Abu Muqawama: Post
Abu Muqawama retains its autonomy and the views and beliefs expressed within the blog do not reflect those of CNAS. Abu Muqawama retains the right to delete comments that include words that incite violence; are predatory, hateful, or intended to intimidate or harass; or degrade people on the basis of gender, race, class, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, or disability. In summary, don't be a jerk.
Afghanistan Trip Report, Part I: BLUF
As readers of this blog know, I have been in Afghanistan for the past 10 days wandering around the country, speaking to everyone from Afghan government officials to aid workers to NATO military officers to Afghan policemen to Afghan parliamentarians to ... you get the point. I will be here for another few days hanging out with some journalists and civilian researchers in Kabul to hear their take on the war and the greater political situation before heading back to the United States next week.
The purpose of this post is to highlight some initial observations, which I will then explore in greater detail in further blog posts beginning next week. I have not yet finished gathering evidence, but I have spent all the time I am going to spend outside Kabul and with Afghan and NATO military units, and I do not expect these initial observations to change too much between now and the time I depart.
Bottom Line Up Front: There is cause for much encouragement about the way in which this conflict is being fought at the tactical and operational levels. There is an equal amount of cause for pessimism when confronted with remaining strategic obstacles, both of which concern the insurgency's ability to regenerate.
Caveat Emptor: First, I analyze this conflict as a specialist in small wars and insurgencies -- not as an expert in the culture, peoples and history of Afghanistan. So I am strongest, if I may say so, in my analysis of security conditions and weakest in terms of my analysis of political trends or Afghan culture. Second, I traveled here as an invited guest of the ISAF command, which asked me to provide feedback on NATO operations. The command gave me all the support I desired to see the things I wanted to see, but of course the reason I am staying an extra few days to speak to people outside the ISAF "bubble" is because I understand how the ISAF "lens" is only one of many lenses through which one can analyze this conflict. (Which is one of the reasons they bring in mischievous outsiders like me to question their assumptions in the first place.)
I'll start with the many, many good things I have seen while here. (All of this, of course, is based on a limited but considerable sample size.):
1. Our intelligence at the tactical level is greatly improved. Eighteen months ago, as I traveled around Afghanistan for the former commander here, intelligence officers were outstanding in terms of providing information on the enemy: size, disposition, composition, most likely course of action, etc. When it came to providing political intelligence on "white actors" or explaining local tribal dynamics, though, most intelligence officers did not have much to offer. What a difference 18 months makes. This time around, when an intelligence officer began a briefing, he or she usually began by explaining the human geography of their area of operations and only later focused on the insurgency as a part of that human geography. I am so impressed with how sophisticated the analysis provided by intelligence officers today is when compared with not too long ago.
2. Counterinsurgency, as practiced at the tactical level, is the best I have ever seen it practiced. Again, I was tremendously impressed with some of the battalions I spent time with. Yesterday, Ranger Jeff Martindale took me up and down the Arghandab River Valley and allowed me to spend some time with one of his companies. I came away really impressed with the company commander, the ODA team leader, the platoon leaders, and the noncommissioned officers fighting in the northern ARV. Really, really sophisticated, and in high spirits as they're going about their work. This was an armored company doing this mission in the light infantry country of the ANV, so their efforts were all the more impressive for that. As an aside, I'll concede that this armor unit is probably losing some of their gunnery skills while in Afghanistan. But make no mistake: U.S. combat arms units are doing a lot of killing of the Taliban in Afghanistan and running the kind of complex, kinetic operations that would knock the socks of a JRTC O/C. So this idea that U.S. soldiers have lost their "warrior spirit" on account of counterinsurgency or have forgotten how to fight conventionally is nonsense. These men are calling for fire, coordinating assaults, and killing Taliban every day of the week under conditions worlds more demanding than anything a U.S. unit went through at the NTC or JRTC in the 1990s. Anyone who thinks U.S. soldiers sit around passing out Snickers bars all day as part of counterinsurgency operations needs to visit the Arghandab.
3. The coordination between special operations forces and general purpose forces is the best I have ever seen it. This applies across the entire theater. I have been traveling with Col. (Ret.) Pete Mansoor, and I have been joking with Pete, who was a brigade commander in Iraq when I was a Ranger platoon leader there, how far we have come from the days when I used to make his life so miserable by conducting late-night raids and leaving him the mess to clean up. SOF and GPF are fighting one fight -- and they are together having a devastating effect on the leadership of the insurgency. Simply stunning.
Now for the bad news:
1. We have two "Achilles heels" in the current strategy: Afghan governance and insurgent sanctuaries in Pakistan. What these two weaknesses have in common is their combined effect on the ability of insurgent ranks, which have been decimated this year, to regenerate either through sanctuaries (to include external support) or by exploiting grievances caused by bad governance. I'm going to be honest and say that I do not see a coherent or otherwise effective strategy for dealing with the sanctuaries in Pakistan. I do not see it anywhere in the U.S. government or within NATO, whose writ only extends to the borders of Afghanistan anyway. With respect to governance, I have seen some isolated rays of hope at the local level, but it is easy to see how, as long as Afghans consider their country the third most corrupt country on Earth and look elsewhere for the rule of law, insurgents will continue to recruit and recover their losses.
2. We might not be taking governance as seriously as we should if we want to win. If I were to land in Afghanistan having never visited before and were asked what the international community values in terms of its objectives, I would argue that based on what I can observe -- to include the metrics tracked and the resources allocated -- killing the enemy is vastly more important than fixing local governance. That may be okay, but a lot of smart analysts argue that we have thus far failed in Afghanistan because we have not taken governance seriously enough.
3. The interests of the international community and the interests of GIRoA might seriously diverge as we begin to transition. Transition, for the United States and others, means turning over responsibility for the security of Afghanistan. Transition, as I am hearing Afghans explain it, means creating a functional state with the infrastructure to support its economic growth and meet the expectations of its people. Someone, I suspect, is going to end up really disappointed. No prizes for guessing who.
Again, I will expand on all of this in posts next week and will also explore other topics. Take this analysis for what it is worth and in light of the caveats I supplied up front as well as any others you can think of.
