Empire Notes

October 26, 2009

Weekly Commentary -- Afghanistan -- Delusions about Democracy

After two months of delays in vote-counting, wrangling, fraud investigations, and fevered consultations that make even the American elections look like a paragon of modernist efficiency, plans are finally in place for a runoff election in Afghanistan, to be held on November 7. Although President Hamid Karzai got almost 55% of the votes in the initial tally from the August election, an election audit carried out under the aegis of the U.N. found widespread fraud. Hundreds of thousands of votes were disqualified, bringing Karzai's share of the vote down to 48%; although his main challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, also benefited from fraudulent votes, the vast majority of the fraud was carried out on behalf of Karzai.

Over here, we have been subject to two months of commentary about the great importance of clean elections to the American counterinsurgency effort. The Afghans must perceive their government to be legitimate; otherwise, there is no way to control the growth of the neo-Taliban. A fraudulent election undermines that legitimacy. This whole stream of commentary grows out of the earlier trope of blaming American failures in Afghanistan on the corruption of the Karzai government; statements that success requires that the Americans pressure Karzai into somehow eliminating corruption abound, at least inside the beltway.

Although the ability of pundits, the chattering classes, and specialized military analysts in the United States to figure out what is relevant to understanding the dynamics of the protracted occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan has certainly increased over the past several years, the discourse still retains a hallucinatory quality.

At a superficial level, the current approach is self-contradictory. As Julia Mahlejd writes on the blog Registan.net, Afghans must be perplexed at the conclusion that Karzai and Abdullah benefited from widespread fraud and that the remedy is to let them have a runoff election. Especially with Karzai, where the scale of the fraud strongly suggests his own complicity, this is a reward for criminality; why not disqualify such candidates and have a runoff between the ones who are clean?

Add to that the fact that turnout in the runoff is expected to be even below the anemic 30% of the August elections, and that some additional polling booths in the war-torn areas, where most of the fraud emanated from, are going to be closed. How is an election supposed to provide legitimacy among a population that won't actually get a chance to vote and many of whom won't even know about the election?

More deeply, what is the source of this belief, suddenly emerging in time for the elections, that making a mark on a ballot is of such fundamental significance to the average Afghan? Afghanistan no doubt has its liberal-minded citizens of the world to whom democracy is an abstract virtue of surpassing importance, perhaps even those who believe that marking a ballot to choose who will be the head of a state with no power, no revenue, and no commitment to the welfare of the people involves some realization of that abstract virtue, but such people are few and far between and likely doing little or nothing to support the neo-Taliban insurgency.

On the other hand, consider the weakness of democracy as a principle of legitimation even in the United States, where the population has been steeped in talk about it for over 200 years. When widespread fraud (the illegal disenfranchisement of tens of thousands of voters), followed by a risibly inconsistent Supreme Court decision won Bush the 2000 election in Florida, opinions on the matter divided almost entirely along partisan lines. If you wanted Bush to win, you were for the final verdict; if you wanted Gore to win, you were against. Where was the mass of people to whom democracy itself mattered so much? Now, consider how much experience Afghans have with the rhetoric and practice of democracy -- none, except for a few years of rhetorical bombast from Bush administration officials -- and ask yourself how much the concept means to them.

It is true, of course, that the corruption and general ineffectuality of the Kabul government are a real problem for the counterinsurgents. But no one is asking why it is that the United States always seems to end up backing corrupt governments with no interest in the people's welfare -- and why it is that at least some of their foes, like the NLF in South Vietnam and apparently at least some of the neo-Taliban groups -- are better able to provide security and governance than our allies.

Posted at 10:50 am.

October 19, 2009

Weekly Commentary -- Stanley McChrystal -- the Petraeus's Petraeus

The must-read article of the week is definitely Dexter Filkins's profile of Stanley McChrystal in the New York Times magazine.

One must be careful reading Filkins. He is a very good reporter and an intelligent, insightful person -- his profile of Ahmad Chalabi is still the one and only source I've seen that gave me any insight into what he could possibly have been thinking in his mad quest to become the new king of Iraq (like so many exiles, he had ignored the passage of time in his country, in particular the collapse of the old feudal order).

There's only one problem -- his attitude toward the U.S. military and their mission, whatever exactly it might be, is roughly akin to that of a typical teenage girl toward the Jonas brothers. His first portrait of Lt. Col. Nathan Sassaman made him out to be a great hero of the brave new world being created in Iraq; Sassaman, who was later forced out of the military because of the coverup of the murder of an Iraqi boy (he wasn't involved in the murder), was in actuality a brutal overlord and a strong believer in putting the fear of God into the natives. When Filkins went into Fallujah during the second assault in November 2004, he was stunningly incurious about the possible use of chemical warfare by U.S. forces.

And his book The Forever War is a remarkable accomplishment: an acute observation and depiction of the reality of Iraq that actually makes it harder for the reader to understand and evaluate the occupation. His masterful evocation of the depravity to which so many Iraqis descended is not leavened by any useful explanation of the role the United States played in this descent, let alone by any understanding of these terrible acts as the acts of human beings not so different from us.

