One thing I just noticed as well. You’ve written above that we can simply bomb any terror camps we don’t like once we withdraw. I also happen to know you find Tom Englehardt’s arguments against an air power-heavy conflict to be very persuasive. How would you reconcile this?

And I don’t like you claiming I apply the minimalist-maximus framework. Since I know you read my analysis here, I have to assume you’re choosing to ignore the very mixed picture I present on a consistent basis. Things are going well and things are going poorly. Lawless areas of the country will continue to be lawless should be leave (i.e. nothing will change, with the possibility that things will get worse), and if they’re funded properly, there might be regions of relative stability in the Northern and Western regions. No one denies this. But at the same time, the toxic ideology of Al-Qaeda and the Taliban will also gain a foothold. We know this will happen. Right now, it isn’t, though they are starting to make headway.

I look at the possibilities on the table and in this specific case I do see the negatives of withdrawal as vastly outweighing the negatives of an increased presence. It is not the standard form of the Iraq War justifications. As I said at your blog, I am not a Kagan. Please don’t misrepresent my argument.

“I reject these questions.”

I should have said: This question is a logical fallacy: the “loaded question.” The answer to the key question is assumed in the choices.

As I explained in the following text, the core issue concerns limits to our power and wisdom. The “what would you do” question assumes that we can and should do something.

Despite the interventionish logic, nothing is often the best thing to do.

Another assumption here is the minimalist-maximus presentation. The consequences of non-intervention are assumed to be worst case. The consequences of intervention are assumed to be beneign or beneficial. Costs are pretty much ignored.

This is the standard form of the pro-war argument for the Iraq War. Perhaps for all wars. Since there have been so many, I guess many folks find it compelling.

(quote from Josh:)
“you address the Neo-Taliban insurgency without using guns or troops? How would you create pockets of stability and prevent violent outsiders from infiltrating to cause chaos?”

(your reply, Fabius:)
I reject these questions.

You reject these questions? Smartest argument ever. It’s funny that this is right where you lose.

As to what would happen with the neo-Taliban in power? The US may not have a 9/11 again if you make your country 1984-ish enough, at least for incoming visitors. The oceanic shield is still kind of useful to manage that.

The case is still not so clear for Europe, though. An al-Qaida poppy kingdom in southern Afghanistan wouldn’t be much fun for us Europeans with likely increasing trends of tourism between that place and countries over here. The consequences of which the political far right in Europe will react to in predictably intelligent ways.

Oh, and your argument about training camps easily bombed is just so funny. The intel is often wrong with as many troops as there are now, but we’ll surely successfully micromanage the situation with cruise-missiles once we’re outside. And would they really need training camps for the sort of operations they’d like to carry out? Wasn’t it, to a degree, the part of a show in the late 1990s? They do have training camps in the FATA east of the Durand Line now btw, and it seems like it’s not so easy to keep those bombed. But I’d make the assertion that the training camps are more important for pseudo-regular warfare against any reincarnation of the Northern Alliance. And you can set off VBIEDs without those.

What you may be trying to get at is that, instead of a continued large presence, the northern militias could be assisted by SFs and bombs to keep the neo-Taliban (and their growing number of local allies in such a case) contained. Notwithstanding that the ANA will inevitably have to work a bit like that, with continued extensive assistance though, the militia-based version of the same scenario simply wouldn’t work.

So, my final verdict: you’re trying to rush things on the basis of a short-sighted interpretation of your interests in an interdependent world requiring a long-term approach. And you also think foreign troops can’t achieve results. Which they can, in the right numbers.

The lack of enough troops for more ideal coverage of more territory is what allows otherwise allied districts/tribal areas fall to the neo-Taliban again and again, until the neo-Taliban are chased out by troops or rather by CAS. Which tends to kill a number of people from among otherwise friendly communities.

I’ll tell you some districts’ name so you can go check: Arghandab, Panjway, Zhari, Musa Qala, Chora, Deh Rawod etc.

So far, we have not [kept our promises in Afghanistan]. So long as we continue to break our promises, so long as we adapt a military-first strategy to conflict resolution and post-conflict reconstruction (in money and actions, that is, not rhetoric), we will continue to see failure after failure. Has the current, military-centric approach resulted in a single successful mission over the last twenty years? I cannot think of any—with the possible exceptions of Panama and Grenada. The rest—Iraq I, Somalia, Bosnia, Nigeria, Indonesia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Philippines, Iraq II—are all either failures or merely qualified defeats. It is possible to do better, because we have done better—post-War Europe comes immediately to mind, which involved taking an economics-centric approach to engagment, rather than a military one. Yet, as Priest documents, these lessons have been available for decades, both in military and civilian lore, yet they continue to be ignored by those in charge. So history will repeat itself until we either stop nation-building or until we bother to prepare properly for it.

