Second, since when do we take military advice from our Left. Tofu advice? Sure. Basket weaving? You betcha! Military strategy? I don't think so.
I am not persuaded that there is any particular Afghanistan objective that an increase of forces in Afghanistan can achieve:
I can be persuaded that a brigade or three can accomplish some particular mission, but Afghanistan and Pakistan have too many people to attempt an Iraq-style pacification campaign.
Further, even if appropriate to mirror Iraq, we simply can't supply that many troops in Afghanistan. I'd be wary of risking more than ten percent of our active brigades in that potential Stalingrad pocket.
Besides, other than keeping the country from becoming a training area for al Qaeda, our interests in Afghanistan are more humanitarian than strategic these days. I simply don't aspire to very much out there.
Another author wonders what the heck we would do with more troops in Afghanistan:
The consensus on sending more troops to Afghanistan has acquired the same simplicity that the plea for more troops in Iraq had four years ago. Back then, the cries for more troops, especially from Bush administration critics, seldom included precisely what the complaining pundits intended to do with those troops. The “more troops” mantra ultimately became so divorced from strategic realities that critics of the surge like Andrew Sullivan dismissed the surge’s possibilities for success because, Andrew argued, it would have taken at least a half million additional troops to make a difference.
Just what would more of our troops do in Afghanistan? Right now, I think that patience is our best weapon. We need to hold the perimeter as we train more Afghan forces to take on the role of keeping the Taliban down.
Like I've written, I can be persuaded that more troops could accomplish something useful. But what is that objective? Because the real problem comes from Pakistan. If additional American troops support a new style of post-Westphalian campaign that works with sub-national groups inside Pakistani territory to defeat the jihadis, that would be a worthy objective.
But this is a difficult road to follow and one that should be a last resort. If the Pakistanis finally believe that the jihadis are a real threat to Pakistan, then we will get somehere. But we've heard this resolve before:
As investigators sifted through the bloodied attack site in the eastern city of Lahore, Yousuf Raza Gilani admitted Pakistan "is passing through a difficult phase."
"We have to fight back the challenges of terrorism and extremism," the premier told an audience in the nation's capital, Islamabad. "The war against terrorism and extremism is the war of our own survival. With the people's cooperation we will fight this war and ensure the government's writ at all costs."
If Pakistan will tackle the jihadis who infest the border areas, it will protect Pakistan and will keep Afghanistan safe, too. Then we may see the last jihad.
