Indecision taken to new levels

[Wezil]

Personally I think the whole "indecision" argument is a red herring. Even if the general gets the troops he's asking for it will be insufficient. 200K (many of which are NATO non-combatants) is simply not enough. Soviet numbers were closer to 400K (without non-fight caveats) and look how it turned out for them.

[rah]

I don't think a direct comparison to the Russians is valid.
The missions are completely different. Occupation vs. security.

And there were a lot of people here that thought the surge in Iraq would be an utter failure and look how that turned out for them.

I'm not saying it will work or not, but the commander on the ground has a lot more information available to him that I do about the situation.

[Imran Siddiqui]

An argument could be made that launching a war of aggression against a 3rd nation which sapped troops from the real fight (Afghanistan) was dithering.

That's kind of a silly argument. Dithering by aggressive action?

[Wezil]

Actually, dithering by diversion. Put yourself in a position where you can't do anything.

[Wezil]

I don't think a direct comparison to the Russians is valid.
The missions are completely different. Occupation vs. security.

Who are you kidding? You don't think we are occupiers? The Soviets also built schools, roads, and held elections.

And there were a lot of people here that thought the surge in Iraq would be an utter failure and look how that turned out for them.

Pull the troops out of Iraq and see what happens. Iraq is not a success. The "surge"? Yes, it convinced the Iraqis they had to wait it out until you leave so it was a "success" in that fewer US troops are getting killed.

I'm not saying it will work or not, but the commander on the ground has a lot more information available to him that I do about the situation.

McChrystal made a request for the number of troops he felt he could get. I'm sure he would ask for more if he thought there was a chance he could get them.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Actually, dithering by diversion. Put yourself in a position where you can't do anything.

I'm guessing that wasn't the intent of declaring war in Iraq.

[Wezil]

Probably not (and was actually the other way around - Afghanistan leads to Iraq). It had that effect though.

Like I said at the outset Imran. It is a half-hearted argument. I take your point.

[rah]

Actually, dithering by diversion. Put yourself in a position where you can't do anything.

That's no where near dithering. It's just being stupid.

And I still think that while some of the afghan people view us like the soviets that there are many that don't. A lot of people fear the taliban and don't trust us to protect them from them.

[Ramo]

Why, exactly, are people clamoring for an immediate escalation in the wake of a fraudulent election? COIN doesn't work if the government is widely perceived as illegitimate. I'm a skeptic of the use of military force in Afghanistan, but if you're going to go that route, it would behoove us to wait for a freely and fairly conducted runoff before we publicly announce a doubling down in support of the government. This reluctance has already paid dividends in establishing the runoff in the first place.

[Wezil]

And I still think that while some of the afghan people view us like the soviets that there are many that don't. A lot of people fear the taliban and don't trust us to protect them from them.

The Soviets were "invited" into the country. That's more than we can say.

The Taliban derive from the Pashtun, the majority ethnic group in Afghanistan. A future partition may be a way to go...

[Wezil]

Why, exactly, are people clamoring for an immediate escalation in the wake of a fraudulent election? COIN doesn't work if the government is widely perceived as illegitimate. I'm a skeptic of the use of military force in Afghanistan, but if you're going to go that route, it would behoove us to wait for a freely and fairly conducted runoff before we publicly announce a doubling down in support of the government. This reluctance has already paid dividends in establishing the runoff in the first place.

It's a good argument and I believe this is what the Obama Admin is arguing.

The only problem with the argument is what will ultimately be seen as a "legitimate" government. Just because we have a western style display of people showing up at the ballot boxes doesn't make it legitimate.

Fraud is widespread, votes are often tribal (the unanimous votes at polls we saw) and ultimately the unelected Cabinet is drawn from the warlords of the country (btw these were the people the Taliban protected others from before our arrival to revisit the Rah post). Additionally, the Taliban are prohibited from running for office and the whole affair is conducted under the guns of the western world. Legitimacy is tough to come by.

[rah]

The Soviets were "invited" into the country. That's more than we can say.

Since they proceeded to execute the government that "inivited" them, I don't think that really counts.

[DinoDoc]

Why, exactly, are people clamoring for an immediate escalation in the wake of a fraudulent election?

... for purposes of creating a representative government as the foundation of U.S. counterinsurgency strategy, the key flaw of Afghanistan's August election was not the widespread ballot fraud; it was the fact that almost 3 out of 4 voters didn't show up at the polls because of the Taliban security threat. So, while a runoff election might satisfy the fraud complaints, it won't make the resulting government much more representative unless millions more voters show up at the polls this time. But the deteriorating security situation and limits of the appeal of both candidates give little reason to expect that the rerun would see a voter surge; turnout in a runoff, if anything, could be even lower.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1931050,00.html?iid=sphere-inline-bottom

[Patroklos]

Personally I think the whole "indecision" argument is a red herring. Even if the general gets the troops he's asking for it will be insufficient. 200K (many of which are NATO non-combatants) is simply not enough. Soviet numbers were closer to 400K (without non-fight caveats) and look how it turned out for them.

Which super power is supplying the Taliban again?

The Soviet conflict involved the death of anywhere from 700K to 2M civilians and at least 5 times as many Soviet troops than American troops currently. There is no comparison.

[Ramo]

http://www.time.com/time/nation/arti...-inline-bottom

The question is whether the government has widespread legitimacy issues, not simply whether it's "representative." An immediate escalation would be really dumb. I'm glad that if the Admin isn't beginning to withdraw, it's at least waiting for a non-sham election before escalating.