Afstan: Some doses of pessimism

A lot of things do indeed need to be done a lot better:

1) Foreign minister Maxime Bernier:

Canada and its allies must do a better job of co-ordinating security and reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, and that means finding a new United Nations super envoy, Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier said yesterday.

In an interview, Mr. Bernier echoed the dire assessment of British politician Paddy Ashdown, the man Afghanistan recently rejected for the job of super envoy. Yesterday, Mr. Ashdown wrote the West faced "a real possibility" of defeat in Afghanistan unless it rises above its "disconnected collection of unco-ordinated tactics" in the country.

In Canada, the Manley report criticized the government's lack of centralized control over the efforts of the military, its diplomats and development strategy, something Mr. Bernier did not dispute.

"We need strong international leadership. We need better co-ordination. That's why my government asked for a UN special envoy on Afghanistan and the Manley report told us that: that the international community must better co-ordinate their work," Mr. Bernier said...

2) Lord Paddy Ashdown:

The great sixth century BC military strategist Sun Tzu wrote: “Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.”

With fighting in Afghanistan now entering its seventh year, no agreed international strategy, public support on both sides of the Atlantic crumbling, Nato in disarray and widening insecurity in Afghanistan, defeat is now a real possibility. The consequences for both Afghanistan and its allies would be appalling: global terrorism would have won back its old haven and created a new one over the border in a mortally weakened Pakistan; our domestic security threat would be gravely increased and a new instability would be added to the world’s most unstable region.

David Miliband, the British foreign secretary, is right – in the face of these consequences, withdrawal is not an option.

But then neither is continuing as we are. So what should we do?..

3) The Australian defence minister...

...Joel Fitzgibbon, has denounced the handling of the war in Afghanistan and says the allies are disunited, lack a clear plan and have failed to deal with the drug trade.

In a scathing assessment of the progress of the war, Mr Fitzgibbon yesterday laid out a string of failures and warned that a new strategy was required to ensure the Australian contribution was not "for nil".

"Alarmingly, I [have] found a lack of common objectives amongst the partners," he told Parliament. "No coherent strategy, confused chains of command and blurred lines of responsibility, a failing counter-narcotics strategy, the absence of benchmarks for progress, a crisis in burden sharing, with a number of NATO countries failing to meet or live up to their side of the bargain - and poor progress in advancing Afghan security forces towards the critical mass in skill required for them to be able to hold our military gains."

He referred to recent comments by the British politician and diplomat Paddy Ashdown, who this week said the NATO-led forces were in disarray and "defeat is now a real possibility".

"What a tragedy failure in Afghanistan would be for all of those who have given their lives for the cause or have been badly injured," Mr Fitzgibbon said. "What an ominous development it would be for global security and for the Afghan people. What a tragedy it would be if all the good work done so far in the end were to count for nought."

Before the election Labor signalled a strong commitment to Afghanistan, and the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, told the US President, George Bush, that Australia would consider "further reasonable requests" for additional troops. But Mr Fitzgibbon has resisted recent calls by the US for other countries to increase troop levels, saying Australian forces have been hampered by a failure by their "political masters" to develop a clear plan...