When the war began in early October, no one knew how long and difficult it would be, and many pointed to the Russians' failed invasion of Afghanistan as a warning that the enterprise could prove to be a disaster. Two months later, as I write, the Taliban regime is in its final death throes in Kandahar, and the war itself--or, at least, the Afghan phase of it--may nearly be over. Although the curtain has not yet come down, it doesn't seem too early to explore why the war has progressed so fast and what it means for us and the world.
Contrary to cautionary opinions in the early fall, it's now evident thatthe Taliban were in much worse shape politically and the United States in muchbetter shape militarily than was generally supposed. War often clarifies the truecondition of a regime. Before the fighting began, some observers did argue thatthe Taliban government had little popular legitimacy after years of oppressiverule and, therefore, that the American campaign would not meet the opposition theSoviets faced. The crumbling of Taliban support has now amply confirmed thisview. It took only the Northern Alliance's victory in Mazar-i-Sharif to set off apopular explosion that within a few days brought down the Taliban in 90 percentof the country.
But it is the other side of the story, the increase in American militaryeffectiveness, that may hold the most important political implications. TheTaliban may have thought that they were about to fight the last war--their waragainst the Soviets--but American military capabilities have advanced far beyondwhat Russia or even the United States could deploy a decade ago. Writing aboutthe "new American way of war" in The Washington Post, Thomas E. Ricks recently pointed out that the past decade has seen a dramatic increase in the military's ability to hit long-range targets with "unprecedented precision ... relying as never before on gigabytes of targeting information gathered on the ground, in the air, and from space."
The Gulf War gave the world a preview of this form of warfare. But whileprecision-guided bombs received enormous publicity during that conflict, theyrepresented only 10 percent of the total dropped. The cost at that time ran about$1 million per cruise missile, and incompatible information systems and otherproblems prevented the military from getting the full benefit of new technology.
The systems that were then in early development have now matured. InAfghanistan, 90 percent of the bombs are precision-guided; the "cost ofprecision" has fallen to $18,000 per bomb; and electronic coordination hasgreatly improved. Pilotless planes ("drones") can now monitor the enemy anddeliver bombs without exposing Americans to enemy fire. The result is asignificant increase in airpower that, as Ricks suggests, may transform not onlyhow America fights its wars but also how it thinks about them.
And there's the dicey part of the change: Will the triumph of Americanwar-fighting technology make war so easy for us that military force seems moreattractive than the messy and uncertain tasks of diplomacy?
Make no mistake about it: We are better off with smart bombs thanwith dumb ones. It is a good thing that increased airpower is bringing the war toa rapid conclusion, thus far with relatively little loss of life to our soldiers.
Although a single civilian death is too many, it is also a good thing ifbetter targeting of weapons reduces the number of civilian deaths and injuries.(Perhaps after the war, we will learn whether this is actually what happened.)
And it is a good thing, too, if pinpoint bombing deters rogue governments thatmay now decide the risks to their own survival are too great to provide refugefor anti-American terrorists.
The danger lies ahead, and it lies within us. An easy victory in Afghanistancould mislead us about the prospects in Iraq. Perhaps Saddam Hussein's regimewould be no more capable than the Taliban of thwarting American airpower. Butsince there is no opposition army in Iraq comparable to the Northern Alliance, wewould have to put a more substantial force on the ground and be prepared to takemore casualties. Moreover, major elements in the international antiterroristcoalition would not go along with an extension of the conflict. We may not needtheir military backing, but if the objective is rooting out terrorism, we surelyneed the full support of their intelligence, police, and banking authorities.
Most important, we risk sacrificing the advantage of the world's sympathy andcooperation that we have enjoyed since September 11. And in a war againstterrorism, while airpower is mighty, occupying the moral and political highground is mightier still.
One day the precision-guided weapons that we now monopolize will find theirway into enemy hands. The complex information systems required for the newwarfare may enable us to dominate it for a while. But the trend in technologytoward lower cost will inexorably put such weapons within reach of morecountries, perhaps even of terrorists. I wish I were more confident that the newway of war offered us indefinite security, but more likely it has only bought ustime, if that. In the long run, we need international cooperation and the art ofdiplomacy to live in a world that still harbors people we don't like and whodon't like us.
