Reply With Quote
chirp
McChrystal’s Myth
There is no such thing a "victory" in the kinds of wars we’re fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. The best one can hope for in these types of conflicts – counterinsurgency efforts in far-flung corners of the globe with fuzzy objectives and vague necessity – is to not be seen as having "lost." For that to happen, unfortunately, you have to stick around for so long and fade away so gradually that, by the time you leave, nobody notices you’re gone.
The neoconservative apparatus that got us into Iraq for reasons we still haven’t decided on threatens to keep us in Afghanistan indefinitely for reasons yet to be determined. Everything we’re doing in Central and Southwest Asia supposedly has something to do with eradicating al-Qaeda, yet there is no sign of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. The argument for persisting in Afghanistan says that we have to make sure al-Qaeda doesn’t go back there, yet as former CIA officer Philip Giraldi recently noted, credible assessments suggest that "Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda has likely been reduced to a core group of eight to ten terrorists who are on the run more often than not."
For the sake of keeping fewer than a dozen evildoers out of Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal and his legion of supporters in the Pentagon, Congress, and the media insist we need to bring increase U.S. troop levels to over 100,000, and the overall coalition force level to a half-million, the number of troops we had on the ground at one point in Vietnam.
The half-million figure comes from the counterinsurgency field manual (FM 3-24, Counterinsurgency [.pdf]), which calls for 20 to 25 counterinsurgent forces per every 1,000 locals, and Afghanistan contain a tad over 28 million locals. Your cat can do the math from there. What your cat can’t tell you is the thought process behind the conclusion that it makes sense to pit a half-million persons under arms against a force of eight or ten persons who aren’t in the vicinity of where you plan to place your half-million armed people.
That’s because your cat’s thought process isn’t as short-circuited as the cognitive quagmire going on in the minds of McChrystal and the people backing him.
The short version of this loopy logic equation goes like this: you put McChrystal in charge and he’s asking for what an official doctrine manual says he should ask for, so you have to give it to him. This skips over a trail of false assumptions that, lined up end to end, would span the Khyber Pass.
The requirement for a half-million to ten superiority ratio should have been laughed out of the discussion the moment it was mentioned. The counterinsurgency manual’s dictum that we must "convince the people of the government’s legitimacy" contains two dismal flaws in the context of Afghanistan (and Iraq as well). There is no convincing the Afghan people of the legitimacy of the Hamad Karzai government or any other government we replace it with.
The biggest flaw in the pro-McChrystal plan argument is that the counterinsurgency manual reflects tried-and-true tactics and strategy. There has never been such a thing as a triumphant counterinsurgency conflict. These types of wars have all been indecisive and draining quagmires; the sorts of conflicts that Sun Tzu warned us about over two thousand years ago when he said "No nation ever profited from a long war."
Yet it is that the military-industrial-congressional complex has adopted the "long war" concept, a gem of tank thinkery straight out of Orwell designed to keep America on a permanent wartime economy and in an endless state of fear and loathing of enemies vaguely defined and overly demonized.
Lacking a peer military adversary since the end of the Cold War, the American war mafia, headed by Bill Kristol’s Israeli-centric neoconservative cabal, casts about desperately for a "new Pearl Harbor" to justify its existence. The 9/11 attacks gave them the "catalyst" they needed to justify the invasions in Iraq and Afghanistan. It remains to be seen if we’ll be able to pull out of the flat spin they have flown us into.
The greatest fallacy in the counterinsurgency doctrine is the notion that we can partner with the host nation to establish order and security. As U.S. Army Col. Timothy Reese recently observed, our years of effort at establishing a competent and reliable government and security apparatus in Iraq have come to naught. The "ineffectiveness and corruption" of Iraq’s government, he wrote in a recent memorandum, "is the stuff of legend." Of Iraq’s security forces, he wrote, "corruption among officers is widespread."
Laziness is "endemic," Reese said, and "Lack of initiative is legion." These and other compelling reasons are why Reese recommended that it’s time to "declare victory" in Iraq and go home.
To think we can do better than this in Afghanistan is the epitome of delusion. Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, which we backed in a long war against Iran during the 1980s, was a real country with a real army and real ins utions and infrastructure. Afghanistan has always been a fourth-world wasteland. When it comes to Afghanistan, our counterinsurgency manual amounts to little more than a ream of latrine linen.
The only reason we’re still playing political patty-cake about what to do in Afghanistan – or anywhere else in that part of the world – is to determine who gets the blame for "losing." A popular adage of war says it’s the losers who determine when they’re over. So, the logic goes, as long as we don’t quit, we can’t lose. Hence the "long war."