Finally, there has been some silly analysis arguing that my most recent report for CNAS is a Palin-esque refudiation of counterinsurgency. I am sorry to upset my critics further, but I have never been so confident that "getting the inputs right" in 2009 (and to borrow a favorite phrase of Gen. Petraeus) was the right decision by the president and his national security staff. My paper written with Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Dave Barno is both a) a recognition that counterinsurgency does not take place in a resource vacuum and that you cannot sustain it indefinitely and that b) we have to start thinking seriously about both how we are going to transition between now and 2014 and how we protect U.S. interests beyond 2014. (Pres. Obama: "I want to start leaving in July 2011." Pres. Karzai: "I want full sovereignty by 2014." My job: To figure out how to make all that happen.) I thought that was clear, as did my friend Gulliver, with whom I have often sparred on this war. But maybe it was not. That having been said, I completely agree with a CT strategy for Afghanistan. Just, you know, in 2014 -- and after setting the necessary conditions.
This is from the Bacevich
This is from the Bacevich part of my brain, which usually dominates these discussions. If you're "winning" at the tactical and operational level but not moving forward on strategic goals, then you're still doing something wrong. As far as post-2014 objectives go, you still can't answer "so why is Afghanistan important to the United States?" when AQ is operating in Syria, Iraq, Somalia, and other states. You can't defeat a non-state actor by taking over one state. Last, how many years after 2014 do you think we're going to need to be pumping billions into Afghanistan's economy to keep its security forces running? Is this another $3 billion/yr foreign aid recipient? How many other "failing states" are we going to have to prop up to win the WOT?
Thanks for the comment,
Thanks for the comment, Jason. Briefly, Dave Barno and I discuss U.S. interests in Afghanistan and the environment of scarcity in which we are operating in my latest CNAS paper. Also, you are quite correct that if you are winning "tactically" but losing "strategically," you are ... losing.
"My paper written with Lt.
"My paper written with Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Dave Barno is both a) a recognition that counterinsurgency does not take place in a resource vacuum and that you cannot sustain it indefinitely.." And you didn't know this in 2009? It just dawned on you that an operation costing $1.2 million up front per man per year was unsustainable given the state of the US economy and the nature of the US military?
Sounds like another wasted trip. You're not knowledgeable about Afghan politics and culture but were impressed by how much the military thought it knew about the local situation. My impression is that you didn't have serious discussions with Afghans and drinking Kool-Aid with the US Army can't lead to clarity.
The US isn't "losing" the war. It's lost. Nothing can be gained that is worth the resources already expended and the current plan to hang around until at least 2014 only confounds the errors.
The notion that there is an "operational" level of conflict should be discarded. There are no ground combat operations above tactics. In the days of mass communications there are no tactics that don't have a political and therefore strategic effect. "The Operational Art" is a concept that died on 9 Aug 1945.
Last year (2009), I read a
Last year (2009), I read a USAWC paper on the current situation on Afghanistan. It mentioned a few defficiencies in the Afghan theatre then. Some of the mentioned relavant problems were: lack of unity of purpose, fragmented chain of command (power was shared by Europeans and Americans), different forces that responded to different chains of command, lack of a comprehensive strategy etc. The question I'd like to pose is if, after the ''surge'', those problems were solved, especially the one concerning the chain of command. The problem of different national agendas interfering in the way the COIN is conducted, the recognition that NATO is facing a rural insurgency (which wasn't acknowledged by NATO then - dunno if I that's changed), US forces divided between Op. Enduring Freedom and the NATO/ ISAF missions etc. A US general reported that ''a sensible coordination of all political and military elements of the Afghan theatre of operations does not exist''.
Has this changed after the surge? You mentioned good coordination in some ops. I'd like to know if the problems I mentioned have been solved.
Thanks,
F.
Good summary, Abu M.
Good summary, Abu M. Thanks.
Poor governance plus continued sanctuary. A wicked problem.
1. If ISAF were to boil down "poor Afghan governance" into the one or two of most pressing issues -short term - what might that list look like?
Is it mostly Afghans wanting to be left alone by the central government plus the rapid pace of handling court cases that the shadow Taliban courts provide? Or is it impossible to single out only a few immediate and urgent items? Is it a regional and case-by-case situation - and is that what you mean by the tactical good practice of counterinsurgency that you witnessed?
2. Robert Haddick at SWJ has written about the Pakistan "veto" over our Afghanistan policy given the logistical routes. I think of this as the "short-term veto."
I worry about the "long term veto" our partnership with Pakistan may have over future American strategy in South Asia. If we are in a situation where we feel we must continue to prop up the Pakistan government through aid and military assistance, given the status of Pakistan's nuclear weapons, others will hedge their bets too.
The worst case scenario for the US might include a future India-China "etente" that somewhat restricts US movement in the Indian Ocean. Okay, totally far-fetched and unlikely, but an India hedging its bets by pulling closer to Russia, spreading the defense cash around to Europe and Israel and the Russians, and attempting to entice China where interests overlap in order to constrain US action in Pakistan is not off the cards - if we are viewed as continued enablers of a regime dangerous to Indian lives and interests.
And, so, a veto over our long term South Asian strategy. What say the other commenters? Am I a crazy person? It's not the first time I've let loose with nonsense around here.
From Amy Levine's paper linked in your comments section earlier:
"In the short-term, regional agreement can be found on the issues of counterrorism and counternarcotics....Beyond these immediate concerns, however, the goals of these states begin to diverge, particularly on the composition of the Afghan governments. The United States will have to choose a way forward that will likely alienate at least one regional government - namely, Pakistan or India."
Call it the "veto" principle.
Think hard, important people in important positions, about your aid regimes and your intellectual postures toward the region. Don't make the intellectual concession that you understand the training of jihadis as a part of a regional defense strategy. Say that the US understands the very real security concerns of Pakistan, that they are valid and they are real, but that Pakistan's nuclear weapons and a de facto security guarantee (like, when we run interference between the two - as after Kargil and Mumbai) from the United States is as far as we are willing to go in that regard. Titer aid toward bilateral counter-terrorism efforts that include the two. Something like that.
Once again, maybe I'm completely off-the charts wrong. Easy to comment here, hard to have real decision making responsibilities.
Again, thanks AM.
"I have seen some isolated
"I have seen some isolated rays of hope at the local level, but it is easy to see how, as long as Afghans consider their country the third most corrupt country on Earth and look elsewhere for the rule of law, insurgents will continue to recruit and recover their losses."
