lighting...thank you.
"Readers of this blog will be amused to read this vicious take-down of Klein on Greenwald's blog from late May 2007, when Klein had the audacity to conclude al-Qaeda was on the run in Anbar Province. "
Actually that's got nothing to do with Greenwald's critique. It's simply another in his many criticisms of journalists relying heavily or entirely upon anonymous sources when they either have no reason to or should not be granting immunity. How Iraq turned out doesn't discredit what he wrote, it reinforces it.
Readers of this blog may be amused by someone trying to explain how aQIM being rolled up in 2007 would necessitate anonymous claims of upbeat assessments of a war (which should always be suspect) rather than on the record statements by guys in uniform in front of many a camera.
ADTS:
Wonderful points. Busy day ahead, but will respond soon.
Publius, good to see you on the net
gian
" Its becoming clear that we're pursuing a set of tactics and operations not tied to any clear overarching policy/strategy match."
Wow, it took y´all 8 years to see that?
What confuses me is that for these long years while Afghanistan was atrophying, when people were stealing the aidmoney and undercutting civil efforts, noone spoke up at all. Now, when there is finally some sort of momentum growing and at least some sane tactical attempts are being made, everyone is all aflutter and negativistic. I would think the strategy is clear: Stabilize to a level where its most propable we wont have to do it again, and then withdraw.
Did anyone catch the emergence of mullah Rocketry as a possible mediator between the talebs and Karzai, btw? Was a big interview on norwegian tv.
And Greenwald has, btw, been one of the most consistent nd honest reporters of the whole torture-affair, refusing to shut up as it continues under Obama with renditions and suchlike. Give him kudos for that.
apropos: http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/2009/09/01/tomo/
Greenwald has a hard time with criticism though, witness his attack on my suggesting that he was misreading the assignment of combat units to NORTHCOM. Yes, perhaps I used unkind language, but his logic was misguided. ANYhow...
RE: the impressive MAJ K and his observation at 7 PM, I note this short passage in Halberstam's "The Best and the Brightest," where Gen Matthew Ridgeway went in to talk to then-President Lydon Johnson in 1968 about the Vietnam War. Ridgeway had advised Eisenhower not to intervene in Vietnam to save the French, and he didn't support escalating the war in 1965, although he wasn't public about it. So Ridgeway turns to VP Humphrey and says there was one thing that puzzled him about the war in 1968.
"What's that?" Humphrey asked.
"I have never known what the mission for General Westmoreland was," Ridgeway said.
"That's a good question," said Humphrey. "Ask the President."
But when Johnson returned, he immediately got into one of his long monologues about his problems, pressures from every side, and the question was never asked.
meanwhile, gen. McChrystal has a few points on the subject of strategy: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/31/afghanistan-mcchrystal-strat...
Comment by Fnord on September 1, 2009 - 7:10am
"Did anyone catch the emergence of mullah Rocketry"
That a weapons program ?
Likewise, Colonel Gentile.
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