Page 2 of 2 Afghanistan defies the US battle plan By Brian M Downing
Communications now allow for greater control over counter-insurgency programs.
Whereas advisers in say, remote parts of Vietnam's Central Highlands and the
Parrot's Beak enjoyed independence of action, their peers today in Afghanistan
often must seek approval from headquarters in Kabul and sometimes in Tampa,
Florida, where CENTCOM is located.
The effect on innovation and feel for the locale is unlikely to be helpful.
In the aftermath of Vietnam, the military diligently avoided adopting
counter-insurgency doctrine because such expertise could lead to deployment
into another guerrilla quagmire. Vietnam
had gravely damaged its cohesion and prestige and avoiding another such war was
foremost in the minds of the officer corps. It was best to focus on fighting
the Soviet Union in Central Europe. There was more to learn by studying the
Plain of Westphalia than the Plain of Reeds.
Most of the wars the US engaged in after Vietnam were short, successful and
deceptive. The US never faced a formidable opponent in Grenada, Panama or Iraq,
nor did it face an insurgency until after Baghdad had fallen in 2003.
Conventional warfare had worked in defeating the Iraqi army, but an insurgency
developed. Many officers argued for a response based on counter-insurgency and
such approaches were conducted by skilled local commanders, but heavy-handed
measures continued as well. The destruction of city blocks and rounding up
hapless passersby at a bombing site left a firmer impression on the minds of
civilians than did new schools and electricity production.
Similarly, the US response to insurgents in Afghanistan has too often relied on
air power, which reduces US casualties but inflicts high civilian losses. The
response is a veritable instinct in NCOs and officers - one widely criticized
by North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) partners, especially the
Netherlands. Insurgents now seem to wait for air strikes after attacking an
outpost. They know the "accidental guerrilla" dynamic quite well, as did the
Vietcong, who employed a similar tactic.
Fortunately, many NATO partners, after long and often hard experience with
colonies, are better suited for counter-insurgency. Counter-insurgency doctrine
developed as European powers tried to hold on to overseas possessions in the
immense wake of World War II - principally the British in Malaya and the French
in Indochina and North Africa - though a good deal of it was based on previous
metropole efforts to rule indigenous peoples through parleys and power sharing.
Tribal negotiations and fighting guerrillas have been part of their militaries'
experience for over a century and counter-insurgency is in their training and
doctrine.
The government of Afghanistan
On ridding an area of insurgents and establishing security, a political
dimension of counter-insurgency comes into play. The government seeks to win
over support from local peoples by providing an array of services - schools,
medical and veterinary help, and resources for economic development. This may
prove particularly difficult in Afghanistan.
Counter-insurgency programs in Malaya, Vietnam, the Philippines, and Iraq took
place in countries where dialogue and exchange had long taken place between the
central state and villages. While not absent in Afghanistan, relations between
state and locality have historically been limited and filled with mistrust.
Tribal areas tolerated efforts by monarchs to bring fiscal and military reform
but deeply resented any attendant attitude that held tribal life as something
the country had to be rid of. Government offices in the villages were seen as
foreign intrusions, an outlook strengthened by the different attire and
language of officials. Localities bribed officials to leave them alone,
infiltrated officialdom with members of sympathetic qawm, and invoked
religion to limit the state's purview.
It was the prospect of sweeping, state-directed change that triggered the
revolt against Kabul in the late 1970s that led to Soviet intervention.
The experience of turning the Sunni tribes in Iraq from insurgents to allies
probably serves as a template for programs in Afghanistan. This could be
misleading because state-tribe relations were considerably different in Iraq
before the US arrived.
Saddam Hussein, having come to power in a coup directed by a small number of
officers and their troops, knew well that another such coup could one day oust
him, and so he developed patronage networks with tribes, linking them to his
state. Oil wealth was doled out to key tribes, and leading families were
awarded pivotal government posts, especially in the army and security services.
War brought changes that strengthened the position of tribes vis-a-vis the
state. During the long war with Iran, the state's repressive capacity declined.
State propaganda lauded the greatness of tribal societies in order to rally
support and sustain morale among tribal conscripts on the front. After the
First Gulf War in 2001, Saddam faced disaffection within the army and security
services, which had paid the price for his reckless ambition far more than he
and his political apparatus had. He shored up his position by building support
from the tribes, more through politicking than with money, as oil revenue had
collapsed under the UN embargo.
The government of President Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan has been less skillful
in using tribes in state-building. It is frequently noted that he has appointed
family and members of his Popalzai tribe (part of the Durrani confederation of
the Pashtun nation) to provincial government posts, and that appointees are
corrupt and sometimes tied to the opium trade. But nepotism and drug
trafficking are not always offensive in Afghanistan and are not the worst of
the government's mistakes.
Fearful of regionalism weakening his position, Karzai has placed outsiders in
provincial government posts and charged them with limiting the power of tribal
confederations and increasing the power of Kabul. This is especially pronounced
in the flat southern provinces, where geography poses no obstacle to the
coalescence of tribes into formidable confederations such as the Durrani.
