Remind Me Again: Why Are We in Afghanistan?
We would be in minimalist possession of a fractious, ruined land, at war for three decades, and about as alien to, and far from, the United States as it's possible to be on this planet.? We would be in minimalist possession of the world's fifth poorest country.?
We would be in minimal possession of the world's second most corrupt country.? We would be in minimal possession of the world's foremost narco-state, the only country that essentially produces a drug monocrop, opium.? In terms of the global war on terror, we would be in possession of a country that the director of the CIA now believes to hold 50 to 100 al-Qaeda operatives ("maybe less") -- for whom parts of the country might still be a "safe haven." And for this, and everything to come, we would be paying, at a minimum, $84 billion a year.
On the basis of our stated war objective -- "[W]e cannot allow Al Qaeda or other transnational extremists to once again establish sanctuaries from which they can launch attacks on our homeland or on our allies," as General Petraeus put it in his confirmation hearing at the end of June 2010 -- success in Afghanistan means increasingly little.?
For al-Qaeda, Afghanistan was never significant in itself.? It was always a place of (relative) convenience.? If the U.S. were to bar access to it, there are so many other countries to choose from.
After all, what's left of the original al-Qaeda -- estimated by U.S. intelligence experts at perhaps 300 leaders and operatives -- seems to have established itself in the Pakistani tribal borderlands, a place that the U.S. military could hardly occupy, no matter how many CIA drone attacks were sent against it.? Moreover, U.S. intelligence experts increasingly suggest that al-Qaeda is in the process of fusing with local jihadist groups in those borderlands, Yemen, Somalia, North Africa, and elsewhere; that it is increasingly an amorphous "dispersed network," or even simply an idea or crude ideology, existing as much online as anywhere in particular on the ground.
In this sense -- and this is the only reason now offered for the American presence in Afghanistan -- a counterinsurgency "success" there would be meaningless unless, based on the same strategic thinking, the U.S. then secured Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, and a potential host of other places.? In other words, the U.S. military would have to do one thing the Bush years definitively proved it couldn't do: impose a Pax Americana on planet Earth.
Of course, the Bush administration might have offered other explanations for the ongoing Afghan War, including the need to garrison what it called "the arc of instability" stretching from North Africa to the Chinese border (essentially the oil heartlands of the planet), roll back Russia from its former Soviet "backyard" in Central Asia, and guarantee the flow of Caspian Sea oil westward.? More recently, with the revelation that a trillion or more dollars worth of natural resources lie under Afghan soil, securing that country's raw materials for western mining companies might have been added to that list.? The Obama administration, however, offers no such explanations and, being managerial rather than visionary in nature when it comes to U.S. foreign policy, might not even have them.
In any case, our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan seem to be telling a rather different story.? The singular thing the Iraq War seems to have done politically is promote Iranian influence in that country.? Economically, it's made Iraq a safer place for the state-owned or state-controlled oil companies of China, Russia, and a number of other non-western nations.? In Afghanistan, in terms of those future natural resources, we seem to be fighting to make that country safe for Chinese investment (just as the recently heightened U.S. sanctions against Iran are helping make that country safe for Chinese energy dominance).
The Question Mark over Afghanistan
All of this leaves the massive American investment of its most precious resources, including lives, in Afghanistan an ongoing mystery that is never addressed. ?Somewhere in that country's vast stretches of poppy fields or in the halls of Washington's national security bureaucracy, in other words, lurks a great unasked question.? It's a question asked almost half a century ago of Vietnam, the lost war to which David Petraeus turned in 2006 to produce the Army counterinsurgency manual which is the basis for the present surge.
The question was: Why are we in Vietnam?? (It even became the title of a Norman Mailer novel.)? In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson's administration produced a government propaganda film solely in response to that question, which was already threatening to drive down his polling figures and upend his Great Society at home.? The film was called Why Viet-Nam.?
While it had no question mark after the title, the question of whether to add one was actually argued out in the most literal way inside the administration.
The film began with the president quoting a letter he had received from a mother "in the Midwest" whose son was stationed in Vietnam.? You hear the president, in his homey twang, pick up that woman's question, as if it were his own.? "Why Vietnam?" he repeats three times as the title appears on the screen, after which, official or not, a question mark seems to hover over every scene, as it did over the war itself.
In a sense, the same question mark appeared both before and after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, but it has never been associated with Afghanistan.? Because of 9/11, Afghanistan remained for years the (relatively) good (and largely forgotten) war, until visible failure visibly tarnished it.
