Afghanistan Mission Creep Watch - The Future Version Posted by Michael Cohen

Barack Obama on March 27th, 2009:

As President, my greatest responsibility is to protect the American people. We are not in Afghanistan to control that country or to dictate its future.

The newly released ISAF guidance for counterinsurgency in Afghanistan:

Essentially, we and the insurgents are presenting an argument for the future to the people of Afghanistan: they will decide which argument in most attractive, most convincing, and has the greatest chance of success.

 . . . We need to understand the people and see things through their eyes. It is their fears, frustrations and expectations that we must address.

Sigh. But this isn't even my favorite part of this guide:

Earn the support of the people and the war is won, regardless of how many militants are killed or captured. We must undermine the insurgent argument while offering a more compelling alternative. Our argument must communicate - through word and deed - that we and GIRoA have the capability and commitment to protect and support the people. Together, we need to provide a convincing and sustainable sense of justice and well-being to a weary and skeptical populace. We must turn perceptions from fear and uncertainty to trust and confidence.

And I would like a pony for every man, woman and child in Afghanistan.

Surely it's important to communicate that ISAF and GIRoA have the capability to protect and support them. But what if we don't actually posses that capability . . . or commitment for that matter.

Honestly, I urge you to read this guide and it's wonderful pie in the sky predictions about what a counter-insurgency can accomplish in Afghanistan. And then ask yourself: how are we going to achieve these goals if we a) don't have enough American troops; b) lack the political will to remain in Afghanistan at current troops levels for 5-10 years. (I mean does anyone think we're going to make a dent in Afghanistan's problem in 12-18 months); c) have little support from the Afghan government, the Afghan military and the Afghan police.

How exactly are we going to "provide a convincing and sustainable sense of justice and well-being" to the people of Afghanistan without these resources? Not to mention the fact, it's very hard to see why this would be in our national interest. Hell, how about turning perceptions of fear and uncertainty to trust and confidence here in America! It might actually help pass health care.

Yesterday, I spoke about the growing gulf between our intentions and capabilities in Afghanistan. You want prima facie evidence - read this guide and then read this article from the Sunday New York Times about how the Marines in Helmand province don't have the resources to carry out their mission.

And then maybe have a stiff drink.

"A Small Cabal of Homogenous Folks" Posted by Heather Hurlburt

it must be August if I'm on the NY Times website debating the role of emotion in politics and arguing that that halcion past where white men sat around making all the decisions behind closed doors was not really so devoid of emotion -- surely one way of reading the Inspector General's report released yesterday is as a record of what happens when fear is not just allowed to drive everything bu explicitly made the foundation of reasonign and policy-making.

NSN Daily Update: August 25, 2009 Posted by The Editors

To see today's complete Daily Update, click here.

What We're Reading

While officials in Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s cabinet believe Karzai won last week’s elections convincingly, preliminary results show a split vote with the main challenger, Dr. Abdullah Abdullah. Various claims of fraud continue to be raised.

Fury in Britain and the United States continues over the early release of the Lockerbie bomber. However, the United States has limited options.

North and South Korea discuss an initiative to unify families separated by the Korean War, while South Korea launches its first rocket into space.

China surpasses the United States in the production of solar panel technology.

Commentary of the Day

Bob Herbert discusses the incongruity of Obama’s characterization of Afghanistan as a war of necessity while maintaining an all-volunteer army that uses only a fraction of the US population to fight our wars of need.

David Ignatius argues that Iranian influence in Iraq’s national intelligence service is exacerbating sectarian differences and reducing managerial integrity.

An Afghan witness describes how threats of Taliban intimidation during the recent Afghan presidential election were exploited by election officials to commit fraud in favor of incumbent Hamid Karzai.

