In today’s Toronto Star, Eric Margolis makes some interesting points about the recent Manley Report. His first criticism I found to be particularly well put…

“The report on Afghanistan delivered Monday by the Manley panel was deeply disappointing. Its totally predictable findings could have been written without the panel of instant Afghan experts wasting millions of tax dollars.”

Margolis’ assertion in that paragraph should not be overlooked, no matter your position on Canada’s role in Afghanistan. The report, despite its goals, produced very little in the way of constructive criticism. While some have claimed the report unbiased and critical of a variety of different positions, I must admit that I also agree with Margolis’ follow-up paragraph…

“This whitewash was designed to provide political cover for the Harper government, which has hung its hat on the failing war in Afghanistan, and provide it an escape hatch if the kabob hits the fan. It’s the latest example of the Liberals pathetic failure to demand Ottawa answer tough questions about the mess in Afghanistan.”

There are, of course, those that view the report as proof positive that we are currently engaged in a conflict against an enemy bent on the complete suppression of a people. I’ll not argue the fact that the Taliban’s ideology is entirely dangerous and counter to those principles that I, personally, hold dear, but it must also be said that its resurgence since the occupation of that country cannot wholly be aligned with the support of the group’s ideology, but rather support for the group’s desire to see foreign occupiers dispelled and their ability to put that desire into practice. There are currently some 2 million displaced Pashtuns along the Pashtun belt that have helped bolster the Taliban’s numbers, many of them simply reacting to the dire circumstances that they have found themselves in and willing to fight because the pay offered them is, in comparison to the Afghan army, considerably more.

This is also, of course, where Afghan history comes into play, and it is something that should not be conveniently overlooked. It is important to remember that the current government of Afghanistan is, in many ways, a Western proxy, and that its survival depends on Western intervention. To some, that fact is entirely relatable to the proxy government backed by the Soviets in the 70’s, which led to over a decade of armed struggle against them and their Afghan allies. During that period, Islamic radical groups were funded by the likes of the United States, largely using the Pakistani ISI as a conduit, many of whom would go on to form the Taliban.

Pakistan, then under the governance of the now assassinated Benazir Bhutto, supported the Taliban’s crusade to control the country after the defeat of the Soviets primarily because it viewed such backing as way in which to see Afghanistan become a Pakistani satellite state. It was because of this that Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan’s current President, broke faith with the Taliban, whom he himself once supported, resulting in his decision to work to reinstate Zahir Shah, the last Afghan King, which he did, rather ironically, while in exile in Pakistan (of all places).

Unfortunately, as is always the case, the people became the true victims of regional political designs, resulting in the implementation of a government that was dramatically fundamentalist and wholly without regard for basic human rights. But it should also not be overlooked that when the Taliban regime was publicly executing women in football stadiums for crimes that any civilized person would consider utterly ridiculous, the West, Canada included, did not act.

It is here that the most important aspect of the current Afghan adventure must be mentioned – the luxury of pretext.

Without the pretext provided by September 11th, the United States would have never used outright military force against the Taliban regime. They may have, at some point, funneled monies into supporting the Northern Alliance, whom they employed as a proxy force during the 2001 invasion, and may even have undertaken covert operations to kill or capture Osama Bin Laden, whom they were after because of the embassy bombings in Africa, but it must not be forgotten that prior to 9/11 a lucrative pipeline deal that would have seen a US based company granted the rights to its construction from the Caspian coast in Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan to the Pakistani coast was in the works, and that the cooperation of the Taliban regime was required to make it happen. Again, it is not wholly beyond the realm of possibility that the US might have attempted to covertly destabilize the Taliban were they to refuse their support, but what is of vastly greater importance is the reality that were the Taliban to have supported the initiative, and September 11th not occurred, the United States would most likely have played ball with them.

Back To ‘The People’

From a domestic perspective, our role in Afghanistan has been painted as one that is crucial to ensure the simplest of freedoms to the Afghan people – be it schooling, women’s rights, or the ability to freely participate in electing a representative government. And while these are truly noble causes, there is a darker side to our involvement, even to ISAF’s involvement, that must not be overlooked. That when the time comes that Afghanistan is finally secured, and at this point there is no way of knowing when that will be, the people of Afghanistan, and their government, will find themselves beholden to foreign powers. Of course, those simple freedoms fought for and secured will be in place, but so will a continued resentment amongst a percentage of the population regarding foreign influencing and the entirely inevitable economic exploitation of the country. Given that those primarily involved in operations in Afghanistan are members of the G8 and entirely supportive of globalization, it only stands to reason that Afghanistan will find itself flooded with foreign entities bent on exploiting it. Of course, given their new found freedoms and stability, not to mention the fact that Afghanistan is a nation in which most live on $2 dollars or less a day, the introduction of foreign investment will be welcomed and, as is usually the case in the beginning, hailed for its vision and commitment to the growth of the country’s economy, which is currently almost non-existent. The truth, unfortunately, is that the majority of that investment will not, as is always the case, benefit the people themselves, who will eventually come to realize that they have simply traded one form of oppression for another.

