“Tweaks” to our Afghanistan War Strategy
An article in Sunday’s Boston Globe reported that Senate Foreign Relations Chairman John Kerry (D-Mass.) is calling for a revision of US strategy in Afghanistan with a more limited focus for the mission and a significant reduction in the number of American forces deployed there. The story has garnered considerable attention as Senator Kerry is seen as a key proponent of the Obama administration’s strategy in Afghanistan and was a supporter of the plan to “surge” an additional 30,000 troops into the country.
However, the Globe issued a clarification this morning, stating that Kerry had in fact not called for a “significant” reduction in US military forces, but rather a “tweak” of current strategy that would reduce US troop levels by an unspecified amount and place a greater emphasis on counter-terrorism.
Regardless of the correction to the record, other statements made by Senator Kerry in the Globe story depict an important administration ally moving toward a critical re-examination of the assumptions and goals underlying US involvement in Afghanistan. Indications of such a shift are particularly significant given the upcoming round of oversight hearings in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Further, they echo concerns over Afghanistan from a growing number of voices in Congress on both sides of the aisle.
Senator Kerry’s concerns over the current strategy come on two main points that hold considerable promise should they become a focus of the oversight hearings:
First, Sen. Kerry calls for clarification on the metrics of success in Afghanistan, noting that despite claims of recent military gains there is general agreement that no military solution to the conflict exists. Rather he states, “What I worry about is whether or not the government [improves] sufficiently to make a difference.”
This worry is well-founded, as evidenced by CJ Chivers’ article in Sunday’s New York Times which describes a shadow government run by the Taliban and flourishing in the vacuum left by the Karzai administration in Kabul. However, while Kerry’s focus on governance is warranted, difficulties in extending the reach of the central government must not slow efforts to forward the political negotiations whose success should be the true measure of an effective strategy.
Second, Sen. Kerry seems intent on defining US strategic interests in Afghanistan. In the Boston Globe article Kerry differentiates between Vietnam and the war in Afghanistan stating, “Unlike Vietnam, where there was no threat to the United States, and no real strategic interest…here there is a real one.”
There are indeed real strategic interests for the United States in Afghanistan and the oversight committee hearings that Senator Kerry will serve on would do well to keep focused on them.
The first: prevent Afghanistan from becoming a “safe haven” that could significantly enhance Al Qaeda’s ability to organize and conduct attacks on the United States.
The second: keep the conflict in Afghanistan from threatening the stability of the Pakistani state and the security of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal.
Both of these interests would best be served by putting the full weight of US engagement in Afghanistan behind the effort to reach a political settlement.
On the first point, a report published today by the Center for International Cooperation at N.Y.U. argues that the relationship between Al Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban is a matter of pragmatic politics rather than ideology. This finding highlights the potential of a political approach to achieve the separation between Al Qaeda and the Taliban necessary to accomplish the US’ strategic goal of denying Al Qaeda a safe haven in Afghanistan. On the other hand, the reports authors argue that increased military targeting of Taliban field commanders and provincial leaders has left the movement in the hands of increasingly younger and more radical fighters and, if continued, this strategy will strengthen the influence of Al Qaeda among the Taliban.
As for the second point, engaging regional stakeholders like Pakistan and India in the process of creating a political settlement in Afghanistan holds far more promise for stabilizing the Pakistani state and safeguarding its nuclear arsenal than carrying on an increasingly kinetic military campaign that encourages the maintenance of sanctuaries for militant groups within Pakistan and radicalizes generations of Pakistanis in the furor over drone attacks in their country.
