More on the consequences of failing in Afstan

Further to this post,

"What If We Fail in Afghanistan?"/Strong horse update

David Bercuson weighs in:

Don't head for the exit
The West should set an objective, not seek a way out, which would mean defeat
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The people of NATO's member countries are surely more confused than ever about the mission and have lost sight of the West's vital interest: to show the Taliban and their Islamist allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan that they will not be allowed to threaten a wide swath of South Asia from their mountainous redoubt along the border between the two countries...

...When the peoples of the Western democracies began to realize that their safe, secure and prosperous world still had to pay a blood tithe for their safety and security, they began to demand “exit strategies”: virtual guarantees that every war would have a predictable, controlled ending. But that's not what happens in war...

Wars almost always end politically, or they simply peter out – no matter how long it takes – because the determination and the physical capability of one side are greater than those of the other. When the stronger side persists, an end of some kind follows.

The West has the physical resources to wear the Taliban down, but now seems to have lost the will to do so.

Canada, Britain and the United States have lost fewer soldiers killed in six years of conflict in Afghanistan than the Allies did in one morning on June 6, 1944...

Unless the NATO countries actually fighting the Taliban can agree on a single unified political objective (the rest of NATO is important only symbolically but not militarily), there is no foreseeable successful exit strategy, and the only realistic exit strategy on the table right now consists of evacuation and defeat, either sooner or later. No political solution is in the cards for Afghanistan, as long as the ideological and religious core of the Taliban keep faith with their holy mission. At this point they have no reason not to.

Defeat in Afghanistan would return the Taliban to power in at least part of the country, virtually ensuring a resurrection of the civil war that raged from 1989 (when the Soviets left) to 1996, when the Taliban prevailed. Defeat could also embolden the Taliban in Pakistan to the point where they might eventually dominate that country or turn it into an Islamist state.

How long would India tolerate an Islamist state on its northwestern frontier?..

When the talk of “exit strategies” is closely examined, the real choices emerge. And they are stark. Fight this war to a successful outcome – understanding that success does not mean victory, though it must mean stability and security for most of the people of Afghanistan – or choose the pace of defeat.

War is both terrible and complex but one age-old dictum still applies. If you are attacked and you are defeated, you will pay significant consequences. The West was attacked and cannot lose the war in Afghanistan with impunity. That is an exit strategy with a high degree of risk and even more punishment in the long run.

David Bercuson is Director of the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary

On India, an excerpt from an earlier post of mine:

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My quick thoughts on Indo/Pak. I think he's rather over-optimistic about Pakistan, the army after all being the only thing that holds it together--other than fear of India which Mr Coll seems just to wish away. And I believe from all I've learned about the subcontinent that Indians still want Pakistan to go away (most recently, how would you like a fractious, semi-Islamist state with nuclear weapons next door? makes the Cold War look like a piece of cake by comparison). A split up of Pakistan, de-nuked so oder so, into bits under an Indian "sphere of influence" being the ultimate Indian goal, remember Bangladesh.

The Indo/Pak enmity (at the level of Pakistani national consciousness, where that exists) is fundamental and simply not appreciated as such in the West...