Selwyn Duke

https://www.selwynduke.com/2021/09/when-afghan-nation-building-did-we-remember-the-mandatory-pig-roasts.html

For the record, I’ve not only opposed our Mideast military adventures but also, in 2007, wrote an article warning about the folly of "nation-building.” Yet I also know that if you are going to overthrow a tyrannical regime and remake the government, a prerequisite is winning the hearts and minds of the people. You must also note that you "never change things by fighting the existing reality,” as famed architect Buckminster Fuller observed. "To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”

Yet from the Afghans’ perspective, did we come as liberators or cultural conquerors?

Tim responds:

I supported both Afghanistan and Iraq and have never altered that support, although I am utterly disgusted at the way we implemented both.

Afghanistan was necessary. The forces that attacked us were given sanctuary in Afghanistan, and the Taliban refused to hand over Bin-Laden. I don't see what choice we had. But we should have been willing to smash the Taliban and kill Bin Laden and put a strong man in power. Afghanistan was not and is not a nation, but rather a feudal society with endless jockeying for position. We might have wound up with a thug there but he'd be OUR thug.

Trying to create a "working democracy" was foolish. Democracy doesn't even work in the U.S.

(BTW I supported Iraq too because I thought it sound military strategy. Split Iran off from Syria and Palestine, while at the same time putting the Iranians in a pincher. Create a base of operations for the U.S. BUT we took no account of the Russians, who were guaranteed to sweat it if we showed up at another place on their southern border and we played a defensive game in Iraq, so instead of our exporting revolution to Iran the Iranians exported it to Iraq. We got caught in our own trap thanks to weak-willed idiots running the war and the mistaken notion you can "win hearts and minds" without first annihilating the enemy.)

At any rate, we spent too much time in Afghanistan playing hide and seek. We allowed Pakistan to give sanctuary to the Taliban - a quick way to lose a war. We allowed the Russians and Chinese to meddle and give support. We build roads and hospitals and schools and sought to buy the Afghan People with our money rather than kill Taliban. That is a fatal mistake. The people knew we would eventually leave and knew we wouldn't protect them. They knew the Taliban would be there in the end. OF COURSE the Afghan army ran for it! They knew how this was going to play out. And the people helped the Taliban hide from us because they were more afraid of them than of us. You can't win a war like this that way. The public must feel defeated by us. They have to understand it is worse to oppose us than them. We always try to be Mr. Nice Guy and wind up surprised when it all falls apart.

Germany and Japan were very different and for a good reason. Germans obey authority and figure they lost fair and square (we destroyed their country.) Japan obeyed their Emperor. Afghanistan and other Muslim nations are not like that. They fight as dirtily as is possible. They only understand force. We simply are unwilling to do that.

We also used technology instead of old fashioned man-on-man warfare, which gave them the sense that it was o.k. to fight a partisan war. Where were the public executions? The battles featuring hand-to-hand combat? We needed to do these sorts of things and make it obvious they were beaten, not outgunned.

Afghanistan was a clear example of how modern political and military thinking cannot win wars against a determined, deceptive enemy. We should have been able to adjust our tactics. We did not.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 11:17 AM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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