Afghanistan Mission Creep Watch - The Hopeless, Not Hard Version Posted by Michael Cohen

Over at abumuqawama, Andrew Exum approvingly cites Robert Kagan's op-ed in the Washington Post on the issue of wars of necessity vs. wars of choice.  As is often the case with a Kagan op-ed it reduces a complicated question about fighting wars to a black and white issue - all wars, unless the United States is being invaded or in imminent danger, are ones of choice says Kagan:

It would have been bad if the United States had not defended South Korea in 1950 . . . but it would not have been the end of the world, either. The United States and the West suffered far more from the Soviet Union's stationing of the Red Army across Eastern Europe after World War II, but no one, including Haass, claims it was necessary to go to war with Stalin in 1945.

The fact is, unless the nation is invaded or its very survival is imminently threatened, going to war is always a choice. So what is the point of trying to make this elusive distinction anyway?

For many, including Obama, the present purpose is to distinguish Afghanistan from Iraq, Obama's "good" war from George W. Bush's "bad" war. But it won't work. As Haass correctly argues, right or wrong, they were both wars of choice.

This is wrong on a number of counts. First, it must be noted that even if you buy Kagan's formulation, there can still be good wars of choice and bad wars of choice. So Korea was likely a good choice (well until MacArthur brought the Chinese Army across the Yalu), same goes for the Gulf War. Iraq, a bad choice - same for Vietnam.

But Kagan has this whole thing backwards. The war in Afghanistan began as a war of necessity and to some extent continues to be one, because policymakers have convinced themselves that it is a war they must fight to prevent a return of an al Qaeda safe haven to Afghanistan (which would of course pose an existential threat to the United States). If you believe, for example, as Peter Bergen does that "if the Taliban did come back to power in Afghanistan, of course they would give safe haven to al Qaeda" (a rather amazing statement I might add) then of course the war in Afghanistan is a necessity.

The problem here is that we have policymakers who are operating under the dubious assumption that the current war in Afghanistan - and the current mission - is a war of necessity.  Indeed, has any president who sent troops into harm's way not believed that it was absolutely necessary to do so? So yes, let's stop arguing about wars of necessity and wars of choice - and instead let's question the assumptions that lead us to believe any war not in the country's self-defense must be fought.

Even more striking than Kagan's argument, however, is the response of Andrew Exum. He recounts a story of being quizzed by public servants as to "What are we doing in Afghanistan and why are we there in the first place?" his reaction is "this is now Obama's war, and he and Stan McChrystal need to explain to the American people in non-IR-speak why we are in Afghanistan and what we are doing there."

Yes, I suppose that is one solution. But one would imagine that if so many people were asking me "What are we doing in Afghanistan and why are we there in the first place?" it might cause me to step back and say NOT how can I sell this war better, but if after 8 years, people are still asking me this question then maybe the whole enterprise doesn't make a lot sense.

What is striking to me about the "hard not hopeless" crowd is that they no matter how "hopeless" things seem in Afghanistan, it's still not "too hard" that we shouldn't muddle through. For every indication that we don't have enough troops on the ground, that we don't have the support of the Afghan government and security forces, that the American people are increasingly unconvinced that we should be fighting this war . . there is always another call to do more, to give it another 12 months, to improve the PR job, to send more troops etc. There is always something more that can be done, except that is, actually changing course.

When does hopeless actually become . . hopeless.

Afghanistan Mission Creep Watch - The Helmand Sideshow Posted by Michael Cohen

If you want to get as frustrated as I am about the current US policy in Afghanistan read this article in the New York Times - it's all about how the Marine offensive in Helmand province IS in fact a sideshow:

In a region the Taliban have lorded over for six years, and where they remain a menacing presence, American officers say their troops alone are not enough to reassure Afghans. Something is missing that has left even the recently appointed district governor feeling dismayed. “I don’t get any support from the government,” said the governor, Massoud Ahmad Rassouli Balouch

Governor Massoud has no body of advisers to help run the area, no doctors to provide health care, no teachers, no professionals to do much of anything. About all he says he does have are police officers who steal and a small group of Afghan soldiers who say they are here for “vacation.”

