Afghanistan is not "Harder" than Iraq

I have to take issue with the now clichéd line that Afghanistan is harder than Iraq. It is hard - very hard - but saying it is "harder" is Monday morning quarterbacking with rose-colored glasses. As Iraq descended into chaos in 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007, there was nothing "easy" about it. We forget that we spent years groping in the dark in Iraq with no real clue - on either side - about what to do.

The progressive argument for withdrawal did not really pick up steam until the fall of 2005. Prior to that progressives argued for more troops, a focus on nation-building, and protecting the population, (yes the very approaches that Petraeus implemented) but with little confidence it would work. Conservatives were wedded to a highly kinetic "kill bad guys" approach until they adopted what progressives had advocated in 04-05. The point being there was simply no straightforward approach to turn things around. The only thing that was clear was that the Administration's approach wasn't working.

By 06 and 07 the strategy began to shift and those running the war became more competent and pragmatic about U.S. goals and means. But the other factors that contributed to the decline in violence and greater stability were by no means a given or even foreseen. For instance, negotiations with former Sunni insurgents would not have been politically possible in the first few years of the war and there wasn't a real sense when they began that they would be successful. I never heard anyone say with confidence in 05-06 that the key was negotiating with insurgents. Once they began to show promise they were pursued vigorously. There were also inherent reductions in violence resulting from comprehensive ethnic cleansing, which were followed on by the efforts of U.S. forces to maintain the segregation of these neighborhoods. This contributed greatly to the let up in violence, but no one would have said that the ethnic cleansing or segregation of urban neighborhoods was easy. Finally, the gradual development of the Iraqi security forces and Iraqi capacity, which was by no means a given, enabled the U.S. to increasingly work with Iraqis and begin to transfer authority. U.S. strategy and policy played a key role in exploiting opportunities, but there was never any clear indication at the time that any of these efforts - negotiations, walling neighborhoods, and investing in Iraqi security forces, along with a counter-insurgency approach - would pay off.

Additionally, we spent a lot of money and threw the whole weight of the U.S. military behind these efforts - much more than we are imagining we will put into Afghanistan. And after all this and after being the sole focus of U.S. foreign policy and national security for five years, Iraq could easily still be pulled apart by ethno-sectarian violence.

Now - Afghanistan is hard, very hard. Its terrain is extremely challenging, its poor, the insurgency is rural-based, there is no history of a strong state, there are deep ethnic cleavages, it is bordered by an ungoverned region that serves as a safe haven and launching pad for attacks, and the insurgency is fueled by an uncontrollable drug trade. Oh it's bad, real bad. But Iraq had much of this as well, such as uncontrolled border with Syria that allowed insurgents to stream across, not to mention a meddling Iran. And Afghanistan has some advantages, baseline expectations are lower, we are still more popular, we have allies, and there is an Army that is respected.

The point though is that this debate over what is harder is really not all that helpful. Each pose exceptionally challenging and unique circumstances and shouldn't really be compared in such a direct way. It also raises the uncomfortable question: If we are truly committed to Afghanistan and believe that it is harder than Iraq, shouldn't we be committing more resources and manpower to Afghanistan than we did in Iraq?

Comments

[Guytar]

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Afghanistan was invaded through the centuries by the most powerful military forces. British were butchered there at the height of Empire in the 19th century and again in early 20th century. USSR invaded Afghanistan in 1979 with massive overwhelming military force and occupied the land for ten years with 100,000 troops on the ground. Soviet forces evacuated ten years later after 15,000 troops had died. Nothing was achieved other than terrible suffering for both Soviets and Afghans.

In 2009, eight years after the attack on the Twin Towers, Afghanistan is still occupied by US and fifteen other NATO countries. Osama Bin Laden has been hiding in Pakistan for years.

Afghanistan is a tiny impoverished country. It has no military or poltical or economic power. US and NATO keep on fighting Taliban leaders and martyrs as they bomb weddings and funerals. An endless guerrilla war.

Pakistan is different. Population of 130 million with a democratically elected government. Military leadership has real control of civilian elected leadership. Pakistan has nuclear arsenal of 70 to 100 warheads of varying yields. India sits next door with a population and nuclear arsenal 6 or 7 times the size of Pakistan. What now?