It’s all about seeing who gets the blame for failing to do the impossible.
chirp
the neocons neolibs and moderates all voted for to go to war with iraq. If we have beaten the terrorist groups in Afghan to where they are almost dead, should we quite. What I mean is if we are succeeding that well, should we not keep going?
I don't think the idea is to put that kind of ratio force in all of Afghanistan. Probably just the western provinces, maybe less.For the sake of keeping fewer than a dozen evildoers out of Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal and his legion of supporters in the Pentagon, Congress, and the media insist we need to bring increase U.S. troop levels to over 100,000, and the overall coalition force level to a half-million, the number of troops we had on the ground at one point in Vietnam.
The half-million figure comes from the counterinsurgency field manual (FM 3-24, Counterinsurgency [.pdf]), which calls for 20 to 25 counterinsurgent forces per every 1,000 locals, and Afghanistan contain a tad over 28 million locals. Your cat can do the math from there. What your cat can’t tell you is the thought process behind the conclusion that it makes sense to pit a half-million persons under arms against a force of eight or ten persons who aren’t in the vicinity of where you plan to place your half-million armed people.
It's hard to read this author with all his name calling.That’s because your cat’s thought process isn’t as short-circuited as the cognitive quagmire going on in the minds of McChrystal and the people backing him.
It is sounding like this guy is targeting McChrystal. Since the history of America, Presidents have protected their generals. I don't think the libs should be attacking Gen. McChrystal. It will turn on them.The short version of this loopy logic equation goes like this: you put McChrystal in charge and he’s asking for what an official doctrine manual says he should ask for, so you have to give it to him. This skips over a trail of false assumptions that, lined up end to end, would span the Khyber Pass.
The requirement for a half-million to ten superiority ratio should have been laughed out of the discussion the moment it was mentioned. The counterinsurgency manual’s dictum that we must "convince the people of the government’s legitimacy" contains two dismal flaws in the context of Afghanistan (and Iraq as well). There is no convincing the Afghan people of the legitimacy of the Hamad Karzai government or any other government we replace it with.
England was pretty successful at it in the 19th century. America did well in the phillipines.The biggest flaw in the pro-McChrystal plan argument is that the counterinsurgency manual reflects tried-and-true tactics and strategy. There has never been such a thing as a triumphant counterinsurgency conflict. These types of wars have all been indecisive and draining quagmires; the sorts of conflicts that Sun Tzu warned us about over two thousand years ago when he said "No nation ever profited from a long war."
Free people elect their govt. This govt decides through an open debate who is our enemy and who we go to war with. Just because their is an industry that helps upgrade our military equipment, doesn't mean they are publicly lobbieing for wars.Yet it is that the military-industrial-congressional complex has adopted the "long war" concept, a gem of tank thinkery straight out of Orwell designed to keep America on a permanent wartime economy and in an endless state of fear and loathing of enemies vaguely defined and overly demonized.
facts?Lacking a peer military adversary since the end of the Cold War, the American war mafia, headed by Bill Kristol’s Israeli-centric neoconservative cabal, casts about desperately for a "new Pearl Harbor" to justify its existence. The 9/11 attacks gave them the "catalyst" they needed to justify the invasions in Iraq and Afghanistan. It remains to be seen if we’ll be able to pull out of the flat spin they have flown us into.
The corruption, is probably not as bad as govt.s like China, Russia, and Iran. Declare victory. He said victory. Obama would have left Iraq regardless.The greatest fallacy in the counterinsurgency doctrine is the notion that we can partner with the host nation to establish order and security. As U.S. Army Col. Timothy Reese recently observed, our years of effort at establishing a competent and reliable government and security apparatus in Iraq have come to naught. The "ineffectiveness and corruption" of Iraq’s government, he wrote in a recent memorandum, "is the stuff of legend." Of Iraq’s security forces, he wrote, "corruption among officers is widespread."
Laziness is "endemic," Reese said, and "Lack of initiative is legion." These and other compelling reasons are why Reese recommended that it’s time to "declare victory" in Iraq and go home.
Saddam Hussein's Iraq was never a real country. It was a dictator occupying it. He starved his own people. As far as Iran-the enemy of our enemy is our allie. Also it was democrats who but bush down for messing up the order of the Middle east. About his arguement of the effectiveness of the counterinsurgency man, what proof does he have. Does he have a better way, or is his way just to get out?To think we can do better than this in Afghanistan is the epitome of delusion. Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, which we backed in a long war against Iran during the 1980s, was a real country with a real army and real ins utions and infrastructure. Afghanistan has always been a fourth-world wasteland. When it comes to Afghanistan, our counterinsurgency manual amounts to little more than a ream of latrine linen.
