The decision to increase the number of troops, while a natural step to invigorate the haggard and thinly spread NATO and U.S. forces, presents a complicated scenario for military intervention where the lessons of Iraq may not apply.
A quick survey of history shows that military action in the country has ended in resounding defeats for the occupying forces. The Russian Invasion of 1979 and the Anglo-Afghan Wars of the 18th century resulted in painfully protracted guerilla warfare, where neither country succeeded in wresting control from the Afghans. That is not to say the conditions of the Coalition’s involvement or comport are the same as those of the British and Russians, or that the U.S. cannot impose stability in the country. Yet we would do well to revisit these particular episodes, as Afghanistan may well prove to be the intractable quagmire the U.S. population so feared in Iraq.
For one thing, the troop surge heralded as the turn-around maneuver in Iraq will be hard to pull off in the context of Afghanistan. Plagued by a lack of infrastructure, weak governing institutions, low levels of health and literacy and an economy based largely on the illegal trade of poppies, many elements of the surge are simply not applicable in Afghanistan. The tribal groups in the country have multifarious interests and are just as likely to support the Taliban as they are to aid Coalition forces, precluding some sort of “Sunni awakening movement” capable of undermining the Taliban and other insurgents. The lack of key cities in which to concentrate troops, the larger country and extreme terrain and weather dilute the effectiveness of the expected 82,000 U.S. and allied soldiers. Many experts believe it was General David Petraeus’s redeployment of the troops among Iraqi neighborhoods to mix with civilians, build trust and gather intelligence that made the difference in the surge. To do anything remotely similar in Afghanistan, the U.S. would need a troop presence well above even the 140,000 in Iraq.
The decision to send in an additional 17,000 soldiers would best be seen as an initial step for future U.S. policy in Afghanistan. Too paltry to be a full-on surge, the troop increase will help stabilize the situation in the country, where levels of violence have peaked since the initial invasion in 2001 and are expected to increase at the onset of summer. The insurgents’ use of Pakistan’s self-governing northwestern tribal area as a staging ground and sanctuary further complicates the matter, extending the conflict further into Pakistan, where experts fear a destabilization of the new civilian government. In Afghanistan itself, public support for the war and President Hamid Karzai has eroded as a new U.N. report shows U.S. and NATO troops caused 45 percent of civilian casualties in 2008.
There are, however, some encouraging signs that Afghanistan will not see a repetition of the mistakes made in the Middle East. Unlike the boisterous claims and promises made at the beginning of the war in Iraq, Petraeus, America’s most famous warrior-scholar and head of U.S. Central Command, offers a sobering assessment of the challenges ahead. In a recent interview for Foreign Policy, he acknowledges many of the tactics used in Iraq will not work, emphasizing instead “context-specific techniques that will serve the population, in addition to securing it.” To this I would add increased civilian reconstruction of democratic institutions, rule of law, infrastructure and long-term training of the Afghan military and police. Measures that were hard to muster for the surge in Iraq are indispensable in Afghanistan where existing institutions are so much weaker.
Besides the daunting challenges in Afghanistan, Obama must also convince Americans at home that a comprehensive approach and sustained commitment is the necessary course of action at a time when the unraveling of the economy takes precedence. Likewise, he must make an impassioned appeal to the disenchanted NATO allies, many facing domestic pressure to minimize their involvement in the war. In either case, Obama must bring to bear his eloquence and a comprehensive strategy to fight in what should have been the original theater against terrorism.