The defeat siren is sounding for Blair's vainglorious jihad in Afghanistan
The take-hold-and-build strategy is mere pastiche imperialism. All wars end in talking, as must this US vendetta in Afghanistan
By Simon Jenkins
"Fact is at last fighting fantasy in Afghanistan. Fact is that Tony Blair's vainglorious jihad against the Pashtun insurgency is not succeeding, and British commanders, diplomats and politicians know it. After three years of 'inkspots', hearts-and-minds and take-hold-and-build, that battle-weary siren of defeat, talking to the enemy, is back onstage.
"While on Monday the prime minister was greeting Operation Panther's Claw with a parody of Lady Thatcher's triumphalism, 'Rejoice, just rejoice', the deputy chief of the defence staff, Lieutenant-General Simon Mayall, was bizarrely declaring that the current Afghan war was 'not against the Taliban'.
"Other British ministers suddenly went anthropological. The foreign secretary, David Miliband, professes to detect not just good Taliban and bad Taliban but 'three tiers' of Taliban. His colleague, the development secretary, Douglas Alexander, has newfound friends in the 'moderate Pashtun', allegedly eager to do something called 'renunciate violence'. The defence minister, Bill Rammell, wants to 'peel away the footsoldiers' and rebuild trust in government institutions.
"This awayday at the school of oriental studies cannot conceal the fact that we have been here for years. The one thing you know (and the enemy knows) about a named military operation is that it ends, which is one thing counter-insurgency can never do. All talk of talking to the Taliban forgets that Americans were talking to the Taliban before 9/11. Indeed, they spent a fortune training and arming them against Russia. Britain's first Helmand offensive in 2006 concluded that the Taliban would not be beaten and was followed by talking and a 'cessation of hostilities', involving a series of local deals with (good) Taliban and a joint withdrawal agreement. It was later regarded as a disaster.
"Advocates of such a strategy are scrupulous to plead cases where it seems to have worked. The first British commander in Helmand, General Sir David Richards, insisted that he was merely repeating the Malayan inkspot strategy, apparently unaware that Pashtun were no more akin to Malays than they were to Geordies.
"Now we are told by Miliband 'the lessons of Northern Ireland' should be applied to Helmand. For years, Ulster secretaries refused to talk to Sinn Féin 'until the men of violence lay down their guns'. Yet eventually there were talks and they duly laid down their guns. Now that Johnny Taliban has had a right drubbing, the Foreign Office implies, if he promises to stop shooting at us he should be offered a loya jirga a dozen cows and honorary membership of the Travellers Club. Then we can go home.
"The comparison is false. Sinn Féin never laid down its guns before talking ..."
Read on at The Guardian
Categories: afghanistan, uk, usa, blair, war-on-terror, taliban
By Simon Jenkins
"Fact is at last fighting fantasy in Afghanistan. Fact is that Tony Blair's vainglorious jihad against the Pashtun insurgency is not succeeding, and British commanders, diplomats and politicians know it. After three years of 'inkspots', hearts-and-minds and take-hold-and-build, that battle-weary siren of defeat, talking to the enemy, is back onstage.
"While on Monday the prime minister was greeting Operation Panther's Claw with a parody of Lady Thatcher's triumphalism, 'Rejoice, just rejoice', the deputy chief of the defence staff, Lieutenant-General Simon Mayall, was bizarrely declaring that the current Afghan war was 'not against the Taliban'.
"Other British ministers suddenly went anthropological. The foreign secretary, David Miliband, professes to detect not just good Taliban and bad Taliban but 'three tiers' of Taliban. His colleague, the development secretary, Douglas Alexander, has newfound friends in the 'moderate Pashtun', allegedly eager to do something called 'renunciate violence'. The defence minister, Bill Rammell, wants to 'peel away the footsoldiers' and rebuild trust in government institutions.
"This awayday at the school of oriental studies cannot conceal the fact that we have been here for years. The one thing you know (and the enemy knows) about a named military operation is that it ends, which is one thing counter-insurgency can never do. All talk of talking to the Taliban forgets that Americans were talking to the Taliban before 9/11. Indeed, they spent a fortune training and arming them against Russia. Britain's first Helmand offensive in 2006 concluded that the Taliban would not be beaten and was followed by talking and a 'cessation of hostilities', involving a series of local deals with (good) Taliban and a joint withdrawal agreement. It was later regarded as a disaster.
"Advocates of such a strategy are scrupulous to plead cases where it seems to have worked. The first British commander in Helmand, General Sir David Richards, insisted that he was merely repeating the Malayan inkspot strategy, apparently unaware that Pashtun were no more akin to Malays than they were to Geordies.
"Now we are told by Miliband 'the lessons of Northern Ireland' should be applied to Helmand. For years, Ulster secretaries refused to talk to Sinn Féin 'until the men of violence lay down their guns'. Yet eventually there were talks and they duly laid down their guns. Now that Johnny Taliban has had a right drubbing, the Foreign Office implies, if he promises to stop shooting at us he should be offered a loya jirga a dozen cows and honorary membership of the Travellers Club. Then we can go home.
"The comparison is false. Sinn Féin never laid down its guns before talking ..."
Read on at The Guardian
Categories: afghanistan, uk, usa, blair, war-on-terror, taliban
Pip Wilson posted at 7:36 am | Permalink
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