McChrystal Faces Massive Failure in Afghanistan in Next Few Months
By Gareth Porter, IPS NewsPosted on June 13, 2010, Printed on June 14,
2010http://www.alternet.org/story/147190/
Gareth Porter compiles evidence to document and further confirm that the US-led offenses in Afghanistan are not going well. Porter examines the recent attack on Marja in Helmand Province and the planned attack on Khandahar, which has already led to some US military incursions or probes. In both cases, Porter writes, the failures stem from the lack of support from the populations and leadership. Their attitudes, in turn, reflect the continuing strength and influence of the Taliban (or certain groups of Taliban) to remain an intimidating presence in both provinces.
Porter writes: On Thursday, McChrystal's message that his strategy will weaken the Taliban in its heartland took its worst beating thus far, when he admitted that the planned offensive in Kandahar City and surrounding districts is being delayed until September at the earliest, because it does not have the support of the Kandahar population and leadership.
The evidence is troubling in Marja as well. Equally damaging to the credibility of McChrystal's strategy was the Washington Post report published Thursday documenting in depth the failure of February's offensive in Marja.
Porter thinks that such failures are likely to be repeated over and over again in media coverage in the coming months.
The basic premise of the US Kandahar operation is unconfirmed, namely that the populations of Marja and Kandahar would welcome US-led forces and cooperate with them in identifying the Taliban insurgents in their respective areas. But it is now clear that McChrystal has understood for weeks that the most basic premise of the operation turned out to be false.
"When you go to protect people, the people have to want you to protect them," said McChrystal, who was in London for a NATO conference.
He didn't have to spell out the obvious implication: the people of Kandahar don't want the protection of foreign troops.
Afghan President Karzai has not helped to facilitate the US-led operations, which focus on driving the Taliban out of the two provinces. Why? because Karzai has made no secret of his preference for a negotiated settlement rather than continued efforts to weaken the Taliban by occupying key Taliban strongholds.
A recent detailed report by the National Editor of the Post, Rajiv Chandrasekaran provides the first detailed evidence of the systematic non-cooperation of the population of the district-sized area called Marja with U.S. troops.
Chandrasekaran reported that female U.S. Marines tried to get Afghan women to come to a meeting last week, but that not a single woman showed up. And despite a NATO offer to hire as many as 10,000 residents for labor projects on irrigation projects, only about 1,200 have signed up.
The Taliban have killed about a dozen people in Marja for collaborating with occupation forces,
and many more have been warned to stop, according to Chandrasekaran's report.
....Chandrasekaran also reported that representatives of rural development and education projects came to Marja initially and then retreated to the province centre. They appear to be as convinced as the population that the Taliban will continue to be a powerful presence in the region.
Taliban influence continues despite the deployment of nearly 15,000 U.S., British and Afghan troops to control Marja's population, representing a ratio of one occupying soldier for every two members of the population....The fact that the U.S.-NATO forces could not clear the Taliban from Marja despite such an unusually heavy concentration of troops is devastating evidence that the McChrystal strategy has failed.
Porter thinks that the continuing lack of progress could well lead to the swift unraveling of political support for the war on the part of the elected and unelected political elite, as occurred in the Iraq War in the second half of 2006. The collapse of elite political support for the Iraq War followed months of coverage of sectarian violence showing the U.S. military had lost control of the war.
The US generals think that more time (and perhaps more troops) will solve the problem
and change the attitudes of the population in Helmand and Kandahar. General McChrstal and CENTCOM chief Gen. David Patraeus may now be counting on pressure from the Republican Party to force President Barack Obama to reverse his present position that withdrawal of U.S. troops will begin next year.
That was the view expressed Thursday by retired Army lieutenant colonel and former Petraeus aide John Nagl, a leading specialist on counterinsurgency who is now president of the Centre for a New American Security.
Porter assumes that political considerations of the Obama administration will lead it to go along with what the Generals want. After the organization's annual conference, Nagle told IPS that Obama will have to shift policy next year to give more time to McChrystal, because he would otherwise be too vulnerable to Republican attacks on his Afghanistan policy going into the 2012 election campaign.
If Porter is correct, then the Afghan war and occupation will continue to require a major investment of US dollars, along with deaths, injuries, destruction of towns and infrastructure, corruption at all levels of government, the need to bribe Taliban to protect trucks carrying supplies to US troops, and the consequent self-defeating alienation from the occupation.
© 2010 IPS News All rights reserved.View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/147190/
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