The point here is that we do have many examples of successful nation-building to draw from, including non-American ones. And while the military should play a role in these sorts of adventures, it shouldn’t play the primary role (by this I mean combat troops providing security). The problem is, in Afghanistan the approach has been security-heavy: aid has been devolved to the 90% military/10%civilian PRTs (whose limited goals are hobbled by poor security), and the overwhelming amount of money spent in the country is spent on military concerns—something locals are painfully aware of. And still, the security situation deteriorates.

In other words, while we talk a pretty game about building institutions and self-sufficiency and so on, we put the military in charge of everything, then provide them with a laughable number of troops to accomplish the many tasks with which they’re saddled. We put the troops out front, but too few, while reversing our priorities.

That is deeply frustrating. And it aptly summarizes the past two years of my posting here about the U.S. in Afghanistan. The Army does play an absolutely vital role in the country, but it is underequipped and under-manned for that role. At the same time it has been shoe-horned into other tasks for which it is not well-suited.

It is possible this later dynamic, the way in which a good idea can be mutated by politics, is what Fabius is thinking of when he says I haven’t “made my case” and draws from the history of failed interventions to argue this one will fail as well.

Just a thought.

Again: we thought we could in the 90s. You’ve given no reason why you doubt that situation would not resurrect itself, while complaining I’m not making my case. I’m afraid you’ve failed to make yours, and you leave far too many issues up to vague “I doubt” or “history indicates” assertions. Data, please. If history is a sound guide for the fallibility of military occupation, why is it not one for the consequences of our withdrawal? I would say the latter is a far more concrete possibility than vague skepticism of our attempt to rebuild Afghan society (which is not, despite your rhetoric, colonialism, considering we are attempting to replicate the fully native government that existed under Daoud before he was overthrown by the communists).

I’m tired of continuing this. If you want one way the military can achieve concrete results if it wanted to (this is avoiding the Yglesias/Green Lantern fallacy, since it exists, and has worked, but is simply ignored), I suggest reading Kip at Abu Muqawama (you posted a comment on a post I’d have chosen), who has done an excellent job of exploring the many ways we are, in fact, capable of creating an Afghanistan that is neither colonial nor vulnerable to Taliban and al-Qaeda depredations… and why the military is a vital piece of this strategy. I don’t care to paraphrase or duplicate what he’s done.

I hate to sound like I’m pulling rank (or whatever the equivalent is), but it is that paucity of knowledge about the region you admit that makes these broad generalizations about war and occupation and even counterinsurgency not applicable. My continued case is that Afghanistan is an exception. That still has not really been addressed. Simply saying “Afghanistan is not a clock” doesn’t make much sense when the same forces as before—internal and external—are at play and have not been tackled in a meaningful way… because (quite literally) of the “light footprint.”

Provide aid, assistance, training, advice. With low expectations for results.

If a hostile State emerges, that is OK. We can live with that. I believe in a policy of intense response to attacks. Al Qaeda are outlaws AND declared enemies of the US — and their bases can be attacked at will.

Note my comment in the FM blog about assuming that a Tailban regime regaining power likely means more 9/11 attacks. I doubt that.

You are the area expert here, not me. I am listening to your case, or trying to elicit your case.

“Do you really mean to write off Afghanistan as hopelessly violent and unstable, destined to be a hotbed of warring tribes and violent xenophobia?”

Exactly, if necessary. Life is like that.

If you can build a case for military ops, I am on board. But if not, OK. Stuff happens, despite our good will, because of limited knowledge and resources.

I believe my analogy of pre-modern medicine captures the situation well. Perhaps I underestimate our capabilities. But the case is yours to build, not mine.

“In other words, there is no inherent reason why Afghanistan must be violent.” As a theoretical statement who can disagree?

“Which means the root cause of violence could be addressed.”

That is an assertive form of my question. Why do you believe military force can successfully address the root causes of Afghanistan’s violence? The answer does not seem obvious to me. That is the point of #5 and #6.

There are fundamental reasons why foreign combat troops seldom prove effective – speaking of long-term ground ops (not raids or strikes).

To summarize Richards’s argument, which he makes at length in If We Can Keep it, military operations by foreigners work when supporting functioning States with legitimate governments. But they seldom need foreign military intervention, except when attacked by other States. And when they do it is usually funding, training, and logistical support.

