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Birds of a feather: flocking together or flying apart?
I suspect most of the AfPak attention will be focused on the revelations that President Hamid Karzai's brother has been on the CIA payroll, the Taliban attack that killed six people at a U.N. staff house in Kabul, and the bombing that killed more than 80 people in Peshawar. Plus, there are new reports that the United States is going to adopt a strategy that eschews counterinsurgency throughout all of Afghanistan and concentrates on protecting major cities. These are all important stories, because they underscore just how difficult it has been, is, and will be to do social engineering on the lives of 200 million Muslims in Central Asia.
But I want to focus on somewhat broader question today. Yet another justification for continuing the war in Afghanistan is the belief that the Afghan Taliban, al Qaeda, the Pakistani Taliban, and groups such as the Haqqani network form a tight ideologically-inspired alliance that is relentlessly anti-American and dedicated to attacking us no matter where we are or what we are doing. In this view, these various groups are "birds of a feather flocking together." This belief fuels the fear that a Taliban victory in Afghanistan would produce a dramatic increase in al Qaeda's capabilities, once their Islamic soulmates provided them with territory, recruits, and other forms of support for attacks on the West in general and the United States in particular.
Such an outcome cannot be wholly ruled out, I suppose, and well-informed experts like Ahmed Rashid apparently think it's likely. But there are several good reasons to doubt it. The first is that we know that there have been intense frictions between some of these groups in the past, as well as intense divisions between Osama bin Laden and some of his own associates. In his prize-winning book The Looming Tower, for example, Lawrence Wright describes the repeated tensions between Mullah Omar and Bin Laden, which nearly led the former to turn Bin Laden over to the Saudis. The rift was reportedly healed after bin Laden swore an oath of loyalty to Omar, but their interests and objectives are not identical and one can easily imagine new quarrels in the future.
A second reason to be skeptical that these groups are tightly unified by a set of common beliefs or doctrines is the fact that the foreign presence in the region gives them an obvious incentive to help each other. In other words, what looks like ideological solidarity may be partly a manifestation of balance-of-power politics, and these groups' tendency to back each other might easily dissipate once the foreign presence were reduced. Afghan political history is one where diverse coalitions form, dissolve, and realign in myriad ways, and similar dynamics are likely to resurface once the the United States and its foreign allies are gone.
A third reason has to do with the nature of certain types of political ideology. Unlike liberalism, which emphasizes the need to tolerate a wide range of political views, political ideologies that rest on a single authoritative interpretation of "truth" are inherently divisive rather than unifying. In particular, ideologies that call for adherents to obey the leadership because it wields the "correct" interpretation of the faith (whether in Marxism, Christianity, Islam, etc.) tend to foster intense rivalries among different factions and between different leaders, each of whom must claim to be the "true" interpreter of the legitimating ideology. In such movements, ideological schisms are likely to be frequent and intense, because disagreements look like apostasy and a betrayal of the faith. Instead of flocking together, these "birds of a feather" are likely to fly apart.
During the Cold War, for instance, hawks repeatedly worried about a "communist monolith" and were convinced that Marxists everywhere were reliable tools of the Kremlin. In reality, however, world communism was rife with internal tensions and ideological schisms, as illustrated by the furious Bolshevik-Menshevik split, the deadly battle between Trotsky and Stalin, and the subsequent rift between Stalin and Tito. China and the Soviet Union became bitter rivals by the early 1960s -- on both geopolitical and ideological grounds -- and the U.S. withdrawal from Vietnam ended another yet another period of illusory communist unity and quickly led to wars between communist Vietnam, communist Kampuchea, and communist China.
Such historical analogies should be used with caution, of course, but in this case the logic is similar and compelling. Islamic fundamentalists rely in part on specific interpretations of Islamic thought to recruit and motivate their followers, and disagreements over doctrine and policy can easily lead to bitter internal quarrels, especially once the immediate need to cooperate against a common enemy is gone. We've already seen amples sign of division within al Qaeda and its clones, and more are to be expected.
