Taliban breaking ties to al Qaeda

[Kulaf]

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/1 ... index.html

LONDON, England (CNN) -- Taliban leaders are holding Saudi-brokered talks with the Afghan government to end the country's bloody conflict -- and are severing their ties with al Qaeda, sources close to the historic discussions have told CNN.

Potentially great news if true.

[Klast Brell]

Oh Noes. Hamid Karzai is negotiating with terrorists.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

Nice. Even the extremists see Al Qaeda as too extreme.If we can make America genuinely safer with the stroke of a pen, then I'm all for it. I've always believed in Teddy Roosevelt's doctrine of speak softly and carry a big stick. I'm not against using the stick, and I think most Americans feel the same way. The manner in which we speak, and the manner in which we use the stick are what's important to me.

I wonder what impact Obama's recent statements have on this. We're putting the hurt on the taliban as it is with only a half-assed focus on Afghanistan (muddling through it as McCain put it), and Obama has said that he intends to shift our focus away from Iraq and onto Afghanistan. Not good news for one-eyed Omar and his rag tag band of merry misfits.

[Harlowe]

Oh Noes. Hamid Karzai is negotiating with terrorists.

This made me giggle.

[Arathena]

Good news, imo.

Step two, now, is to stop burning the opium that AQ uses to fund its Afghanistan operations, and start buying it. Our health system needs the opiates anyway. The locals will hate us much less if we stop sending soldiers in to destroy their livelihoods.

[Ddrak]

Meh - they'll break ties for a bit, then tie back up for a bit, then whatever. It's a fluid political scene. The trick is to make it politically bad for them to get back together because (as stated yesterday) it's not a situation that is winnable using military force.

Dd

[Kulaf]

I agree. The Soviets couldn't do it. Which is why it makes me laugh every time someone comes here spouting how we are diverting efforts away from Afghanistan in Iraq. Wouldn't matter if we had every man in Iraq in Afghanistan......not much would change. The terrain is just way too rough for ground troops to make much of a difference.

[Freecare Spiritwise]

Hmm, what a coincidence. I find it mildly amusing that some people spout off comparisons to a war fought by an empire so inept that it no longer exists, and also I don't see anyone in this thread suggesting we devote all of our ground troops to Afghanistan. Maybe Ddrak is right in that a military solution isn't the best option, but we certainly have many advantages over what the Soviets tried to do, and I'll try to state a few obvious ones.

1. Doctrine. The country itself is of no strategic importance to us. We don't want the land, as the Soviets did. We didn't even really care about the taliban except for the fact that they were harboring the folks that attacked us on 9/11. All we need to do is focus on killing those folks we don't like. We don't need a massive presence on the ground to do that - we just need to shift our resources away from the pointless war in Iraq, and shift them more towards the real enemy. We can even win through diplomacy. Just hand over the bad guys and we'll send our hardware home. Once we're freed from the distractions of Iraq, I think we'll be able to be a lot more innovative in our approach, so shifting our focus doesn't mean pulling x pieces of hardware and n number of troops out of Iraq and plunking them all down in Afghanistan - we need as much of a strategic shift was we do a resource shift.

2. Technology. The Soviets had massive, overwhelming firepower, but it was conventional low tech stuff by today's standards. They didn't have sophisticated sateilite imagery, unmanned arial drones, GPS guided smart weapons, night vision technology, bunker busters, etc. I agree with the advantage of the "home team" as far as the terrain goes with boots on the ground, but that advantage is negated when you factor in the unmanned drones on station 24/7. The taliban has no terrain advantage against these types of technologies, and if they're lucky enough to shoot a few down, we'll just build more. There's no propaganda victory in shooting down a drone. No pilots to capture and parade around like the Vietnamese did.

3. Training. When we do put boots on the ground, as is inevitable in any war, our troops are the best trained in the world bar none, and we have the best equipment and the support infrastructure to back it up. We're in a much better position to win "hearts and minds" than the Soviets ever were. The Soviets were well trained as fighters, but their goal was total subjugation of the populace. Where they crushed, we at least try to bribe first.

4. The Soviets were undermined by the CIA. Who is undermining us? The Pakistanis? The Iranians? They're 20 years behind in technology where we were 30 years ago when we were giving the mujahdeen shoulder fired, heat-seeking missiles. They shot down just shitloads of the best planes the Soviets could muster. You could look at the Soviet Afghanistan war as a proxy war between two superpowers, one of which no longer exists. After 9/11, there was little desire world-wide to undermine our war there - that only came with Iraq. We still have carte blanche there.