Agree with it or not but Obama wouldn't of been elected if he said 9 months into his presidency, he would pull out of Afghanistan, or leave his general in limbo because he didn't know what he was going to do. He is the one saying we should focus on afghanistan.The only reason we’re still playing political patty-cake about what to do in Afghanistan – or anywhere else in that part of the world – is to determine who gets the blame for "losing." A popular adage of war says it’s the losers who determine when they’re over. So, the logic goes, as long as we don’t quit, we can’t lose. Hence the "long war."
This author probably made this same arguement about Iraq.It’s all about seeing who gets the blame for failing to do the impossible.
So basically this guy thinks we shouldnt be in Iraq and never should have gone. Afghan- We shouldn't be there anymore because we got rid of most of the terrorists we went to get. The ones left will not follow us over the water. As far as our allies-their problem(assumed). The neocons, ran by bill kristol, the weeklystandard editor, are running a secret society of war profiteering companies who push our political class towards war. Obama is only letting soldiers die in afghanistan because of politics, and he doesn't want to be remembered for losing a war. and the neo cons are wanting to blame him. They don't care for the soldiers either.
This is an entertaining op ed, worthy of the author becoming a contributor to MSNBC and CNN.
Last edited by spursncowboys; 09-30-2009 at 01:34 PM.
Commander Jeff Huber, U.S. Navy (Retired) commanded an E-2C Hawkeye squadron and was operations officer of a Navy air wing and an aircraft carrier. Jeff's essays have been required reading at the U.S. Naval War College where he earned a master of arts degree in neoconservative studies in 1995.
WHy would someone get a masters in neoconservative studies? Officers in the Army always have the most useless degrees. In fact some ROTC recruiters try and pursuade students to take the easier ones. Like English. Im not saying a Masters in Neoconservative studies is easy. Anywho I am regressing. I stand by my remark that the guy belittles and namecalling.
Navy...Ha.
Huber is for sure a polemicist and often goes over the top rhetorically.
IMO his take on strategy is spot on: our strategy has mostly been improvised, and the stated aims of the war are probably not achievable, even with the desired force levels.
Touche'.In fact some ROTC recruiters try and pursuade students to take the easier ones. Like English.
It seems the Navy doesn't have very many fans of counterinsurgency. I don't know if it will work as well as it did in Iraq. G. Will had a good article about how to get out of Afghanistan.
Time to Get Out of Afghanistan
By George F. Will
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
"Yesterday," reads the e-mail from Allen, a Marine in Afghanistan, "I gave blood because a Marine, while out on patrol, stepped on a [mine's] pressure plate and lost both legs." Then "another Marine with a bullet wound to the head was brought in. Both Marines died this morning."
"I'm sorry about the drama," writes Allen, an enthusiastic infantryman willing to die "so that each of you may grow old." He says: "I put everything in God's hands." And: "Semper Fi!"
Allen and others of America's finest are also in Washington's hands. This city should keep faith with them by rapidly reversing the trajectory of America's involvement in Afghanistan, where, says the Dutch commander of coalition forces in a southern province, walking through the region is "like walking through the Old Testament."
U.S. strategy -- protecting the population -- is increasingly troop-intensive while Americans are increasingly impatient about "deteriorating" (says Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff) conditions. The war already is nearly 50 percent longer than the combined U.S. involvements in two world wars, and NATO assistance is reluctant and often risible.
The U.S. strategy is "clear, hold and build." Clear? Taliban forces can evaporate and then return, confident that U.S. forces will forever be too few to hold gains. Hence nation-building would be impossible even if we knew how, and even if Afghanistan were not the second-worst place to try: The Brookings Ins ution ranks Somalia as the only nation with a weaker state.
Military historian Max Hastings says Kabul controls only about a third of the country -- "control" is an elastic concept -- and " 'our' Afghans may prove no more viable than were 'our' Vietnamese, the Saigon regime." Just 4,000 Marines are contesting control of Helmand province, which is the size of West Virginia. The New York Times reports a Helmand official saying he has only "police officers who steal and a small group of Afghan soldiers who say they are here for 'vacation.' " Afghanistan's $23 billion gross domestic product is the size of Boise's. Counterinsurgency doctrine teaches, not very helpfully, that development depends on security, and that security depends on development. Three-quarters of Afghanistan's poppy production for opium comes from Helmand. In what should be called Operation Sisyphus, U.S. officials are urging farmers to grow other crops. Endive, perhaps?
