A major goal of US President Barack Obama’s “surge” of33,000 troops in Afghanistan was to force the insurgency’s less intractableelements to accept conditions for reconciliation. But as Afghans prepare for apost-NATO combat mission in 2014, a peace deal with the Taliban and otherinsurgent groups doesn’t appear any closer. Indeed, heavily indoctrinatedlow-level fighters seem committed as ever to fighting on. Despite upbeatreports by the war’s decision-makers, the surge’s short-term, tacticalvictories could pave the path for long-term, strategic defeat.
The US military has been tireless in its efforts, and yetAfghanistan, as a whole, is no more law-abiding, democratic or stable than itwas before the surge. The latest monthly trend report put out by theInternational Security Assistance Force shows that compared to the same periodin 2011, enemy-initiated attacks between January and July 2012 decreased inRegional Commands East, North, and Southwest, and increased in RegionalCommands West and South. Coalition statistics showed a rise in insurgentattacks across the country. In May there were nearly 3,000 violent incidents,an increase of 21 percent compared to 2011.
The Taliban has always been amorphous and fragmented. Butparadoxically, aspects of the surge may have both weakened the movement’soperational leadership and breathed new life into its grassroots fighters.
In their chilling assessment of the conflict, Kandahar-basedresearchers Alex Strick van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn conclude in An Enemy WeCreated: The Myth of the Taliban-Al Qaeda Merger in Afghanistan, that thecoalition’s kill and capture campaign against mid-level commanders has weakenedthe leadership’s grip on the chain of command. Some of these higher-ups,however, were more open to peace talks. Younger insurgents opposed to apolitical settlement are now moving into leadership positions and areincreasingly influenced by Al Qaeda’s worldview.
Given the complex nature of Afghan society and politics,forging a power-sharing deal between the insurgency and the Afghan governmentcomposed of its enemies was always going to be difficult. But if, as reportssuggest, a generation of neo-Taliban are refusing to reconcile, and Talibanhigher-ups who are less opposed to peace are having the rug ripped out fromunder them, then something about the surge went terribly wrong.
In addition, the surge brought a massive uptick from USforces in misdirected firepower, kicked in doors, and controversial incidentsof perceived cultural insensitivity, all of which sowed discontent among thepopulation and affirmed the worst insurgent propaganda. The kill and capturecampaign in particular was never popular among Afghans.
Further complicating matters for the coalition is theunpleasant truth that radicalism is exhibited by more than those against whomour soldiers fight. For example, in the recent shooting and beheading of 17 insouthern Afghanistan, one villager alleged that among the attackers was anenraged family member of the two girls. And consider Aisha, the Afghan girl whograced the cover of Time magazine after her nose and ears had been severed. Inthat horrendous episode, a Taliban commander helped, but “Aisha’sbrother-in-law held her down while her husband pulled out a knife. First hesliced off her ears. Then he started on her nose.” This level of religiouspurity and the barbarity it inspires persists after more than 10 years of war,more than half a trillion US taxpayer dollars, and thousands of young Americansoldiers dead, maimed and traumatized. Sadly, the loss of blood and treasurecontinue for desperate and war-weary Afghans who opposed the surge in the firstplace.
Competing nationalisms and ethnic and factional differencesremain impervious to the increased foreign troop presence, particularly aftermore than three-decades of continual conflict. In this respect, the surge’scentral weakness was not that it was executed poorly, but the assumption thatit could have magically fixed the underlying causes of Afghanistan’sinstability.
In 2009, Obama’s refocus on the “good war” did not require a“surge” as the way forward. What it needed ” and eventually lost ” was apolitically focused strategy as a way out.
Malou Innocent is a foreign policy analyst atthe Cato Institute in Washington, DC.
