Losing the PR War in Afghanistan
In the modern media age, you no longer win wars by killing maximum numbers of the enemy. You win (or lose) wars by using violence to shape global public opinion.
My latest column for CNN.com looks at General McChrystal's firing and the larger story lost in the ensuing media uproar.
In the modern media age, you no longer win wars by killing maximum numbers of the enemy. You win (or lose) wars by using violence to shape global public opinion. …
The coalition in Afghanistan faces a similar challenge. Within minutes of any large-scale use of force by coalition forces, the Taliban will be on the air accusing the coalition of the murder of villagers. Some of these encounters are genuine cases of accidental killing of civilians. Some are fabrications and distortions. In every case, the coalition response lags behind the accusation: It takes time to confirm the facts in remote locations.
The Taliban propaganda has had an effect, especially among the Pashtun population, the country's largest ethnic group. U.S. forces have worked to improve their strategic communications. McChrystal had also imposed stricter rules of engagement so as to minimize exploitable accidents in the first place. McChrystal also made a priority of opening his headquarters to the Western media. The flow of information and access was intended to sustain media understanding of the war and, it was hoped, public support in the coalition's home countries. …
But now the risk is that McChrystal's key insight will be lost: that our job in Afghanistan is not to kill Taliban, but to discredit Taliban; not to hold territory, but to gain consent; not to secure the country, but to establish an effective indigenous government.
The real revelation in the Rolling Stone piece is that McChrystal assessed that the coalition was not succeeding at these tasks, that we are not winning the war. That news got lost in the fuss that McChrystal's staff sometimes groused about their colleagues. But it's the only story that matters.
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