McChrystal: Try a little triage in Afghanistan

Posted By Thomas E. Ricks Monday, July 27, 2009 - 4:18 PM Share

Gen. McChrystal, the new U.S. commander in Afghanistan, told the Los Angeles Times that the new focus on protecting the Afghan people might mean temporarily permitting the Taliban freer rein in some rural areas.

"Practically speaking, there are areas that are controlled by Taliban forces," he told reporter Julian Barnes, who wrote that "first priority will to be to make sure populated areas are free of insurgent influence."

I think this is pretty much one of the key recommendations Exum and his posse made for Afghanistan in their "Triage" paper in June.

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DON BACON

9:56 PM ET

July 27, 2009

triage

from Triage: In counterinsurgency campaigns, momentum matters. Over the next 12 months, the United States and its allies must demonstrate they have seized back the initiative from the Taliban and other hostile actors.

from Gen. Stanley McChrystal: The U.S. and its allies must change their mission [from pursuing Taliban] to focus on protecting the Afghan people.

So the US military will seize back the initiative by . . .retiring to populated areas?

And then, the US forces, if they act like they have in Iraq, will "light up" neighborhoods when attacked, causing untold civilian casualties, routinely run over civilian vehicles with tracked vehicles for sport, call in air raids for 'precision' bombing of civilian structures, conduct middle-of-the-night house raids and arrests, and generally engage in all of the other activities that have caused them to be evicted from Iraq's cities, leading to further "unraveling." It's all so predictable, but a lot of people are making a lot of money off it so that's the main point.

Let's see, this strategy must be in FM 3-24 somewhere, from the genius General David Petraeus. Ah, yes here it is: To regain the initiative when faced with a rapidly deteriorating security situation, it's necessary to more than double the troop strength and go on defense. The best offense is a good defense, after all.//Okay, I made it up.

Let's also understand that this new strategy doesn't comply with the Commander-in-Chief's new Afghanistan strategy, "A New Strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan", which was rolled out with much fanfare on March 27th. Obama: "So I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and to prevent their return to either country in the future. That's the goal that must be achieved."

Sorry, Mister president, the guys in green have decided differently. Protect the Afghan people, that's the ticket.

IMC

10:59 PM ET

July 27, 2009

Ah yes, the Soviet strategy

Afghanistan is a rural country. The Soviet strategy, which was to protect "population centers" and cede rural territory to the mujahidin with the exception of periodic missions into the hinterlands, was a big failure. CNAS needs to invest in a library about Afghanistan pre-1989.

The population is in the rural areas. Protect them there. And protect the cities.

TYRTAIOS

4:39 AM ET

July 28, 2009

Well IMC, we need to

Well IMC, we need to remember, though the Soviets deployed well over 500,000 into Afghanistan, probably only about as many as we have there now ourselves served at any given time. As you allude, the Soviets were able to hold the major population centers, and when necessary drive the Muj out of the hinterland, but only to see them return upon their departure.

I'd imagine the old analogy that trying to defend every where, means defending no where. We'll probably keep our presence not in the major population centers per se, but in the smaller towns and major villages until such time as the Afghan army and hopefully the national police are capable.

In the mean time well keep the pressure on by hunting with special operations, driven by national level intelligence, out in the more remote rural areas.

One problem with the Soviets by the way was: although they also understood this, they modeled the Afghan Army after themselves, and split them to prevent any intrigue with the power to back a coup.

Interestingly, military mindsets like chasing around the rural areas; it allows them more latitude to bring supporting arms to bear, and amass an enemy body count to show progress, since implementing counter-insurgency is time consuming and few are any good at it (primarily because they rotate by the time they begin to understand it, if accepted at all).

Anecdotally - did you know Rep. Charlie Wilson kept the launcher for the first Stinger missile fired in Afghansitan by the Muj on his office wall - at least that's what one of his former bimbos allegedly told an aquaintenance of mine?

DON BACON

11:42 PM ET

July 28, 2009

I think they get it

news report:
A peace deal between the Taliban and the Afghan government announced by Hamid Karzai has been dismissed as a sham amid claims militants were paid to lay down their weapons. Diplomats said they believed officials had "bought" a temporary truce until next month's presidential election for £20,000. One senior Western diplomat said he feared it was part of a plot to manipulate the vote in Badghis province in north-west Afghanistan.

Old Hamid isn't quite the stooge he was believed to be, bribing his enemies. Call them the Sons of Afghanistan, another "COIN" success story.