This is not to say that global terrorists won't continue to learn from each other, to inspire imitators (much as Marxism-Leninism once inspired a wide array of fringe groups who had nothing to do with Moscow) and they may even provide each other with various forms of tactical support on occasion. But there are good reasons to question the facile assumption that they are eternally loyal comrades-in-arms, united forever by a shared set of a deeply held politico-religious beliefs. And if there is considerable potential for division among both the leaders and even more among their followers, then a strategy of divide-and-conquer makes more sense than a long and costly counterinsurgency campaign that gives them every reason to stay united.
SHAH MARAI/AFP/Getty Images
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“The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.”
Stephen M. Walt is the Robert and Renée Belfer Professor of International Relations at Harvard University.
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Recent Writings
Looming Tower -- Terrible Source
In Taming Obama by Pruning Advisors, I point out the dangerous untrustworthiness of The Looming Tower as well as one incredible lie on the author's part. (I would have put it all here, but the FP software is not friendly to foreign character sets.)
Joachim!
I'm glad you didn't, as I am not friendly to your anti-Zionist screeds. At least you've managed to directly link your post to something in Walt's - even if it's over 6 weeks old. How about trying to respond to this post's content? I'd love to discuss it with you. But keep it short and sweet, okay?
complex is the nature of the game
Yes. Whoever can best manage the naturally divisive nature of politics in subsistence cultures will usually find a way to remain more united and win the conflict. The goal is to infiltrate and become a part of as many sectors of society as you can while you remain united in a fractured world of competing politicians.
Personally, I would like to see more study about the rootless refugees and how their loss of attachments of families and communities has been replaced by an ideology that provides a substitute for their destroyed identities. I wonder if that is a factor among a people with so many refugees as in Afghanistan and is becoming the case in northern Pakistan. These kinds of people can provide a hardcore central leadership that can make and continually nurture person-to-person network building that extends beyond their loyal core.
Another important factor is the nature of groups. In subsistence societies, groups are chain-links of personal deals that require continual maintenance so that another individual does not recruit your linkages. That is the nature of alliances.
Space is short here, but institutions are almost always suspect by the broad base of people. Everyone is searching for the next best deal---always. Thus, the opposition always has an advantage because nobody ever trusts a government institution even without a war.
Bob Spencer
Don't Believe It
Implying that various militant groups- including the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban- operate under a loose-association with Al'Qaeda is one thing...actually basing U.S. security policy on this assumption is totally different. True, Al'Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban have appeared to be at odds with one another lately. Dr. Marc Lynch had an excellent post last week discussing this very development. More specifically, online forums have exposed the growing distrust between the two long-time allies; so much so that senior members of the Taliban leadership have denounced Al'Qaeda's global aspirations for a single Islamic Caliphate. You can read the story here: http://lynch.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/10/22/jihadica_online_rifts_between_al_qaeda_and_the_taliban
This is absolutely encouraging. As Americans who have loved ones in harms way, we can only hope that such a disruption within the Taliban-Al'Qaeda partnership will permanently fracture the alliance. But, is Dr. Walt's plan of withdrawing American soldiers from Afghanistan really going to bring this about?
Sure, Al'Qaeda, the Taliban, and other Pashtun groups do have a common enemy in the United States. All three organizations view the NATO contingent in Afghanistan as an occupying force that will do nothing but harm the interests of the indigenous population. Likewise, an increased U.S. presence does have the possibility of furthering this hostility. However, can be really believe that Dr. Walt's proposition- redeploying U.S. troops- will completely alter this mindset?
The answer should be obvious to all of us. The Taliban-Al'Qaeda alliance has been sustained for the past thirteen years, even before the United States decided to launch its first cruise missiles on remote Afghan terrorist camps. At that time, there was no direct American presence in Afghanistan, yet the anti-U.S. ideology grew to unprecedented proportions...so much so that 3,000 American lives were lost five years into Taliban rule.
