With the news that Abdullah Abdullah is pulling out of the Afghani Presidential run-off, things in that particular quagmire take yet another turn for the worse. Karzai is generally perceived in Washington as a weak ally, turning a blind eye to his brother selling opium and, you know, frauding the hell out of an election to keep himself in power in a pathetically unsubtle way. Just getting the run-off took a lot of effort on America's part, mainly focused on a lengthy and successful conversation between John Kerry and Karzai, and it looks now like it may be completely unnecessary.Of course, without a run-off, Karzai gains none of the legitimacy that the run-off was designed to bring back to him - he gets to be president, but without any respected authority. So now, NATO and the UN either expend a vast sum of money to set up a predetermined election in the hopes that it will prop out Karzai, or abandon it and lose yet more leverage to secure and reform the country. This really is, as far as I can tell, lose-lose.
I have generally kept my mind to myself on Afghanistan. This was partly intellectual laziness: it's a damn hard thing to make one's mind up about, both because I considered it a legitimate occupation when it began in 2001 and because I seriously wanted it to work out. While more cynical views made logical sense to me, I hoped - I really really hoped - that NATO was capable of doing something that Britain and the USSR had failed to do, to make sense of a violently pre-modern part of the world. I don't know whether you can attribute this irrational roadblock in my mind to my liberalism or maybe some not-so-dormant noblesse oblige neoconservatism, but it allowed me to avoid taking a really critical look at what I expected and hoped for in Afghanistan.
This whole run-off thing, though, has done wonders for clearing my mind. I don't have any idea how we are supposed to leave, and I can't say for sure that our leaving won't leave us in a slightly more dangerous world. But I can say that there is no way we are going to make ourselves a significantly safer world by sticking around for another 10 years and dumping another quarter of a trillion dollars down the drain.
The real questions we face now are the following:
1. What can we say, minimally, is a success? No safe havens? A functional government? What is the least we can do before we can spin ourselves a win? The country will not be a functional country and the Taliban is not going away; we have to aim much much lower.
2. What is the shortest amount of time necessary to do this? What is a reasonable amount of time (please, please not in Friedman Units) before it is clear it is unachievable?
3. If we do not achieve success, is sticking around worth the lives and money to achieve the goals we outline?
4. What kind of political coalition in the United States can force a close to the occupation? How can we strengthen this coalition? Do we have to get along with Ron Paul to get this done? An American domestic lobby is essential here, as Canada is most likely leaving soon anyway and we all know this thing ends when you guys say so.
So what is it? Do any of you have answers? I'm putting my ignorance well out on display here and I'll say that if there are any counterarguments I want to hear them. I've had my head in the sand on this for so long (...8 years) that I'm willing to take a beating on this. I just don't see how we can win this, and I don't think trying to do so is really even worth it.
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Ah. Watching BBC at the moment, I guess the run-off is off.
ReplyDeleteI've been just as unsure about the whole situation as you. I can't tell you how many times I've run through this conversation with my step-dad in the past few months. Both of consistantly come to the same conclusion that there is no good solution here. And that is usually where the conversation starts.
ReplyDeleteAs he usually puts it, there are really only three options on the table: 1) pack in what is bound to be not enough troops in the hopes of replicating the military-component of the surge in Iraq, 2) half-ass it, by keeping troop levels basically contant, "redining" the mission to terrorist hunting only, and waiting until 2012 when the Obama administration can actually do something semi-decisive, while praying that the government doesn't topple and the troop death count doesn't soar in the meantime, or 3) by far the most morally satisfying, get the hell out.
None of those are good choices.
But I think reducing our policy options to a spectrum of how militarily involved we are overlooks a seperate approach and one that, within certain obvious contraints, has very little to do with how many troops we have on the ground. That is, there is always the possibility that we stop working with the (or any) central government altogether and start putting our political and military muscle behind what are likely the more legitimate sources of authority from valley to valley and tribe to tribe.
From my limited understanding of the situation, I think that would give us the best chance of success, in which success is defined as keeping the harder line of the Taliban out of power, fighting systematic corruption, and reducing violence against American troops as much as possible. In exchange, we would basically be getting behind the policy of disolving the Afghan state, working with drug lords and other ideologically unsavory leaders (more than we already are, anyway), and abandoning any pretense that we are there to bring democracy.
I'm hoping that made sense.
"Dissolving the Afghan state"? Write a post pleaaaassseeee.
ReplyDeleteAlso waiting til 2012 is something that I really hope is not a factor in Obama's mind. That would be a horrible waste of time and money for the tiny amount of breathing room it will give him. I'm coming to think that, short of a total pull up stakes and book it in the middle of the night situation, Obama will not be judged unfavourably by anyone outside the neocon rump in Washington for leaving, and I think that as a result it probably gives him a lot of breathing room to pick the time and the place.
Also, I think I have to step back a little from where I went last night. I want a withdrawal, and soon. But I recognize the political and military loss in pulling out too quickly (WINK), and how it will inevitably be spun, and how spin on the world stage means funding for bad dudes who spin it their way and so on.
Anyway, I want a bigger post on your opinions. I honestly think we need to step up with some real thinking on this and hash it out this is a huge question and we've been sleeping it on it ladies and gentlemen.