It all raises serious questions about what the American mission is in southern Afghanistan — to secure the area, or to administer it — and about how long Afghans will tolerate foreign troops if they do not begin to see real benefits from their own government soon. American commanders say there is a narrow window to win over local people from the guerrillas.

What this article makes clear is that the US mission in Helmand lacks the resources to be carried out effectively - in short, it highlights the monstrous inconsistency between our goals in Afghanistan and our capabilities.

For example, look at what the President said last week in Phoenix about the US mission and American troops:

They're adapting new tactics, knowing that it's not enough to kill extremists and terrorists; we also need to protect the Afghan people and improve their daily lives. And today, our troops are helping to secure polling places for this week's election so that Afghans can choose the future that they want.

But this isn't what's happening. I don't doubt that it's our intention, but the facts on the ground suggest otherwise. Let's catalog all the challenges to our current mission:

1) We don't have enough US troops:

The Marine battalion, which deployed with less than 40 percent of its troops, can regularly patrol only a small portion of its 6,000-square-mile area. . . That leaves no regular troop presence across the vast southernmost reaches of Helmand. On the Pakistani border the town of Baramcha — a major smuggling hub and Taliban stronghold — remains untouched by regular military units

2) The Afghan Army and police is of little help:

He (Governor Massoud) said he was promised 120 police officers, but only 50 showed up. He said many were untrustworthy and poorly trained men who stole from the people, a description many of the Americans agree with. No more than 10 percent appear to have attended a police academy, they say. “Many are just men from the streets,” the governor said.

The Afghan National Army contingent appears sharper — even if only one-sixth the size that Governor Massoud said he was promised — but the soldiers have resisted some missions because they say they were sent not to fight, but to recuperate.

3) There is no support from the Afghan government:

“Without the Afghan government, we will not be successful,” said Capt. Korvin Kraics, the battalion’s lawyer, who is in Khan Neshin. “You need local-level bureaucracy to defeat the insurgency. Without the stability that brings, the Taliban can continue to maintain control.”

Local administration is a problem throughout Afghanistan, and many rural areas suffer from corrupt local officials — if they have officials at all.

4) The local population is more supportive of the Taliban than the government in Kabul:

 . . . two of every three local residents supported the Taliban, mostly because they make a living growing poppy for the drug trade, which the Taliban control. Others support them for religious reasons or because they object to foreign forces.

Forgive me for beating a dead horse, if we don't have the troops, if we don't have the support of the Afghan military, police and civilian government, if we are not even able to impose our military will and if the local population is not interested in what we are selling why are we continuing to pursue a counter-insurgency mission that depends on all of these things?

Why as, Andrew Exum, suggests should we give this mission 18-24 more months when there is little indication that the problems identified in the Helmand offensive are going to be fixed any time soon? If we haven't been able to get the very basics of counter-insurgency right over the past 8 years; if we haven't been able to get the Afghan government on board with providing effective services to its citizens why will a slight increase in the number of troops combined with a switch in tactics, devoid of ample resources and host country support, going to magically succeed? (And if someone says well it worked in Iraq with the surge, I'm going to pop a blood vessel).

Certainly, it's possible that things could turn around in 18-24 months but there has been precious little indication that this is going to happen. Yet instead of adopting a more restrained mission based on a somewhat narrow view of US interests we are going long- larding on more responsibilities to US troops, like hunting drug dealers and waging a PR war against the Taliban, when we've shown little indication that we can even get the big things right or as Josh Foust suggests learn from our successes. Once again, we are trying to fit a square counter-insurgency peg into a round hole.

And the gulf is more than operational, it's also rhetorical. If as the President has suggested the war in Afghanistan is a war of necessity and "fundamental to the defense of our people" then why aren't we sending 100,000 troops or 250,000 troops to Afghanistan? Why aren't we committing to be in Afghanistan for more than 12-18 months, but for five years. How can the President, on the one hand, say this war is "fundamental" to America's defense and yet at the same time not provide the resources to fight it effectively? Because, its fairly clear from reading this article in the New York Times that our troops don't have the resources to do what the President or their military commanders are asking them to do.