Completely scrapping the U.S. mission would not break the Taliban-AQ relationship, as Walt proposes. Rather, the move could have the dramatic effect of destabilizing the entire region of Southern Asia. Not only would U.S. interests be harder to obtain, but Islamic radicals (based in Afghanistan and Pakistan) could use this symbolic victory as a vantage point. Unfortunately for the despotic regimes of Central Asia, this is already coming to fruition.
http://depetris.wordpress.com
Keep in mind that assuming
Keep in mind that assuming your enemies are united in their opposition to you when you are wrong also is also harmful to your national interests. I'm reminded of how long it took the US to recognize that the communist world was not actually a monolith, and how much damage that misconception caused us (Vietnam, anyone?).
It is clear that the Taliban and AQ have different goals, and always will have. Yes, Mullah Omar supported AQ before 9/11, but that was before he learned the cost of doing so. At the moment, one perspective on this issue speculates that the US retaliation for Taliban support of AQ is irrelevant, and that the Taliban will immediately throw their support behind AQ after we pull out (assuming they take control of Afghanistan). The other perspective on this issue speculates that the Taliban received a reality-check when they were thrown out of power, and would no longer offer a haven for AQ if they regained power.
There's no way to know which is true, but I find it unlikely that the Taliban leaders would not shift their behavior to avoid offending the US to the extent they did after 9/11 if they regained power. That would be more consistent with their pre-9/11 agenda, which was focused on Afghanistan, rather than the international agenda that AQ possesses.
As for destabilizing the region, in all honesty I have to wonder how much difference that will make. The region isn't that stable in the first place, after all. The US presence itself may be a net destabilizing factor, in the first place, and the region is likely to be unstable whether or not the US will be there.
That being the case, will it really harm the reputation of the US to pull out? An equally plausible argument is that staying there is the real source of damage to the reputation of the US.
Vi-et-nam
Speaking of Vietnam, again, I'd highly recommend the recent piece in Newsweek mentioned below.
One of the Talibs says at one point, "We never worry about time. We will fight until victory no matter how long it takes. The U.S. has the weapons, but we are prepared for a long and tireless jihad. We were born here. We will die here. We aren't going anywhere."
I mean you could simply replace the word 'Jihad' with war, and this could be a quote from Viet Cong in 1968.
Scary stuff.
The difference between my
The difference between my assumption and Dr. Walt's (maybe yours as well) is pretty cut-and-dry; I am assuming the worst, hoping that this will push the United States into looking at each and every problem facing its mission in Afghanistan. What Dr. Walt is doing is exactly the opposite; blindly associating an American withdrawal with a decline in American hatred.
Rationally speaking, this is no way to conduct a foreign or defense policy. I find it very hard to believe that removing foreign troops from Southern Asia will translate into a symbolic sense of remorse from the Muslim population. My prediction, on the other hand, takes into account all the bizarre twists and turns often created from asymmetrical warfare. We cannot simply believe one causation theory and hope that, out of some divine power, we guessed right.
As far as your point about Central Asian security, you may be correct in one respect. Most of the region's authoritarian regimes are anything but stable. In fact, virtually all of them are ripe with corruption, inefficiency, poverty, and a false-sense of what it means to be a part of the world community. However, just imagine the alternative; an area of lawlessness and despair that drives young Uzbeks, and Tajiks into the arms of Islamic fundamentalism. If you think the Asian continent is fractured now, just wait until the governments of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan fall apart. Which situation would you choose?
http://depetris.wordpress.com
I agree, you are assuming the
I agree, you are assuming the worst. A little historical perspective teaches us that assuming the worst is a very poor starting point for either analysis or policy. See Walt's Scary Monsters post (http://walt.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2009/10/30/scary_monsters_a_halloween_tribute) for more discussion of this.
The argument does not rest on America's withdrawal resulting in a decline in hatred against the US, though that is a likely result. Rather, it is that the withdrawal of US troops will eliminate a major factor inspiring our enemies to work together, and will thus allow their natural differences to manifest in a split.
