(Army Times) Backtalk: Strategy change needed in Afghanistan

Strategy change needed in Afghanistan
By Lt. Col. Thomas Brouns

To win in Afghanistan, we don’t need a surge. We need an “anti-surge.” If we can’t provide enough troops to secure the country, we need a change in strategy, one that will eventually put us out of a job.

It’s good that Afghanistan has gotten a lot more attention these days. But we’re still using the wrong kind of language. In addition to talking about “surges,” there is a lot of talk about “smashing the insurgency,” spring and winter “offensives” and “defeating enemies.” That kind of language betrays a mind-set that shows we still haven’t come to grips with what it will take to “win” in Afghanistan.

Preoccupied with bigger concerns in Iraq, we had hoped that our NATO allies would be able to wrap things up in Afghanistan. But seven years after the Taliban was “defeated,” and more than two years since NATO assumed control of Afghanistan’s East and South, victory — or even a measure of stability — remain elusive.

Pause to recall why we’re in Afghanistan in the first place. Al-Qaida attacked us, and then Afghanistan’s Taliban-run government refused to hand its members over for their crime. Now the leaders of al-Qaida are hiding somewhere “in the mountains between Afghanistan and Pakistan,” while we continue to pour blood and treasure into a search for victory — against the Taliban.

Somewhere along the line, the war in Afghanistan became an insurgency, though some of our partners find it politically unpalatable to refer to it as such. It also became nation-building — another unpopular term — and has been for quite some time. And it has become, frankly, a losing battle in winning the hearts and minds of nearly 30 million Afghans.


Rest of article at: http://armytimes.com/community/opinion/army_backtalk_afghans_020209/%2e