Glad you went all the way to Afghanistan to pick up that gem.
" I would argue that based on what I can observe -- to include the metrics tracked and the resources allocated -- killing the enemy is vastly more important than fixing local governance. "
Yes! Exactly! And it doesn't help when you spend most of your post gushing over tactics and ops. Nor does it help when you - now a veteran think tanker and a PhD student (or did you finish? if so, congrats - also, are you getting it published? Because I'd like to read it) - pass on delivering strong analysis on political trends in Afghanistan.
Commenter Jason basically
Commenter Jason basically made a similar point to one that I made at InkSpots a few days back: we are creating more client-state relationships - just like those we have with Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Learned nothing this past decade, did we?
I have to agree - when
I have to agree - when somebody's focusing on the day-to-day minutia, *and* not noticing that it's the wrong day-to-day minutia, there's a problem. The joke is that we're repeating Vietnam - lots of search and destroy missions, lots of enemy allegedly KIA, not progress in building a nation which will function (to a degree) as we'd like it, and to the point where all it needs is relatively minimum help.
Theo, It sounds as though
Theo,
It sounds as though you're implying that anyone with a PhD is automatically an expert on any subject. It's usually those PhD's that would agree with you that don't add anything meaningful to the conversation (see Bernard Finel for an example). I think it's refreshing when a man earning a PhD in a field related to War Studies chooses to keep his commentary within his area of expertise instead of venturing into speculation about a subject he readily admits he has not conducted serious research into. If more people chose to educate themselves about a subject before pontificating on it, I think we might find far less ignorant white noise masking genuine intelligent discussion.
If ISAF really wanted a no
If ISAF really wanted a no bullshit assessment, it should ask those who are in the mud and the blood every day, rather than some think tank blogger.
Madhu wrote: "If ISAF were to
Madhu wrote: "If ISAF were to boil down "poor Afghan governance" into the one or two of most pressing issues -short term - what might that list look like? "
It would look significantly different in each of Afghanistan's 34 provinces, and often in different districts in the same province.
Abu Muqawama, could you break down your observations by province, or ANSF unit, or ISAF unit?
Since you spent time in Kandahar, could you share your observations on the performance of the 10 or 11 ANA combat infantry battalions operating in Kandahar province?
Jason, GIRoA long term steady
Jason, GIRoA long term steady state expenditure is likely to be approximately $15 billion/year. Maybe you could reduce that to $12 billion per year, if you gut the ANSF and Afghan education budget, but not much below that. The ANSF alone currently have a long term steady state budget of $8 billion/year. I think the ANSF will need $10 billion/year to get a decent shot at winning this war over the long run.
# In the fiscal year ending February, 2009, GIRoA annual revenue was about 42 billion Afghanis, or approx $800 million, which was about 6.9% of Afghanistan's $11.6 billion GDP.
# In the fiscal year ending February, 2010, GIRoA annual revenue was about 63.8 billion Afghanis, or approx $1.3 billion.
# In the fiscal year ending February, 2011, GIRoA annual revenue projected to be about 83 billion Afghanis, or approx $1.7 billion, which was about 9.0% of Afghanistan's $18.9 billion GDP.
# In the fiscal year ending February, 2011, GIRoA annual operating expenditure projected to be about 154 billion Afghanis, or approx $3.1 billion, which was about 16.7% of Afghanistan's $18.9 billion GDP [according to the section 1230 report . . . in my view the operating expenditure budget of the GIRoA is greatly under estimated.]
Afghanistan has massive budget deficits as far as the eye can see. The budget deficit excluding international grants is over $10 billion/year.
Jason, GIRoA long term steady
Jason, GIRoA long term steady state expenditure is likely to be approximately $15 billion/year. Maybe you could reduce that to $12 billion per year, if you gut the ANSF and Afghan education budget, but not much below that. The ANSF alone currently have a long term steady state budget of $8 billion/year. I think the ANSF will need $10 billion/year to get a decent shot at winning this war over the long run.
- In the fiscal year ending February, 2009, GIRoA annual revenue was about 42 billion Afghanis, or approx $800 million, which was about 6.9% of Afghanistan's $11.6 billion GDP.
- In the fiscal year ending February, 2010, GIRoA annual revenue was about 63.8 billion Afghanis, or approx $1.3 billion.
-In the fiscal year ending February, 2011, GIRoA annual revenue projected to be about 83 billion Afghanis, or approx $1.7 billion, which was about 9.0% of Afghanistan's $18.9 billion GDP.
-In the fiscal year ending February, 2011, GIRoA annual operating expenditure projected to be about 154 billion Afghanis, or approx $3.1 billion, which was about 16.7% of Afghanistan's $18.9 billion GDP [according to the section 1230 report . . . in my view the operating expenditure budget of the GIRoA is greatly under estimated.]
Afghanistan has massive budget deficits as far as the eye can see. The budget deficit excluding international grants is over $10 billion/year.
I'd like to add another
I'd like to add another Achilles' heel:
The war-wearied population seeks an authority who will guarantee their basic security needs. Although winning hearts and minds goes so far, a frightened population can also turn to the authority who monopolizes violence or exercises it freely. In this case, the Taliban undermine security disproportionately to their relative size. What if the Afghan government demonstrated justice and security more tailored to the Afghan culture? i.e. public executions/harsher tactics
Machiavelli was on to something..
Bluff: you're doing it.
Bluff: you're doing it.
Abu Muqawama,
Abu Muqawama,
Your analysis is informative and thought provoking. However, our government does not look at the big picture and seems to be unaware of the history of Afghanistan. Afghanistan is not a country. It was artificially created by the British and Russian empires in the 1890's when the Durand Line was drawn up. This divided the Pashtun ethnic group into 2 halves- one half in Britsh India and the other in Afghanistan. The Pashtuns ( roughly 10 million of Afghanistan's 25 million people ) have always dominated Afghanistan and most of the Taliban originate from the Pashtuns. There are also 25 million Pashtuns living across the border in Pakistan. The Taliban have a safe refuge among the Pashtun people of Pakistan and the Pakistan government and miltary have made only a half hearted effort to eliminate the Taliban. Indeed, sections of the ISI and Pakistani military actually support the Taliban and related miltias. There is an analogy with Vietnam here. The North Vietnamese miltary had their own safe haven during the Vietnam War- the entire country of North Vietnam. Despite extensive bombing they could not be defeated and the US government was unwilling to invade North Vietnam to eliiminate this safe haven. The limited drone attacks on Taliban targets in Pakistan are nowhere nearly as extensive as that against North Vietnam. There are 25 million Pashtuns in Pakistan and 10 million in Afghanistan. So 400,000 male Pashtuns turn age 18 every year- a large potential source of recruits for the Taliban.