Political Islam is not a monolithic entity, but by treating it like it is we can certainly make the different Islamist groups cooperate against us. I'd prefer to stop doing that, personally.
As for your "domino theory" extension of this, you've got no basis for the contention that a US withdrawal will somehow destabilize other states in the region. Let's stick to something that can be supported with analysis, eh?
Jihadica Address Jihadist Politics
Some blog entries in Jihadica relating to Professor Walt's discussion: Jihadica Addresses Jihadist Politics.
Marc Lynch addressed the only relevant Jihadica post
Check it out. Have anything original to say about Walt's post?
A Stitch in Time... if 8 years later is still 'in time'...
Regarding frictions between Al Qaeda and the Taliban:
-----------------
- Wright has also stated that while (in principle) Mullah Omar was prepared to expel Bin Laden as late as July of '98 in exchange for quid pro quo and diplomatic cover from the Saudis, Omar's anger over the bombing of Afghanistan in August of that year (in response to the Embassy attacks in Kenya and Tanzania) had driven him closer to Bin Laden. In fact Wright says that Mullah Omar was openly rude and hostile to the Saudi Intel Minister and denied ever making a deal for ousting Bin Laden.
- It's clear that the Afghan Taliban and Al Qaeda have disparate end-game scenarios. But those aren't necessarily mutually exclusive. Al Qaeda seeks to repel the Crusaders globally, and create a series of Islamic Emirates, born out of 'jihad,' independent and defiant of the "West" - all across the Muslim World. This whereas the Taliban has gone to considerable lengths, particularly as of late, to state their confinement to Afghanistan.
- So far it appears clear that the administration is fully aware of these nuances, but is hamstrung over forecasting the susceptability of Southern and Eastern Afghanistan serving as a haven for Al Qaeda after a withdrawl.
Regarding 'The Enemy of mine Enemy...' theory:
-----------------
- The likeliness of this scenario is possible, but highly contentious. The leadership of the Pakistan based TTP, being apparently the 'loose coalition of the willing' in FATA and NWFP, has repeatedly stated that once they have succeeded in repeling the Pakistani Army's onslaught, they will re-turn their attention to NATO forces in assistance of their Afghan Pashtun kinsmen. Whether the 'Afghan Taliban' actually want this dubious honor is debatable as well. The opinion that the 'Pakistani' Taliban are just a local manifestation of the Al Qaeda cancer, due to the relocation of radicalizing foreign fighters to the Tribal Agencies, seems to be growing in popularity.
- As a related side note, there was an interesting segment from a recent media symposium on reporter security in volatile regions where Martin Smith of Frontline talks about the "Culture of Lying" in the Pakistani Government. I mention that because the source of the above assertion is a Pakistani Official. Part of the problem is that there is just an endemic paranoia within the Pakistani decision-making 'establishment' of elaborate schema to undermine its hegemony on the nation. Non-specialists in this region and western academics, for laudable reasons, are trained to consider such assertions as essentializing, and thus faux pas. But it helps explain many of the blunders that Pakistani rulers have made historically.
Regarding Ideology:
-----------------
- The Taliban's interpretation of Islam is heavily influenced by long lasting Pashtunwali codes of behavior and societal relationships. They are considered extreme by even the most principled Deobandi fundementalists, whose schools the Taliban leadership attended during the Soviet War, and those that provided recruits for the movement. Al Qaeda's ranks are filled by a multi-national membership of fanatical and militarized Wahhabi literalists who, at least on the surface, do try to justify their contentions from within Islamic Orthodoxy. Both movements have several tenets of their understanding in common, and they both meet in Afghanistan. The fact of the matter is that Islamic fundamentalism is on the rise in Central Asia because of several historical factors that converge at the end of the 20th Century: the Iranian Revolution, which demonstrated that Political Islam can displace a regime; the Afghan War against the Soviets, which (at least to many fundamentalists) showed that persistent and uncompromising asymetrical warfare can "destroy" a Super Power; and post '74 Saudi petro-dollars used to push Wahhabist ideology out of Saudi Arabia and onto the world stage, which provided fuel for the fire (no pun intended). A convergence that was rightly articulated by a well respected Tufts academic, and current administration advisor to Richard Holbrooke, Vali Nasr.
