ASG Blog
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Quagmires Make for Strange Bedfellows
Published: March 18th, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study GroupSome might say that it would take a particularly cold day in political hell (or Washington D.C. for that matter) for conservative Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA-46) and progressive Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH-10) to seek warmth under the legislative covers with one another. Well, it was a balmy 63 degrees on Thursday in our nation’s capital and yet the two congressmen did it anyway in voting together on a resolution calling for all U.S. troops to be withdrawn from Afghanistan by the end of the year.
To be clear, that’s the Dennis Kucinich who regularly introduces legislation to create a Department of Peace and the same Dana Rohrabacher who told an Afghanistan Study Group media conference call Thursday afternoon, “First and foremost, I’m not a pacifist in any sense of the word,” just before he headed to the House floor to cast his vote for withdrawal.
Rep. Rohrabacher is no newcomer to the dilemmas of Afghanistan policy and has been deeply involved in the country for over thirty years. What that experience tells him is that the war in Afghanistan is a disaster.
A disaster strategically: “We have evolved into a whole different mission since the Taliban were driven out. Our mission now has become to force a centralized government…onto the people of Afghanistan…slowly but surely the conflict has become about that. And we cannot win at that.”
A disaster for national security: “I think that an ongoing effort in Afghanistan with a mission that one cannot succeed in with military action weakens us tremendously in dealing with the other challenges in the region.”
A disaster fiscally: “In terms of cost…if we’re going to balance the budget…(we’re) howling about a $50 million expenditure for some radio station, yet we just let this go by for billions of dollars worth of expenditure without having any guarantee of success.”
A disaster morally: “…it certainly is immoral for us to be sending our troops over there and putting them at risk and seeing even more hundreds of them give up their lives and give up parts of their body for a mission that can’t be won.”
Afghanistan Study Group co-founder Steve Clemons asked Rep. Rohrabacher if the upcoming vote would mark the first time he found himself in agreement with Kucinich and Rohrabacher replied, “I think 98% of the time I’m on the other side, but there is this one little area of agreement.”
The “little area of agreement” that is opposition to the failed strategy in Afghanistan grows bigger by the day. Last year Kucinich’s proposal to withdraw troops garnered 65 votes. This year it got 93.
And let’s not forget the little area of agreement among the two-thirds of the American public who want an end to this disastrous war.
You can listen to the audio of Representative Rohrabacher’s media conference call below.
Conference Call with Rep. Rohrabacher
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#WINNING in Afghanistan
Published: March 16th, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study Group
Rolling Stone reporter Michael Hastings on the parallels between the PR campaign of a self-destructive major drug-consuming Hollywood star and General Petraeus’ publicity tour for a self-destructive policy in major drug-producing Afghanistan:
“This is the Charlie Sheen counterinsurgency strategy. Which is to give exclusive interviews to every major network saying you’re winning and hope the U.S. public actually agrees with you.”
But the public isn’t buying the spin in either case…
…and both parties need to admit they have a problem and seek help.
Nearly two-thirds of Americans now believe that the war in Afghanistan is no longer worth fighting and close to three-quarters say Obama should withdraw a “substantial number” of combat troops this summer according to a new Washington Post / ABC News poll.
These figures show the highest level of public disapproval yet for the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan. They were released the same day that Gen. Petraeus traveled to Capitol Hill to testify in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee on his first nine months in charge of the war.
One would think that such overwhelming evidence of their constituents’ opposition to the war would prod the senators on the committee into asking some tough questions about the Pentagon’s claims of success. But in four hours of testimony the senators failed to push back on any of the assertions of progress being made in the stacks of pie charts and bar graphs handed out by Petraeus’ staff. For all the accolades and slow pitch questions tossed his way, the general might well have mistaken the senate hearing for softball practice. Here’s the link to the C-Span video: http://www.c-spanarchives.org/videoLibrary/event.php?id=191964 . Don’t watch it while operating heavy machinery.