That said, I believe the general tenor of his reporting on McChrystal. Apparently, he is the Petraeus's Petraeus; not only has he gone far further than anyone before in the "kinder, gentler" approach to counterinsurgency than any previous American commander anywhere, he can run faster than Petraeus as well.

Filkins recounts a striking incident. A U.S. foot patrol is attacked by a remote-control-detonated bomb. Although no one is seriously injured, the SOP in the past would have been to kick down everyone's doors and raid their homes, yelling incomprehensibly at the residents. Even after the changes of 2005-2007, the response would have been quite forceful. Now, the soldiers ask for five men from the village to come forward, and plead with them for any information, which, unsurprisingly, they don't get.

Perhaps even more striking is the meeting where McChrystal hassles a fellow general for gliding too comfortably past an airstrike that killed civilians.

Although these represent striking departures from business as usual, even under the "counterinsurgency paradigm," in other ways McChrystal is no different from others. Filkins documents a ludicrous series of exchanges between McChrystal and "ordinary Afghans," where he goes up to them and without preamble says "What do you need?" Some say security, some say development. It is utterly superficial and means nothing.

We have seen laudatory embedded reporting right from the beginning of the so-called "war on terror," of course. This is credible, where earlier reporting wasn't, for two reasons. First, the Obama administration is a conventional modernist rationalist bunch, not thoroughgoing postmodernists like Bush and friends; they understand that there must be some loose consonance between the words and deeds if credibility is to be maintained. Second, whereas "kinder, gentler" actions were earlier conceived as concessions to the laws of war or more often as fodder for PR to American audiences, significant parts of the U.S. military have bought into the idea that "kinder, gentler" is more militarily effective in counterinsurgencies. Mere humanitarian considerations could not have forced such profound changes in the mode of operation so quickly.

Whether this perception is accurate or not is far from clear. It depends on many things, including the strategy of the insurgency. While the changes McChrystal is attempting are very welcome (unlike the 40,000 additional troops he wants), there are two potential problems. First, it is hard to believe that he will be able to remake the basic attitudes, approaches, and inclinations of American solders to such a great degree. Second, it is impossible to believe that the military will hold to such changes in tactics if they prove unsuccessful.

And make no mistake; McChrystal has made himself so vulnerable not just by contradicting Obama but by articulating a vision of a war where the United States has nothing to gain, gives selflessly, and refrains from using violence even in situations where Americans are threatened. Such articulations are welcome and even necessary when they are propaganda for militarism; when they are actually sincere, they make all the important people very uncomfortable.

Posted at 10:54 am.

October 12, 2009

Weekly Commentary -- Eight Years In

It cannot have escaped anyone's attention that in the past two months the old reflexive notion that Afghanistan was the unquestionable "good war" has disintegrated. There had been growing criticism around the margins, but it was only late this summer that a full-fledged public debate erupted. It is undoubtedly a testament to the great virtues of our open democratic society, with its free and active political discussion, that such a debate has broken out a mere eight years into the war.

It is unfortunately something of a surreal debate. The battle lines are drawn between those who believe we must help the Afghans, sacrifice for them, and build them a modern state in order to assure our own security and those who say we should let the Afghans go hang because they are not very relevant to our security.

Stanley McChrystal brought the simmering debate to a boil with his strenuous advocacy of a profound reorientation away from killing insurgents toward "protecting" Afghans and toward serious restrictions on U.S. military rules of engagement, together with a serious emphasis on state-building and the provision of security and other government services. For a number of military people who had already been extremely suspicious of the turn toward what they call the "counterinsurgency" approach, this was the last straw; either the proper role or the capabilities of the American soldier were being dramatically misconceived, with the result that the United States would be drawn further into a Vietnam-like quagmire.

This only intensified with McChrystal's call for an additional 40,000 troops to be sent, which would bring the U.S. contingent to 108,000 and the total international forces to near 150,000.

The other side ranges from status-quo centrists like Joe Biden, who wants to keep the number at 68,000 but step up drone strikes and anti-insurgent Special Forces raids, to people like George Will at the margins who want to withdraw ground forces entirely but continue to administer death from above.

The debate has distressingly little to do with the good of the Afghan people, although it is constantly used as a rhetorical device, especially by the McChrystal side. For those who take it seriously, it might be a good idea to evaluate the effect of the last eight years on the wellbeing of Afghans.

As far as I am able to determine, the only thing in the plus column, besides the odd highway and school, is the end of official, aboveground Taliban rule over the bulk of the country. This is not a small achievement; it's very different from the case of Iraq, because it's quite possible that the government/anarchy that replaced Saddam's government was actually worse for the people. In the case of Afghanistan, that's not true; the Taliban provided very few of the services of a state, other than public order, and their restrictions on people's lives were much more far-reaching.