What often times gets missed is that the Taliban is, by its essence, an ethnic movement. All Talibs are Pashtuns, but not all Pashtuns support the Taliban. A fact made clear by comparing the location of the Pashtuns to where the Taliban has firm control .
My hunch is that the administration is feeling the heavy burden of what Afghanistan represents: namely the coming toghether of the competing geopolitical interests of no less than 9 regional powers (Pakistan-India- and China, Pakistan's historical ally and check on India; Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan whose ethnicities spill over into northern Afghanistan and who all fear renegade Islamist political movements being harbored in Afghanistan; therefore Russia, their historic patron; and finally Iran who has co-religionist Shi'ites in the North, thus alarming and involving its historic competitors in Saudi Arabia, and by extension the Gulf States and possibly Egypt).
If this wasn't enough, this volatile neighborhood represents the conflagration of all the 21st century security concerns that Great Powers face: nuclear safety and proliferation; ethnic strife; Radical Islamism; international terrorism; IDPs and refugees; failed/rogue states; nation building, etc.
I'm not saying that I or any of the commentators I trust have the answer to solving this cluster-fudge. We're screwed if we send more of our guys there. But we're screwed EVEN MORE if we don't - and instead pull all of our troops out.
It's a lot more than meets the eye.
G-D! How I miss the cold war.
More interesting links for anyone that's interested:
The Taliban in their own words.
A short summary interview by one of the authors of the article.
and
Since the Professor mentioned him, a deconstruction by Ahmed Rashid of the Bush Administration's handling (or lack thereof) of Afghanistan and a big picture analysis of Pakistan.
PS- I don't know why, but the picture for this post made me think of Edward Said.
Deobandi Muslim Movement and Taliban
I am dubious of making a strong connection between Deobandi and Taliban ideologies: In Re: [Islam in Europe] Antwerp: Report on extremist mosques and organizations.
Joachim, he isn't making any connection between them
But rather contrasting them. At least read the sentences that you pull your keywords from.
'the most principled Deobandi fundementalists
Maybe the meaning is clear to the Norwegian shyster, but it is not to me.
Deobandi-Educated Does Not Equate to Ideologically Deobandi
The article, Islamist opposition in the Islamic Republic, Jundullah and the spread of extremist Deobandism in Iran, shows precisely this sort of confusion.
Many thanks for linking to someone else's work
And that of Norwegians, to boot! Again, thanks.
Now all you need to work on is relevance. This report is about the nationalist Baluchi resistance in Iran. Close in geography, but no cigar.
Do I Really Have to Explain the Basics of the Region ,,,
... to the Norwegian Shyster, who apparently does not know anything about the region?
Baluchis are a significant minority in Pakistan.
Baluchi separatism/nationalism spans Pakistan & Iran. There is also a small Baluchi minority in Afghanistan. Pakistan has accused India of trying to use Afghan Baluchis to get a foothold in Afghanistan.
Understanding the politics and ideological currents among Baluchis in Iran, Pakistan, and Afghanistan is absolutely necessary for US policy makers and regional foreign policy analysts if the USA is going to maintain a major commitment to the region.
Discussions including the topic militant Deobandism whether in Afghanistan among the Taliban or in Iran among Baluchis or in Pakistan is an indication of the utter cluelessness or the conscious misrepresentation (e.g., Lawrence Wright) within American or European foreign policy discourse about the region.
No, you don't.
But I can help you out a bit:
Are you saying India doesn't have a foothold in Afghanistan? What about the Northern Alliance? Certainly the people who keep bombing the Indian Embassy in Kabul think India already has a foothold and is a threat.
Again, the topic is relations between al-Qaeda, Afghan and Pakistan Taliban, and other tribal warlords. Have you made one comment about this?
You're like a PhD student writing a dissertation. "If I just read one more book, I can finish my thesis." Stay on topic!
