I fail to understand (perhaps because I was never in the defence industry), why a similar stealth, SpecOps/CIA small task force could not be deployed to Iraq to achieve the overthrow of Saddam.
Well Kumar, Afghanistan didn't even possess an organized army, while Iraq did.. That would be the first observation.
Afghanistan was already in the midst of a civil war between the Northern Alliance under Massoud (who was assassinated by Al Qai'da 2 days prior to 9/11), thus giving us a ready force already in place to conduct the overthrow of the Taliban. Nothing like this was in place in Iraq.
Furthermore, there was the belief that Saddam would replicate his "scorched earth" tactics, setting the oil fields on fire, which meant we needed to establish firm control over those fields before he could issue the order. Our only real "allies" in Iraq were the Kurds, and the Turks, nor the Arabs, certainly were not going to permit the Kurds to dominate the country.
The intrinsic wealth evident in Iraq's oil reserves would prove far too tempting a target for neighboring countries to seize control over, had the operation been merely a SpecOps unconventional war. Without the necessary force projected into Iraq to deter an intervention by a country like Iran or Syria, the likelyhood of a successful op would have been limited.
In sum, the conditions were right in Afghanistan's state of anarchy, to throw money and firepower around to convince the local warlords to recognize a mutual agenda, the fall of the Taliban. But now that the Taliban has fallen, it's pretty damn difficult to get those warlords to submit to a central authority, no matter how much money we throw their way.
But there was no such conditions evident in Iraq. The dissolution of the central authority, without some form of force to properly establish order would lead to anarchy, which has been the argument that many people have made about the limited size of the US force that remained in Iraq. Note: I think the limited force option COULD have worked, HAD our leadership been more explicit about guaranteeing the Iraqi army would remain employed, vetted, retrained, and hold their position of honor as soldiers. The dissolution of the Iraqi army was probably one of the most grievous errors on the part of Bremer. It left hundreds of thousands of soldier's unemployed, and humiliated.
Btw, Kumar.. I have never once suggested that India shares a common border with Afghanistan. The US doesn't share a border with Afghanistan either (nor Iraq). But that doesn't mean that our vital interests aren't threatened. A nation's interests cannot be measured merely by shared geographical boundaries given the current violent "spillovers" we're seeing.
I would suggest that India has some vital interests in Afghanistan, if only to prevent it from, once again, becoming a sanctuary from which Islamic militants can be trained and then deployed to terrorize Kashmir. So long as Al Qai'da seeks refuge in Pakistan, India is in a position to directly pressure the Musharraf government to take concrete steps to deal with them.
Hawk |