The solution to Afghanistan's endlesss wars ( 33 years and counting ) is to aknowledge that Afghanistan is a failed state and plan accordingly. The state should be abolished. The Turkmen regions of Afghanistan ( 1 million Turkmens- living in the regions bordering Turkmenistan ) should be annexed by Turkmenistan. The Uzbek regions of Afghanistan ( 2.5 million Uzbeks ) should be annexed by Uzbekistan. The Tajik regions of Afghanistan ( 7 million Tajiks- extending from the Tajik border to Kabul ) should be annexed by Tajikistan. Indpendent nations should be created for the Hazara ( 2.5 million ) and Nuristani peoples. What would remain of Afghanistan- the Pashtun regions of the south and east- should be incorporated into Pakistan. The Taliban then become entirely a Pakistani problem. If the Pakistan government decides to crush the Taliban, then the Taliban cease to exist. The Pakistan military certainly has the capability, but currently not the will, to do so. If the Pakistan government refuses to destroy the Taliban, then at least we know who to blame. Could Pakistan risk being labled a terrorist state that gives safe harbor to the Taliban and Al Qaeda ?
It is true that there is some ethnic admixture in Afghanistan. Generous grants and assisance should be given to those Afghans who need to be relocated to the region of their native ethnic group. The cost of this relocation would be far less than the yearly cost of funding the Afghanistan war. Billions of dollars are currently lost to corrupt Afghan leaders and should be diverted for this purpose.
Afghanistan is somewhat similar to another artificially created state- Yugoslavia. After the death of Tito, the different ethnic groups- the Slovenians, Croatians, the Albanians of Kosova, the Bosnian Muslims and the Serbs, eventually ended up in their own separate nations after much bloodshed. This process is still continuing in the ethnically mixed Bosnia. NATO could have averted much of this ethnic conflict by intervening after the death of Tito and abolishing the country of Yugoslavia and imposing a partition and relocation of the population. It was eventually done in a much more savage manner by the Croats ( expulsion of the Serbs in Croatia ) and the Serbs in Bosnia and Kosova. NATO must also realize that , as in Yugoslavia with the minoity Serbs, there will never be peace in an Afghanistan nation dominated by a Pashtun minority.
Missing from this whole
Missing from this whole discussion is any acknowledgment of the ethnic dimension -- which may be the critical "lens" through which to view the broad strategic situation in Afghan-Pakistan, given that NATO's mission there is in part democracy-building. Historically, dictatorships are capable of holding together multi-ethnic states but democratization causes them to disintegrate. Witness anything from Yugoslavia in the 1990s, to Iraq, Lebanon, Bosnia, Belgium, etc., today.
All the good governance and security in the world won't make a population submit to what they see as foreign rule -- and I'm not referring to NATO/US as the foreigners, but to local rivalries which are bottled up within post-colonial borders and lead to ethnic conflicts for autonomy/domination within those borders. At most, short-term stability can be bought at the price of heavy expenditures in blood and treasure, only to crumble in the long-term, whenever such an ethnic dimension exists. I can't think of any counter-examples, or any such situations that have been truly stabilized, without either (a) dictatorship, or (b) division of the state along ethnic lines.
The question is, how does the ethnic dimension impact the mission in Afghanistan? The Taliban are undoubtedly seen as a "Pashtun" force that operates in Pashtun territories on both sides of the artificial Afghan-Pakistan border. But is the Karzai Administration seen as "Pashtun," or a front for Northern nations (Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazara), or a combination of both - that wins the loyalty of neither? And if it is the latter, what are the implications for a strategy that is premised on an eventual successful U.S. withdrawal? Where is the Karzai Administration's stable base of support?
Let's not forget that Gen. Petraeus' success in stabilizing (perhaps temporarily) the situation in Iraq was due in large part, not to successful counter-insurgency operations, but to the Sunni Awakening - in which Sunnis took up arms against Al-Qaeda (taking the initiative from the United States, and accomplishing what the U.S., or any foreign force, could never accomplish). My guess is that only a similar "Pashtun Awakening" could stand any chance of wiping out the Taliban, rather than allowing them to use the local Pashtun population both as (a) a safety net, (b) a source of intelligence, and (c) a bottomless reservoir of reinforcements. So how do you get Pashtuns to take up arms against the Taliban?
I don't have any answers here. Other than to point out that these crucial questions are completely missing from this analysis, as well as from most of the analysis that I've seen coming out of both Washington and NATO. As an ethnic Pole, who understands the importance of communal independence struggles and the ethnic identity politics they are intertwined with, I don't have a hard time seeing how this western myopia towards the ethnic dimension of democratic nation-building can lead to extremely unsuccessful strategizing.
We have two "Achilles heels"
We have two "Achilles heels" in the current strategy: Afghan governance and insurgent sanctuaries in Pakistan.
Funny, that was the problem in Vietnam too.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vo-rh9C6K_g
Old news footage of Laos discussion if you have the time. Does not even touch Cambodia!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jBfBDns1iRs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4mEVraodfE
I don't think you understand
I don't think you understand combined arms operations.
It is not nonsense Andrew to point out what I and others have that the American Army's proficiency at combined arms warfare at especially higher organizational levels has atrophied. Artillerymen if you talk to them will acknowledge that as a branch their skills at robust artillery fires have indeed atrophied. It is a fact that the American army has become light infantryized and that our combined arms skills have atrophied.
You should read Dave Johnson's new Rand paper where he describes different tiers of capabilities and sophistication of enemy forces.