States that need foreign military assistance to fight non-State foes (internal or external) usually have low legitimacy – which is the primary problem. The outside aid often reduces the pressure for the government to address this problem.

Worse, the presence of outside troops usually exacerbates the problem by diminishing the host government’s legitimacy. The longer and larger the foreign combat presence, the more likely and more serious this effect.

If van Creveld is correct, we will see more States fail during the next few generations. Since military interventions have a low success rate, we might rely on — for lack of better opportunities — simple carrot and stick “solutions.” Aid plus strikes and raids (either pre-emptive or retaliatory).

“you address the Neo-Taliban insurgency without using guns or troops? How would you create pockets of stability and prevent violent outsiders from infiltrating to cause chaos?”

I reject these questions.

“I’m unaware of any organization that at least could address a foreign-backed insurgency apart from the military.”

Implicit in this is belief that the military can do so. History suggests that the odds of success in these projects are not promising.

The difference between us seems to be that I accept the fact that there our sharp – not distant or theoretical — limits to our wisdom and abilities. Perhaps America can live with a neo-Taliban insurgency. I do not consider the Afghanistan – Pakistan to be more than a line on a map – folks will cross it both ways and cause trouble, and there is little we can do about it. It is their problem, not ours.

The real solution to the questions you pose is to conquer and colonize the area. Unfortunately, evolution of 4GW since WWII makes that impossible – and accounts for the increased number and power of non-State entities.

This framework is incompatible with Barnett’s neo-colonialist proposal for large-scale and widespread military interventions.

Also note that the funds for this project must be borrowed from our foreign creditors, which greatly magnifies the cost to the future generations who will eventually pay. Cost seems to be frequently ignored in geopolitical reasoning. Not a good idea. As Paul Kennedy showed in the Rise and Fall of Great Powers, overspending has brought down many hegemons.

“Do you really mean to write off Afghanistan as hopelessly violent and unstable, destined to be a hotbed of warring tribes and violent xenophobia?”

Exactly. If necessary.

If you can build a case for military ops, I am on board. But if not, OK. Stuff happens, despite our good will, because of limited knowledge and resources. I believe my analogy of pre-modern medicine captures the situation well — but I could be underestimating our capabilities. But the case is yours to build, not mine.

3) Do you really mean to write off Afghanistan as hopelessly violent and unstable, destined to be a hotbed of warring tribes and violent xenophobia? I would question how closely you’ve read its history. Afghanistan has had a turbulent relationship with its neighbors, but it has generally never been any more or less violent than anyone else. Well, it has been brutal by Western standards, but no more so than Bukhara or Isfahan in the 19th century. Especially recently, the tribal violence there is very much a creation of the wars that have raged across its soil.

In other words, there is no inherent reason why Afghanistan must be violent. Which means the root cause of violence could be addressed. And if the aid and support necessary to prevent future outbreaks of violent extremism are prevented from being delivered because of the security situation, and aid on its own doesn’t really address it, then that would mean that if we want such aid and development to arrive, we would have to address security.

5) You misunderstand me. “Troops can.” Not “troops do,” or “troops always.” Troops can. I can stand on my head. But not all the time. Just as there are many examples of foreign troops being unable to provide security, there are also many examples of foreign troops being able to do exactly that—in Afghanistan.

6) I’m thinking that I’m using too many mental shortcuts to get to this point, and that’s where this seems to fail. Let me ask you a question: how would you address the Neo-Taliban insurgency without using guns or troops? How would you create pockets of stability and prevent violent outsiders from infiltrating to cause chaos?

This is an honest question. I’m unaware of any organization that at least could address a foreign-backed insurgency apart from the military. And I’ll pre-empt what I think might be a likely response and say that referencing some Barnett-style “pistol-packing peace corps” is a non-answer. What exists today, right now, that could provide a secure environment better than the military?

So, I know that essay, and found it highly amusing. And still do. But your point about scale and duration give me pause: those don’t address the initial “why,” which I thought was the point of this. If it is a good idea but simply unattainable or impractical (which I think is what Friedman was reaching for but didn’t quite prove), that is another issue. But you’re not saying the idea of the occupation is an impractical one—now it seems you’re saying it is fundamentally flawed. The fundamental utility or appropriateness of the military is related to the duration and scale of an occupation only in the second degree—meaning, the question of whether it is a good and appropriate response comes first. Only then should its practicality be examined.

It looks like you have those two reversed.