During the run up to American participation in World War I as Woodrow Wilson was trying to frame a reason for our coming into this purely European civil war, former president Theodore Roosevelt--personally in favor of the US going to war--wrote to his fellow progressive Republican, Henry Cabot Lodge, Senator from Massachusetts. TR knew a thing or two about war. He knew even more about the American people. This shows in his words.
"In my experience," he wrote,"the American public is not disposed to overseas wars unless there is a great cause involved or the goal is plainly clear." While the ex-president believed there was a "great cause" to be fought in the trenches of the Western Front, he properly concluded that it was not possible yet to convey this to the great mass of We the People in a way which would assure full-fledged support. He was right. Even later, after Wilson had put forth his vision of the "great cause" such as to gain nearly monolithic support, it was necessary in the estimate of the administration to put into place the most draconian laws restricting free speech and assembly in the Republic's history and back these laws with a shadow army of millions of hyper-patriotic snoops.
In the aftermath of the war when the noble vision of Wilson turned to foggy and nasty reality, the American public recoiled against any involvement in the affairs of Europe and Asia. This, the era of isolationism, made both World War II and the ensuing Cold War the next thing to inevitable.
The lesson was and is clear. "Great causes" must be real and not the artifacts of ideology or ideals. A goal which is "plainly clear" is far more important than the purported greatness of the cause.
The lessons to be derived from TR's insight are applicable right now as the US considers when, how, and at what speed we should/must ramp down our war in Afghanistan. The original intent, the goal, of the invasion of Afghanistan way back in the Dark Age, was twofold: Remove by killing or capture Osama bin Laden and his fellows of al-Qaeda; punish the Taliban regime for having harbored al-Qaeda even after 9/11 and repeated diplomatic efforts to accomplish the capture of the al-Qaeda heavyweights.
The goal was "plainly clear." And, the motive did, in the estimate of most Americans, constitute a "great cause." Not since 7 Decemember 41 had there been such uniformity of conviction regarding both the necessity and justice of going to war. The TR dictum had been followed, well and truly.
Almost before the first American boot hit the ground in Afghanistan, the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld Neocon Ninny crowd betrayed the "plainly clear" goal and undercut the credibility of the "great cause." This was accomplished by a surprising, even shocking, set of awesomely stupid decisions driven by skewed perceptions of the requirements of political opinion both domestic and foreign.
The administration came to the conclusion that the American public or at least the left-leaning elite would support the war if and only if the American goals were enlarged to encompass the creation of a modern Western style nation-state in all its full splendor. It was the apparent belief of the decision makers that the war would be gutted of public support without the goal of nation-building replacing the narrow, "plainly clear" one of destroying al-Qaeda and administering condign punishment upon Mullah Omar and the Taliban.
That decision as well as its predicate were both as wrong as a cat barking.
Another decision, this one powered by diplomatic considerations, made the situation immeasurably worse. In total spite of the reasonably well developed intelligence picture which showed the long standing relation between the Pakistani military and intelligence service with Taliban and its protectorate, al-Qaeda, the administration failed to put sufficient pressure on Islamabad to seal the border or arrest fleeing Talib and al-Qaeda personnel who flooded across the border with their Pakistani hand-holders. Nor did the US provide adequate and properly positioned forces to do the job at the border itself. (In this context it might be recalled that credible testimony exists as to American units receiving stop orders as they closed in on critical border crossing points.)
The Afghan situation was changed quickly into a protracted multi-party insurgency in which the foreign interventionary forces had neither the numbers nor the doctrine to convert defeat into victory at least in a reasonable amount of time. The Iraq invasion--which also fails the TR test completely as regards "great cause" and, again by self-imposed mission-leap, fails the goal being "clearly plain"--supervened to assure the situation in Afghanistan would improve only from the perspective of Taliban, the Haqqani network, al-Qaeda and, of course, the Pakistanis.
Now, not quite two years into our belated effort to retrieve some semblance of success in the place, the combination of the killing of Osama bin Laden, the new focus on the deficit and government economy as well as an election only eighteen months in the offing, the debate has shifted from how-can-we-succeed to how-can-we-get-out. There is no doubt but that We the People have lost any and all desire to keep on keeping on in Afghanistan.
The largest single reason for this widely held view is not the passage of time. Nor is it the quite modest losses incurred by American forces. Rather it is simply because our "cause" there is not "great" and our goal is most definitely not "plainly clear."
Rather than engage in a sterile and bitter controversy over how many troops should be withdrawn when and with what effect, the US would be better off to define what our goal is now that the icon of terror is sleeping with the fishes. Is our goal now what it was in the beginning, the defense of the US and other civilized states by suppressing the offensive capacities of al-Qaeda along with convincing the adherents of Taliban to stop giving "Islamic hospitality" to groups which practice violent political Islam against Western targets? Or is our goal the more expansive one of nation-building together with forceful counterinsurgency?
The first alternative is cheaper. Counter-terrorist operations require a lower number of boots on the ground--albeit a highly skilled and specialist bunch in those boots. The offense-defense of counter-terrorist operations allows us to ignore the nature and character of Afghan society, polity, culture, and economy. As long as the Afghan government and its armed forces offer no hindrance to our efforts, we can overlook any and all objectionable features of the regime and its personalities.
The downside to this operational concept is the possible blowback from Americans offended by our having left the Afghan population at the "mercy" of political parties espousing political Islam. As a number of Americans are offended deeply by the practices of some Muslim regimes, it is probable that there will be significant opposition to drawing back from the goal of seeing Afghanistan become a stable, democratic, multi-party, free enterprise state with an honest, transparent, and responsive government which includes an independent judiciary.
The other option is, quite simply, the pursuit of the totally impossible. Even a successful counter insurgency campaign will end with negotiations, negotiations which will see Taliban and others as part of the government. The ultimate result will be women in burkas, and clerics in charge. Perhaps not as absolutely as during the heyday of Taliban dot one, but bad by liberal Western norms and values. But, no purely military effort can do more than kill the most highly motivated and least given to compromise among the insurgents while placing effective pressure on the others to join in the process of negotiation. The military by itself cannot make the status quo government legitimate either functionally or existentially. Nor can the military by itself create an atmosphere which draws the support of the uncommitted majority. That is up to the indigenous government.
The time is here for the Obama administration to choose one of the two options. Choose and then make the goal "plainly clear." At the same time the administration would not be wrong to insist that there was a "great cause" underlying our efforts in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. That cause is no less than the critical one of protecting the country against future attack by Muslims who are motivated by the goals of violent political Islam.
Even the smaller, less costly in both lives and money alternative will not see us totally out of Afghanistan for many years. It will also necessitate putting the real screws on Islamabad to go into North Waziristan so as to put actual pressure on the black turban guys to put down the guns and stick to preaching and stoning women.
Years ago the Geek predicted that the conflict between the civilized states and proponents of violent political Islam will last so long as to render the Cold War a short lived blip in our history. It will still be going on when President Obama is getting social security--that is if it still exists in twenty years.
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