The Difficulties of Firming Up Strategy in Afghanistan
1900 GMT, 011014
Over time, wars tend to take on a definable shape. Attack leads to shock;
shock leads to plans. Plans are implemented. Implementation encounters
frictions, and the enemy reshapes his own strategy in response. The war
begins to coalesce into a recognizable form.
This war is different. It doesn't quite want to gel on the American side. The
reason for this is that more than any other recent war, the geopolitical
dimension keeps destabilizing the military dimension. To be more
precise, the politics are so complex and uncertain that the United States
cannot create a stable platform for military planning.
The United States has made its first response to the events of Sept. 11.
The response was highly predictable, drawn from the core of American
strategic doctrine. The response began with air attacks, designed to
achieve command of the air so that other operations could take place
unhindered. Then the attacks will move toward attacking the command
and control facilities of the enemy. Finally, they turn to attacks on the
enemy's ground forces.
The first phase was relatively short and effortless, given the Taliban's air
defense capabilities. The second phase, now occurring, is more difficult,
for the same reason that the first phase was relatively easy. The relative
underdevelopment of Afghan infrastructure makes it difficult to degrade
Afghan command and control capabilities. Apart from being hard to hit,
the targets tend to recover fairly quickly. This has forced the United States
to launch anti-army operations in parallel with counter-command and
control operations.
In general, this is not a critical problem, but it does point out a peculiarity
of this campaign. During both Desert Storm and Kosovo, a large part of
the air campaign was carried out by ground-based tactical air power
provided by the Air Force. Because of basing issues, that is not the case
in this war. The Air Force's contribution is strategic air capabilities -- its
bomber force -- flying extended missions from as far away as the United
States. Tactical air power is being provided by the U.S. Navy, whose
carriers are in the Arabian Sea.
The lack of Air Force tactical air limits the intensity of the attacks. The
tempo of operations are limited by the number of sorties that can be flown
at the distances involved, as well as by the relatively low number of strike
aircraft that carriers can launch. Now, on a certain level, the effort
produced is commensurate with the target set involved. The job is getting
done. But the level of effort may not be commensurate with what is
required in the next phase of the war.
The Northern Alliance is being primed for an assault on Kabul. It is not
clear when or even if they will launch that offensive. There are many who
would be very unhappy to see the Northern Alliance take Kabul. That
includes the Pakistanis, but it also involves many Afghan elements that the
United States is trying to draw into an anti-Taliban coalition. Moreover, it
is not clear that the Northern Alliance, by itself, would be able to beat the
Taliban. Certainly, they have not done particularly well in offensive
operations in recent years. If the Northern Alliance was slaughtered on the
way to Kabul, its leadership would lose its following. The leaders might not
be particularly eager to take that chance.
Moreover, if an attack comes, the United States will be hard-pressed to
provide the kind of close air support that the Northern Alliance might
require. The strategic bombers can do an excellent job of bombing ground
forces, but they are not particularly useful for close air support missions --
which require extremely rapid response, relatively small amounts of
munitions and extreme precision. The Navy is a long way from the
northern battlefield, and tactical mission requirements can dwarf the
number of aircraft available. Even if Air Force aircraft are based in Oman,
the distances involved make extended patrolling over a land battle difficult.
Therefore, the United States has two choices. Assuming -- as
STRATFOR does -- that Pakistan is not a basing option for large numbers
of tactical aircraft, the United States can ask to build up a tactical air force
in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, which would be a logistical nightmare, or it
could ask the Russians to provide air support. The Russians might be
willing, but the strategic price for the United States would be high. Higher
still would be the political price inside Afghanistan, where Russian air
power is not remembered fondly. Building a national anti-Taliban coalition
around Russian air power is not going to work.
That means the Northern Alliance will have to attack without tactical close
air support, but with strategic bombardment. The Taliban will be hurt and
hurt badly by U.S. cluster bombs, but when the close-in fighting starts the
Northern Alliance will be on its own, with whatever armor and artillery the
Russians are able to provide.
All of this has slowed up the attack by the Northern Alliance. They are not
sure they want to do it -- and if they do, they probably need more logistical
support from the Russians than received to date. For political reasons, the
United States is not sure it can afford to have the Northern Alliance be the
ones to eliminate the Taliban and is therefore busy making the case to
Afghans and Pakistanis alike that a victory in Kabul for the Northern
Alliance would not mean a government of Afghanistan by the Northern
Alliance. All of this is taking place as winter and Ramadan draw close.
The United States is hoping that the air campaign alone will break the
back of the Taliban. The first hope is that the rest of the country, appalled
at the air war, will hold the Taliban responsible for it and move from sullen
submission to active hostility. The second hope is that the air campaign
will split the Taliban itself. There is a certain logic to this hope. The Taliban
fought very hard to take power, and its leadership enjoys holding power. If
the leadership were to decide that they were in a hopeless position in the
long run, some or many of them might decide that overthrowing Mullah
Mohammed Omar and repudiating his policies is the best way to preserve
their own position.
That hope in Washington has become a driving force in the air campaign.
Unlike Desert Storm, in which the air campaign was the preface for a
carefully planned ground offensive, there is no ground offensive in the
offing here, unless you count the Northern Alliance. The air campaign
therefore has a direct political purpose -- to break the Taliban now, before
winter sets in. Failing that, it is meant to lay the groundwork for intense
political activity among various Afghan tribes over the winter with an eye
toward a spring offensive.
The Taliban understands this. Right now, it is occupying the major cities
and other clearly defined bases. It is being pounded by U.S. air power. It
has two options.
First, Taliban leaders can decide to send non-combatants across the
border to Pakistan and disperse its forces in the countryside, immune
from strategic air power. It would leave a covering force in and in front of
Kabul to raise the price of an attack by the Northern Alliance, but the bulk
of its forces would be saved and ready to fight in the spring.
The second, parallel option is to stage strategic attacks in the United
States. The Taliban understands that the more extreme the American
anger, the more frustrated the United States will be with questionable
allies like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. Just as the United States wants to
create an anti-Taliban coalition inside of Afghanistan, the Taliban wants to
create an anti-American coalition outside of Afghanistan. For this, it
needs American help. It needs the United States to force its aircraft and
troops into Pakistan and to create a crisis with Saudi Arabia and other
Arab countries. That isn't happening at the moment.
It follows, therefore, that a combined strategy of dispersing Taliban troops,
combined with another round of attacks in the United States, might force
Washington to overextend its position and create the political conditions
the Taliban badly needs. Thus, the current movements we see inside of
Afghanistan may be part of a Taliban plan, and the current FBI warnings of
imminent danger of attack might be serious indeed. The Taliban has
every reason to stage an attack, and quickly.
Thus, two factors keep the United States from creating a stable military
plan. One is the incredible complexity of the reality on the ground. The
second is that the United States is dealing with an enemy that has
options. Unlike the Serbs or the Iraqis, who were in the position of hold or
capitulate, the Taliban has a more nuanced set of options available. The
air attacks are designed to break the Taliban before they can implement
new plans. If that doesn't work, the Taliban can create an even more
complex situation for the United States than ever before. |
