Regarding Afghanistan, the author [of the historical background essay] and the two [featured] commentators focused upon arguing that we must spend additional billions and station troops there for many years to come, and then things will probably work out OK. I too strongly favor spending more, and retaining U.S. troops inside the country.
Strategika, however, is about military history, not policy advocacy. Afghanistan is already an historical American failure. Mr. Bush had unshakeable confidence in his messianic beliefs, assessment of leaders, and firm decision-making. Due to this trifecta of hubris, he bears the heaviest responsibility for the failure. When Mr. Bush changed the mission in Afghanistan to democratic nation-building, he committed America to a task that takes decades, if not centuries. It was a mission that could not be accomplished at acceptable cost and time to the American public.
He appraised in positive terms Putin of Russia, Maliki of Iraq, Karzai of Afghanistan, and Musharraf of Pakistan. All four repaid his trust with duplicity. He did not solicit options; he took pride in his unilateral decisions as commander-in-chief. That did not work out well.
Today, Fallujah is held by Sunni terrorists because we backed Maliki, a sectarian Shiite tyrant. Iraq is not a democracy. Neither is it stable nor a contributor to American interests.
We failed to achieve victory in Afghanistan. The Army and Marines, especially Generals McChrystal and Petraeus, embraced nation-building and protecting ten million Pashtun tribesmen. The central message of the Counterinsurgency (COIN) Field Manual was that the American military, by fostering good works and honest government, would persuade a population to abandon an insurgent cause. A battalion commander was to pursue four lines of operations: security (i.e., patrolling), providing projects and jobs, installing honest and competent government officials, and establishing the Western rule of law.
British Field Marshall Slim wrote, “Commanders in the field must be clearly and definitively told what is the object they are locally to attain.”
What was that clear objective? General Petraeus said, “I’m always leery of using terms like winning. Conduct a comprehensive civil/military counterinsurgency campaign. Areas of progress, we’ve got to link those together, extend them and, and then build on it because, of course, security progress is the foundation for everything else, for the governance progress, the economic progress, rule-of-law progress and so forth.”
That is not a clear, attainable military task. 1,000 U.S. and UK platoons could not protect 5,000 Pashtun villages. No tribes ever came over to our side as happened in Iraq. After 13 years, Afghanistan remained the most corrupt nation in the world.
Bush and Obama said they would defeat the Taliban. There is no record that any general explained to either president that such a defeat was impossible, given the aid and sanctuary provided by a perfidious Pakistan. The Taliban still roam the Green Zone, while the Afghan National Army (ANA) holds outposts on highways and in major centers, thus safeguarding the urban half of the population.
Secretary Gates wrote, “Troops risking their lives, need to be told that their goal is to ‘defeat those trying to kill them.’”
General McChrystal, however, said, “I wanted to take away any incentives that might drive commanders and their men to see killing insurgents as the primary goal.”
“Military history must never stray from the tragic story of killing,” wrote Victor David Hanson. “To speak of war in any other fashion brings with it a sort of immorality. Euphemism in battle narrative or the omission of graphic killing altogether is a near criminal offense of the military historian.”
In Afghanistan, that omission became the direct mission. The magical, metaphysical mission was to persuade the Pashtun tribes rather than to kill the enemy. General McChrystal said, “I directed all units to cease reporting…insurgents killed.”
We reported our casualties and civilian casualties, but not enemy casualties. The platoons I embedded with were genuinely confused and skeptical of directives from the top.
Before deciding in 2009 to surge in 30,000 troops, President Obama had asked General Petraeus, “David, tell me now. I want you to be honest with me. You can do this in 18 months?”
At the time, Petraeus was in charge of the Central Command, with Afghanistan as a subordinate command under General McChrystal.
“Sir, I’m confident we can train and hand over to the ANA in that time frame [i.e., mid-2011],” Petraeus replied.
Eighteen months to turn around a country the size of Texas. Wow!
In 2009, Gates was determined “to win.” By 2011, he wrote that his goal was to “prevent a defeat.” How did our Secretary of Defense and our most distinguished general reach such different conclusions?
The test of success is whether you would repeat the process. No prudent general would again undertake the meandering, dithering strategy we pursued in Afghanistan from 2001 through 2013.
