The refusal to face up to reality that the United States cannot succeed in Afghanistan, despite all evidence to the contrary, suggests that the political elite is desperately clinging to the American system of global military hegemony.
Consider the following statement offered by Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, at a news conference last week. He was discussing Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks as well as the person who has taken responsibility for the vast, still ongoing Afghan War document dump at that site. “Mr. Assange,” Mullen commented, “can say whatever he likes about the greater good he thinks he and his source are doing, but the truth is they might already have on their hands the blood of some young soldier or that of an Afghan family.”
Blackwater (rebranded as Xe in an effort to escape the negative publicity associated with their former name), recently received a $100 million contract from the CIA to secure its bases in Afghanistan. The State Department also awarded them $120 million to provide security for new diplomatic buildings, including consulates outside Kabul, giving the firm a total of $220 million in new contracts in Afghanistan. This seems remarkable, given the extremely negative image Blackwater has throughout the world. That people even know about a private security company is a bad sign in itself. Not surprisingly, CIA Director Leon Panetta had to go on the offensive to defend the contracts.
Kigali felt muggy on July 20, the temperature unusually high. The police and army were on high alert at every corner as the Rwandan capital was getting ready for the big political event. About to begin was the two-week election campaign leading up to presidential elections on August 9.
Soldiers’ recent backlash against restraint in Afghanistan is the most recent example of the clash between the demands of counterinsurgency and conventional military culture.
Wars are rarely lost in a single encounter; Defeat is almost always more complex than that. The United States and its North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) allies have lost the war in Afghanistan, but not just because they failed in the battle for Marjah or decided that discretion was the better part of valor in Kandahar. They lost the war because they should never have invaded in the first place; because they never had a goal that was achievable; because their blood and capital are finite.
Have you ever thought about just how strange this country’s version of normal truly is? Let me make my point with a single, hardly noticed Washington Post news story that’s been on my mind for a while. It represents the sort of reporting that, in our world, zips by with next to no reaction, despite the true weirdness buried in it.
Even though we’re flooded with new information about Afghanistan — leaks, Rolling Stone features, et al — without the military draft, we have no hard incentive to enhance our knowledge.
It’s up to us to ensure that, in the wake of WikiLeaks, the war doesn’t last four more years like Vietnam did after the release of the Pentagon.
Is Wikileaker SPC. Bradley Manning the next Daniel Ellsberg?