Afghanistan is like a Chinese finger trap: The harder you try to solve it, the more it constricts you. Ask the Russians. In 1979, the Soviet Union sent military forces to install a pro-Soviet government in Kabul. At its peak in the country, the Red Army numbered some 140,000. But, after ten years of inconclusive fighting, 15,000 dead, and tens of thousands more wounded, the battered Soviets mounted a humiliating retreat--one that probably helped speed the collapse of their empire. ("They've already repeated all of our mistakes," one former Soviet general from the Afghan campaign recently said to The New York Times of the U.S. occupation.) Or ask the British. More than a century earlier, the United Kingdom dispatched a huge army to Afghanistan from India to secure it against Russian influence. That adventure, too, was a disaster, ending in a retreat of 16,500 troops and civilians through the Khyber Pass into Pakistan. Only one survivor made it--his life spared by the Afghans so he could recount the ghastly tale for others.But never fear: Counterinsurgency theory, the latest faddish strategic doctrine to sweep Washington and rescue the dreams of those who believe American power can redeem the world, has a solution to this age-old problem:
Nagl's rule of thumb, the one found in the counterinsurgency manual, calls for at least a 1-to-50 ratio of security forces to civilians in contested areas. Applied to Afghanistan, which has both a bigger population (32 million) and a larger land mass (647,500 square miles) than Iraq, that gets you to some large numbers fast. Right now, the United States and its allies have some 65,000 troops in Afghanistan, as compared to about 140,000 in Iraq. By Nagl's ratio, Afghanistan's population calls for more than 600,000 security forces. Even adjusting for the relative stability of large swaths of the country, the ideal number could still total around 300,000--more than a quadrupling of current troop levels.Oof. And suddenly, the path to Obamas own Vietnam comes hauntingly clear. 10,000 troops committed becomes 20,000 troops, then 50,000 troops, and more and more, as a Democrat realizes himself politically unable to retreat from Afghanistan and strategically incapable of winning the war. But the article's oddest, and most unsettling, tic comes clear towards the end. Crowley repeatedly suggests that America's strategic interest in Afghanistan is murky at best, and that the real question from a terrorism standpoint is Pakistan. Afghanistan could prove nothing more than a morass, suggests Crowley, and "it's quite possible that a major U.S. troop buildup in another Muslim nation is just what Al Qaeda wants." Even so, he ends the piece on this note:
But just because Afghanistan may be a good war doesn't mean it will be an easy one. Nagl warns that, in order to win, we need to approach the situation there with our eyes wide open. Obama will need to move beyond the rhetoric of the good war to convey to the American public the sacrifice and hard choices of war itself. "If resources are limited," Nagl says, then Obama should "mobilize the country"--increase the size of the military and even ask Americans to pay more through taxes. "How badly do we want to win this war to ensure that nobody can use this territory to kill three thousand Americans again?" he asks. "I'm willing to pay an extra dollar a gallon of gas for that to happen--who's with me?"We'll soon find out. Nagl's instincts may be right. The case for rescuing Afghanistan with great military force and at vast expense may carry the day. No one can dispute that the world would be a better place if Afghanistan is peaceful, stable, and at least semi-democratic. But, as one painful war winds down and a deep recession strikes, it's unclear whether Americans are prepared to make the necessary sacrifices. Ultimately Obama, and the United States, may find that the goodness of this war isn't good--or simple--enough.
Nagl's quote is eerily reminiscent of the sort of moral blackmail that led us into Iraq. The article doesn't articulate either an argument for why an open-ended commitment to Afghanistan would be in the national interest nor does it offer a compelling strategic case for why it might be successful. But it nevertheless ends with a dark invocation of 9/11 that suggests opponents of a build-up are insufficiently attentive to terrorism, and in a quote from a couple paragraphs earlier, a declaration from Nagl that "I am personally unwilling to let a regime that throws acid in the faces of little girls who go to school take power." You know, I saw this movie in theaters back in 2003. And frankly, I didn't like it.
