Martin LeFevre: A War By Any Other Name

Afghanistan has replaced Iraq as America’s main war. That means the mantra of progressives that we ‘took our eye off the ball by invading Iraq’ has come back to haunt us.

Obama is ‘doubling down’ in Afghanistan, sending 4000 more troops in immediately, 17,000 more this summer, and God knows how many more after that. If that isn’t an example of ‘mission creep,’ there is no such thing.

America is also throwing billions of more dollars at the faltering state of Pakistan, in the vain hope that shoring up its weak civilian government will stem the tide of increasingly brazen attacks by Islamist extremists in urban centers.

Winston Churchill once said, “Americans can be relied upon to do the right thing—after they’ve tried everything else.” But President Obama is still trying everything else. As he outlined it on 27 March, Obama’s plan for the region is Bush’s strategy on steroids.

The stated mission is to “disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan.” That seems clear enough, but Obama added an open-ended clause in the same sentence that’s guaranteed to deepen the quagmire…“and prevent their return to either country in the future.”

At every level, Obama’s strategy misses the mark. Rather than articulate a new approach to terrorism, the Obama Administration simply drops the “global war on terror” rhetoric, while beefing up the same failed policies that made the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan a monumental failure.

Rather than decouple the Taliban and al Qaeda, Obama’s strategy links them together even more tightly. Al Qaeda is to the Taliban as fungus balls are to oak trees. Though they have a symbiotic relationship, oaks can live without the fungus, while the fungus can’t live without the oaks. In this perverse world however, cutting down the trees only produces more fungi.

Obama’s strategy does not distinguish between what can be done, what should be done, and what must be done. It will not suffice to do what Bush did, only supposedly better--from nation building in Afghanistan to dropping bombs from Predators in Pakistan. (Using pilot-less aircraft controlled from the western United States, most Pakistanis of all stripes now view Americans as cowardly killers.)

Military actions must be subsumed to an international legal and criminal framework, if only because the more the United States and its NATO partners militarize the fight with al Qaeda, the more stature we give them, and thereby the more their ranks grow.

It almost looks like the intention of the Pentagon and CIA, along with NATO lackeys, is to continue mucking around in the region until we completely destabilize Pakistan and return Afghanistan to the Taliban.

If the stated goal is to go after the perpetrators of terrorist activity (beginning with but not limited to 9.11), then why not get Security Council approval for missions designed to disrupt, dismantle, and bring to justice (something Obama conveniently left out) those who commit crimes against humanity? Pakistanis would then probably be more supportive of al Qaeda targeted missions on their soil.

Of course the talk of ‘internationalizing’ the fight against terrorists is just that—talk. Obama has ‘rebranded’ America, and his administration sees no reason why we can’t just ‘rebrand’ this regional war.

Given the present philosophical framework and political context, I don’t see how the situation in the region can improve.

Despite the verbiage about a new ‘comprehensive’ strategy, the toxic mix of drugs and corruption that define the tar pit of Afghani political culture still sticks to everyone.

Despite the verbiage about a single theater of operation, the ‘international community’ is still hamstrung by outmoded concepts of sovereignty.

Pakistani leaders openly call for international help in capacity building, but the United Nations is a sideshow as increasingly effective extremists bring more instability each month to an already shaky civilian government.

The entire approach to terrorism vis-a-vis national sovereignty has to be re-thought. America re-focusing on Afghanistan and Pakistan can only make matters worse, no matter how smart and well-intentioned our Commander-in-Chief and his staff.

It isn’t a question of whether Afghanistan falls or Pakistan falls, thereby allowing terrorists to unleash more attacks on America. Nationalistic mentality, however it’s ‘rebranded’ and repackaged, guarantees that terrorism and extremism will grow like fungi in the dark, wet recesses of the global society.

Operating from premises and frameworks that no longer apply is a prescription for chaos. Can enough people step outside the box of national sovereignty, of military power, and of personality cults, and truly take the whole view?

Only then can international law come to mean something, and the divisions and grievances that give rise to extremism begin to ebb. Dropping the phrase “global war on terror,” while continuing the same basic policies, will only increase terror and war.

Martin LeFevre is a contemplative, and non-academic religious and political philosopher. He has been publishing in North America, Latin America, Africa, and Europe (and now New Zealand) for 20 years. Email: martinlefevre@sbcglobal.net . The author welcomes comments.

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