After the Landslide

If you think the furor over leaving Syria and outrage over “abandoning the Kurds” is something, wait until we leave Afghanistan. In a piece at Foreign Affairs Carter Malkasian contemplates that eventuality:

A Taliban advance would likely follow a U.S. withdrawal. The events of the years 2014 to 2016 offer a cautionary tale. During those years, the United States minimized airstrikes, because it believed that doing so could allow the Afghans to learn to fight on their own. Instead, the Taliban all but captured several provinces, including Kunduz and Helmand. Heavy casualties and desertions thinned the ranks of the Afghan military and police. In 2016, the United States went back to permitting airstrikes and thus stemmed the Taliban advance.

If the president decides, whether in 2021 or before, to fully withdraw from Afghanistan, those airstrikes would cease. The United States would close all its bases and stop conducting surveillance in support of Afghan forces. All U.S. drones and troops would depart, including special operations forces and advisers. U.S. allies and coalition partners would undoubtedly pull out their 8,700 troops, too. Washington could continue to provide funding to the Afghan military at a reduced level, but Congress would be sorely tempted to eliminate such support once U.S. troops were out of harm’s way. Just how long a withdrawal would take is a matter of debate: the Obama administration once planned for a timeline of 30 months, but some have called for one that is even shorter.

Toward the end of the withdrawal process, the balance of military force within the country would tip. The Taliban’s leader, Mawlawi Haibatullah, would probably attack provincial centers such as Kunduz and Lashkar Gah. The Afghan army and police would not be able to defend these cities without U.S. air support. The following year, Haibatullah could escalate, striking big cities such as Kandahar and Jalalabad. Afghan special operations forces, the National Directorate of Security, and certain hard-bitten tribal leaders would fight tooth and nail. But chances are good that a significant number of soldiers and police would flee, leaving the Taliban tide to overwhelm the big provincial cities’ defenses.

Kabul itself could then spontaneously fall. Once tribal leaders, police, soldiers, and farmers sense which way the wind is blowing, the whole edifice of the Afghan state could collapse. Such was the sequence of events in 2001 and many times before, as Professor Thomas Barfield writes in Afghanistan: A Cultural and Political History: “The war did not have any decisive battles. Just as the Taliban had come to power by persuading people that they were winners without fighting . . . they lost the war in a reverse process.”

But Kabul also stands a decent chance of surviving. Afghanistan’s army might concentrate on defending the capital, and Tajik, Uzbek, and Hazara warlords—who once made up the Northern Alliance—could mobilize militias to help. Outside powers could oppose the Taliban: Russia, in defense of long-standing Uzbek and Tajik friends; Iran, to protect the Shiite Hazaras; and India, in order to contain Pakistani influence. None of these countries can be assumed to step in fully behind the government, but a total Taliban victory would be in none of their interests.

Regardless of Kabul’s fate, however, the Taliban would control at least half the country, including several cities, fertile croplands, and mineral deposits. Under such circumstances, al Qaeda, ISIS, and like-minded groups would gain access to territory and resources. Other foreign terrorists would join them in Afghanistan, where a perceived Taliban victory over the United States would serve as a beacon to foreign extremists.

I do not believe there is any way to “win” in Afghanistan. The Afghan military and government have demonstrated no ability to stand on their own against the Taliban. We cannot eliminate the Taliban without antagonizing Pakistan and supporting our military efforts within Afghanistan would be prohibitively expensive without Pakistan’s cooperation. Consequently in order to “win” we would not only need to eliminate the Taliban within Afghanistan but pursue them into adjacent parts of Pakistan against Pakistani opposition and be prepared to fight the Pakistanis as well as the Taliban. And Pakistan has nuclear weapons.

If winning and successful counter-insurgency are beyond our reach, what’s left in Afghanistan? As I see it there are two viable alternatives. We could just leave, to massive domestic opposition of which the present opposition to withdrawing from Syria is a mild foretaste.

Or we could prepare to remain forever, keeping what has been characterized as a “small, lethal force” in Afghanistan on an indefinite basis with a strategy of counter-terrorism to prevent the contingency mentioned by Mr. Malkasian:

Under such circumstances, al Qaeda, ISIS, and like-minded groups would gain access to territory and resources. Other foreign terrorists would join them in Afghanistan, where a perceived Taliban victory over the United States would serve as a beacon to foreign extremists.

That essentially mimics Alexander’s strategy more than two millennia ago and he was the most successful invader of Afghanistan in history. If such a strategy were adopted, I think there would be a moral not to mention political necessity of selling it to the American people. IMO a significant fraction of Americans would just as soon obliterate Afghanistan utterly as remain there.