Every war it seems produces inconsistencies between intentions and capabilities; but it seems the gulf between why we fight and what we are actually able to accomplish seems to grow larger and larger with each war. In Iraq, presidents and defense secretaries would brag about how many Iraqi soldiers we had trained while ignoring the fact that they weren't able to do little things like operate by themselves. Now we're told that the US mission in Afghanistan will only succeed when the Afghan security forces are up to speed and we have the resources to win.

But neither situation seems to exist  . . . and so we continue down a path that provides barely a glimmer of hope that the current ambitious mission will succeed.

Afghanistan MIssion Creep Watch - War of Necessity/War of Choice Version Posted by Michael Cohen

Ok so I'm supposed to be on vacation right now, but the AMCW must roll on.

Today's must read is Richard Haass's thoughtful op-ed in the New York Times about why the war in Afghanistan is a war of choice and should be judged as such. Now Haass comes down on the view that the American interests in Afghanistan are "sufficiently important" to continue the current mission. I don't agree, but that's fine. Haass does two things that are really important - first he shows the folly of President Obama's war of necessity argument for Afghanistan and makes clear that there must be limits to a war of choice:

There needs to be a limit to what the United States does in Afghanistan and how long it is prepared to do it, lest we find ourselves unable to contend with other wars, of choice or of necessity, if and when they arise.

Second, Haasss gives creedence to military options in Afghanistan other than continuing on the current course or withdrawal:

There are alternatives to current American policy. One would reduce our troops’ ground-combat operations and emphasize drone attacks on terrorists, the training of Afghan police officers and soldiers, development aid and diplomacy to fracture the Taliban.

Whether one believes this is the right approach or not, I am pleased that Haass has shown a willingness to consider a multitude of options on what to in Afghanistan - not the strawman arguments that often define this debate.

Read the whole piece.

Bernard Finel also makes some smart points about the Haass piece.

Ok, back to vacation.

Vetting Ourselves to Death Posted by Patrick Barry

Paul Farmer wasn't alone as he languished in State Department limbo this summer.  According to Dave Herbert of National Journal, a crop of would-be interns also fell victim to a vetting process that is receiving increased criticism for going too far: 

"...while the trials and tribulations of top-level appointees are well-documented, security clearance delays are much worse at the lowest rungs of the State Department. Half a dozen current and former interns complained to National Journal.com that start dates are routinely pushed back because of the slow pace of clearances."

Given what I've heard about the average internship experience at State, it's tough for me to fully sympathize. While State is doing these prospective civil-servants a disservice by stringing them along like this, the fact that we still don't have a USAID administrator seems like a far bigger tragedy.  But as Herbert points out, these interns' woes point to a much bigger flaw with State's clearance and vetting process:

Looming in the background are charges of even more serious dysfunctions. Concerned Foreign Service Officers, which is made up of current and former State Department employees, alleges that investigators sometimes practice ethnic and religious profiling, robbing Foggy Bottom of applicants with critical language skills. And Hirsch argued that unlike the Office of Personnel Management and the Department of Defense, which conducted the majority of clearance applications, the Bureau of Diplomatic Security doesn't have enough checks against profiling.

This is a serious, serious problem.  Take Afghanistan. Where exactly is State going to get the Dari or Pashto speakers so critical for the U.S. to have any chance of stabilizing the country?  As of the publication of this Gareth Porter article from last May, there were only 18 Pashto-speaking FSOs in the entire department, and only 2 stationed in-theater.  One obvious way of quickly correcting this deficiency would be to heavily recruit Afghan-born U.S. citizens.  But its unclear whether such a push can be successful, given the dysfunctional vetting process that Herbert describes.    