Petraeus’ mantra of “significant” and yet “fragile and reversible” progress was apparently enough to lull his audience into complacency. When it came time to discuss the number of troops that would be brought home in accordance with the July deadline, Petraeus got away with saying he hadn’t decided yet. When senators referenced the new poll numbers showing the American public’s increasing disagreement with the war it was only to tee-up a canned clarification from Petraeus as to “why we fight.”
For his part, Senator Lieberman (I-Conn.) attributed the ongoing decline in public support to the sorry state of the American economy rather than disapproval of the war itself. (Psst…Hey Joe, there’s a connection.)
Sen. Lieberman: “we have to remind the American people why we are in Afghanistan, why it’s worth it, and that we are succeeding.”
If Sen. Lieberman wants to convince the American public that the current strategy is succeeding he would do well to direct their attention away from the testimony given by senior U.S. intelligence officials in front of the same Armed Services Committee just last week. The stories don’t jibe:
Gen. Petraeus: “The momentum achieved by the Taliban in Afghanistan since 2005 has been arrested in much of the country and reversed in a number of important areas.”
Lt. Gen. Ronald Burgess (Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency): “The Taliban in the south have shown resilience and still influence much of the population…in the east, the Taliban and Haqqani network have suffered numerous tactical and leadership losses with no apparent degradation in their capacity to fight.”
Charlie Sheen: “Winning!”
So far the Petraeus/Sheen approach to strategic communications has worked, at least inside the Beltway. Gen. Petraeus has long recognized that the hearts and minds on Capitol Hill were far more important than any that could be won in Kandahar or Helmand. As Michael Hastings noted in his Rolling Stone profile of Petraeus from February:
“One lesson he learned during the surge in Iraq is that it’s not what’s happening on the battlefield that counts – it’s what people in Washington think is happening. As Petraeus wrote in The American Military and the Lessons of Vietnam, his 1987 doctoral dissertation at Princeton, ‘What policymakers believe to have taken place in any particular case is what matters – more than what actually occurred.’ Success lies in finding the right metrics, telling the right story, convincing the right people we’re not losing. The key to victory, Petraeus concluded, is ‘perception.’”
But not all policymakers are reciting the mantra of “winning” while ignoring the demands of the American public. Governor Haley Barbour of Mississippi, for one, doesn’t need a general to tell him which way the political winds are blowing.
On Tuesday Gov. Barbour broke with his rivals in the Republican presidential primary by suggesting that the U.S. should reduce its presence in Afghanistan while speaking with reporters in Iowa:
“‘I think we need to look at that,’ he said when asked if the U.S. should scale back its presence… ‘What is our mission?’ Barbour said. ‘How many Al Qaeda are in Afghanistan. … Is that a 100,000-man Army mission?’”
With three-quarters of the American public calling for a substantial withdrawal of combat troops this summer and no other leading presidential candidates (let alone the candidate currently in the White House) listening to their demands, Gov. Barbour might be the one #winning in 2012.
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Gen. Petraeus Comes to Washington: Will Congress Buy What He’s Selling?
Published: March 15th, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study Group
This week the Afghanistan war’s top salesman is going door to door in Washington to hawk his counterinsurgency wares.
His newest product is a one-year old escalation of the conflict that increasingly looks like a bad paint job that was sprayed on to cover up the disastrous decade-long war underneath.
General Petraeus’ first house call was Monday at the Obama residence. There’s no way to know the exact details of the meeting, but it’s a fairly well-established rule of sales that if the homeowner invites you inside and offers you a seat on the couch you’ve probably got a deal. Of course, it also helps that President Obama is already a customer. Last year the Pentagon hooked the President on the 30,000 troop / $36 billion dollar Afghanistan “surge” with hard sell tactics that would make the guys at your local used car lot blush.