At which Ivy League university were you a faculty member?
In truth I never was, but I used to be on the MIT faculty, and as I remember, all the application forms to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, etc. refer to the Ivy League and MIT. Thus MIT must be up there in the academic stratosphere.
Anyway, before you babble about comparing me to be to a PhD student because I am off-topic, it behooves you to make sure that you have a clue what the topic is.
Why do you think I call you the Norwegian Shyster?
The topic is not relations between al-Qaeda, Afghan Taliban, and Pakistan Taliban (parallelism!), but the analysis of these relations and the beliefs that underlie this analysis.
Because you really don't have a clue about the discussion, it is worthwhile to deconstruct your goals for participating.
You say: "I am not friendly to your anti-Zionist screeds."
Thus, I can reasonably infer that you are just another Zionist troll trying to guarantee that discussions of the problems of US foreign policy making fail to address the role that Zionists and Zionist money play in poisoning the process.
Infer til the cows come home
but you still won't be right. But okay, let's continue.
Tell me about how Zionists and Zionist money poison the process of US foreign policy through your analysis of the relations between al-Qaeda and both Talibans.
The Taliban Identity
I understand your point. And it makes sense.
My wording was aimed at conveying a middle way of interpreting the relationship between the two.
What we usually see is that groups out there that have a vested stake in portraying Deobandism as dangerous, tend to conflate it with the Taliban in order to associate it with the worst aspects of human behavior.
It's a PR campaign of guilt by (extremely thin) association.
Deobandis clearly believe in tasawwuf (Sufism) as an integral part of the Islamic experience. We don't clearly know what the Taliban thinks on the issue. Evidence seems to indicate their view is more tilted towards Wahabbist dogma.
Deoband has produced formidable Hanafi scholars, and yet it takes the Orthodox opinion about the absolute validity of the three other schools of law. The Taliban never states what its take on Islamic Law (even from an historic POV) is.
In short, although the Taliban's roots are associated with JUI, and JUI has links to Deobandis, it doesn't necessarily follow that the Taliban is Deobandi.
In fact my mention of Pashtunwali was intended to clarify that point.
The Taliban is first and foremost and political movement, not a religious one. Deobandism is a social reform movement at its core.
If one wants to hear from Deobandi scholars on any given issue, we can unequivocally point to particular scholars. The Taliban has NO scholars. And the people they put forward as 'Mullahs' are by-and-large Madrassa drop-outs with little (if any) knowledge of Islamic Law (no matter how rigidly interpreted), and even less so of Islamic History or mysticism.
You're absolutely right.
It's a failure on my part to be clearer in explaining what I meant.
Pants on Fire
I didn't see it before the earlier post, but this very site seems to be agreeing with my point about the habitual lying of Pakistani officials.
Gotta say wow!
Wish I had time to read your links, but thanks for the comments.
Yes, but so what? OK, there
Yes, but so what?
OK, there are some valid reasons to be skeptical that these groups will remain united in anti-Americanism if we withdraw and cede them the country (or some strategy like that).
But, just as a logical matter, that's a meaningless argument, especially without some evidence that these speculations can be counted on to some extent.
I read somewhere one idea that if the Taliban want to show us they aren't irreconcilable in their hatred they could make a gesture to this effect by handing us bin Laden. What do you think?
The fundamental problem, sir,
The fundamental problem, sir, is this: you will never eliminate terrorism while the US's foreign policy is unjust.
A Jewish pro-Zionist UN Jurist (Mr. Goldstone) found that Israel has committed war crimes in Gaza. And what does the US do? Bury the report.
Since IDF is now a confirmed War Criminal entity sending ANY US military aid to the Israelis is in DIRECT contravention of our Arms Export Control Act. Why do we still support these war criminals?
I am not saying that Hamas is blame-free. But we don't give them cluster bombs to use on children either.
Since we support war criminals with helicopters and cluster bombs, is it a surprise that we get terrorism in return?