While you were there how many times did you observe an infantry battalion commander maneuver his rifle companies against the enemy who stuck and fought, and had to do this simultaneously while coordinating fires? These were the skills that the Israeli Army had lost by 2006 (acknowledged over and over again by the Israeli Army themselves) when they faced a tier 2 enemy (in Johnson's taxonomy). This is in no way questioning the fighting spirit of American combat men in Afghanistan. But gosh, when will you and the rest of the small wars experts get off this defensiveness about acknowledging that the Army does in fact have serious problems with combined arms competencies at levels higher than platoon.
Lastly you say that the American Army has improved greatly at coin operations over the last eighteen months (that timeframe fits conveniently of course when the better general, General McChrystal, was put into place and does comply with General Petraeus's notion of finally having the "right inputs in place." But OK, I take your observations but would ask specifically in terms of method, tactics, techniques and overall operational framework what has really changed over the last 18 months to what came before from 2003 to 2009? Specifics here is what i would like to hear if you can spare the time.
gian
Faha, You're not going to
Faha,
You're not going to like this but the regions of the Hazara , the Tajiks and all of Tjikistan should really be returned to Iran. Herat is a Persian city. You're right, it was the British--and Russians--that created this mess.
And it is outside powers like the US--especially the US--that would perpetuate this violently artificial situation by not returning these regions to Iran.
Adding to my 7:24
Adding to my 7:24 comment:
It's not widely known in the West that upon the breakup of the USSR, Azerbaijan was interested in returning itself to Iran. But outside powers including the US pressured the Azeris into not pursuing it any further.
Most of these areas in the region were traditionally Iranian (for millennia) before colonial conquests made by Russia and Britain carved them up in the 19th and very early 20 centuries. It has produced a lot of conflict and suffering, as a result.
The general arrogance on
The general arrogance on display in some of these comments is cracking me up - let's divide up Afghanistan! Just like drawing lines on a map in the old colonial Africa era - or maybe a bit more like what Stalin did in those regions in his day - except this time, you're going to do it right by carving things up along 'the correct ethnic divisions' - gosh, hasn't that worked out well in Serbia-Croatia-Bosnia-Kosovo? Wasn't that the same wet dream proposed for Iraq - Sunni-Shia-Kurd?
Now, there are places in the world where this IS the correct approach - but what is the theme in such places? There are now high hopes for a peaceful resolution of the Sudan question, the North-South split - but what is they key factor there? The DEMOCRATIC REFERENDUM - and also the South's guarantee that any groups from the north will not be persecuted in an independent south. Only a rabid colonialist would even think of trying to artificially impose such divisions from Washington - or London - or Moscow.
Hence, Stalinist-colonial line-drawers, what you really need is a functioning local democracy - and the warlord-ridden heroin-smuggling regime in Kabul doesn't even come close to qualifying. You can thank the State Department for that situation, if you want to thank anyone. If you drive out the Taliban and then let the heroin warlords take their place - as was the U.S. policy for years - then you're just setting up for a big disaster. Now, maybe the new approach to human intel will assist local people to control local politics, instead of having to chose between wildly corrupt Kabul officials and manic Taliban Koran-thumpers. Here's hoping, anyway.
Furthermore, those cherished assumptions about the stability of the old Soviet colonial states in central Asia are so wildly inaccurate and un-informed as to invite even more ridicule - the post-Soviet situation in most regions could easily turn into a dozen Yugoslavian meltdowns, correct? But no fear, you'll sit there and draw new lines on the map - but tell me, who gets this valley? Who gets this village? Serbian-style ethnic cleansing, anyone? Talk about idiotic arrogance uncoupled from reality...Fahahahaha!
In reality, the best international diplomacy-scale hope for Afghanistan probably lies in the settlement of the Pakistan-India dispute - again, something the State Department has flubbed. There are simply too many external interests in the country, all trying to push it this way or that.
Finally, notice that this visit took place in the winter, the time when fighting dwindles back - with some exceptions, apparently:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/11/AR20101...
P.S. The notion that China and India would "restrict" U.S. activity in the Indian Ocean is more ludicrous nonsense - we protect the oil shipping lanes, and they're even more reliant on those energy sources (for the moment) than we are. If anything, we should be asking them to contribute more to that effort - without which, a whole lot more ships would currently be tied up off Somalia's Pirate Coast. The cost for such operations, of course, is IMMENSE.
"My paper written with Lt.
"My paper written with Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Dave Barno is both a) a recognition that counterinsurgency does not take place in a resource vacuum and that you cannot sustain it indefinitely.." And you didn't know this in 2009? It just dawned on you that an operation costing $1.2 million up front per man per year was unsustainable given the state of the US economy and the nature of the US military?"
Good point. Remember back in 2009 when Exum was arguing that there was no other solution than to escalate the war in Afghanistan? Paying Exum to undo the bad advice he provided in 2009, what a good use of tax payer dollars.
P.S. The notion that China
P.S. The notion that China and India would "restrict" U.S. activity in the Indian Ocean is more ludicrous nonsense - we protect the oil shipping lanes, and they're even more reliant on those energy sources (for the moment) than we are. If anything, we should be asking them to contribute more to that effort - without which, a whole lot more ships would currently be tied up off Somalia's Pirate Coast. The cost for such operations, of course, is IMMENSE. - Gunboat diplomat
That's why I asked if it was a crazy suggestion. You think it is.Thank you for your reply.
Let me add one or two other things to the conversation, however, and then you can promptly tell me how crazy they are, too:
1. Do you think the Great Britain of 1930 would think she would be in her current position, militarily and economically? In 50, or 100, years, perhaps the Chinese and Indians will be a bit richer and have more ships? Or, perhaps, we will keep an economic trajectory such that even with great strides by the two, we will still be ahead.
2. Our difficult strategic posture in South Asia today is do, in part, to difficult decisions we took decades ago during the Cold War. This left us tied to a, well, difficult ally. Is it possible that decisions we take today could, negatively, affect our strategy down the road? If not in the outlandish scenario I painted above, other more plausible ways? Why should we assume that in the future the only game in town will be us? I want us to remain at the top but doing so requires a lot of hard work, good stratecraft, and a certain amount of luck.
3. High level American diplomacy to "solve" the India-Pakistan problem means what? Addressing Kashmir? India will resist internationalization of that issue. DId you have something else more specific in mind?
Challenging core assumptions is not always such a bad idea.
