The Intelligence Pool

The Endgame in Afghanistan

by Robert Roy Pool

tribesOver the last 2,340 years many powerful empires have conquered and attempted to pacify Afghanistan. None have succeeded for long. This fact alone should make us think carefully about what we imagine we are doing there.

Afghanistan is easy to conquer but impossible to hold. This was true in the time of Alexander the Great, and it is even truer now. Foreign invaders inevitably become embroiled in Afghanistan’s tribal conflicts, favoring some tribes over others and making enemies of the rest. These hardy Afghan tribes – Pashtuns, Uzbeks, Tajiks, Hazaras, Baluchis, Aimaks, Turkmen, and others – are adapted to constant warfare with each other. They quickly reform their alliances to oppose any foreign invader. Even so, foreign occupiers have often been able to sustain their chosen viceroys in Kabul for as long as they are willing to commit the necessary resources.

In times past, once a foreign occupier realized it could not effectively control the Afghan countryside or the lucrative trade routes to China, Iran, and India, its interest invariably waned. There was little else of value in Afghanistan. The cost of assimilating Afghanistan into any empire was therefore high, the benefits negligible. Occupiers have had every incentive to cut their losses and withdraw.

For this simple reason every foreign-backed Afghan regime eventually collapsed in the face of a zealous coalition of native Afghan tribes. Typically, the victorious Afghan coalition then “liberates” Kabul before it dissolves into squabbling and civil war. A new balance of power between the Afghan tribes eventually emerges, but only after a period of chaos. Each tribe grabs what it can; each warlord takes some of the plunder. In this manner wealth is redistributed from the urban enclaves to the desperately poor countryside. 

After the expulsion of a foreign occupier, the process of attracting a new foreign occupier begins almost at once, although it can take centuries before a new foreign empire feels strong enough to undertake the conquest of Afghanistan. By means of this complex historical process, Afghan warlords have learned to profit from the conquest of their country and from the subsequent revolt, collapse, and chaos that inevitably follows.

But this complex process -- chaos, invasion, occupation, revolt, expulsion, collapse and chaos again -- has prevented Afghanistan from integrating itself into a stable empire or international trading system. This very process has helped keep Afghanistan ignorant and poor for two thousand years.

The Great Game

This is “The Great Game” of Afghanistan. The Afghans excel at it, but most foreigners don’t understand its most fundamental principles. We Americans certainly do not.  Like the Soviets before us and the British before them, we have deluded ourselves into believing that the Afghans are buying our ideas and joining our empire. They love us! They want to be like us! They are having elections! They are practically Americans already!

This delusion would be comic if it didn't have such deadly consequences. The Afghans have not suddenly embraced American democracy any more than they suddenly embraced communism in 1979 or the benefits of British rule in the 19th Century. Afghan warlords fight to expel us even as they profit from our presence. Their interests are served if their war against NATO goes on as long as possible, giving the urban enclaves more time to build up wealth. This will make the plunder all the more lucrative when the foreign-backed regime finally collapses.

The New Twist

The 9/11 attacks added a new, exciting twist to this old game. Because the United States had suffered almost 3,000 civilian casualties on 9/11, because Al Queda had been sheltered by the Taliban government of Afghanistan, and because the U.S. and NATO possess the most capable military forces the world has yet seen, our government was highly motivated to “control” Afghanistan. The result of this desire has been the occupation of Afghanistan by 68,000 American and 38,000 NATO soldiers and marines.

Americans tend to believe they can do anything. This has made it possible for the wily Afghan warlords to suck us into a colossal extortion scheme, perpetrated on a global scale. They have convinced us (and we have convinced ourselves) that we must continue to garrison Afghanistan and spend tens of billions of dollars there or we will suffer another 9/11 attack. We have enlisted all our most trusted allies, even pacifist Germany and ambivalent Canada. We believe we have no choice but to sacrifice more soldiers and marines, and that someday our efforts will produce an Afghanistan that governs itself peacefully, respects the rule of law, and does not harbor terrorists. We are oblivious to the gigantic extortion scheme because can’t see past our own ideology. We see Afghanistan as we want it to be, not as it is.

 

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