On Afghanistan...

The Republican Caucus at Harvard Kennedy School

by Scott Darnell, MPP'10 on September 30, 2009 in Dems v. Reps

We are living in a moment of great consequence with regard to U.S. foreign policy in Afghanistan. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has said the situation is “serious” and “deteriorating.” U.S. commanders have just told Richard Holbrooke, U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, that they do not have sufficient troop levels to combat Taliban and other insurgents who are becoming more sophisticated in their attacks and whose growing intensity challenges the legitimacy of Afghanistan’s national government.

Currently, the U.S. is attempting to quell an insurgency with one-third or fewer total military forces and half the number of security and police trainers than were needed to dispel the insurgency in Iraq. All of this is taking place in a country that is not only more populous than Iraq but which also maintains dangerous hideouts along its rugged border with Pakistan.
Rightly or wrongly, what Afghanistan looks like in 20 years will depend largely on the decisions President Obama makes in the weeks ahead. A future of continued tyranny and fear for the Afghan people, as well as increased instability in South Asia, are not impossible outcomes. The longer the U.S. waits to increase the number of troops in Afghanistan, the harder it will be for the country to be fully secure.

As Obama correctly noted when running for the presidency, “…the security of Afghanistan and America is shared.” He called the Afghanistan/Pakistan border the “wild frontier of our globalized world,” later remarking, “We cannot fail to act because action is hard.” Obama’s rhetoric about the importance of the war in Afghanistan must be quickly matched – not by politically palatable mini-surges or tactic shifts – but by a significant surge in forces (perhaps as many as 40,000 additional U.S. troops) that will display his clear and decisive commitment to ending the violent insurgency. This will serve as the necessary first step in achieving peace and progress in Afghanistan.

To this point, Obama has spoken words of support for a war that he hasn’t convinced the American people is winnable. He has lacked clarity in defining what ought to be America’s end goals in Afghanistan, namely to enhance U.S. security by gaining a democratic ally in a region that has become a hotbed of conflict, and to provide the approximately 28 million people of Afghanistan a chance to experience freedom, prosperity, and social progress.

There are many aspects of the fight against the insurgents in Afghanistan that differ from what the U.S. faced in Iraq prior to President Bush increasing troop levels there. That being said, as Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institution astutely notes, “Basic principles of counterinsurgency and stabilization do have a general applicability across missions. The size of security forces always matters.”

It’s also becoming clear that an insurgency grows when the U.S. is distracted by other matters, and democratic, social, and economic progress is hindered until a violent insurgency is reigned in. We’ve found this to be true in Iraq, and this currently characterizes Afghanistan. A surge in armed forces would disrupt the confidence of the Taliban and allow for increased efforts to train Afghan security and police forces. A concerted effort to bolster local governmental authorities and work to legitimatize the national government could then be undertaken to achieve greater democratic stability.

Obama is in the political fight of his life over an ambitious and controversial domestic agenda that involves the U.S. government taking over aspects of the financial sector, auto industry, and healthcare system. Undoubtedly, he’d prefer not to face the potential political fallout of sending additional troops to Afghanistan. But he must understand that, so long as he believes the mission to be worthy and winnable, Americans will likely give his new strategy an opportunity to succeed.

From a political standpoint, Obama deserves no sympathy. If President Bush could successfully surge U.S. forces in Iraq two months after his party was trounced and thrown out of power in midterm elections while his approval ratings languished at 30 percent, then President Obama can surely survive any political fallout that might come from his ordering a significant surge of forces to Afghanistan.

Our strength can break the confidence of the insurgency; our reticence only bolsters it daily. The decision is on the president’s desk. For our soldiers in harm’s way and for the Afghan people who seek a brighter future, it’s time now to honor our commitment and send additional forces to Afghanistan.