State Department Reform Posted by David Shorr

Many thanks to Mark Goldberg at UN Dispatch for helping foster discussion a favorite topic: how to remedy the weakened state of our civilian international affairs agencies. The latest catalyst was an expression of despair by public diplomacy expert and blogger Matt Armstrong, who asked whether the State Department's weaknesses demand that we scrap its entire set-up and rebuild from the ground up. In response, Spencer Ackerman then offers thoughts about the nature, difficulty, and history of bureaucratic reform, with reference to Goldwater-Nichols.

I'd like to add some points about the 'why' of reform -- what should reform give us? This being a favorite topic, I might need to do a little recycling, first from a December 2008 Foreign Service Journal piece I wrote with Derek Chollet and Vikram Singh:

Every international problem confronting the United States includes more variables than ever before. This is an age of stakeholder proliferation — from the private sector and powerful NGOs to rising powers, and from criminal and terrorist networks to workers in the globa supply chain. To have any chance of shaping world events, Washingtonmust be alert to this panoply of actors and engaged at many levels in the intricate dynamics that determine political trends and policy decisions around the globe.

Accordingly, the essential aim of any effort to strengthen the U.S. civilian agencies must be to extend America’s lines of communication and cooperation to reach those on whom future peace and prosperity hinge. In the same way that globalizing trends have broken down international barriers for information and business, the United States must break down communication barriers to understand others’ concerns, by expanding ties further beyond the confines of officialdom in national capitals, and by responding more diligently and creatively to emerging problems. We won’t be able to do this without more effective — and better resourced — civilian agencies. Just as we need to invest in education and science to ensure that the American work force can compete and thrive in the globalizing world, wemust likewise transform our government to be competitive in the effort to sustain America’s global power in the 21st century.

Standish in the Line of Fire Posted by Adam Blickstein

Chris Bodenner over at Sullivan's blog flags an important story out of Standish, Michigan, where the possibility of turning the soon to be shuttered Standish Maximum Correctional Facility into a detention facility for Guantanamo detainees, has made the small town an epicenter for the often hyperbolic and politicized detainee debate. Of course it doesn't help the cause of having a rational and reasonable conversation over the issue when Pete Hoekstra, no stranger to politicizing national security debates, is also running for Governor. Which is why it shouldn't be surprising that a recent town hall there turned into a three ring circus replete with stark mischaracterizations and over the top rhetoric. According to the Washington Post:

"He [Hoekstra] told me things that really scared the heck out of me," Munson said. "He told me about soft targets and safe zones, that if they came to this country they would have rights, visitors and friends would come who could be jihadists."

Hoekstra, ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, told those in the crowd that they have much to fear if the detainees are transferred to Standish, a town of 1,500 about 150 miles north of Detroit.

But what is more striking about the coverage is the lack of balance in the Post piece as compared to the local Standsh paper, which covers the townhall with a far more skeptical eye then the Post, whose only counterbalance is a wavering local political official who asserted that federal officials said they "would not send detainees to Standish in the face of intense local opposition." But the the context and tenor of the town hall are important to gauging the overall coverage of the event and the issue, and the Standish paper includes a few extremely important points the Post misses:

Hoekstra was asked later if a federal detention center in Florence, Colo., which also houses terrorists, was ever the site of an attempted jailbreak by terrorists’ allies.

Hoekstra said that the Colorado facility, which he said only detains terrorists captured on American soil, not in foreign countries during wartime, had never had an incident like that.

And:

One person in the crowd, Brent Snelgrove, a Standish businessman, agreed that there was a lack of information, but showed displeasure with one-sidedness of the meeting.

“I’m disappointed in this panel,” he said. “I don’t see both sides of the conversation

“20 years ago I heard some of the same concerns… almost identical,” he added.