As soon as we stop messing around overseas (witness our clear involvement with the terrorist murder of 5 Iranian revolutionary guards recently) we will get blowback terrorism. It does not matter whether or not AQ has any safe havens or not -- regular people can become radicalized by the sheer extent of our injustice abroad.
Force -- even when wielded by the seemingly strong against the nominally weak -- continues to be an exceedingly uncertain instrument. The United States' penchant for projecting power has created as many problems as it has solved. Genuinely decisive outcomes remain rare, costs often far exceed expectations, and unintended and unwelcome consequences are legion.
The pursuit of US military dominance is an illusion, the principal effect of which is to distort strategic judgment by persuading policymakers that they have at hand the means to make short work of history's complexities. The real need is to wean the United States from its infatuation with military power and come to a more modest appreciation of what force can and cannot do.
We have to come to the painful conclusion that we have created the terrorism that we are subject to via our terrible foreign policies. (In this case directly: we worked in 1980s to radicalize the pustuns). No lack of safe havens will protect us from our well-earned blowback.
Is It Democracy When Jewish Zionists Decide Who Gets the Podium?
If Brandeis typifies American Democratic ethics, skepticism about American democracy is completely justified: Gaza, Goldstone, Jewish Ethical Cluelessness.
We are missing a vey important fact
. . . which is, that Pakistan wants an anti-Indian, or at least not India-friendly government in Kabul. The recent explosion at the Indian facility there was, I believe, another attempt to communicate that to us.
Pakistan -- not the US -- is demonstrating its ability to kill off rogue Taliban elements -- with the full support of its own people. Our drone attacks eliminate a few Taliban leaders and reinforce Pakistani public opinion that we are the cause of their insurgent problem.
Brilliant, is a fairly perverse away.
Pakistan could present us with Taliban elements who would agree to not attack us or our interests if we get out.
Contrary to Secretary Clinton's assertion, that would still leave us with quite a bit of leverage. Afghanistan is riven with tribal conflict and we could very well sponsor a Contra-like response to any attacks on us.
At a far lower monetary and human cost.
crucial lack of certainty and amorphous nature of the enemy
One of the major problems is that no one seems to know with any certainty what we're dealing with here.
On one end there are experts on the ground that tell us that the Afghan Taliban are a creature of the ISI, and are categorically distinct from the Pakistani Taliban, who are more aligned with Arab, Chechen and Uzbek foreign fighters (Al Qaeda) that set up shop in FATA and NWFP after the US bombing began. Both seem to be getting Gulf funding.
On the other hand you have experts and fairly trustworthy testimonials from Afghan Talibs claiming that they received training in Waziristan in both combat and IED usage directly from Arab instructers, and in their classes were Pakistani Pashtuns and Punjabi students.
Some folks are convinced that we're dealing with three distinct parties with mutually exclusive goals. Others are convinced that the enemy's resolve to aid their allies is highly unpredictable and can be strategically catestrophic if misjudged.
Who's to say? For every sound source one side produces, the other side has an equally sound source.
We're SO screwed.
Relentless anti-Westernism vs Relentless anti-Islamism
Professor Walt,
Your point is important, but you also have apply it to the world view of Arab/Islamic Jihadism.
Abdullah Azzam and his successors looked at all the border wars of Islam from Algeria, through Bosnia, Chechnya, Sudan, Palestine, Somalia, Lebanon, Afghanistan, India/Pakistan/Kashmir, China, Burma, Cambodia, Thailand, and the Philippines, and then concluded that there was a worldwide carefully orchestrated conspiracy against Islam.
The belief is of course nonsense. The problems of Muslims in Chechnya and Thailand are surely completely unrelated, and the vast majority of Muslims understand this simple fact.
Yet the position of the tiny jihadist minority is not completely insane if we look not at the border wars but at Islamophobic incitement and include N. America and Europe, for we find increasing coordination among the six major currents of Islamophobia.
