There are many potential lessons learned from the deadly battle last summer in the
remote Afghan village of Wanat that claimed nine American lives but has yet to
be fully investigated and understood by the U.S. military command. One major question I
have, based on extensive review of the official record and conversations with
multiple sources, is this: Were the U.S. forces correctly mounting a
counterinsurgency operation, or not, when they got drawn into the Wanat
battle?
American
officers had been talking to village elders for months about establishing an
outpost in the village
of Wanat.
But that approach gave the enemy more than ample time to prepare what was
effectively a giant ambush. This isn't a thought original to me: The company
commander worried about it at the time. "By negotiating with local people
about the location and trying to gain support it allowed the locals to plan
with the enemy to attack the base," he told the investigating colonel.
The
Army maintains that the commanders were observing counterinsurgency doctrine of
meeting with local leaders. "Providing legitimacy to and improving partnership
with the district government was determined to be a key component of the
on-going counterinsurgency fight," it stated in a response to an inquiry from
the office of Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii).
But
others tell me that Army forces in eastern Afghanistan really weren't
conducting a full-scale counterinsurgency campaign, which would mean not only
meeting with local leaders and establishing outposts, but also finding and
arming some local allies, and building roads and other projects, and, above
all, protecting the population from being intimidated by the enemy. It would
appear that the U.S.
military didn't have enough troops and presence in eastern Afghanistan to
do that. Rather, they were in a tough fight and conducting a lot of airstrikes.
In other words, it was more Fallujah 2004 than Ramadi 2007.
Likely
lesson, I think: Counterinsurgency can't be conducted piecemeal. You are either doing the
full-court press -- or you are not doing counterinsurgency. Just dropping troops
into a hostile neighborhood is not COIN. The company commander seems to have
similar thoughts, saying in his statement that he thinks more of a "gradual
push" approach should have been used-that is, an "ink blot" strategy. Instead,
the battalion commander appears to have tried to leapfrog into the valley.
But
my thoughts are tentative, and I'd like to hear from others on this.
U.S. Army Photo
Inside An Afghan Battle Gone Wrong: An Investigative Series
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