It's now past time to ask that question, even as the Obama administration repeats the al-Qaeda mantra of the Bush years almost word for word and lets any explanation go at that.
Why are we in Afghanistan?? Why is our treasure being wasted there when it's needed here?
It's clear enough that a failed counterinsurgency war in Afghanistan will be an unaffordably expensive catastrophe.? Let's not wait a year to discover that there's an even worse fate ahead, a "success" that leaves us mired there for years to come as our troubles at home only grow.?With everything else Americans have to deal with, who needs a future Petraeus Syndrome?
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
By Tom Engelhardt
Reprinted with permission from
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We're in Iraq in order to control the flow of oil from the country. Look at the monthly oil imports; today, we import over 490,000 barrels of oil per *day*, the 7th largest source of US oil imports.
The question is extremely naive. You want to answer it, just follow the money. Or as the lawyers say, "Who benefits?"
The answers, as always, are:
1) Big business; 2) lobbyists; 3) congress.
And if you ask the corollary, the answer to that, too, never changes. "Who pays?"
1) The American People. With lives, treasure, and honor.
In order to spend that money at home, as the article laments, the recipients of the money would have to change dramatically. No longer weapons manufacturers, but builders of bridges, developers of solar and wind power, makers of electric vehicles... these people don't have the power to change the course of congress's money spending, and so this will never happen. And we can't change it, because we can't evict the lobbyists, either. And is is THEY who control this process, by channeling money and favors to congress.
It's October 2001, the Taliban are harboring Bin Laden and the country is screaming for the govt to take revenge for the 911 attacks. Bush asks the Taliban to give up Bin Laden - they refuse. He sends the Army in - they clean house and the Taliban and any Al Queda escape to the hills.
If you look at geography and history you get a few clues to what went on from there. Afghanistan is surrounded by Iran on one side, Pakistan on the other and a bunch on other istans on top. On the Pakistani side there is a group of mountains that have always given shelter to any temporarily conquered folks. Upon invasion the existing ruling class flees to these mountains leaving a tribal society that simply doesn't care who is in care (or more accurately doesn't have the power to care who's in charge). The exiled ruling class then waits out the invaders orchestrating sniper like attacks from the mountains and the invading power spends lives and money there until they are sick of the whole thing and leave. Then the exiled ruling class take over.
The invasion force can't do anything about this because trying to attack the exiles would involve a suicidal attack on high ground and loads of lives lost. This is what happened in the USSR and what awaited us.
So what does Bush do knowing this? He makes his way to Iraq which is a much easier place to fight and has a relatively modern populace that will defend themselves from aggression. He goes to Iraq which has invaded its neighbors, been a bad actor on the world stage, mistreats its people, supports terrorism (at least in Gaza) and according to international and US spy sources is seeking nuclear weapons. It's perfect for his plan.
And what is that plan? Once in Iraq, he basically says "nah-nah-nah-nah Al Queda, we're in Iraq waiting for you to come and get us but you don't have the guts." He calls it the flypaper strategy and Al Queda goes for it. He kills a lot of them who have come from all over the world to fight the Great Satan, decimating Al Queda for at least a decade. A lot of detractors say that action recruits Al Queda but there is not evidence of this. On the other hand he may gain some grudging respect some Arabs (I believe the Kurds referred to Bush as "the avenger of the bones' or some such nonsense)but there's equally no evidence on that side. Of course, Al Queda will come back, but short of getting Bin Laden (which was botched by the generals in charge) that's as good as can be done in this circumstance.
So, to use some ironic words "Mission Accomplished" for Bush - time to draw down the troops in both places. Then comes Obama. He's been attacking the Iraq effort by saying that Afghanistan was "the good war" so when elected he escalates that war.
Now we need to stand by the folks who helped us. We can't let Karzai and his ilk get destroyed by the returning Taliban, but anything more than a security force is overkill. We never said we would wipe out the Taliban, we just wanted them to give up Bin Laden so is Obama ready to attempt a suicidal attack on high ground to attack a group who didn't attack the US on 911. My solution would be to hold Afghanistan on the borders (like they've been doing for 8 years) and allow every relief and social agency within the borders of Afghanistan to build up the country and make its own people believe their own lives are worth fighting for. Anything else seems a waste of lives and treasure and I feel Obama is walking down a foolish and ultimately tragic path.
That's my theory. It may be hogwash but I feel it's a little more credible than "Bush wanted his daddy to be proud of him"
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Because dubya marked time for 7 years instead of getting the job done.
It seems China doesn?t mind financing this war since they?re in there doing deals and scarfing up all the goodies.