I will try to post a long overview of the issue at Ethnic Ashkenazim Against Zionist Israel sometime next week, but for the moment I have only the following two blog entries, which discuss en passant the role of Jewish Zionist mega-money in merging Zionist Islamophobia with European nativist currents derived from the thought of politicians like Enoch Powell and Pierre Poujade:
1. Wilders' Columbia Song and Dance
2. Scaremongering Muslim Interns, Undermining Democracy.
These two of the six major Islamophobic currents may seem rather remote from the Afpak region especially if we accept Tip O'Neil's postulate: All politics is local.
Yet in the Age of Globalization, all local politics is global and all global politics is local.
In my experience people in the Afpak region are highly aware of Western/Zionist Islamophobic incitement: [AAFIA] The Zionist Islamophobic Police State.
Clearly there is an issue of confusion of image with reality, but because image affects reality as well as policy decisions on both sides, image becomes deadly and there is a resonance effect of reaction and counterreaction.
The most realist, cost-effective and rational approach to weakening the alliances of various Jihadist and Islamist organizations requires confronting worldwide Zionist subversion immediately with the arrest of as many of the funders as possible for criminal violations include Conspiracy Against Rights, Seditious Conspiracy, and material support for Zionist terrorism (in other words turn the current Islamophobic strategy being managed by Zionists like Treasury official Stuart Levey back on the Zionists strategically placed in positions of power throughout American society).
Obviously, the effort must start with the identification of the numerous Zionist subversives with the US government, who must be arrested, tried, and sentenced for long prison terms in the facilities that Zionist government officials have been establishing throughout the US prison system for loyal and patriotic Arab and Muslim US citizens: US Government: More Zionist Subversion.
Re-considering Containment - The Long Telegram Updated
In 1946 the American diplomat, George Keenan wrote what came to be called, The Long Telegram, back to the State Department. It was the seminal document for what emerged as the Doctrine of Containment. In the recent past several well-respected sources in the field of foreign policy have been calling for something like Containment to be applied to militant Islamic fundamentalism, especially in light of the protracted unpromising nature of the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. I have taken the text of The Long Telegram and paraphrased it so that instead of applying to the Cold War it is made to apply to militant Islamic fundamentalism. The full text of both the original and the 2009 version can be read at www.craigcopland.ca
Document Seems Passworded in Some Way
Even though I consider the concept of a new long telegram interesting, I could not read the document.
The attempt to fit Arab/Islamic Jihadism (and legitimate Palestinian resistance to Zionist depredations) into some sort of Bolshevik or Soviet model belongs to Zionist hasbarah: Islamobolshevism: Zionist Copies Nazi Propaganda.*
Jewish Zionists want containment precisely because Ahmadinejad and other Arab or Muslim leaders desire an open East-West dialog that is unmediated by Zionists.
If American misunderstanding and false beliefs about the Holocaust are affecting US foreign policy with respect to the ME and Iran, it is only common sense for Ahmadinejad want to include the Holocaust on the diplomatic table: Unending Jewish Delusions About the Holocaust.
Thus before we entertain the idea of a new containment doctrine, we really have to take a hard look at the subversive Jewish Zionist origins of such ideas, and it is really worthwhile to listen to the analysis of Harvard Kennedy School scholar Thomas Hegghammer before taking the idea of containment seriously: Thomas Hegghammer al-Qaida Interview.
Note
*Note that even though BU Professor Geifman is just spewing Zionist propaganda about Islamo-Bolshevism, we now know thanks to access to Soviet archives that the concept of Judeo-Bolshevism was more true than false: In Re: [Fair Policy, Fair Discussion] Mitchell’s glitter wearing off? [Comment 17 (Howard) ]
Historical analogy between
Historical analogy between communism and Islamism should not be used in the current context of International Affairs. Because during the Cold War the world was multipolar, two ideologies and two different political and economic systems were competing against the other. The Muslim world is fighting against the unbridled liberalism of the Western world. If we continue to misinterpret the Muslim world reaction to our action, we are condemned to repeat the same mistake and make the wrong decision based on misconstrue or preconceive ideas.