Council on Foreign Relations: Next Steps in Afghanistan

www.foreignaffairs.com/blackwill121710

“Washington should accept that the Taliban will inevitably control most of the Pashtun south and east and that the price of forestalling that outcome is far too high for the United States to continue paying,” writes Robert Blackwill, former deputy national security adviser and current CFR Henry A. Kissinger senior fellow. Instead, the United States and its partners should “let the local ‘correlation of forces’ take its course” in the Pashtun homeland, while deploying U.S. air power and Special Forces for seven to ten years, explains Blackwill. This will “ensure that the north and west of Afghanistan do not succumb to the Taliban.” Reluctantly accepting the de facto partition is hardly an ideal ending in Afghanistan, argues Blackwill. But regrettably, it is now the “best result that Washington can realistically and responsibly achieve,” and the “best available alternative to strategic defeat.”

“Such a change in U.S. strategy would make clear to all that the United States, through its prolonged military presence in Afghanistan, intends to remain a power and influence in South and Central Asia for many years to come. It would dramatically reduce U.S. military casualties and thus minimize U.S. domestic political pressure for a hasty withdrawal. It would substantially lower U.S. expenditures on Afghanistan (now nearly $7 billion per month). It would increase the likelihood that NATO allies would continue their missions in Afghanistan over the long term. It would allow the U.S. Army and Marines to recover from years of fighting two ground wars. It would encourage most of Afghanistan’s neighbors to support an acceptable stabilization of the country. It would reduce Islamabad’s capacity to use the U.S. ground role in southern Afghanistan to extract tolerance from Washington regarding terrorism emanating from Pakistan. And it would allow the Obama administration to concentrate intensively on other important issues.”

“We have seen no evidence of that, and very frankly, my view is that, with regards to reconciliation, unless they’re convinced the United States is going to win and that they are going to be defeated, I think it is very difficult to proceed with a reconciliation that is going to be meaningful.” Despite the intensification of drone attacks, the United States cannot kill the Taliban into meaningful political compromise. As a senior Defense Department o⁄cial told The Washington Post in late October, “The insurgency seems to be maintaining its resilience,” adding that if there was a sign the momentum was shifting, he did not see it.”

More Time, Not More Troops Necessary to Finish the Job in Afghanistan

http://foreignaffairs.com/miller121710

“The stabilization and reconstruction effort in Afghanistan has gone better than is widely believed,” writes Paul Miller, former director for Afghanistan in the U.S.National Security Council under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. In fact, Miller explains, since 2001, Afghanistan’s economy has grown at an impressive rate and major development indicators in the country have improved dramatically. Even security and the rule of law—long neglected—are now improving. “Aid dependency and a poorly diversified economy threaten Afghanistan’s long-term economic stability, but the greater risk is that the country’srecent progress will unravel unless security is greatly improved,” explains Miller. And, the most important resource the United States now needs is “not more troops but more time,” he concludes.
“If additional U.S. and NATO soldiers are matched by a comparable civilian surge, a continuing donor commitment, and a heightened focus on capacity development—increasing the capabilities and performance of civilian institutions of governance, including the ministries in Kabul, their provincial counterparts, and the legal system—the international community is likely to achieve its core goals and Afghanistan will have a genuine chance of becoming stable for the first time in a generation.”

“The single greatest strategic threat is the weakness of the Afghan government. Efforts in recent years to increase the size and scope of governance-assistance eªorts are a welcome gesture, but they are not enough. The Obama administration should push for a dramatically more ambitious capacity-development program, starting with a much larger civilian presence in the Afghan bureaucracy and court system. Washington should also recognize that it can choose to withdraw from Afghanistan quickly at high risk or slowly at low risk. The programs, budgets, and strategies that are now finally in place have only been operating for a few years; it is unlikely that there will be dramatic progress by July 2011. The Obama administration has calculated that some degree of withdrawal is necessary to pressure the Afghan government, but it should be wary lest a precipitous withdrawal lead to panic in Afghanistan, undoing a decade of careful gains.”