Robert Kaplan, doing his best impression of a right-wing blogger (excerpted at length to make the parallels clear):
When it comes to foreign policy, Republicans and Democrats are each suspect in their own way. Republicans used to be the party of competence in world affairs. They lost that aura during President George W. Bush’s first six years in office, when he mismanaged the wars both in Iraq and in Afghanistan. The Democrats, for their part, are often accused of being wobbly on national security, lacking both toughness and gumption. Unfortunately, President Barack Obama’s recent handling of the war in Afghanistan plays to those charges. Being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize will only intensify the perception that he is a weak war leader.
Wait…what? Never mind…we’ll get back to that:
It’s perfectly legitimate for Obama to review Afghanistan strategy and troop numbers. But by calling into question the very strategy that he put into place earlier in the year, when he called Afghanistan the “necessary war,” and promised to properly resource it, Obama is courting charges from the right that he is another ineffectual Jimmy Carter—that other Nobel Peace Prize winner.
[…]
The Administration had many months, beginning the moment Obama was elected, to recalibrate Afghan strategy. Yet it’s now in the position of publicly questioning the fundamental wisdom of the general it has chosen. The position Obama’s now in is similar to that of former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld some years back—appearing not to be listening to his generals. If the president doesn’t agree with his field commander, that’s fine. Just don’t make a public spectacle of it.
Even if Obama does end up making the correct decision on Afghanistan strategy (by which I mean adding troops, since counterinsurgency is manpower-intensive), the public agony over his deliberations may already have done incalculable damage. The Afghan people have survived three decades of war by hedging their bets. Now, watching a young and inexperienced American president appear to waiver on his commitment to their country, they are deciding, at the level of both the individual and the mass, whether to make their peace with the Taliban—even as the Taliban itself can only take solace and encouragement from Obama’s public agonizing. Meanwhile, fundamentalist elements of the Pakistani military, opposed to the recent crackdown against local Taliban, are also taking heart from developments in Washington. This is how coups and revolutions get started, by the middle ranks sensing weakness in foreign support for their superiors.
Obama’s wobbliness also has a corrosive effect on the Indians and the Iranians. India desperately needs a relatively secular Afghan regime in place to bolster Hindu India’s geopolitical position against radical Islamdom, and while the country enjoyed an excellent relationship with bush, Obama’s dithering is making it nervous. And Iran, in observing Washington’s indecision, can only feel more secure in its creeping economic annexation of western Afghanistan. So, too, other allies far and wide—from the Middle East to East Asia, and Israel to Japan—will start to make decisions based on their understanding that Washington under Obama may not have their backs in a crisis. Again, the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Obama only plays to such fears.
Alright, now hold up there partner. Now it does appear that the Obama administration has at least been caught somewhat flat-footed by McChrystal’s request for an additional 40,000 (or more) troops. If you buy Spencer Ackerman’s analysis of this Washington Post story (and I do) it seems like administration officials might not have known precisely what resources were required for what they had in mind, and as a result are now re-entering a period of assessing precisely what mission they want to engage in, counter-terrorism aimed at Al Qaeda or counter-insurgency aimed at Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Even if the administration made one call earlier this year, and now appears to be hedging on that, you don’t rush more troops into Afghanistan just so you can appear to look decisive, or because you already said you would even if you didn’t think that’s what you were saying. This isn’t a blind date you wish you could back out on but can’t.
And this idea that the Afghans are waiting with baited breath on Obama’s decision? Nonsense. Perhaps Kaplan’s been too busy playing war-pundit with Iraq, but we have been fighting a see-saw battle with the Taliban for eight years now. It is nearly a decade of warfare and terrorism, not some bureaucratic brain-storming, that has prompted Afghans to wonder if in fact we, or the Karzai government that recently stole itself into power, are up to the job of keeping a lid on the Taliban.
And yes, I’m sure the Taliban are quite ecstatic that we are now re-considering exactly how many soldiers we want to send after them (and in turn, how many of our soldiers they can hunt.) But as I have said time, and time, and time again on this blog and elsewhere throughout the course of the Iraq war, you don’t base your strategy on how your enemy feels about it. You make calculations that include an honest assessment of raw self-interest, the limitations of your own power, and your willingness to expend lives and money in a conflict. Were we to plunge head-long into a wider conflict, I’m sure the Taliban would shed a small tear for the lost opportunity to drive out an enemy…then they’d go right back to killing our soldiers until we re-consider our strategy once again.
And India? Since when did justify upping conflicts to suit the self-interest of second-tier allies?
Lastly, the Nobel Price…I’m not sure what Kaplan is saying here, but it sounds like by merely accepting the Nobel, Obama has failed to demonstrate sufficient war-mongering-ish tendencies so as to intimidate the Taliban. I would ask Kaplan to explain that in more detail, as I honestly wonder whether any member of the Taliban right up to Mullah Omar himself has spent more than one minute thinking about the implications of the Nobel Peace Prize on the war in Afghanistan.
As I said, all in all a solid day’s work for a right-wing blogger. Thanks Robert Kaplan.
