Posted on 09/08/2017 2:58:28 PM PDT by Lorianne
I was one of the first American officials to arrive in Kabul at the end of 2001. The war that seemed to be ending back then is currently in its 16th year with no end in sight, and for those of us who were there at the beginning it now sometimes seems like it was a lifetime ago. President Barack Obama not so long ago referred to Afghanistan as the “necessary war.” But now it might be more appropriate to refer to it as a “forgotten war,” as President Donald Trump has sent a few thousand more soldiers to Kabul—while also stating emphatically that he will not be discussing strategy or entertaining any questions regarding what might be coming next.
Scott Horton’s new book, Fool’s Errand: Time to End the War in Afghanistan, is a masterful account of America’s prolonged Afghan engagement. It reminds us that what began in 2001 was only the most recent phase of a decades-long struggle that began in 1979 when the Russians invaded Afghanistan, and Washington responded by arming and funding the mujahideen guerrillas, who effectively pushed back against Soviet control of their country but later morphed into al-Qaeda. Like the CIA’s ill-fated replacement of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran in 1953, the meddling in Afghanistan has borne bitter fruit, a prime example of what has been referred to as “blowback.” Fool’s Errand is at its best when it carefully follows developments subsequent to the 2001 U.S. invasion of the country. Scott describes all the missteps in some detail, with full notes that enable the reader to consider the validity of his judgements. He discusses the failure of the United States and its allies to comprehend the type of society and culture they were dealing with and the tendency to be taken in by Afghan leaders who were canny enough to pretend to be advocates of western-style democracy in order to keep the money and political support flowing. He describes the inability of a series of generals who had made their reputations in Iraq, often based more on hype than on achievements, to comprehend the different conditions in Afghanistan. To his credit, he explains counterinsurgency doctrine in such a way as to make it comprehensible to the non-specialist reader. And he also explains why it failed.
Scott concludes that:
After more than a decade and a half, the results are in. The U.S. government has been unable to achieve its goals in Afghanistan. Even worse, what state it has been able to establish there is completely unsustainable and is certain to fall apart when the occupation is finally called off, and America does come home. The politicians, generals and intelligence officers behind this unending catastrophe, who always promise they can fix these problems with just a little bit more time, money and military force, have lost all credibility. The truth is America’s Afghan war is an irredeemable disaster. It was meant to be a trap in the first place. America is not only failing to defeat its enemies, but is destroying itself, just as Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda always intended.
SNIP
CIA’s ill-fated replacement of Mohammad Mossadegh in Iran in 1953
The replacement of the Russian backed Mossadegh served America well for 40 years.
Could be. I’d have to do more research on that part of the history. I was more interested in the assessment of the cultural issues around “winning” in Afghanistan.
Afghanistan has been called “The Graveyard of Empires.” That primitive land mass has defeated every attempt at civilization, from Alexander the Great to the present. A terrific book that explains this is Apocalypse Rising by Timothy Dailey.
The only one who almost subdued the place was Genghis Khan. While his methods were exemplary, they would not be tolerated in this puling and neurotic age.
You are correct - Genghis did manage to conquer all of Central Asia. The tactics of one of his successors, Timorlame, who razed entire cities and piled up mountains of skulls, would not be approved by modern day standards.
Authors, journalists, and other chattering-class members purporting to “instruct” the United Sates and other extenders of Western Civ on the impossibility of this or that course of action in foreign policy ought to read the record a little closer.
The British Empire went into Afghanistan neither to conquer nor to civilize - it went in to forestall Czarist Russian moves that appeared to threaten India. When the Russians turned elsewhere, the British returned to their Indian dominions.
The Soviets succeeded. Then, when their victory was all but complete, a few venturesome parties convinced the United States government to supply Stinger missiles to the insurgents. Their air power negated, the Soviets were forced to withdraw.
None of which really illuminates the current geostrategic situation. The United States is now mulling over the possibility of giving it all up, because the public’s attention span has been exceeded, and because Americans deem themselves too good to dirty their hands with the grubby realities of international policing.
Declaring that a given course of action should never have been taken, because current results aren’t all that might have been hoped for, is an adolescent response.
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