I don't want to invoke a
I don't want to invoke a Vietnam analogy, but it sounds like what we are pursuing is an attrition strategy, i.e. kill enough Taliban until there are not enough Pashtuns left to sustain the insurgency. This seems to be the rationale behind the High-Value Targeting, which some are presenting as the "gamechanger" that will turn the tide. Putting aside the question of verifying the numbers, is it possible that this tactic is eliminating the very persons who are supposed to represent the other side in reconciliation efforts?
The Arghandab District is clearly a hard fight, and one that we are winning, but do the locals view themselves as better off than they were in 2007 when there was no fighting or conflict in the District? We can justifiably argue that the Taliban are to blame for turning the Arghandab Valley into a battlefield but I wonder if the local villagers will accept such arguments from foreign infidels and allow our facts to override their natural preferences for siding with fellow Pashtuns and fellow Muslims.
I haven't seen a lot of effort to address the question of the negative consequences of a 100K plus footprint in Afghanistan. The financial costs to sustain this footprint are injecting money into Afghanistan that dwarfs the drug trade money, thus exacerbating corruption. The sustainment effort also leaves us even more vulnerable to Pakistani threats to cut off our supply lines and the inflationary effects of this injection of money into Afghanistan are likely damaging the livelihoods of those Afghans who do not have access to this financial windfall.
Finally, I have to cringe when I see discussions about improving governance. Governance is not something that comes in a box or can be fixed/created because it is an official line of operation in a campaign plan. Governance is ultimately about political will - something that is owned by the locals and cannot be imposed or created by foreigners. In the (tor)mentoring relationships between foreigners and Afghans, I have typically seen two responses to a lack of enthusiasm and/or effort on the Afghan side - either put more pressure on the Afghan official or try to have him replaced. Neither method is really more than a short-term solution.
"My paper written with Lt.
"My paper written with Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Dave Barno is both a) a recognition that counterinsurgency does not take place in a resource vacuum and that you cannot sustain it indefinitely.." And you didn't know this in 2009? It just dawned on you that an operation costing $1.2 million up front per man per year was unsustainable given the state of the US economy and the nature of the US military?"
Perhaps you forget the nonsense of the time that all of our newborn European friends were suddenly going to pony up thousands of troops in recognition of the anointed Savior and his new gang of the Best and the Brightest.
"Finally, I have to cringe
"Finally, I have to cringe when I see discussions about improving governance. Governance is not something that comes in a box or can be fixed/created because it is an official line of operation in a campaign plan. Governance is ultimately about political will - something that is owned by the locals and cannot be imposed or created by foreigners. In the (tor)mentoring relationships between foreigners and Afghans, I have typically seen two responses to a lack of enthusiasm and/or effort on the Afghan side - either put more pressure on the Afghan official or try to have him replaced. Neither method is really more than a short-term solution."
Careful, the light-workers are in motion bringing progress to the heathens. Both here and abroad.
On the bright side, the more energy they waste discrediting themselves abroad, the less they'll have to conduct mischief at home.
AM's analysis prompts him to
AM's analysis prompts him to be optimistic. This mystifies me.
If we were making great progress in the areas where he asserts we're stuck in the mud, and stuck in the mud in the areas where he thinks we're making great progress, the war would be won by now. The insurgency would not be able to regenerate using sanctuaries in Pakistan, and the Afghan government would be asserting its authority over most of its territory. The United States could begin winding down a military commitment that is being paid for entirely with borrowed money (I understand how the eyes of military people tend to glaze over when talk turns to finances. Just try thinking of how we pay for the Afghan war as a question of logistics).
I don't mean to be flip. I'm really glad special forces and main force units have improved their coordination. I would be pleased to learn that the gunnery skills of armored and artillery units deployed to counterinsurgency in Afghanistan have not deteriorated as much as some critics believe (take that, Col. Gentile!). I'd be even happier if these developments were key factors in a war we were winning. They don't seem to be.
AM is sure there is a way to maximize the benefit of the small things we are getting right while minimizing the damage of the big things that have gone wrong, and make it to 2014 so everyone gets what they say they want. My main message to him in response is: We. Don't. Have. That. Kind. Of. Time. It doesn't matter how impressive Gen. Petraeus is, or how strong is his bureaucratic position at the moment, or how high morale has gotten in select frontline small units, or how committed everyone is to the mission right in front of them. I'm afraid it does matter -- a lot -- how much the Afghan commitment is costing. After nine years, a few specks of light in the darkness isn't a picture of success. Paradoxically, it's only the scope of the economic disaster at home that is keeping Afghanistan off the front pages long enough for us to begin Gen. Petraeus' experiment in counterinsurgency, but that same disaster will eventually force us to cut it short. If AM is looking for a mission, he should start thinking about ways of limiting the damage to American interests when that happens.
If Mil people don't get the
If Mil people don't get the magnitude of the economic disaster we are facing in the USA - outside of the Beltway -
Think.Stalingrad.Late.December.1942
Finally, there has been some
Finally, there has been some silly analysis arguing that my most recent report for CNAS is a Palin-esque refudiation of counterinsurgency. I am sorry to upset my critics further, but I have never been so confident that "getting the inputs right" in 2009 (and to borrow a favorite phrase of Gen. Petraeus) was the right decision by the president and his national security staff. My paper written with Lt. Gen. (Ret.) Dave Barno is both a) a recognition that counterinsurgency does not take place in a resource vacuum and that you cannot sustain it indefinitely and that b) we have to start thinking seriously about both how we are going to transition between now and 2014 and how we protect U.S. interests beyond 2014. (Pres. Obama: "I want to start leaving in July 2011." Pres. Karzai: "I want full sovereignty by 2014." My job: To figure out how to make all that happen.) I thought that was clear, as did my friend Gulliver, with whom I have often sparred on this war. But maybe it was not. That having been said, I completely agree with a CT strategy for Afghanistan. Just, you know, in 2014 -- and after setting the necessary conditions.
Love it when they say silly. I do not think that Exum is repudiating COIN. Do think that there are realities.
Every conflict has a start, middle, and end. There are a lot of places we could mark as the "start". For this conflict the start could be the beginning of religion. Birth of Israel in the 40's maybe? Then there was the Soviet-Afghan conflict of the 70's & 80's. Was the start later in the 80's when AQ really got going? Was it the first attempt on the WTT in '93, CT attempts by the Clinton administration, embassy bombings in Africa, attack on the USS COLE, or is the start date 9/11 ? Some might say that the American-Afghanistan war did not start until after Iraq.
