On Tuesday, Senators Obama and McCain talked about Pakistan and the war in Afghanistan. I am not really all that interested in campaign politics, but I am interested in counter-insurgency (COIN), especially COIN in Pakistan and Afghanistan. And some of the things the candidates say about this theater worry me.
Sen. Obama has been criticized for being naive, and his statements about Pakistan will not help. On the one hand, he is continuing his hard line with regard to Pakistan, once again threatening military action inside Pakistan should the Pakistan government prove unable or unwilling to counter terrorism within its borders; on the other hand, he continued his call for diplomatic initiatives to overcome regional rivalries in favor of cooperation. The only logic that can reconcile these is that he is willing to use force whenever allies cannot comply with his demands to the letter. This may sound harsh, but the Pakistan government, military, and paramilitaries are hip-deep into fighting the same insurgency we are. This insurgency has spread out of the FATA “tribal areas” into the settled areas of the NWFP, Islamabad, etc.
Unfortunately, Obama’s understanding of COIN strategy is also revealed to be lacking. He seems to believe that the problem of insurgent safe-havens in Pakistan can be solved by taking out “high-level terrorist targets like bin Laden when we have them in our sights” and that he could secure the border between Afghanistan with “more troops, more helicopters, more satellites, more Predator drones.” Pakistan has taken out several high level terrorist and insurgent leaders, but for some odd reason the insurgency just continues to grow. More attention to the border will certainly help, as will continued cooperation/coordination between Afghan, Pakistani, and Coalition forces along the border. But overt unilateral strikes (or worse, invasions) will only further fuel the insurgency.
Coalitions are good, and I am glad both presidential candidates plan to use them. But the maintenance of coalitions among disparate partners is messy, hard work. Black and white solutions may win elections, but they make for poor policy. Keeping Pakistan, Afghanistan, and the members of ISAF working together is the right thing to do, but it is often uglier than making sausage.
Pakistan’s COIN strategy is often maligned because it has not stopped cross-border attacks. Some analysts want Pakistan to eschew diplomatic negotiations and agreements with insurgent groups and their supporters in favor of more aggressive military action. This is silly and shortsighted. Pakistan is right to combine military action, occupation, and negotiations, and we have been right in providing military, economic, and training assistance to make them more effective at this.
Election and deployment cycles create a mindset that leads U.S. politicians, commanders, reporters, and citizens to be impatient. Insurgents cannot be beat overnight – in fact, it usually takes about 10 to 15 years to defeat them at all (when they can be defeated at all). And the solution usually involves political compromise. Pakistan seems to be following the manual we wrote on COIN better than we are.
I do not really fault Senator Obama for getting this wrong. It is popular to blame Pakistan for our problems in Afghanistan. And Lord knows Pakistan’s government deserves the lion’s share for the mess Islamists are making in their own country, in Afghanistan, and throughout the world. But, thanks largely to the policies of Presidents Musharraf and Bush, COIN is one area where Pakistan is generally slogging through in the right direction.
P.S. Sen. McCain seems to have a better handle on things, but that may just be because he is more cautious. His idea of using local tribes to help with COIN effort is good, but hardly new; ditto for his suggestion that we convince the people of Pakistan that we share a common enemy. The coalition (to include Pakistan) has been working on this for a while, with mixed results. It doesn’t help that our IO infrastructure, message, and campaign are anemic, especially when compared to our enemy’s.