Last year, Petraeus’ successful pitch included dire warnings that without a troop surge the U.S. was on the brink of defeat in Afghanistan was key to selling military escalation. This year, the pitch is all about optimistic assertions of progress. This is where the performance element of salesmanship becomes critical–Gen. Petraeus will go before Congress this week to say with a straight face that the strategy is succeeding when in fact every indicator, from civilian casualties and the number of IED attacks on US troops to Afghans’ perception of government corruption and the number of provinces threatened by the insurgency say it is failing.
It increasingly looks like the American public hasn’t gotten what it paid for. A timeline including a “significant” drawdown of troops in July has been steadily walked back to an unspecified but insignificant number based on undefined “conditions on the ground.” Now military commanders are saying there will be a “significant” U.S. presence in Afghanistan for another eight to ten more years.
So Congress should ask Gen. Petraeus some hard questions about what he’s selling before they add another decade to the American public’s subscription to the longest war in U.S. history.
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The Afghanistan Weekly Reader – March 11, 2011
Published: March 11th, 2011
The week started with Secretary Gates’ unannounced visit to Afghanistan, in part to assess the number of troops that can be withdrawn starting in July (the President’s stated deadline). But Gates (or perhaps the media) buried the lead—while stating that enough progress had been made to begin reducing the American presence on time, he also made clear that our presence would continue to be significant not just through 2011, but even after the new understood date for withdrawal, 2014. One congressman recently returned from a visit to Afghanistan and said our commitment could last an additional 8 to 10 years—Gates himself raised the idea of permanent military bases.
Meanwhile, the debate between conservatives about the war is now in full bloom, with reliable neo-conservative outlets like the Weekly Standard continuing to cling to anecdotal evidence of “progress” to demonstrate why our commitment must be indefinite, and others, including well-regarded foreign policy conservatives like Cliff May asking questions about our continued involvement.
Next week’s visit to Capitol Hill by General Petraeus should be the best opportunity to ask hard questions about our long-term strategy and prospects.
Articles
U.S. Likely to Have a ‘Significant Presence’ In Afghanistan for 8 to 10 More Years: Dem Rep
The Huffington Post by Amanda Terkel
“WASHINGTON — The United States is likely to have a “significant presence” in Afghanistan for another eight to 10 years, according to a member of Congress who just returned from a trip to the region and has introduced legislation calling for a full accounting of the costs of the war.”Afghanistan Civilian Causalities: Year by Year, Month by Month
Guardian UK
“Civilian casualties in Afghanistan have increased, according to the latest statistics from the United Nations creating the highest total since 2006 for civilian deaths – the continued annual rises has seen over 8,000 killed in the past four years”.GOP Rep: Republicans Are Turning on the War In Afghanistan
TPM by Evan McMorris-Santoro
“A bipartisan group of House members are pushing a new plan to end the war in Afghanistan. Many of the lawmakers who spoke at event on Wednesday announcing the new effort have been outspoken on ending what has become America’s longest military conflict for years, but one Republican, Rep. Walter Jones (NC), says the names on the list of legislators opposing the Afghanistan conflict are expanding on his side of the aisle.”Opinion
The $110 Billion Question
The New York Times by Thomas L. Friedman
“When one looks across the Arab world today at the stunning spontaneous democracy uprisings, it is impossible to not ask: What are we doing spending $110 billion this year supporting corrupt and unpopular regimes in Afghanistan and Pakistan that are almost identical to the governments we’re applauding the Arab people for overthrowing?”Leaving Afghanistan?
The National Interest by Christopher Preble
“On Monday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, speaking in Kabul, stated that the United States “will be well-positioned to begin drawing down some U.S. and coalition forces this July.” But as Greg Jaffe of the Washington Post reports, the planned reductions likely wouldn’t lead to a major change in the U.S. mission in Afghanistan. Indeed, even as Gates is stating that the United States will adhere to its date to begin withdrawing troops, negotiations are in the works that could establish a long-term security presence for the U.S. beyond 2014 and might include permanent military bases.”America’s ‘Aimless Absurdity’ in Afghanistan
CATO Liberty by Malou Innocent
“Rasmussen reports that 52% of Americans want U.S. troops home from Afghanistan within a year, up from 43% last fall. Of course, polls are ephemeral snapshots of public opinion that can fluctuate with the prevailing political winds; nonetheless, it does appear that more Americans are slowly coming to realize the “aimless absurdity” of our nation-building project in Central Asia.”How’s That Population-Centric COIN Going?