Even though violence exploded across Iraq after, and partly because of, three elections, Afghanistan's recent elections were called "crucial." To what? They came, they went, they altered no fundamentals, all of which militate against American "success," whatever that might mean. Creation of an effective central government? Afghanistan has never had one. U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry hopes for a "renewal of trust" of the Afghan people in the government, but the Economist describes President Hamid Karzai's government -- his vice presidential running mate is a drug trafficker -- as so "inept, corrupt and predatory" that people sometimes yearn for restoration of the warlords, "who were less venal and less brutal than Mr. Karzai's lot."
Mullen speaks of combating Afghanistan's "culture of poverty." But that took decades in just a few square miles of the South Bronx. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the U.S. commander in Afghanistan, thinks jobs programs and local government services might entice many "accidental guerrillas" to leave the Taliban. But before launching New Deal 2.0 in Afghanistan, the Obama administration should ask itself: If U.S. forces are there to prevent reestablishment of al-Qaeda bases -- evidently there are none now -- must there be nation-building invasions of Somalia, Yemen and other sovereignty vacuums?
U.S. forces are being increased by 21,000, to 68,000, bringing the coalition total to 110,000. About 9,000 are from Britain, where support for the war is waning. Counterinsurgency theory concerning the time and the ratio of forces required to protect the population indicates that, nationwide, Afghanistan would need hundreds of thousands of coalition troops, perhaps for a decade or more. That is inconceivable.
So, instead, forces should be substantially reduced to serve a comprehensively revised policy: America should do only what can be done from offshore, using intelligence, drones, cruise missiles, airstrikes and small, potent Special Forces units, concentrating on the porous 1,500-mile border with Pakistan, a nation that actually matters.
Genius, said de Gaulle, recalling Bismarck's decision to halt German forces short of Paris in 1870, sometimes consists of knowing when to stop. Genius is not required to recognize that in Afghanistan, when means now, before more American valor, such as Allen's, is squandered.
I already posted it here. It went over like a lead balloon.
Oh ok. G. Will doesn't offend enough people for most of us.
Al-Qaeda is not only OBL. It is world wide. So what other reason is there to still be interested in Afghanistan?The neoconservative apparatus that got us into Iraq for reasons we still haven’t decided on threatens to keep us in Afghanistan indefinitely for reasons yet to be determined. Everything we’re doing in Central and Southwest Asia supposedly has something to do with eradicating al-Qaeda, yet there is no sign of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. The argument for persisting in Afghanistan says that we have to make sure al-Qaeda doesn’t go back there, yet as former CIA officer Philip Giraldi recently noted, credible assessments suggest that "Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda has likely been reduced to a core group of eight to ten terrorists who are on the run more often than not."
This report only gives the perspective of why...not a clear reason as to why. Not that I can desolve it's credibility...but more so that it is only a view based on speculation and not facts as to why we are still there. Those facts would never be illuminated for giving the enemy your goal is allowing your enemy to win.
There's got to be a reason Obama is willing to continue this effort that we just don't or won't know until the final outcome. And if Obama is willing to risk future election because of a decision to continue this effort...I would bet it is for reasons other than his own political ambition.
Obama doesn't want to be the guy who lost the war. The day fell on Ford, I think. We lost Vietnam during Nixon and the Dems are rightly blamed for the loss, though they followed a popular call, and the country was ready for it to be over.
IMO the ultimate loser was LBJ, who saw no really good reason to continue, but he did anyway, so he wouldn't be the guy who lost. He withdrew in 1968 because of it.
I see shades of LBJ. If Obama successfully hands off the war in Afghanistan merely to avoid getting tagged with the loss, he deserves to lose the election.
Buchanan just the other day referred to Eisenhower, who put an end to the Korean war and was unafraid to be tagged with the loss. He was reelected. But he commanded Overlord.
Eisenhower and LBJ are the two main roads for Obama: either extend the futility, or withdraw honorably.
I'd like to think Obama is angling for an honorable withdrawal....
...but so far I doubt it. Obama will try to avoid the loss, so the vagueness of his strategy, an apparent weakness, will serve as a temporizing move, to prolong the war unnecessarily and facilitate a successful handoff to the eventual *loser*.
After all, given the assymetry of power and wealth and all that goes with it, we can sustain the conflict for decades in principle, just like the nation-builders say, and certain pols are keen to warn us. Fifty years, a century.