So in conclusion, I think it's a weak argument to suggest that if the Soviets couldn't win there, then we'll automatically fail. And IMO shifting our focus to the real enemy doesn't mean that we get sucked into a quagmire if it's done intelligently. Inventing/creating new enemies while the ones that attacked us on 9/11 get a free pass doesn't seem to be working out well for us. Time to revise our playbook.

[Ddrak]

The Soviets were defeated through economics, not through the military. In fact, it was widely acknowledged that the Soviets were probably better than the US in terms of troops on the ground - maybe not through technology but in ability to project power in Europe and Asia. They'd have steamrolled Europe long before the allies could have seriously stopped them through conventional means had it come down to that.

There is no military solution in Afghanistan, just as there is no military solution to the "war" on terror. You may be able to kill individual terrorists, but you can't defeat terror through overt force. It's like trying to make a kid love you by only spanking it - just doesn't work. Need carrot *and* stick. To address your points on the comparison:

1. I'm not sure the doctrine is all that different. The US wants bases to project military power from across southern Asia and across the Middle East. Afghanistan is well placed to keep an eye on Pakistan, India, Russia and China so it's got plenty of strategic points to it. The Soviets wanted it for similar reasons, though they weren't able to flex economic muscle at the same time. The big problem with the US Is the whole thing in Afghanistan since 2003 is a completely half-assed effort. The real political focus has been pissed away in Iraq and a democratic nation can't sustain popular support for an active foreign occupation for 5 years, so the game's all but lost by now.

2. Technology. You'd be amazed how much this helps in the tactical theater, and how little it helps in the strategic theater - especially in a war over hearts and minds. Nothing like some impersonal computer-controlled hardware taking out an innocent gathering in some village to set the whole thing back a few years, and the guerrilla forces you're fighting know it damn well. It's not just a terrain advantage - its the ability to instantly blend in among innocents, to speak the local languages and foster local sympathies, to exploit the border tensions between Pakistan and Afghanistan, to arrange for a popular local to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and get shot by US troops who then become demonized by an entire region, to use the vast array of non-military tactics against a foreign occupation force that has limited and usually military responses. It's a fight you can't win that way.

3. I'd disagree that the US troops are the "best trained" in the world. Many of the US's allies have at least as good training as you guys do, and much smaller armies to focus the training on. None of that matters in a war over "hearts and minds" though, because that's a political battle and not a military one. Doesn't matter if you have the best armor, best rifles, best gadgets or the best fitness levels if you don't speak the language, don't understand the culture and get deployed for so long that you are just sick of the whole shitty situation. You're right that the Soviets understood that even less than the current administration does though - they had no hope at all.

4. The Taliban is undermining you. Nothing to do with technology - everything to do with massive funding from the poppy fields. Like I said - they aren't fighting a stand-up military war but a guerrilla war which presents a whole new avenue of warfare that you just can't compare face to face. Given they can now strike from a haven that is becoming politically safer and safer inside Pakistan, the chances of ferreting out the root causes are pretty low. Even if you "win", it's because Al Qaeda just decides to regroup a while and blend in again for a bit. Even if you destroy Al Qaeda, there's another nut with an axe to grind somewhere and a nut with a few million dollars to spend giving the axe some bite. It's why framing the conflict as a "war" is such a stupid thing - it's closer to police action because like crime, terror is not something you beat but something you simply keep in check.

However, in conclusion, it is a weak argument to compare the Soviet action in Afghanistan with the US/NATO action there. It bothers me that Pakistan is becoming less cooperative, but I'm encouraged by the Taliban's willingness to talk things through. I think a good dose of diplomacy with many of America's enemies could go a long way to restoring Pax Americana.

Dd

[Klast Brell]

I agree. The Soviets couldn't do it. Which is why it makes me laugh every time someone comes here spouting how we are diverting efforts away from Afghanistan in Iraq. Wouldn't matter if we had every man in Iraq in Afghanistan......not much would change. The terrain is just way too rough for ground troops to make much of a difference.

Kulaf raises the white flag of surrender.

[Kulaf]

I agree. The Soviets couldn't do it. Which is why it makes me laugh every time someone comes here spouting how we are diverting efforts away from Afghanistan in Iraq. Wouldn't matter if we had every man in Iraq in Afghanistan......not much would change. The terrain is just way too rough for ground troops to make much of a difference.

Kulaf raises the white flag of surrender.

Ok I'll bite. To whom or in what context am I surrendering?