Hopefully, America is closer to the end of Afghanistan than being in the middle. Does not matter what you call the "start" of this conflict, I think that every one could agree that the US had a lot of information to make decisions before the start date. Reality is no human will ever in their lifetime have the ability of "getting the inputs right" at least not 100% right, that requires knowledge of the future. Petraeus is not responsible for the US economy, yet he is using up a lot of treasure.
Ten years into a conflict and mission creep happens. Lot of people would not agree, but Rumsfeld had it right when he said the fighting in Afghanistan was over in 2004 timeframe. Don't get me wrong cause I really do not think the fighting was over in 2004 in Afghanistan. What I am saying is, if the US were wise they would have stopped sooner not later. Maybe Rumsfeld just did not get his message across to the American public that the search for AQ in Afghanistan was going to be limited in scope. AQ moved on and the US did not. Personally I think Afghanistan has become something that the US taxpayer should not be paying for which is nation building. It is pretty damn arrogant to go around nation building with your pants around your ankles. US has some work to do on our own nation.
"Getting the inputs right" is just to damn simple. The real questions should be, "What am I trying to achieve? “, "What are my limitations?”, or " Can I achieve my goals with the existing constraints?".
What is the mission? Maybe Petraeus is looking the wrong direction when he asks the hard questions. Then shit rolls down hill doesn't.
The mission now should be, "Time to leave, now".
Individually we know the right answer collectively we get stupid. Collectively there are too many faces to save. Potus wants re-election as well as about 500 odd people making $174,000/year. Defense contractors and the economy would not look too good if we pulled the spend out on the military. Then you have all those career Generals that have not gotten to retirement yet, shame.
Guess I have to admit, I am a little greedy too. I would like to retire gracefully too. Do not want to give up my Social Security or see my IRA accounts taxed to nothing. Would like to see the defict and spending reduced. What is the "the right input" for that?
If you have the time......
Vietnam.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHoP6suXZm4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=za9kTS9E3CU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sad73JroBsU&NR=1
Soviet-Afghanistan, first hand accounts of Russian troops and effects on them after the war today.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_Ftm2YLBx8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGTHW4UrTHc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmYjA4sIMW8
There was a lot of information that told us not to get boots on the ground, but we did it anyway.
Mission Creep.
Gian Gentile, Of course the
Gian Gentile,
Of course the combined arms skills have atrophied at the above-platoon level. The question is, "so what?" The fight we are in Now doesn't require it, it requires units capable of conducting intelligent counterinsurgent operations. It's poor policy to ignore the fight you're in now to prepare for the fight that isn't even on the horizon. Once we've completed operations in Afghanistan, or winded them down to a much smaller level, our forces can re-focus on HIC fights, and the doctrine that guides those operations is still with us (and with so many Battalion and higher level officers like yourself that refuse to adapt to the current situation); we will be able to regain proficiency in those skills. You sound like the officers of World War I that insisted their armies don't adapt their tactics to match the situation on the battlefield because it wasn't what they grew up with. If you insist on fighting a certain type of war, regardless of the actual situation on the ground, the result is a failure like that of Vietnam, or the current mess of a situation we find ourselves in in Afghanistan that could have been prevented if the war had been prosecuted properly from the beginning. Likewise, our army was suited Only for a HIC fight in 2003 so when we found ourselves in Baghdad without a clue what to do next, the result was an insurgency that our ill-advised operations continued to inflame through 2006. That you argue we were doing the same counterinsurgency then that we did post-2006 shows that you neither understood the operations on the ground from 2007 on, nor understand what properly executed counterinsurgency looks like. Ask anyone who served in a brigade deployed to Iraq in '05-'06 that returned in '07-'08 and they will tell you of the stark contrast in both the way they conducted operations and the resulting conditions.
There are a boatload of problems with the current war in Afghanistan, but the least concern to anyone over there fighting it is whether their battalion commander can maneuver his companies against an enemy that sticks and fights. Our army's skills in this type of combat have atrophied, but that is of secondary concern to the fact that our army as whole still hasn't learned how to fight counterinsurgency. I have yet to hear anyone on the side of counterinsurgency make the claim that this is the only type of conflict our armies will ever be involved in and that it is therefore the only type of conflict we should train for. Those calling for a greater emphasis on counterinsurgency at the expense of training for a HIC are talking about a temporary fix because for the past decade we've been involved in counterinsurgency, not HIC and for at least the next four years, we will continue to be involved with counterinsurgency, not HIC. Our army being able to conduct COIN isn't a silver bullet that will guarantee success in Afghanistan, but if we continue only to train on the next fight without training for the one we're currently fighting, then we're guaranteed to fail.
While I don't think you need
While I don't think you need to answer Anan's detailed orbat info, the fact that your positive account of operations in the Arghandab is praiseful of the Americans involved in Arghandab position by position, but offers no praise of or even comment on those American officers' ANSF partners is problematic. How well American forces are doing on their own in Arghandab recalls the Col. Harry Summers "Vietcong colonel" story: "True, but irrelevant."
Also, as was mentioned upthread, Arghandab was pretty peaceful, at least by Kandahar Province standards, as recently as late 2008. Now you could say that's because the Taliban had the run of the place, and we had insufficient resources, and you wouldn't be wrong, but the fact that it has since become a place for the routine conducting of complex kinetic operations is not necessarily any improvement on what it would have been like if there were still no U.S. forces there at all. Could be, sure, but not *necessarily.*
God I love Nir Rosen, still
God I love Nir Rosen, still hasnt drunk the Kool-Aid.
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/radio/2010/12/13/rosen...
Spoke to a recent group of
Spoke to a recent group of targeting CWOs who had just returned from both Iraq and Afghanistan and their comments do not match your experiences---nowhere to being close to their comments concerning issues and failures.
