Washington's Failed War in Afghanistan

[Objectivist]

Washington's Failed War in Afghanistan

By Elan Journo

America's campaign in Afghanistan was once widely hailed as a success
in the "war on terror." We have nothing more to fear from Afghanistan,
our policy makers told us, because the war had accomplished its two
main goals: al Qaeda and its sponsoring regime, the Taliban, were
supposedly long gone, and a new, pro-Western government had been set
up. But as the daily news from Afghanistan shows, in reality the war
has been a drastic failure.

Legions of undefeated Taliban and al Qaeda soldiers have renewed their
jihad. Flush with money, amassing recruits, and armed with guns,
rockets and explosives, they are fighting to regain power. In recent
months, they have mounted a string of deadly suicide bombings and
rocket attacks against American and NATO forces; more U.S. troops have
died in Afghanistan in the last 20 months than did during the peak of
the war.

Taliban forces have effectively besieged several provinces in southern
Afghanistan. Local officials estimate that in some provinces the
"number of Taliban . . . is several times more than that of the police
and Afghan National Army." Taliban fighters are said to amble through
villages fearlessly, brandishing their Kalashnikovs, and collecting
zakat (an Islamic tithe) from peasants. With astounding boldness, they
have assassinated clerics and judges deemed too friendly to the new
government, and fired rockets at a school for using "un-Islamic"
books.

The Taliban and al Qaeda forces are so strong and popular that Senator
Bill Frist recently declared that a war against them cannot be won,
and instead suggested negotiating with the Islamists.

How is it that five years after the war began--and in the face of
America's unsurpassed military strength--Taliban and al Qaeda fighters
are threatening to regain power?

Victory in Afghanistan demanded two things. We had to destroy the
Taliban and we had to ensure that a non-threatening,
non-Islamic-warrior-breeding regime take its place. But we did not
think we had a moral right to do what was necessary to achieve either
goal.

Our military was ordered to pursue Taliban fighters only if it
simultaneously showed "compassion" to the Afghans. The U.S. military
dropped bombs on Afghanistan--but instead of ruthlessly pounding key
targets, it was ordered to gingerly avoid hitting holy shrines and
mosques (known to be Taliban hideouts) and to shower the country with
food packages. The United States deployed ground forces--but instead
of focusing exclusively on capturing or killing the enemy, they were
also diverted to a host of "reconstruction" projects. The result is
that the enemy was not destroyed and crushed in spirit, but merely
scattered and left with the moral fortitude to regroup and launch a
brazen comeback.

Even with its hands tied, however, the U.S. military succeeded in
toppling the Taliban regime--but Washington subverted that
achievement, too.

A new Afghan government would be a non-threat to America's interests
if it were based on a secular constitution that respects individual
rights. The Bush administration, however, declared that we had no
right to "impose our beliefs" on the Afghans--and instead endorsed
their desire for another regime founded on Islamic law. Already this
avowedly Islamic regime has jailed an Afghan magazine editor for
"blasphemy"; earlier this year Abdul Rahman, an Afghan convert to
Christianity, faced a death sentence for apostasy. The new Afghan
regime cannot be counted on to oppose the resurgence of Islamic
totalitarianism. Ideologically, it has nothing to say in opposition to
the doctrines of the Taliban (two members of the Taliban leadership
are in the new government). It is only a matter of time before
Afghanistan is once again a haven for anti-American warriors.

The failure in Afghanistan is a result of Washington's foreign policy.
Despite lip-service to the goal of protecting America's safety, the
"war on terror" has been waged in compliance with the prevailing moral
premise that self-interest is evil and self-sacrifice a virtue.
Instead of trouncing the enemy for the sake of protecting American
lives, our leaders have sacrificed our self-defense for the sake of
serving the whims of Afghans.

The half-hearted war in Afghanistan failed to smash the Taliban and al
Qaeda. It failed to render their ideology--Islamic totalitarianism--a
lost cause. Instead, at best it demonstrated Washington's reluctance
to fight ruthlessly to defend Americans. How better to stoke the
enthusiasm of jihadists?

America cannot win this or any war by embracing selflessness as a
virtue. Ultimately, it cannot survive unless Washington abandons its
self-sacrificial foreign policy in favor of one that proudly places
America's interests as its exclusive moral concern.

Elan Journo is a junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute

[citizen_142002]

Working off of the assumption that Al-Qaeda was the party responsible for 9-11, which isn't necessarily a given for a lot of people in this group, the war in Afghanistan seems justifiable.

The problem is that we could have been handed Bin Laden had we been willing to go through Pakistan as a middle-man. Instead the US wanted to swoop in and smoke him out of his hole. well, five years later and appearently we are unable or unwilling to do that.

Frankly I think that the problems in Afghanistan are the result of a half assed invasion. That's not to say the troops didn't give it their best shot, or that they exercised too much restraint. We put about 5,000 boots on the ground. Think about how many troops were sent to the diversionary war in Iraq.
If we had sent 50,000 troops and had been willing to cough up more money for buiding an Afghan infrastructure, the results would have been better.

The problem is that a western approach to stability, won't get far in Afghanistan. It has always been a very tribal country, and it will remain that way. The idea of a national army is foreign to Afghans. If American advisors had a better comprehension of our militia heritage, maybe they could put a better context on that.

We transfered control to a sovreign government, before our work was done, and now it's really too late to send more troops. If we had gone at this full steam, we could have all our troops back home, Bin Laden would be gone, and Al-Qaeda would be thrown into chaos in Afghanistan. Not to mention, had we actually pursued our attackers, we might not have decided to take the detour in Iraq.

What's past is past.

[KBCraig]

Working off of the assumption that Al-Qaeda was the party responsible for 9-11, which isn't necessarily a given for a lot of people in this group, the war in Afghanistan seems justifiable.

The problem is that we could have been handed Bin Laden had we been willing to go through Pakistan as a middle-man.

Wow. Talk about your assumptions...

Pakistan doesn't control the territory on their side of the border, much less on the Afghan side.

Their willingness to "help" would also have come at the price of something that would no doubt be objectionable to many (probably India, for starters).

Kevin