The American Conservative by Kelley Vlahos
“If the success or failure of the Afghan military “surge” rests on whether the U.S can bring down the level of violence and protect the civilian population from the Taliban – a metric that the now fading COINdinistas had once insisted could be achieved with the right strategy — then two new statistics to emerge this week don’t bode well for the prospects of the nearly 2-year-old counterinsurgency operation in Afghanistan.”A Tale of Two Headlines…
Afghanistan Study Group by Will Keola Thomas
“The cognitive dissonance is giving me a headache. Two headlines from yesterday’s news …The Obama Administration: Gates Says U.S. May Stay in Afghanistan Past 2014 Deadline “Gates told troops in Afghanistan that the U.S. may remain in the country past a 2014 deadline for the end of combat operations… ‘We are fully prepared to have a continuing presence here assisting the Afghans after 2014…’” – National Journal The American Public:” -
Is This What Population-centric Counterinsurgency Looks Like?
Published: March 10th, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study Group
In the farmland west of Kandahar City the US Army is building what it calls a “Security and Commerce Wall” as part of its strategy to protect the Afghan people. But the reaction of the local population to the wall raises the question of whether their security and commercial interests are actually being protected.
The Scotsman’s Jerome Starkey recently reported on the “split” over construction of the 50-mile long barrier in Kandahar.
On one side: U.S. troops.
On the other: the local population those troops have been sent halfway around the world to protect.
From the U.S. Army’s perspective, the wall’s construction has been a success. Over the last few months it seems to have decreased attacks on Highway One, a critical supply route connecting Kandahar with Kabul.
And the local population’s view? Well…
“’It’s a stupid plan,’ said Haji Suliman, 48, from Sangsar…‘There are many ways the Taleban can use, and now some fields are so wet, we can’t farm them.’”
Starkey reports that during recent rains the wall turned into a dam that flooded fields on one side while keeping those on the other side starved for water. More than 56 sections of the barrier washed away because culverts for rainwater weren’t included, “…lest they provide places for homemade bombs, or tunnels for insurgents to crawl through.”
Come to think of it, a few tunnels might have increased local support for the wall, as insurgents aren’t the only ones whose freedom of movement has been denied. Many farmers’ fields are now separated from their homes by concrete.
US troops told Starkey they recognized that the wall would make life more difficult for locals in the short term. But it’s hard to see how locals will ever benefit from its construction.
Protection of the highway wasn’t a security concern for local people in the first place. As an Army captain told Starkey, “The road was always open, but if you were a soldier or a contractor and you drove through Zhari, you were going to get shot at. Private security convoys were harassed multiple times a day.”
Ay, there’s the rub with the counterinsurgency enterprise in Afghanistan.
A 50-mile long concrete wall is built through rural Kandahar to protect foreign troops and security contractors while they fight the insurgency…
…however the foreign troops can only defeat the insurgency by winning the local population’s support through providing economic development and security…
..but the population’s biggest security concern is the fighting between foreign troops and insurgents that rages around them…and their economic development is paralyzed by 50-mile long concrete walls that threaten their ability to provide for themselves…
…so instead of driving a wedge between insurgents and the population, counterinsurgency strategy as practiced in Kandahar is further dividing US troops from the people they are risking their lives to protect…
…which strengthens the insurgency…
…which is bad news for U.S. troops in harms way and Afghan civilians caught in the middle…
…but which is very good business for contractors who build walls in warzones…
…which is very bad news for U.S. taxpayers who are paying millions of dollars for a 50-mile long concrete wall in rural southern Afghanistan.
