A Brit Tells It Like It Is

Brig Mark Carleton-Smith, the British force commander in Afghanistan shows a firm grip on reality. He spoke a hard, blunt truth when he took the position that there is no way a military victory can be achieved in Afghanistan.

He accompanied that voyage to Realityland with the equally accurate observation that a political solution must be achieved as it has been in all successful counterinsurgent efforts.

This position has not made the Brigadier popular either with his own government or the Current Administration in Washington.

Popularity doesn't matter. The truth does. The weight of history is on the Brigadier's side. The best that can be hoped for from military counterinsurgent operations is, in the Geek's term, "not-losing."

There are very few counterinsurgent campaigns that have resulted in a clear military victory. The American War Between the States stands almost alone in this category although a strong argument can be made for the proposition that finally the Southern political will collapsed not under the weight of Grant's offensive(s) in northern Virginia but with the slash of Sherman's March to the Sea and its sequel, the March Up Country.

The US and its allies had no chance in hell of achieving a purely military victory in Afghanistan from the very start. Had the invading force focused on the task of destroying through death or capture the two target groups, al-Qaeda and the Taliban government of the country, a purely military success would have been possible. At least in principle.

The shift in focus from punitive to nation building assured that the likelihood of military victory slipped down the pole from slim to none. In a nation building, counterinsurgency effort, particularly when the announced political goal is the construction of a liberal, pluralistic, secular democracy in human terrain where all these are either unknown or unacceptable, there is no chance the military effort can achieve more than "not-losing."

Even not-losing has become problematical in recent months and years. The black turbans have grown in numbers and confidence even though their primary tactics still include suicide bombings directed against soft civilian targets. The sanctuary of the FATA coupled with years of Pakistani ineptitude exacerbated by pro-Islamist sentiments within the Pakistani population and critical governmental components such as Inter-Services Intelligence have given the Taliban and its ilk a mega-dose of growth hormone.

While Taliban capo Omar has rejected categorically Karzai's invitation to talks and has engaged in the standard issue bluster regarding the decline of the US, this is inherently meaningless. Taliban is not a monolith. Afghans are increasingly sick and tired of the war. This includes members of Taliban's leadership echelon.

No matter how much one might be comfortable with martyrdom, no matter how much meaning one might seek by one's death, the notion of a Predator having its cross hairs on your back gets tedious. Constant anxiety is a great eroder of morale.

Military pressure--the great and terrible hammer--must continue to be applied to the black turbans on both sides of the porous border between Pakistan and Afghanistan. Predators and Pakistani military operations, cross-border raids by US and NATO specialist forces and never ending combat patrols and ambushes must continue.

While applying the hammer(s) relentlessly and, when necessary, ruthlessly, the US and its allies must never forget the other absolutely essential tool of counterinsurgency--the wrench. Wrenches are great, they are used to turn things, like people's minds. The wrench kit includes, must include, power sharing. It must included negotiations. It must include the recognition and accommodation of people's needs. Even those which sit poorly with Americans such as Sharia.

This is what Brigadier Carleton-Smith was getting at. He has done what any knowledgeable and honest commander must do. He has recognised and admitted publicly that the most the military can do is prevent the other side from winning.

The military can assure that we do not lose.

The wrenches of politics, negotiation, compromise and other distasteful accommodations to the reality of the Afghan human terrain alone can assure victory. Even then it will be an Afghan victory. Not a NATO victory. And, most assuredly, not an American victory.

We the People as well as the current administration (and its successor) better take a firm grip on that. In Afghanistan as in Iraq any victory will be achieved only by the people who live there. The people who will have to keep on living there.