Pro & Con: Should Obama send more 
U.S. troops to fight the Afghan war?

YES: U.S. risks ‘escalation trap’ without decisive action to prevail.

By Zeb B. Bradford Jr.

We are fast approaching strategic choices in Afghanistan that are comparable to those ultimately forced upon us in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War.

I see no acceptable alternative than to seek success by defeating the forces of destabilization outright. This would require a major increase in our commitment of ground forces.

If, however, the Obama administration will not opt for this approach, we would be wise to plan and execute a deliberate exit strategy without having one forced upon us by events we cannot predict or control.

The debate over whether or not to increase our forces in Afghanistan risks our falling into what I believe to be an “escalation trap.”

This phenomenon emerges when we are engaged in lengthy conflicts with indigenous forces in remote theatres. Typically we enter these conflicts with an expectation that we can make quick work of the forces challenging the established “status quo” regimes with which we have become allied. We assume that our superior technology and firepower will lead to a relatively painless victory.

However, what happens often does not follow this scenario. When success becomes elusive, as it is in Afghanistan, there are enormous incentives to rescue the mission by upping the ante: reinforcing or “escalating” the conflict with the addition of new forces. Admitting defeat (or miscalculation) and initiating a withdrawal becomes politically untenable.

How to justify the price already paid in American lives and treasure? The problem is that the enemy also has a vote. He can escalate as well to blunt the effects of our increased efforts, especially if they are taken in small steps

Our leaders find it much easier to avoid hard choices by buying time via incremental escalation.

Usually, after initial enthusiasm, the American public loses its appetite for prolonged indecision and a steady stream of casualties. However, this incremental escalation adds up, and we find ourselves ever more deeply committed, with the perceived costs of backing away from continued engagement increasingly relentless.

In the meantime, opposition to such prolonged engagement prompts its own reaction by segments of the U.S. population. This tends to rule out any decisive escalation that could possibly turn the tide in the conflict itself.

Thus we find that while we cannot lose because we have the power to prevent it, neither can we win because we are not free to apply the overwhelming power necessary. The United States has arrived at such an “escalation trap” in Afghanistan. Even with a major increase in our commitment a clear victory would not be assured and the costs would be high.

Yet to continue on with the current level of effort is likely to result in an indeterminate outcome and steady accumulation of American casualties. This approach will probably turn public opinion further against the war.

The only realistic alternative to escalation or stalemate is to embark on a phased disengagement and withdrawal of American forces, leaving the indigenous Afghani military to assume responsibility for internal security and defending their country. America would still provide essential support and assistance to Afghanistan as it attempts to build a viable nation. The primary effort would be to create a competent and legitimate government. This approach failed in Vietnam. The North Vietnamese army filled the vacuum left by the Americans.

The risk in the current conflict is that al-Qaida and the Taliban have not really been defeated. Therefore the consequences of withdrawing from Afghanistan prematurely could be grave. President Barack Obama neither supported this conflict at its inception nor campaigned on an aggressive policy there.

Yet like it or not this is becoming his war. He is faced with the choice of major escalation to pursue success, or alternatively, continued gradual escalation or withdrawal. Either way it will be “Obama’s War.”

Ret. Army Brig. Gen. Zeb B. Bradford Jr. of Atlanta was a senior military fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and Chief of Force Planning at NATO.

NO: Political, not military, solution required in fractured, complex area.

By Ann Wright

KABUL, Afghanistan —The U.S. strategy in Afghanistan continues to be military, despite senior U.S., British and other coalition partners acknowledging that the ultimate resolution will be political.

Instead of looking to a purely military solution, I believe jobs, education, access to medical facilities, respectful treatment of fighters who turn themselves in and demanding greater accountability from the Afghan government and from U.S. contractors will turn the tide faster and less expensively than putting another 40,000 U.S. soldiers into Afghanistan.

With allegations of corruption within and outside the government and its alleged ties to the opium trade, the recent decision to accept President Hamid Karzai’s re-election will increase pressure on President Barack Obama to justify further U.S. troop deployments to Afghanistan to prop up a government now regarded by Afghans and international organizations as systemically corrupt.

The Obama administration is considering accepting Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s military assessment that 40,000 more U.S. military should be added to the 200,000 military forces in Afghanistan. The additional forces will be fighting 20,000 Taliban.

McChrystal’s strategy is to train 170,000 more Afghan Army soldiers to increase its military to 240,000 by 2013. This will require recruitment and training of 4,000 soldiers per month and may require reinstitution of compulsory military service, according to the Afghan Ministry of Defense. A total of 160,000 Afghan police are to be trained, for a total of 400,000 Afghan security forces.

I have been in Kabul on my first trip back to Afghanistan in almost eight years.

Most people with whom we spoke said that U.S. and international military presence is needed until an Afghan military force is trained and equipped to take over.

They want Afghan soldiers to take the lead in military operations in villages, as the presence of U.S. soldiers and their methods alienate Afghans who live in areas with conservative views toward women.

No one we spoke to wanted the return of Taliban rule, although some said that in areas where the Taliban is strong, it is because the Taliban hires local people and pays them double to triple what the government does, shuns low-level corruption and provides “security and justice.” The Taliban rules in one-third of the provinces of Afghanistan.

Virtually everyone we spoke with said that Taliban operations won’t end in Afghanistan unless either the U.S. or Pakistan eliminates the sanctuary that al-Qaida and the Taliban now enjoy in Pakistan.

If 40,000 more U.S. military come to Afghanistan, border duty and training the Afghan Army are the two tasks most Afghans want them to do. Most we spoke with wanted a U.S. exit strategy, but at this stage, few wanted a specific timetable for reduction of forces.

The Obama administration has accepted Karzai’s “reconciliation” initiative, which is intended to induce low- and mid-ranking Taliban fighters into changing sides or at least laying down their arms.

Paying Taliban fighters to leave the insurgency is a key element of Gen. McChrystal’s new counter-insurgency strategy. The strategy has worked, at least initially, in Iraq by paying off Sunni fighters to join the Awakening Councils. The U.S. should provide funding support for this program in Afghanistan.

U.S. military training to increase the size and capacity of the Afghan military should be the primary mission of U.S. forces. International civilian law enforcement personnel should train the Afghan national police. Military combat operations should be turned over to Afghan soldiers quickly.

Afghans want short-term assistance to train their military, close the borders with Pakistan to Taliban fighters and support an Afghan-led reconciliation process.

Coming to Afghanistan has made it clear that most Afghans want their Army, not the U.S. military, to provide security for their citizens.

Col. Ann Wright is a 29-year veteran who resigned in 2003 in opposition to the Iraq war. In 2001, she helped reopen the U.S. embassy in Kabul.