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The New COIN Doctrine: More Aid and Development to the Corrupt
Published: March 9th, 2011
Edward Kenney
Afghanistan Study Group BloggerOrbis Operations, a consulting firm which operates in Afghanistan, has just published an eye-opening report on development in Afghanistan. The main conclusion of the report is that policymakers wrongly assume that development can “win the hearts and minds” without improvements in governance and security:
[Development] is only effective in areas where security and governance are present.
Few would argue this point, but the report’s author Dr Mark Moyar has an…unorthodox solution to this problem:
“In provinces where the governor is well connected to the population and capable of marshaling broad public support, we most likely should continue allowing the Tweeds and Corleones to use development aid to strengthen their patronage networks.”
To clarify, Dr Moyar is suggesting that the U.S. use aid and development resources to encourage corruption networks. Apparently, this is the best way to encourage better governance. Dr. Moyar concedes that this policy will “slow the development of a bureaucratic state” and may only be effective in ethnically homogenous districts with powerful governors, but he contends that patronage networks can provide stability at significantly less cost.
And who is Dr Moyar’s model governor for this program? It’s Gul Agha Shirzai, Governor of Nangarhar—the same Shirzai whose heavy handed policies in Kandahar are partly responsible for creation of the Taliban, and who later forced many ex-Taliban back into the insurgency. The same Shirzai who has been implicated in the drug trade and who corruptly controls a major pass into Pakistan.
The scary thing is this: Moyar may be right. Counter-Insurgency’s best hope of success may be to encourage powerful warlords like Shirzai and feed their corruption.
Maybe it’s time for a different approach.
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A Tale of Two Headlines . . .
Published: March 8th, 2011
The cognitive dissonance is giving me a headache. Two headlines from yesterday’s news …
The Obama Administration:
Gates Says U.S. May Stay in Afghanistan Past 2014 Deadline
“Gates told troops in Afghanistan that the U.S. may remain in the country past a 2014 deadline for the end of combat operations… ‘We are fully prepared to have a continuing presence here assisting the Afghans after 2014…’” – National JournalThe American Public:
52% Want Troops Home from Afghanistan Within A Year
“A majority of voters, for the first time, support an immediate withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Afghanistan or the creation of a timetable to bring them all home within a year.”
- Rasmussen Reports -
The Obama Administration Can’t Hear You
Published: March 8th, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study Group
More voices calling for a new way forward in Afghanistan and further signs that we may be reaching a tipping point in America’s longest war.
Yesterday, MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan Show hosted Lt. Col. Anthony Schaffer of the Center for Advanced Defense Studies and Afghanistan Study Group member David Cortright for a discussion of the slow-motion train wreck that is current U.S. involvement in the Afghan conflict.
Definitely a “discussion,” rather than a “debate,” as the voices raised on the show were all in agreement that the current militaristic strategy will never solve (and is, in fact, exacerbating) the political problem at the heart of the matter in Afghanistan.
As members of the growing chorus urging the Obama administration to change its tune on the current military-centric approach to Afghanistan, Schaffer and Cortright’s voices are definitely in harmony, but they sing in slightly different keys:
Cortright in responsible-withdrawal-A-minor:
“We need to start the troop withdrawals in July. But that needs to be combined…with a whole series of other measures.” (direct talks with the Taliban leading to a cease-fire, a security agreement with the Afghan government to complement a phased withdrawal of US troops, strengthening social and economic development assistance, etc.)
Schaffer in get-the-hell-out-B-major: “I would start the withdrawal tomorrow.”
Guest host Matt Miller pitched in with this prescient and timely quote from Pultizer prize-winning historian Barbara W. Tuchman’s book, “The March of Folly: From Troy to Vietnam”:
“A phenomenon noticeable throughout history regardless of place or period is the pursuit by government of policies contrary to their own interests.”
Which prompted Cortright to hit the discussion’s high note:
“It’s been long past the time when there’s any benefit we could get from pursuing this military operation in Afghanistan…This current government (in Afghanistan) is unworthy of the sacrifice of our men and women in uniform.”