Karzai's strategy has failed to build amiable relations with many southern
tribes, resulting in local resentment and distrust - a sound basis for the
insurgency. In the eastern provinces, however, mountains separate tribes and
prevented the formation of confederations. The Karzai government feels no need
to place outsiders in administrative posts and is more ready to work through
local power holders. The insurgency there is weaker and the potential for a
successful counter-insurgency program stronger.
The delivery of services to insurgent areas will be done more efficiently by US
and NATO forces than by the government in Kabul, if for no other reason that
their logistical capacities and medical and veterinary resources exceed those
of the fledgling government. Recent pronouncements suggest that Washington has
lost confidence in Kabul's ability to reach out to tribes and will rely mainly
on the US military and NATO forces, and the coalition increasingly sees the
Afghan National Army (ANA) as cooperating with the Taliban in southern and
eastern provinces, giving money and arms to the Taliban so they will not attack
ANA patrols.
Western predominance in this regard will underscore in the people's minds the
view that they are foreign powers occupying their land, as did the Russians and
British and Persians and Mughals before them. An opposite dynamic may emerge
among some groups - one seen in US efforts in South Vietnam. American delivery
of resources led to acceptance of American efforts but did not translate into
support for the indigenous government. Indeed, it strengthened popular belief
that the Saigon government was corrupt and indifferent. Both possibilities pose
difficulties for the counter-insurgency effort in Afghanistan.
Key parts of a Western counter-insurgency program will cause concern if not
dismay in the Kabul government. The US/NATO build-up of village and tribal
defense forces will place military and, necessarily, political power in the
hands of scores of Pashtun tribes and clans, which will be seen as weakening
the state - if not as antithetical to it. Kabul's dismay could be shared by
Tajiks, Uzbeks, and Hazaras in the North, who will see counter-insurgency as
placing too much power in Pashtun hands. But defeating the insurgency is
paramount to the US/NATO, regardless of political consequences.
The perils of modernization
Since counter-insurgency was first bandied about in US bureaus and agencies in
the early 1960s, the idea has been associated with Western ideas of economic
development and modernization - dissolving a backward traditional society and
building a vigorous modern one. In the mind of many American policy makers, it
is their nation's mission in the world to help this process along, inevitable
though they believe it to be.
Western and Afghan bureaus must abandon this idea, as sweeping change will be
opposed in tribal areas and elsewhere. In the late 1970s, the Afghan government
embarked on a reform program of redistributing land, bringing education to the
villages, and increasing the state's presence throughout the country to carry
through reform - a program that will not strike many outsiders as problematic,
resonant as it is with American aid plans dating back to the 1960s. The reforms
led to opposition and later to open revolt in almost every quarter of the
country, which in turn triggered the Soviet intervention and an agonizing war.
Even land reform - a hallmark of US development programs from post-war Japan to
Vietnam and Central America - was opposed. Rural dwellers in Afghanistan felt
little antipathy toward notables as long as they performed reciprocal duties
and weren't overly grasping. Roy Prosterman once proclaimed of land reform in
Vietnam, "We're going to breed capitalists like rabbits."
In Afghanistan it will breed more Taliban than capitalists.
One of the more visible aspects of ongoing development programs is road
construction. Western, Indian, and Iranian engineers are building roads linking
Kabul to various parts of the country, and proudly point to their achievements.
Many people in previously isolated districts will look upon the roads as
beneficial, but many will not. They will see them as ominous contrivances that
will facilitate outside interference and control. Furthermore, roads link many
parts of the country but bypass and isolate others. Established trade flows
will be altered to the detriment of some.
Economic development is a dynamic process, even more so today than in centuries
past. A development project in Kandahar or Paktia today can bring more
disruption in a year than a new cotton mill did over a generation in Manchester
or Birmingham two hundred years ago.
Older artisanal and trade patterns could be disrupted or ruined. Development
programs in South Vietnam brought innovation and greater crop yields, but also
unemployment for many rural laborers. Cast aside by outside forces, they were
recruited by the Vietcong and a loyal worker became a dedicated guerrilla in a
few months - confirmed by after-action intelligence. The Taliban have shown
similar adroitness in the east, where government directives have restricted
lumber production.
Organizations charged with counter-insurgency will face complexities unimagined
by the early thinkers in the field. Modernization and related ideas of progress
that are deeply embedded in the Western mind, must be set aside. They must
build dialogue and reciprocity between state and society without fundamentally
altering the latter.
Their efforts will be better devoted to restoring a traditional society that
has been disrupted by decades of war and the destructiveness of the Taliban.
Paradoxically, this counter-insurgency program will perhaps be the first whose
task is in many respects to avoid modernization and all it portends - for men
and women alike.
Brian M Downing is the author of several works of political and military
history, including The Military Revolution and Political Change and
The Paths of Glory: War and Social Change in America from the Great War to
Vietnam. He can be reached at brianmdowning@gmail.com.
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
