My comment to President Obama on Afghanistan 5/14/09

Afghanistan strategy

Dear President Obama:

Many of us have wondered about the sense of your reasoning in ramping up the war in Afghanistan.

First, are you not aware of the geopolitics of the country? Its geography ensures that no conventional war can be won there. The craggy landscape and the excellent local networking means that outsiders can never dislodge insurgents. Do you wish your presidency to founder in a Vietnam-style debacle?

Second, are you cognizant of the ridiculousness of American policy of war against the Taliban, considering the significant US role in the creation of this insurgency to fight the Soviet invasion there? As with Osama bin Laden, the US funneled untold amounts of money and arms to them through the Pakistani intelligence structure. And given the geopolitics, how do you expect our gormless troops to win against them when the Soviets could not?

Third, obviously this is a war that cannot be won with arms and money funneling by the CIA to corrupt politicians. Neither will result in what is needed: a local democracy on its own terms for its own population. An international, neutral effort needs to be organized to stop the fighting, ensure the population's protection from injury and death from fighting, ensure more democratic functionally on the local scene, and support the right of the population to decide its own fate. Can you not see the obvious similarity between the Afghan government and the South Vietnamese US puppets?

Fourth, remember what went wrong in the past when presidents listened to the military overmuch in framing policy. Military solutions don't work. Even when a "win" is possible, its unraveling is soon ahead because the original problems are not military.

And fifth, the US must take responsibility for its own role in the drug trade in countries like Afghanistan. The US drug-taking population is a huge market for illegal drug-production in other countries, as Secretary Clinton has rightly acknowledged. You must also know that the CIA, which is very active on the war front both in this country and in Pakistan, freely uses the drug trade for its own purposes and frequently has funded its own agent operations with money from drug trading. When war goes on in such countries farmers who survived in legal productions change to drugs, which are easy to produce, light in weight to transport, and valuable for eachunit of weight. There is a direct connection.

If there is one problem that your administration must get the better of during your time as president it is this one.