Alas, the Obama administration seems, at best, tone-deaf to both the clarion call of history warning them of their folly and the cries of even their most loyal supporters urging them to avoid disaster (witness the Democratic National Committee taking the unprecedented step of passing a resolution calling for the administration to begin the “…significant and sizable reduction (of U.S. forces) no later than July 2011.”).
Seen in the worst light, the Obama administration is playing hear-no-evil as the American public begs them to change course.
On Monday Defense Secretary Robert Gates declared that the U.S. may maintain a military presence in the Afghanistan past the 2014 deadline for the end of combat operations. That same day, Rasmussen Reports released the results of a poll showing that for the first time a majority of likely voters want a timetable to withdraw American troops from Afghanistan within one year. Further evidence of the continuous erosion of support for the war in both parties.
Secretary of State Clinton’s response to the American public’s call for change is reminiscent of someone plugging fingers in their ears and saying “la-la-la-la” at the sound of bad news. As she stated in a December press conference:
“I’m well aware of the popular concern, and I understand it. But I don’t think leaders — and certainly this president will not — make decisions that are matters of life and death and the future security of our nation based on polling. That would not be something that you will see him, or any of us, deciding.”
Of course the Obama administration can continue to ignore the public opinion polls demanding withdrawal from Afghanistan. That is, until those officially sanctioned opinion polls called elections come around in November. But to wait until then to listen to the voice of reason and realize that the pursuit of the current failed strategy is against our own best interests is truly the march of folly.
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The Afghanistan Quagmire: World’s Best Military Pushed to Breaking Point Over an Unclear Mission
Published: March 7th, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study Group
It’s impossible for Republican Rep. Walter Jones of North Carolina to ignore the enormous costs of the war in Afghanistan. That’s because those costs are borne disproportionately by the constituents of his district, which is home to Cherry Point (the world’s largest Marine Corp Air Station), Camp Lejeune (where 43,000 Marines are based), Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, and more than 60,000 retired servicemen and women.
While one would expect that having such a large segment of his constituency in uniform would lead Rep. Jones to toe the Pentagon’s line on the war in Afghanistan, his constant interaction with those service-members has in fact led him to become one of Congress’ most vocal and consistent critics of continuing U.S. military involvement in a conflict that he says is “…physically and mentally breaking the military.”
In February, Rep. Jones co-sponsored a bipartisan bill that could have saved the U.S. more than $100 billion a year by ending the war in Afghanistan. That legislative effort hit a roadblock when an odd-couple marriage of President Obama and newly elected House Republicans who support continuing the counterproductive status quo in Afghanistan refused to support the legislation.
But the temporary setback hasn’t silenced Walter Jones. His constituents returning from tours in Afghanistan won’t let him rest. As he says in this video interview with Michael Ostrolenk:
“I’m hearing from Marines that they don’t know what the end point is in Afghanistan. And why in the world are we supporting a corrupt government? Why are we letting our kids die for a corrupt government?…Please for God’s sake pick up the phone and call your senators and House members and say, “Get our troops out of Afghanistan.”
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Morning Cup of Get Out of Afghanistan
Published: March 3rd, 2011
Will Keola Thomas – Afghanistan Study Group
Washington finally appears to be coming to the conclusion that the American public did months ago: people are tired of the war in Afghanistan and don’t know why we’re sacrificing American lives and dollars there. But those on Capitol Hill and in the White House with the power to act on that knowledge aren’t discussing their conclusions openly.
An exception, is the following must-watch discussion from yesterday’s Morning Joe with Scarborough, Chuck Todd, and Tom Brokaw all questioning the value of putting our soldier’s in harm’s way:
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Joe’s been on the case for a while. If you missed it, last week Scarborough hosted another important discussion following Secretary Gates’ revelation that the war in Afghanistan is just plain crazy. (Preview of Scarborough not pulling punches: “These are unwinnable wars. The president knows it. The Secretary of Defense knows it. The Republicans who are pushing to stay there longer know it…It’s disgusting.”)
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