Still Waiting for Obama's Afghan Strategy

The “war” in Afghanistan is getting more lethal.

An increasing number are saying it can’t be won and we should not only get out, but we should never have committed troops in the first place.

It was only a couple of years ago that this was the predominant view of Americans about Iraq, Even diehard Republican supporters of George W. Bush were urging that he dump Iraq (as President Richard Nixon dumped Vietnam –“peace with honor”) as a lost cause.

That was before General David Petraeus persuaded Bush to launch the “surge” which, as we now know, was successful. Despite incidents, Iraq today is not the epitome of instability and anarchy it once was.

As for Afghanistan, it is Obama’s war. As White House press secretary Robert Gibbs acknowledged: “You can't under-resource the most important part of our war on terror... for five or six or seven years... and hope to snap your fingers and have that turn around in just a few months.”

In the past six months, what Obama once called a “good war” in Afghanistan, has gotten worse. Bush cannot be blamed, because it wasn’t this bad when he was immersed in Iraq.

Canada is withdrawing from a combat role by 2011, primarily because we have to. The small size of our army demands it; manpower and our equipment are exhausted. Repeated tours of duty by our soldiers is unfair and unreasonable – senior NCOs and junior officers leaving the army is a growing concern.

For the army, the government’s shift in emphasis has to be disturbing. It’s almost as if Prime Minister Stephen Harper got elected by latching on to the army as a popularity cause with Canadian voters.

That has changed ever since Rick Hillier left as Chief of Defence Staff, replaced by Walter Natynczuk who makes no waves and doesn’t say boo in public. Hillier was always sounding off and had opinions that resonated within both the country and the military.

So it would seem that politically Canada is drifting back to the 1990s and beyond, where the military is seen as something to downplay. Noble sentiments and promises are mostly rhetoric, and it’s a fair bet that mechanized equipment that is Afghanistan now, will likely stay there. Or won’t be replaced when our troops are mostly back home.

As for Afghanistan, critics who deplore the warlords and endemic corruption miss the point. These have always existed in Afghanistan – a country of varying tribes and clans, where warlords are like the feudal lords that once ruled Europe.

Our concern for Afghanistan should be the elimination of the Taliban, who are not al-Qaeda and pose no threat to Toronto's CN tower, stock exchange building, or of a future terrorist attack. The Taliban are a threat to ordinary Afghans, whom our troops are trying to protect. It is not NATO’s, America’s or Canada’s role to introduce democracy as a way of life. Fine if it happens, but in the meantime help Afghanistan with an infrastructure (military and police) that can combat and withstand Taliban extremism.

Warlords have always thrived in Afghanistan, and it’s unrealistic to suppose this can be changed by outside intervention, and not from within the country.

Afghanistan is now America’s problem. Canada’s problem will be maintaining our military’s capabilities after Afghanistan - something our political leaders seem to have lost interest in doing.