Nation Building

David Brooks has a column in today's New York Times arguing for McChrrystal's recommendation to increase the amount of US troops in Afghanistan.

And David Brooks hits the nail on the head on at least one major point. "You [cannot] fight a counterinsurgency war with a light footprint." The US cannot make the same mistake that Rumsfeld made in Iraq. Either the US must hunker down and send more troops and prepare itself for a difficult, long, and maybe winnable road ahead. Or the US must pack up and leave. Brooks does not shy away from using even stronger language to describe the choices. He writes, the US must "surrender the place to the Taliban or do armed nation-building."

And this is something that almost all supporters of the War in Afghanistan have refused to say. No one wants to call it "nation building." The neoconservative ghosts of old are supposed to be dead and buried. But the truth seems to be that in a nation that is as complex as Afghanistan (diversity and drug cartels among other things), and that has as strong an insurgency as it does, the only real options are committing to a long haul which includes substantial infrastructure-building or packing up.

This, however, is the point where Brooks and I deviate. He goes on to argue that the war is a war of necessity (something even Richard Haas has questioned). He reasons that the US must fight in Afghanistan; if it does not then Afghanistan will fall to the Taliban (probably true), and if it falls to Taliban then al-Qaeda will have a safe haven (maybe) and nuclear-armed Pakistan will be in grave danger (I'm not so sure).

Of all the bold broad strokes that he paints, this is the one that I'm most intrigued by and most unsure of. In all that I've read about Afghanistan, I still don't fully understand how the conflict in Afghanistan affects Pakistan. I know that much of the fighting in Afghanistan is along its mountainous border with Pakistan. But the Taliban is not a monolith, as Brooks suggests when he writes that "the Taliban is a transnational Pashtun movement active in both Afghanistan and Pakistan." As Christia and Semple argue in the July/August issue of Foreign Affairs, the Taliban is more of a patchwork of self-interested and pragmatic tribal groups that first and foremost look out for their own political survival. They may fight in two nations, but they are not a movement as Brooks argues. And I don't understand the relationship between the Taliban and al-Qaeda either. I know the two share similar visions of a shar'ia rule South Asia. But how much do they work together, and how willing would Taliban factions be to fight against al-Qaeda?

Figuring out these questions affects where I stand on whether this a war of choice or a war of necessity. These two questions seem integral to the debate over a US troop increase. Brooks makes a strong argument about how the war must be fought, it's arguing if the war must be fought (and if not, what viable alternatives exist) that is lacking.

Thoughts on "Flipping the Taliban"

In a July/August 2009 Foreign Affairs article titled, "Flipping the Taliban: How to Win Afghanistan," Fotini Christia and Michael Semple argue that it is possible to "flip" Taliban commanders, and convince them to put down their guns and take part in the democratic Afghani national government. Christia and Semple write that "For all their reputed fanaticism...Taliban commanders will leave the movement and shift allegiances if the conditions are right" (37).

That's a pretty big if that will take lots of work for the US, Afghani government, and international actors. Nonetheless, although the climb may be steep, it's surmountable. Christia and Semple briefly look at Afghanistan's recent history--3 plus decades of war. Fighting that's involved feuding Afghani factions, Islamist from near and far(Tajik and Uzbek Islamists, as well as al Qaeda), and international powers (the erstwhile Soviet Union, and the US). 3 Decades. That's an incredibly difficult thing for me to imagine. However, Semple and Christia argue that it has bred a pragmatism among Taliban commanders. They see Afghanistan's recent history as "replete with examples of commanders choosing to flip rather than fight" (36). What's more, there's popular support on the ground for mediation between the Taliban and national government.(They cite a February 2009 poll where 64% of Afghani respondents stated they wanted the two to negotiate a settlement whereby the Taliban puts down its guns and is allowed to hold office).

Their prescription for flipping the Taliban is pursuing a political surge to accompany the military surge that is currently underway. Despite the difficulty of executing this "surge", it all sounds pretty common sensical: provide better security for Afghans, strengthen a reconciliation program that can protect and reintegrate Taliban fighters that choose flip, target networks and midlevel commanders (rather than just low level recruits), and work on building towards a comprehensive peace agreement while an incremental political and military strategy is being implented.

Their prescription strikes me as smart and well thought-out. So, I guess I don't have any particularly strong feelings about the details of their ideas.

My mind is on bigger concepts. I feel sympathy for Afghan's rough history, and I believe it's regrettable that the US is involved in Afghanistan. I don't think that nation building and military invention in politically unstable nations is a sustainable foreign policy. Yet, in the case of Afghanistan, I believe the US is stuck between a rock and a hard place (Afghanis are stuck between two rougher and scarier things..) A military surge--as well as a political surge that the US must help organize--is necessary to keep al Qaeda out. And I believe that at this point, the US must do all it can to bring stability and safety to Afghanistan. But the change trying to be accomplished takes patience. It must be incremental and must be a result of sustained political (and military) policy. Christia and Semple offer patient and pragmatic suggestions for future US policy in Afghanistan--for instance, looking ahead, they write that " 'patriotic' Taliban must be allowed to claim some of the success for the Afghanization of the country's security"--but that still doesn't make it easy. And from these difficult times, the US must learn and figure out a foreign policy that balances concerns of stability and protection from religious extremism, while also conserving troops and money.

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Here's a NYTimes article that among other things, reminds me that social problems and inequity lie at the base of much of the extremism and instability that adversely shapes US foreign policy. Kyrgyzstan