The West's Afghan Blues

The west’s Afghan blues
Paul Rogers: 1 - 3 - 2007
Open Democracy
The tensions among Nato member-states over military strategy in Afghanistan complicate the struggle against a reviving Taliban.

The suicide-bomb attack at Bagram air base on 27 February 2007 during United States vice-president Dick Cheney's brief visit, made headline news across the world. Its impact within the US in particular is a powerful reminder to the American domestic audience that the country is still engaged in a major conflict in Afghanistan, more than five years after the Taliban regime was terminated.

The enduring conflict there is routinely described in terms of a Taliban comeback. The necessary caution here is that the very term "Taliban" is more accurately used in a generic sense to signify a range of quite loosely allied groups, even if these exhibit a higher degree of coordination than in 2004-05 (see Matthias Gebauer, "The Star of Afghanistan's Jihad", SpiegelOnline, 1 March 2007).

This greater cohesion is illustrated by the marked increase in the level of violence across many of the southern and eastern provinces of Afghanistan during 2006. That year, roadside bombings doubled in comparison with 2005, attacks using light arms trebled and suicide-bombs increased fivefold. Furthermore, the violence has continued through the winter of 2006-07 to an extent greater than at any time since 2001-02. At the same time, it does not extend across the whole of Afghanistan. Much more civil aid is now flowing in (including major contributions from India and Iran), while much of the north and northwest of the country is relatively peaceful, and even making some progress after more than two decades of war.

Nato's tensions

In the context of these mixed trends, two western military contingents - Nato's International Security Assistance Forces (Isaf), which includes US troops, and the large, separate US military contingent operating close to the Pakistan border - are each undergoing a substantial expansion. This boost to US forces and the newly announced 1,400 British reinforcements is likely to bring the total number of foreign troops close to 50,000 by May-June 2007.

The process underway is more than a matter of troop numbers. It also involves a comprehensive upgrading of equipment, especially armoured-personnel carriers modified to be more resistant to roadside and suicide-bombs. All the major troop contingents, especially the Americans, Canadians and British, are desperately trying to improve the protection of their forces in anticipation of a much higher level of Taliban activity as winter gives way to spring and summer, allowing much greater access from Pakistan.

The Isaf troops will number around 35,000, with nearly a third of these from the United States, the next largest contingent from Britain and substantial numbers from Canada and the Netherlands. Many other Nato states are involved but the numbers are mostly small, or else have restricted rules of engagement that revolve around stability rather than counterinsurgency. This is creating stresses within Nato member-states, including the political crisis in Italy precipitated by opposition to the policy of Romano Prodi's government on Afghanistan.

The division, though not absolutely clear-cut, is broadly between the more "Anglo-Saxon" elements (especially the United States and Britain, which make up the majority of the force and are clearly engaged in vigorous counterinsurgency) and European states (Germany and France, for example) that are far more cautious about Nato's inveiglement into a thoroughgoing war well beyond its geographical area. At its most extreme level, the caution revolves around a suspicion that the United States is drawing Nato into a long-term geopolitical competition with Russia and China over influence in central Asia.

Within these tensions, there are also stresses between the British and American positions. Some of the most experienced of Britain's generals have effectively concluded that the war against the Taliban is unwinnable in any conventional sense, whereas the US attitude is far more robust and determined. One result of the US attitude is the far more extensive use of its overwhelming firepower advantage. A series of operations in the eastern mountains in summer 2006 - including Mountain Thrust, Mountain Fury and Mountain Lion - provides numerous examples of this. All were undertaken by those US forces (around 12,000 personnel, before planned reinforcement) independent of Nato's Isaf command.

While the British forces that deployed to Helmand province in spring 2006 found themselves engaged in counterinsurgency rather than stabilisation, their use of force, although frequent and intense, was essentially in defence of their own personnel rather than engaging in large-scale offensive operations along the lines of the American activities further east. Moreover, towards the end of the year, a number of local British commanders engaged in discussions with community leaders in some towns and rural districts, even though such people may well have had connections with Taliban and other militias.

Such operations had the tacit support of the British commanders, but were viewed with grave suspicion by their US counterparts who saw this as far too much like "talking to terrorists". The overall Isaf commander was a British general, David Richards, but he was replaced on 4 February by a US general, Dan McNeill. There is a concern that General McNeill will be much more uncomfortable with the British approach and will instead encourage traditional US counter-insurgency tactics, as used in the east of Afghanistan and much of Iraq.

Pakistan's calculation

Meanwhile, across the border in Pakistan, the widespread withdrawal of Pakistani army units from the key frontier districts of North and South Waziristan in the latter part of last year has meant that Taliban and other militias have few problems in mobilising, training and providing logistic support. Moreover, the huge increase in the proportion of the Afghan opium crop that is now refined within Afghanistan into high-value heroin and morphine means that the Taliban leaders have far greater financial resources to support their activities.

In all of this, the role of Pakistan is highly significant, and it is hardly surprising that Cheney preceded his visit to Kabul by meeting General Musharraf in Islamabad. Some very mixed messages have been coming out of Washington recently, with several White House sources being critical of the Musharraf regime for not controlling Taliban activities in the districts bordering Afghanistan and sources in the state department praising him for his commitment to the war on terror. All the indications are that Cheney was promoting the White House view.

What are Pakistan's real interests? While it is really difficult to decipher the machinations of internal Islamabad politics at present, one aspect that is rarely factored in is the pervasive fear of increasing Indian influence in Afghanistan, a country traditionally considered "home territory" for successive Pakistani governments. Indian involvement in Afghanistan is primarily civil rather than military - it includes a $100 million fund for reconstruction announced in Kabul on 23 January by foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee, and also encompasses a close relationship with the Hamid Karzai administration.

Paul Rogers is professor of peace studies at Bradford University,
northern England. His new book is Into the Long War: Oxford Research Group,
International Security Report 2006 (Pluto Press, November 2006)