"Whatever it takes, dude."
Of course, Obama could lose in the meantime and then he would be toast, but we would be the out.
That would be a good thing in my book.
Ah, dreams.
Well...there just might be good reason to continue that we just don't know.
I can't think of any reason why Obama would put his political career at risk over Afghanistan.
Poppies can be grown other than Afghanistan...Threat from radical religious sects don't just come from Afghanistan...A country the size of Texas would not seem a threat to our nation...The people (tribes) other than the ruling parties of the recent past don't seem to have an issue with us...Their culture has always been one of agriculture and ranching and not industrial or world monopolization...And if OBL is not there...I can bet we have a pretty good ideal where he is...So....
it just doesn't make since for BHO to make a testiment (Eisenhauer or LBJ) regarding Afghanistan unless there is something else to this region that does make it dangerous to the United States.
Of course...Obama never made since to me to begin with...but...I just can't see a person of his intelect allowing something like this to be his potential downfall.
But as you stated, but for different reasons...
That would be a good thing in my book as well.
I don't have a faith-based relationship to my government.Well...there just might be good reason to continue that we just don't know.
Do you?
Do we not deserve to be told patiently and deliberately why we continue to fight?
Or the strategy for ending it all, so we know that they have one...
This war in Afghanistan has gone on for what, almost eight years now?
Let's get the out if we can. Have an outpost or two. Big bad embassy. Whatever.
But after we whup some ass in Afghanistan pretty soon, let's find the end of it. Ya basta. Bring em home. They did more than enough already. Declare victory, and withdraw honorably.
Enough.
Where nationalism is strong, intervention is not needed.
Where nationalism is weak, intervention will not be successful.
When MacChrystal says how bad Afghanistan is now, how clever and tough and adaptive the Taleban are, he's really saying how bad the NATO invasion has failed. Taleban now present in 90%+ of Afghanistan.
@Bartleby: Everybody knows that counter-insurgency wars are typically long. That doesn't change the fact that Mr. Huber was revealing either a reckless disregard for truth or a concerning lack of knowledge about the issue he was addressing when he made the statement refuted with those links.
Curiously, the linked article states a very different thing: "The top commander of U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan said Friday he sees no signs of a major al-Qaida presence in the country, but says the terror group still maintains close links to insurgents."we still haven’t decided on threatens to keep us in Afghanistan indefinitely for reasons yet to be determined. Everything we’re doing in Central and Southwest Asia supposedly has something to do with eradicating al-Qaeda, yet there is no sign of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan.
One has to wonder if Mr. Huber reads the articles he links in his writings or if he just relies on the laziness and credulity of his readers.
Last edited by mogrovejo; 10-01-2009 at 07:43 AM.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_...Gibbs-9/29/09/
Q: Robert, was Rasmussen speaking for the President when he said today in the Oval Office, "We will stay in Afghanistan as long as it takes"?
MR. GIBBS: Obviously, I'm not going to get into parsing the words of --
Q It's pretty straightforward.
MR. GIBBS: I understand, I just don't currently hold the position of his spokesperson.
Q Well, does the President agree with that?
MR. GIBBS: I think the President believes that we have to do -- we have to, as I said earlier, disrupt, dismantle and destroy al Qaeda, prevent it from having a safe haven that would allow it to plan the type of activities that we saw happen in September of 2001 in this country.
Q And that is the objective for which the U.S. will stay in Afghanistan, as long as it takes?
MR. GIBBS: That is the objective of our U.S. policy toward Afghanistan.
The obvious political problems for this Administration that could arise from leaving Afghanistan without establishing conditions that don't allow a return of the Taliban to the power are 2:
- the Taliban regime is a sanguineous and totalitarian one. No Administration would like to be associated to a replay of the Khmer Rouge capture of Phnom Penh and the succeeding events.
- the other is the one explicitly stated by Press Secretary Gibbs above: in the even of a new terrorist attack in the US mainland preprepared by groups established under the protection of a Taliban regime, the least of the problems to Obama would be being associated with the arguable and putative label of "loser" or losing an election. History would be extremely severe towards his tenure.
Last edited by mogrovejo; 10-01-2009 at 07:15 AM.
The government they have now is weak, corrupt and intensely disliked.the Taliban regime is a sanguineous and totalitarian one. No Administration would like to be associated to a replay of the Khmer Rouge capture of Phnom Penh and the succeeding events.
When it comes to the bad guys, everyone's a psychic.
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