Obviously there is a massive difference between living in a nation governed by fanatical religious zealots and enduring the exploitative practices of the world’s wealthiest nations in exchange for the insurance of basic freedoms. But the question ultimately must be asked – why are those that have nothing, and most likely never will, routinely forced to choose between the lesser of two evils?

If Afghanistan is to be for Afghans, then our intentions must be plainly and unequivocally stated – that our role in Afghanistan at present is not to reap the rewards of an outcome that will benefit us and others. That we will adamantly oppose the exploitation of that country given our role in securing those freedoms for its people that we have used as justification for being there. And that we will never endeavor to take advantage of the sacrifice of those who have given their lives in that pursuit to line the pockets of already wealthy Canadian business people.

Power To Truth

That said; there are innumerable complexities regarding the current state of affairs in Afghanistan that obviously come before predictions of any post-war reality.

Margolis continues…

“Ottawa’s rash blunder into a tribal civil war in Afghanistan, and one-sided policy in the Mideast, have put Canada squarely in the gun sights of violent anti-western groups, and make it appear an eager spear carrier in the Bush/Cheney wars in the Muslim world. Every bombed Afghan village breeds new enemies for Canada.

Ottawa is hiding the full truth about Afghanistan from Canadians. Our flag-waving media has further obscured the facts.

When did we last see a report filed from the side of the Taliban and its growing number of allies?

The report’s claim that Afghanistan’s U.S.-imposed regime is “democratic” is absurd. CIA “asset” Hamid Karzai was installed by Washington and is kept in power by U.S. troops and a stream of cash payoffs to drug-dealing tribal chiefs. His rigged “election” was supervised by U.S. troops and bought with $100 bills.

Afghanistan’s so-called “national army” is made up of U.S.-paid mercenaries. The “army” does not need more training, as Manley claims. It needs loyalty to a legitimate national government — which does not exist.

Half of Afghanistan’s population, the Pashtun tribes (source of Taliban), has been largely excluded from political power. Until included, there will be no stability, never mind democracy.

Ominously, the war is spreading into Pakistan. Canada is backing Musharraf’s dictatorship in Pakistan while claiming to be fighting for “democracy” in Afghanistan.

The report soft-soaped government corruption. It ignored the 800-lb. gorilla in Kabul: Senior government officials up to their turbans in the heroin trade. Canada, the U.S. and NATO find themselves patrons of the world’s leading narcostate, which supplies 90% of the world’s heroin and runs on drug money.

The drugs are exported through Pakistan, another key western ally. Taliban eliminated the drug trade before being overthrown.

Most important, Manley’s report completely ignored the biggest problem of all. Canada has no political objective in this aimless war beyond making high-ranking Ottawa officials feel self-important at NATO meetings.

The Karzai regime, which rules only Kabul, would not last a week without western troops. There is no prospect of national political consensus until the Taliban and its allies are brought into the process. The reborn Afghan Communist Party is again a dominant influence in Kabul, including running torture prisons to which Canada had, until recently, been sending captives.

Canada is not being ennobled by this sordid, ugly, drug-fueled war. Its honour and reputation are being injured, its security endangered.

The Manley report is the political equivalent of a subprime mortgage. It does the nation a disservice.”

To many, our role in Afghanistan is a very black and white affair. That we are there to defeat a fascist movement bent on plummeting that nation back into darkness. Of course, it’s not as cut and dry as that, no matter how much we’d like to believe that it is. For every action there is a reaction, and Afghanistan is no exception to that rule. In fact, it is the rule.

Endgames

It’s at this point that I am routinely asked what I believe the solution to the problem to be. With regards to conflict as a whole, there is no easy answer to that question, or at least none that anyone wants to hear, save those that possess the blackest of dispositions.