Still, that has to be balanced against perhaps 10,000 civilians directly killed and 10 or 15,000 indirectly killed through the cutoff of aid during the 2001 war and 25-30,000 fighters killed. No one has good estimates of these numbers and there is no Les Roberts-style survey of Afghan households that I know of, but these can't be too far off. Say, 50,000 Afghans are dead because of this war, and close to 1500 members of the international force, including almost 900 Americans.

I don't know how to weigh those considerations against each other, but what is clear is that the negatives are steadily increasing. The Taliban is more powerful now than at any time since late 2001. How many more will have to be killed to prop up the weak, corrupt government installed by the United States? And will it be worth the price?

Those who favor a full-on counterinsurgency in Afghanistan justify it with reference to Iraq. The "surge" saved Iraq, and maybe something like it can save Afghanistan.

As military men and as proponents of good Western-style technocratic thinking, they are very poorly equipped to understand the central point of the Iraq counterinsurgency: the secret of America's success was its failure. Many of them might well concede that if they had waged a brutal campaign and killed 500,000 to 1 million people, they would probably have broken the back of any insurgency this side of the South Vietnamese National Liberation Front. Well, the fact that all of those people died, and the bulk of them not at the hands of the United States but in internecine warfare, just made it easier.

A similar failure may well be the prerequisite to "success" in Afghanistan. But don't expect to hear this point of view on CNN.

Posted at 11:01 am.

October 10, 2009

Weekly Commentary -- Not Even Worthy of Satire -- Obama's Peace Prize

At first, I thought it was a joke. "Obama wins Nobel Peace Prize." Then I realized it wasn't really funny. At least when Henry Kissinger won the prize, the Nobel Committee was striking a blow for surrealism and irony. This one was just straightforward power-worship -- and a pathetic, needy, clinging form of it, at that.

The only thing I can say in favor of the decision is that it's the one thing that could have made the International Olympic Committee look good; although the IOC may have the moral stature of the Nevada Gaming Commission, at least it didn't allow itself to be overawed by the merest contact with the aura of the Chosen One.

Obama is, of course, not a big-time war criminal like Henry Kissinger, but there's always hope; this award comes just as Obama is on the cusp of a decision regarding escalation of the war in Afghanistan. Since he took office just nine short months ago, both Afghanistan and Pakistan have seen dramatic escalations in violence, some of it directly at his behest.

Of course, the Nobel Committee is happy that Bush is gone; so is everybody else in the world. But giving Obama the prize just for not being Bush seems excessive; why not just give it to all six plus billion of us? After all, if "you" can be TIME's Person of the Year, why can't "you" be a Nobel Peace laureate as well?

The citation is weak tea, indeed. He is awarded the prize for his "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy," especially his "vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons." In other words, he gave a few speeches. He even traveled all the way to Egypt to give one of them. Even if they were the most remarkable things in the world, they are hardly evidence of any sustained or strenuous effort, let alone of success in advancing any agenda.

Some coverage has suggested that the recent passage of Security Council Resolution 1887 against nuclear proliferation was a landmark achievement for peace. In truth, it is utterly meaningless. It is not a Chapter VII resolution, meaning that it has no teeth. Almost the entire part dealing with general nuclear disarmament is "reaffirming" other agreements, like the Nonproliferation Treaty. It calls for everyone to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty -- any bets on whether the new Nobel laureate will even try to bring it up in the Senate?

For the rest, the resolution is a thinly-veiled warning to Iran, with language watered down far enough that it could get by Russia.

The committee also cites the "more constructive role" the United States is now playing on climate change; perhaps Khrushchev should have gotten the prize for the "more constructive role" of the Soviet state with respect to the gulag. Or, for that matter, Obama could have gotten it for his "more constructive role" in, apparently, ending America's brief flirtation with legalized torture. Going from being a major obstructionist on climate change to being a minor obstructionist is hardly worthy of this sort of recognition.

Anticipating the obvious objections, Thorboern Jagland, chairman of the Nobel Committee, stressed that the award was given for work already done by Obama, but there were several hints that the prize was given as an inducement for future actions.

If so, the Norwegians are making a big mistake. Although Obama is the most remarkable person to occupy the White House in a long time, some of his moral failings have become very apparent. Foremost among them is a tendency toward complacency and a type of moral narcissism, conflating the admittedly inspiring trajectory of his life with actual achievement in changing the world for the better (this became particularly tiresome late in the campaign). Indeed, so focused is he on how wonderful it is that he could have achieved what he did that he generally seems to have very little room for anger on behalf of the dispossessed -- however he conceives them. Robert Kennedy obviously never thought much about Vietnamese peasants burned out of their houses, but he was passionately indignant about the plight of the poor in Appalachia.

This prize will just exacerbate Obama's worst tendencies. How easy it will be for him to conclude that winning the Nobel Peace Prize actually constitutes genuine accomplishment in working for peace. Given that even the small steps he has taken, like mentioning the suffering of the Palestinians in his Cairo address, were flashes in the pan, without any actual sustained effort to back them up, how much less likely is he to start making real efforts now?

Posted at 9:49 am.