Britain’s imperial misadventures in Afghanistan used to be known as ‘the forgotten war,’ a label well suited to the United States’ current undertakings in Helmland, Marja and Kandahar – until recently. With American military deaths approaching 1,200 (four times the figure of the closest coalition partner, the UK), and the money squandered on the nine-year campaign edging towards US$300 billion, the US media were forced to pay full attention again when General Stanley McChrystal openly mocked his civilian superiors in a controversial profile in Rolling Stone magazine.
According to Rolling Stone, McChrystal recalls President Obama being “‘uncomfortable and intimidated’ by the roomful of military brass at the White House”; the general’s staff jokingly refer to the Vice-President as ‘Bite Me’, and they dismiss McChrystal’s first face-to-face meeting at the Oval office as a “10-minute photo-op.” Incensed, Obama responded swiftly. He got rid of McChrystal and placed the more circumspect General Petraeus in charge of US operations in Afghanistan. But even the temporary bipartisanship which greeted this move – the Senate confirmed Petraeus unanimously – hardly conceals the fact that Obama, in Rolling Stone’s memorable formulation “finds himself stuck in something even more insane than a quagmire: a quagmire he knowingly walked into, even though it’s precisely the kind of gigantic, mind-numbing, multigenerational nation-building project he explicitly said he didn’t want.”
In 2002, long before he became a presidential candidate, Obama won praise for his condemnation of the Iraq war as a “dumb” and “rash” war that was being sold to the American public by “weekend warriors [in the Bush administration] irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne.” Since then, the President seems to have forgotten his own wisdom. While in office he has become sandwiched between over-optimistic military commanders and a sceptical public, and trapped between the diminishing prospect of anything close to military victory in Afghanistan and the potential humiliation of a US withdrawal that clears the way for the resurgent Taliban.
McChrystal wryly warned Rolling Stone’s Michael Hastings that “Even Afghans are confused by Afghanistan.” It is a remark that should give the White House pause. For amidst the confusion, the US has launched an ambitious counterinsurgency strategy – often referred to as the ‘COIN doctrine’ – which seems premised on the hope that decades of war and misrule can be overcome by a relatively brief period of political stability. But even if General Petraeus – who personally designed the new COIN strategy – learns how to thread his way through the labyrinth of Afghan politics, it is difficult to see how the US can overcome the stigma of being allied with the notoriously corrupt Karzai government. Few analysts believe that the current fragile political balance could survive without extensive support from the US military. In fact, instead of drawing down troops by the oft-mentioned 2011 deadline, the Pentagon may well call for further surges (under pressure, Obama added 30,000 troops last year), lured by the old, false hope that one last refinement to the COIN strategy can make all the difference.
One major difficulty with the US strategy in Afghanistan is the fact that much of the Taliban’s support has taken refuge across the border, in Pakistan. Until this loophole can be closed, Hastings suggests that “Dispatching 150,000 troops to build new schools, roads, mosques and water-treatment facilities around Kandahar is like trying to stop the drug war in Mexico by occupying Arkansas and building Baptist churches in Little Rock.” And yet, the COIN doctrine seems to be aiming at equally Quixotic ends. It is, at best, unlikely that infrastructure can make the locals forget the coalition’s heavy-handed military presence and the steady toll of civilian deaths caused by aerial drones. (Last month a US army report concluded that “inaccurate and unprofessional” behaviour by Predator drone operators had led to the deaths of 23 innocent men, women and children in February.) But the current administration keeps talking about “regaining the momentum” in Afghanistan. Such empty political posturing was said to have ended with the Bush years – clearly it hasn’t.
President Obama is temperamentally disposed to making deals. His willingness to horse-trade on health care, to rescue the financial institutions which caused the recent crisis, and to meet his severest Republican adversaries halfway on a range of domestic issues, has persistently annoyed the Democratic base. But America’s foreign wars are not as amenable to deal-making. Up to now the President has been out-played by a military that uses the press to its advantage, to pressure the administration into continuing the escalation of what is already the America’s longest war. McChrystal may have overstepped his mark and paid the price, but the military’s cynicism towards the “wimps in Washington” leaves little hope that the US can extricate itself from Afghanistan without uncharacteristically decisive intervention from the White House. With mid-term elections fast approaching, time does not favour the President. Unless he acts soon, the current stalemate in Afghanistan could easily metastasize into something unforgettable.
