[R-G] Ahead of NATO meeting: New US reports warn of failure in Afghanistan

[Anthony Fenton]

WSWS : News & Analysis : Asia : Afghanistan
Ahead of NATO meeting: New US reports warn of failure in Afghanistan
By James Cogan
5 February 2008

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jan2008/afgh-j29.shtml

The latest US assessments of the war in Afghanistan, authored by the  
Afghanistan Study Group and the Atlantic Council, paint a similar  
picture of crisis and failure as did major studies published last year.

The Study Group, which was co-chaired by former marine general James  
L. Jones and former ambassador Thomas Pickering, issued a report on  
January 30 entitled “Revitalising our Efforts: Rethinking our  
Strategies”. The Atlantic Council—which Jones also chairs—released a  
parallel report titled “Saving Afghanistan: An Appeal and Plan for  
Urgent Action”.

The Atlantic Council document bluntly began: “Make no mistake, NATO  
is not winning in Afghanistan. Unless this reality is understood and  
action is taken promptly, the future of Afghanistan is bleak, with  
regional and global impact.”

Both reports made similar estimates. After more than six years of  
occupation, the US and its NATO allies have failed to significantly  
improve the lives of ordinary Afghans or create a functioning  
national government that enjoys popular support. The population has  
been left in terrible poverty and at the mercy of corrupt and brutal  
despots and officials.

The Study Group report admits that many of the top figures in the US- 
backed regime in Kabul “are considered serial human rights abusers by  
large segments of the population”. Millions of people are dependent  
on the opium/heroin trade to survive—either growing poppies or  
working for the warlords and trafficking networks that are flooding  
the world’s streets with the drug.

The anti-occupation insurgency is growing, with US and NATO forces  
suffering their heaviest losses of the war in 2007. Allied military  
operations, particularly air strikes, routinely inflict civilian  
casualties and are fueling the already deep reservoir of hatred for  
the foreign military presence that is encouraging thousands of  
Afghans to join the insurgents.

With less than 60,000 troops in the country, NATO is incapable of  
preventing guerillas operating in large swathes of southern  
Afghanistan. The region of ethnic Pashtun tribes, which straddles the  
Pakistan and Afghanistan border, is effectively under Taliban  
control. Its forces are conducting an increasingly successful war  
against the Pakistani military regime, as well as attacking NATO  
troops over the frontier.

Of even greater concern to the US thinktanks is the extent of popular  
opposition to the Afghan war within NATO countries. The Atlantic  
Council bewailed the fact that “publics, especially in Europe, regard  
Afghanistan as part of the highly unpopular war in Iraq”. Opinion  
polls show that a majority in all NATO countries apart from the US  
and Britain favour the withdrawal of troops. As a result of this  
antiwar sentiment, the governments in a number of NATO states have  
maintained strict caveats that prevent their soldiers in Afghanistan  
being used in overt combat roles.

While not explicitly stated, the Study Group is obviously concerned  
that if the US is abandoned by its NATO allies, it may ultimately be  
compelled to withdraw its forces as well. The result would be a  
humiliating setback for US strategic interests in the region and  
internationally.

“If international forces pulled out of Afghanistan,” the Study Group  
document declared, “the fragile Afghan government would likely fall  
apart, again becoming a failed state while the Taliban and other  
warlords would gain control of various areas and eventually fight  
each other ... Not only would failure to stabilise Afghanistan pave  
the way for a revival of an Al Qaeda safe haven in that country, it  
would also likely have a blowback effect in Pakistan, where local  
Taliban and other extremist groups would be inspired to step up their  
efforts to destabilise the Pakistani regime, with the hope of one day  
installing fundamentalist, theocratic rule”.

The reports dovetail with increasingly strident diplomacy by the US  
and its allies fighting in southern Afghanistan, including Canada,  
Britain and Australia, directed against the refusal of other European  
powers to send additional troops or allow their forces to be moved  
from the relatively safer northern and western areas of Afghanistan.  
The European stance compelled the Bush administration to announce the  
dispatch of an additional 3,200 American troops last month.

US State department official Richard Boucher told a Senate hearing  
last week: “The greatest threat to Afghanistan’s future is  
abandonment by the international community.... Too few of our allies  
have combat troops fighting the insurgents, especially in the  
south.... We expect more from our NATO allies.”

Britain’s international development secretary Douglas Alexander  
declared on Sunday: “We’ve made clear to our NATO partners that we do  
want to see appropriate burden sharing, not simply in terms of the  
number of troops on the ground, but where those troops are committed  
within Afghanistan.”

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued two ultimatums last  
week threatening to withdraw his country’s entire contribution to the  
NATO force, unless the alliance deployed an additional 1,000 combat  
troops to reinforce the 2,500-strong Canadian force in Kandahar.  
Throughout 2007, Canadian troops bore the brunt of the fighting and  
casualties in the former heartland of the Taliban movement, losing 30  
dead and dozens more wounded.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is in Britain this week for  
talks with the Brown government over Afghanistan. On February 7 and  
8, a meeting of NATO defence ministers is scheduled to take place in  
Lithuania, where the conduct of the Afghan war and the demands for  
additional troops will be high on the agenda.

The likely tenor of the discussion is indicated by the Atlantic  
Council’s warning that the European powers risk a rupture with  
Washington unless they provide the troops and finances needed to  
subjugate Afghanistan. Under a heading “The consequences of failure,”  
the thinktank commented: “If the Afghanistan effort fails, NATO’s  
cohesion, effectiveness and credibility will be shaken and the  
rationale for NATO’s expeditionary, out of area, role will be  
undermined.... This could lead to a moribund alliance, which could  
find itself reduced to geopolitical irrelevancy and marginalisation.”

Thus far, US demands have had little impact. The German government  
last month rejected a reportedly “direct and stern” letter from US  
Defense Secretary William Gates insisting that it deploy thousands of  
extra troops, including paratroopers and assault helicopters. The  
French government reportedly received a similar request and responded  
in the same fashion as Berlin. Germany has 3,100 troops and France  
1,600, mainly operating in and around Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul.  
Major NATO states such as Italy and Turkey have also refused to send  
more forces.

A security analyst told Canadian television that additional troops  
were only “likely to come from the Australians”. The Labor government  
in Australia has issued several hints that it would be prepared to  
boost its military commitment in Afghanistan in order to cement its  
relations with Washington. The Australian army, however, would be  
stretched to provide 1,000 more combat troops.