[RIXX]

Afghanistan is IMPOSSIBLE for US.

[Guytar]

Yes RIXX. You speak the truth. Afghanistan was also impossible for Brirish Empire and USSR for past two hundred years

[KillTheMessenger]

I am glad that there are progressive and conservative approaches to war, now. Until recently we mostly had Clausewitz and the likes and that really didn't get the job done, now did it?

D'oh!

[SNusbaumer]

"The progressive argument for withdrawal did not really pick up steam until the fall of 2005."

So, where were you in 2002, 2003, and 2004? You must have been working for a major network since they didn't know what was going on in 2002, 2003, 2004.

Some people really don't care about embarrassing themselves in public.

[TheBaffler]

We progressives saw the folly of the invasion before it started.

[gregzink]

I would first have to ask why is this man including everyone as "we" and what authority grants him power to insist on further death, destruction and needless squandering of tax payer money?
He assumes from the outset of the article that we (this is the real we, the majority we) are in favour of policing the world and wasting capital on foreign entanglements. Allied troops have occupied this country for close to 8 years and the conslusion we arrived at is that we should co-operate with moderate Taliban members to reduce violence and stabalize the government. I would be forced to ask if we could not have done this without troop deployment and massive military spending. All in all it seems quite wasteful to go through all this mess when we could have done it from the outset. We could have used intellegience, spy work and bribery to win over moderate Taliban and oust the oppressive regime, but instead favoured knee jerk blood lust.This man writing the article is no different than the Bush administration in the sense that he favours war over rationality. We have no moral obligation to anyone in the world and foreign entanglements cost the country untold amounts of debt and heartache. They did not declare war on us so we have no business intervening.

[vernbvb]

Whether Afghanistan is "harder" or not is not the greatest concern I have. I see us getting involved in another war similar to Viet Nam where we can't win on the ground and that is basically where this war will be fought. Although it doesn't appear that Afghanistan is as organized as the vietnamse were, the real problem is truly the terrain. My recommendation for fighting in Afghanistan is to use the strongest surge possible in the shortest period possible and end this invasion.

[ThinkCreeps]

Sorry, but it's real hilly in Afghanistan, Iraq is really flat. Google Earth, chaps.

[RG5626]

It's not so much that Iraq was so hard back then as we were pretty much doing everything wrong. It took getting rid of Rummy and bringing in Petraeus to finally make some good dicisions. Even with the mistake of invading, we would not have had all the problems we did if Rummy and Cheney had not been runing the show.

[dcrowe]

Max, you are really going to have to stop painting with such a broad brush. To characterize "progressives" the way you've done above ignores a very large chunk of consistent anti-Iraq-war voices who never wanted war in the first place, who've always wanted withdrawal, and who were against both the "surge" and the current escalation in Afghanistan.

Do not confuse loud Democratic voices who tried to out-hawk the hawks with "progressives," please.

[realpolitic]

Bush sent too few troops into Iraq, despite recommendations from many in the army, including General Shinseki, and laid the ground work for the intitial looting and later insurgency. (Well, the Iraqi war was unnecessary to begin with and based on lies.) Then J. Paul Bremer fired the Iraqi military, a force which could have easily been used for rebuilding. Sure, the Iraqi military at first disbanded, but could have been easily called back to their barracks. Then the purge of Bathists went so deep as to leave thousands out of work with no way to support their families. All these gross blunders fed the Iraqi insurgency, but one must not forget: Afghanistan is where empires go to die!

[RandVictims]

I guess it's just useless trivia that Afghanistan is nick-named the "Tomb of Empires"

[JGatsby]

"The progressive argument for withdrawal did not really pick up steam until the fall of 2005. Prior to that progressives argued for more troops, a focus on nation-building, and protecting the population"
Exactly which progressives are you referring to? How about some names? All the progressives that I know were against the war from the beginning and were for withdrawing from Iraq ASAP before the war and throughout the entire occupation.

[BassMonk]

I couldn't get past that one, either. Baffling.