Andrew, Thanks for this,
Andrew,
Thanks for this, insightful as always. Quick question/comments:
You write that "Transition, for the United States and others, means turning over responsibility for the security of Afghanistan." I completely agree. I work on the Dari and Pashto literacy programs for the ANP here. In my experience, the ANP is beset by a wide range of problems - institutional corruption within its ranks and the ranks of the MoI in particular. In my two and a half years here, I've certainly seen progress but I don't think that it is commensurate in any way with the resources we've been pouring in. The Afghan Government just isn't the strategic partner that we need it to be and, as you wisely note, its interests are increasingly diverging from ours.
What are your thoughts on the progress of the ANSF (the ANP in particular) and their ability to start handling more and more responsibilities?
"The interests of the
"The interests of the international community and the interests of GIRoA might seriously diverge as we begin to transition."
This will come across as exceedingly snotty, but when were you planning on reading "Abandoning Vietnam" by James Willbanks, as recommended to you by Colonel Gentile?
Thanks
ADTS
"As Mr. Holbrooke was sedated
"As Mr. Holbrooke was sedated for surgery, family members said, his final words were to his Pakistani surgeon: "You've got to stop this war in Afghanistan."
Associated Press
Perhaps he thought he was talking to God?
For once I agree with Elf,
For once I agree with Elf, and as usual with Publius. If you read this post in combination with the speech given in the "Four days later" post, i get a distinctive "missive from the Eastern Fron approx 42" feeling. "Our boys are leaning into the fight", "No passing out of snicker bars" here, sir. "Wreaking havoc in enemy leadership", yes sir. The glorious defensive fight against the eastern enemy is going well on all fronts, we bleed them as we retreat sir.
Seriously, if you go by numbers such as friendlies killed, number of contacts a month, geographical dispersion of contacts, previously "safe" areas now in insurgency, enemy movement capacity within the battlespace, enemy logistic ability, and above all enemy morale and long-term strategy chance of sucess, can you with a straight face say that we are "winning"? (And has somebody defined the metrics for a "win" yet?)
Many argue from differing
Many argue from differing viewpoints that essentially conform in the whole. I wonder however if we should try to take a different perspective to inform our arguments more. It seems to me that few of us adopt an Afghan perspective and try to ask the question: Why?
Why is the government so prone to corruption? Some answers to this are in your third post regarding stopping the aid money - money and power corrupts easily. But what are the of this corruption that we can contend with? Are there components of corruption that are western bias views and not Afghan views?
What are the sources of the insurgency and the cause factors that we should be aware of from an Afghan (and Pakistan or regional) perspective? How do we address these?
Why does Pakistan not do more to eliminate the AG safe havens? Is it related to culture, politics, stability, or perhaps ensuring on-going instability in Afghanistan to counter Indian influence?
Why does the Drug Trade flourish and the attract larger numbers of Afghans in its growth, production and distribtution?
Also, turning to our own coalitions. Why do some nations act they way they do? Could the imposition of caveats and force employment restrictions etc relate to National, internal politiacl Agendas?
Why can't we do COIN more effectively? Are we constrained by Force Protection measures and political interference that undermines teh clear, build and hold strategy? If this is the right strategy, or even the selected one; why is it not being implemented according to best practice?
My personal involvement in ISAF operations combined with my analytical research causes me to question Why; to adopt a differing viewpoint. Too often I fear that any advice that is offered tends to become distilled into discrete elements that lose the efficacy within the systems perspective. I feel we should together identify the sources and then adopt strategies to tackle them from a systems perspective. There is likely no end state but there defintiely is a preferred vector (with magnitude and direction). Let's agree on the vector and support all efforts that advance and contribute to it.
For once I agree with Elf,
For once I agree with Elf, and as usual with Publius. If you read this post in combination with the speech given in the "Four days later" post, i get a distinctive "missive from the Eastern Fron approx 42" feeling. "Our boys are leaning into the fight", "No passing out of snicker bars" here, sir. "Wreaking havoc in enemy leadership", yes sir. The glorious defensive fight against the eastern enemy is sale auto parts - AC Compressor going well on all fronts, we bleed them as we retreat sir. Seriously, if you go by numbers such as friendlies killed, number of contacts a month, geographical dispersion of contacts, previously "safe" areas now in insurgency, enemy movement capacity within the battlespace, enemy logistic ability, and above all enemy morale and long-term strategy chance of sucess, can you with a straight face say that we are "winning"? (And has somebody defined the metrics for a "win" yet?)
Awesome Post. I add this Blog
Awesome Post. I add this Blog to my bookmarks.
Buildings are quite expensive
Buildings are quite expensive and not every person can buy it. Nevertheless, loans are created to support people in such hard situations.
Now so easy update era, good
Now so easy update era, good new things people are like, five fingers shoes more people buy, buy everyone reaction was good, said had five fingers shoes make them more like sports, Vibram five fingers Shoes make them more healthy, and virtually five fingers shoes improved walk pose.when you do outside actions, you will get additional comfortable by Vibram Five Fingers shoes.Your apple will can be begin to be superb consecutive Mens Vibram Sprint you apprehend the 5 feel shoes.Mens Vibram Sprint able abreast to are an abstractionl action of gucci outlet aberrant-hunting shoes.Also the gucci outlet online odd style of this shoe can make funny for those who really feel narious and tired in daily life.
Put on vibram five fingers kso feeling very deft, let you totally not bound and pressure. Five fingers shoes now special love by everybody. Five fingers shoes is a personality, also very breathable, let five toes won’t produce stink. In such a good weather, we should not hide in the home, weekends can go out for a walk, and also let us feel relaxed, that you did not good shoes because choose? Your feet are capable of preserving even more deal with over terrain than regular sneakers or shoes.
And so I don’t want to come out to you recommend five fingers shoes today. Five fingers shoes is to exercise design, because five fingers shoes very deft, you can wear five fingers shoes mountaineering, that won’t feel your foot tired, completely is barefoot feeling. vibram five fingers flow can also help you to exercise your body. A great sports shoe can solve this problem for you. vibram gucci sale five fingers shoes, it get a big success on it special design on shoes.
From your experience staying
From your experience staying in Afghanistan, what cultural aspect do admire most about the Afghan people? ulysse nardin
Yeah It is a great point in
Yeah It is a great point in deed however i think it could use a little more explanation.
___________________________________________________
Florida Insurance | prescription discount card | workers comp lawyer
Thanks for it.It increase my
Thanks for it.It increase my Knowledge
computer notes
Add your comment