This is key. The Post's coverage makes it appear that, from the town hall, there is consensus in the commmunity that turning the Standish facility into a domestic detainee prison is a bad idea. There is not consensus:

The group wasn't protesting the prospect of Guantánamo Bay terrorism suspects coming to the town about two hours north of Detroit: They're picketing over their prison's scheduled closure.

The Gitmo detainees are welcome, if they keep the 604-bed prison in this city of about 1,200 up and running.

"If it keeps jobs in the community, it would be fine," said Dave Horn, 29, of Bentley, who was among those picketing over the scheduled Oct. 1 closing of the 19-year-old state prison.

But reading the Post's piece makes it seem like an open and shut case. And this has been the problem with both cable and print news coverage of town halls across America this summer: often the loudest, and most vocal, and usually most factually invalid arguments, get taken as gospel simply do to audible superiority. It's undercut the healthcare debate, but the detainee debate is almost more susceptible to this kind of action and coverage simply because the issue is far more visceral for folks, with good reason. But as Hoekstra said:

"It's possible that people will come to a different conclusion than I have," he said. "But this is too big a deal to make a decision based on only partial information."

Yes, Rep. Hoekstra, I agree too big a deal to make decision based on partial information, which is why it is essential the Administration put forth a clear and concrete plan (and strategy--both in implementation and media) so that the process of closing Guantanamo and transferring detainees is done so in a responsible, transparent and safe manner. But it is also too big a deal to imbue it with false information and political fear mongering, something Rep. Hoekstra seems to have no problem forcing to the forefront of the debate for his own political gain. And this kind of political grandstanding from a gubernatorial candidate in the context of closing Guantanamo will make it politically very difficult to utilize the Standish facility as a place to detain and possibly try terror suspects currently being held at Gitmo.

It's pretty clear that for the GOP, making "death panel" arguments across the political spectrum in order to incite public panic and skew the media coverage seems to be the only strategy they have left.

Who's Being Myopic Here? Posted by Michael Cohen

Jari Lindholm has an excellent blog that is wrongly titled the Stupidest Man on Earth: he is anything but.
Unfortunately, however, his blog post today on the safe haven question in Af/Pak misses the mark. Speaking of the Taliban, he says:

After years of jihad alongside al-Qaeda and other international militants, they would not merely allow terrorist organisations to use Afghanistan as a base; they would encourage it. Naturally, toppling the Pakistani government by supporting their Pashtun brethren would be high on the Taleban to-do list, as they would want to see a friendly, ISI-backed general return to power in Islamabad. In turn, they would gladly help in providing him with the terrorist cannon fodder he would need for his covert operations in India.

But if this is the case and the Afghan Taliban represent an existential threat to Pakistan, why is the Pakistan government continuing to allow the presence of an Afghan Taliban safe haven in their country? And surely Jari knows that when the Taliban ruled Afghanistan they relied in great measure on the support of Pakistan. If the Afghan Taliban represent such an existential threat to Pakistan then why doesn't the Pakistani military do something about it? Now I suppose Jari might argue here that Pakistan's civilian government has little power over the military or ISI, which views the Afghan Taliban as strategic depth against India. But didn't the Pakistani military willingly just wage war against other Pashtun insurgents? Does he really believe that if the Afghan Taliban represented an existential threat to Pakistan - or created terrorist bases for attacking Pakistan -- that the military wouldn't step in? I'll admit I'm not sure I even understand the argument being made here.

Also, while I suppose it's entirely possible that high on the Taliban to-do list would be to topple the Pakistani government - so what? Without Pakistani support how would the Taliban even stay in power no less cause the toppling of a neighboring country with a fairly powerful military. Where else are they going to go for support?

As for the notion "we need 101,000 soldiers in Afghanistan to prevent Pakistan and India from going to war" I don't get this either. Is there really no other option at our disposal to prevent two nuclear armed nations from going to war? Is he arguing that we have to keep American troops ad infinitum in Afghanistan because these two countries hate each other and might fight a war. Talk about a rather expansive view of American national interests and responsibility.