Were one to look at this situation from a purely military standpoint, one without restriction, which is, in truth, the true nature of warfare, then the answer is quite simple, and one first employed by General Thomas J. Jackson after viewing the sacking of Fredericksburg proper by Union forces…

Kill ‘Em All

For those that enjoy employing the term ‘Islamofacism’ and delighting at the quips of individuals such as William Kristol, then I am sure this solution will be particularly favoured.

Despite the fact that we like to think of ourselves as wholly honourable with regards to our conduct in previous wars, the truth is that we are masters at employing overwhelming force to crush those that oppose us. Unfortunately, war is not something that can actually be undertaken with a conscience, as was proven in Vietnam. Had the United States employed severe, and, under the auspices of the Geneva Conventions, illegal methods, they would have made far greater progress than they ultimately did.

For example. During Vietnam, South Koreans were known for their exceptional ruthlessness, in some cases employing the most unconscionable, disgusting, yet effective practices when it came to dealing with the Vietcong. On several occasions they simply entered villages and killed everyone in them, thus ensuring that civilian support for the Vietcong and potential recruits were eliminated along with those in the village that acted as informants and so forth. They were so effective at counterinsurgency operations that they actually became widely feared by the Vietcong, who adopted a standing rule never to engage them unless absolutely necessary or outright victory was a foregone conclusion.

Were the same mentality employed in Afghanistan and suspect areas of Pakistan, you would no doubt see results. Of course, that would require the outright elimination of those civilians that act as a support mechanism for the Taliban, not to mention dealing with the millions of Pashtun refugees from which the Taliban draws some of its strength. In short, such factors would have to be systematically eliminated without regard, and with whatever means are available to us short of the employment of nuclear weapons.

It would probably quadruple the monthly cost of the war, if nor more, but at the same time end the conflict in a much shorter period of time.

True, the terrain is difficult and is to the Taliban’s advantage, but that’s precisely why BLU-82’s exist. While expensive, and logistically more difficult to deploy, one would imagine that they would be extremely lethal if used in large numbers. Then again, there are countless other bombs and remotely launched missiles that, if used in overbearing force, would make an impact as well. Given the satellite targeting technology available to us, we could simply go from grid to grid turning rocks in to pebbles, villages into craters, and people and animals into nothing more than blackened skeletons. At the same time, we would employ ground forces to move into those grids that have already been decimated to confront the survivors, and those remnants of the Taliban that have stumbled out of the hellish rubble, and eliminate them. Of course, to ensure maximum efficiency, we would have to make sure that we went about it in a random enough fashion so as not to allow the enemy to simply move from location to location, having figured out our targeting scheme. It would also require, at the very least, the deployment of some 500,000 combat troops.

The repercussions of such actions would be significant unfortunately, so we would also have to be prepared to deal with any segment of the Afghan population that endeavored to dissent against the use of such tactics, no matter their chosen method. Everyone from your average man on the street protesting the action to those willing to employ violence would have to be either jailed or eliminated. This would require the creation of a special until comprised of Afghans loyal to our cause overseen by Western commanders, all of whom would operate entirely off the books.

You want to win the war? Then fight it. Because in an asymmetric situation such as this, there is no comfortable middle ground.

Realism

Canada is currently one of only three nations involved in direct combat operations despite the fact that our contingent is smaller than numerous others that currently comprise ISAF. Our role in such operations is due to end in 2009, which means that if others are not willing to fill our role, then either we stay or adhere to the conditions of our original commitment.

If we leave, and despite how the current government or the Defense Ministry will attempt to paint it, those Canadians that lost their lives will have done so having done their duty as soldiers that were ordered by their government into harms way to do their job. The continuation of our presence based on our losses thus becomes nothing more than an act of attempting to ennoble the venture to cover the asses of those that were responsible for sending them into harms way in the first place, not to placate the overwhelming desire of Canadian forces to continue fighting and sustaining losses that are wholly disproportionate to those of the United Kingdom and the United States given the size of our contingent and theirs. The refusal of other ISAF members to engage in direct combat operations must also be taken into consideration, and again, not be used to justify our continued presence, but rather question why Canadian soldiers are good enough to be sacrificed while others are not.

If the answer is that we, as a nation, believe in waging war for the freedom of the Afghan people, then the methods that we are willing to employ must be reexamined. If not, Canadian forces could very well be in Afghanistan for another decade, costing this nation billions of dollars, and gifting this country’s historians a Vietnam of their very own.

Want to bookmark or share this entry?



This entry was posted on Sunday, January 27th, 2008 at 2:59 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.