As information (and speculation) fizzle around the edges of the Great Compound Inside the Beltway, there seem to be two antipodal positions on the troop increase request from General McChrystal.
One pole is inhabited by General McChrystal, the JCS, super-diplomat Richard Holbrook, and Secretary of State Clinton. These folks want to put more boots on the ground and definitively "win" over the Taliban and other Islamist jihadist groups.
The other extreme contains, among others, Vice President Biden, Senator Levin, and a host of "progressive" Democrats. In one way or another these folks want to restrict the mission of American forces to that of liquidating al-Qaeda and, for at least some, providing training to the Afghan National Forces.
As of yesterday, Secretary of Defense Gates seemed to be leaning toward the expansionist side of the continuum. That is about as surprising as finding the sun rises in the east.
One detects an emerging argument which is akin, indeed, almost identical to the "oil spot" operational doctrine during the Vietnam War. Back then and again today the thinking is as follows.
US troops would clear and hold a piece of real estate previously dominated by the enemy. When the indigenous security forces had developed sufficiently to take over the job, the Americans would move on to take, clear, and hold the next bit of enemy territory. The analogy with the spreading movement of a drop of oil on water was borrowed by American planners in the early Sixties from their predecessors in Vietnam, the French.
It had not worked for the French. It did not work for the Americans and South Vietnamese when it was reattempted. It will not work if applied in Afghanistan.
There is no doubt that the "oil spot" approach will have substantial appeal for a consensus minded president and even many in Congress. It would involve no major increase in US troop strength. It puts the ultimate burden on the Afghans where it properly resides. Best of all, it will reduce American casualties.
What Senator Levin, VP Biden, and others of the less-is-best school do not seem to realize is the time necessary to adequately train, equip, organize, create command and control, and accomplish the manifold other necessities which turn an armed mob into an effective, disciplined, coherent combat force. And, make no mistake about it, whatever the name--army, police, constabulary--the new Afghan force(s) must be combat formations first and foremost.
While the limited strength US and allied forces sit around holding the land they have cleared waiting for the Afghans to take over both security and governmental functions, what is the enemy doing?
That's right, bucko. The Taliban and others are using the vast amount of uncleared, unheld territory for their own purposes. Purposes which might be perturbed to some degree by UAV and manned platform air strikes, but will continue to assure that they maintain both the initiative and momentum.
Considering that we have yet to "clear and hold" Kandahar, the second largest city in Afghanistan, and the surrounding territory to say nothing of other vast sweeps of less populated terrain, Taliban and the others have a lot of human and physical terrain on which to work. They have ample human material and terrain expanse to use as launching pads for attacks on either the foreign forces or the Afghan national government.
This means the defeat by a thousand cuts will continue. Americans and other outsiders will continue to die from roadside bombs, suicide VBIED attacks, snipers, and all the other nasty features of this type of conflict. The deaths without success in sight will further enervate the political will of We the People to continue the effort.
The bottom line reads: Any "oil spot" or similar split-the-difference approach merely prolongs the agony of losing. It amps the body count while ramping down to zero any potential of actually prevailing over the Islamist jihadists, let alone building a nation in the country. Anything other than a maximum effort will be too little to assure success in stopping the Islamist jihadists.
The only viable alternative to a full scale commitment, which means meeting the maximum request by General McChrystal (roughly 40,000 additional personnel), is a collapse of our effort to an enhanced "counter-terrorism" program revolving around Special Forces teams on the ground along with their CIA pilot teams and Predators or Reapers in the air.
We might burnish the appearances by stationing some training and advisory personnel as well as logistics and other support types. We could make a show of supporting Kabul while acknowledging that no matter what the short-term effect might be, Afghanistan would return in the fullness of time to internal war between the minorities of the north and the majority Pushtu elsewhere. It would be simply one more turn of the ever rolling wheel of internal Afghan relations.
The US and the rest of the world would be back to where we were on 10 September 2001 albeit without an intact al-Qaeda. Not as if that matters anymore. Al-Qaeda's best role is as a symbol, an emblem of the memes which underpin Islamist jihadism around the world.
Of course, that means we (or somebody) will have to fight the war against Islamist jihadism all over again at some future date. Worse, even the slightest, barely plausible hint that we and our allies had been driven out by the Warriors of Allah would hype the cause everywhere from now until some date in the haze of the far future.
This is not a time and a matter on which half way measures are applicable. This is not a time for compromise, for splitting differences, for hemming and hawing over fine points. It is a time for decisive leadership.
Unfortunately, to date, President Obama has not shown much skill, or even interest, in this sort of thing. It's a pity for him. And a tragedy in the making for all the rest of us.
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