Remember That 'War On Terror' Thingie?
Seven years later, Afghanistan turns out to be nothing short of a FUBAR for absolutely nothing - and remains as such, even after Harper made us carry the torch for this war while we wasted billions of dollars ($4.1 billions for 2001-2006, with the counting total so far, as well as that projected up to 2009, or 2011 rather, still remaining a "mystery" - however, estimates indicate that the war costs Canada about $1.3 millions a day) and not counting military and civilian lives galore. As predicted, Pakistan is rapidly destabilizing - and then some (which now include skirmishes between ISAF and Pakistani forces along the Afghan border). Meanwhile, whether the surge has been successful or not does not invalidate by one iota the fact that the U.S., the U.K., and assorted minor poodles coalition partners, simply had no business going in Iraq in the first place. Period.
The following article offers a cold, sober assessment of the never-ending Global War on Terror(TM), going on now for seven years and keeping on going, and going, and going ... and making things worse by the year.
The war on terror: seven years on (Part one)
By Paul Rogers
The United States responded to the attacks of 11 September 2001 by launching a global "war on terror". Two weeks after 9/11, Paul Rogers began to track that war in a weekly openDemocracy column. In the first of a two-part retrospective, the author reflects on these seven years: mistakes made, lessons learned and paths not taken.
The following article offers a cold, sober assessment of the never-ending Global War on Terror(TM), going on now for seven years and keeping on going, and going, and going ... and making things worse by the year.
The war on terror: seven years on (Part one)
By Paul Rogers
The United States responded to the attacks of 11 September 2001 by launching a global "war on terror". Two weeks after 9/11, Paul Rogers began to track that war in a weekly openDemocracy column. In the first of a two-part retrospective, the author reflects on these seven years: mistakes made, lessons learned and paths not taken.
When the first column in this series was published on 26 September 2001, the United States was about to start a military operation to terminate the Taliban regime and disperse the al-Qaida movement, killing or capturing Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri and Mullah Omar. There was already a widespread view in Washington that the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq had also to be terminated, with some sources even linking Iraq to the atrocities of 9/11.
Seven years and 370 columns later, the original Taliban regime has long since gone, as has Saddam Hussein, but the war on terror goes on. In Afghanistan, the Taliban movement has staged an extra ordinaryrevival and now threatens the security of much of the country; a devastating attack on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, the capital's most notable elite gathering-point, has been described as "Pakistan's 9/11". In the face of escalating violence the United States is determined to increase its forces in Afghanistan while it extends the war into the west of Pakistan. Military analysts foresee a conflict of at least a decade.
There has been some easing of security in Iraq - after five and a half years of a bitter war that has cost over 100,000 civilians their lives, seriously wounded at least double that number, led to over 100,000 people being detained without trial and 4 million people living as refugees. The moderately increased stability remains fragile, with persistent bombings and a dangerous environment in Mosul in particular. Indeed, the fear of United States military leaders of a new upsurge of violence in Iraq makes them deeply reluctant to withdraw anything more than a fraction of their forces, notwithstanding the urgent need to reinforce the troops in Afghanistan.
A traumatic moment
That first column of 26 September 2001 (which followed a number of shorter contributions to openDemocracy's immediate post-9/11 online discussions) argued -perhaps forlornly - that forceful military action to terminate the Taliban was the wrong approach. The 9/11 atrocities should have been seen as appalling acts of international criminality rather than the trigger of a war; every effort should have been made to bring bin Laden and the others responsible to justice in the international arena. Instead, to deploy United States military power and forces in Afghanistan was probably what they wanted - direct engagement with their "far enemy", evidence of the imperial hegemon's ungodly ambitions in Muslim lands, and opportunity to wear down another superpower in much the same way that their predecessors had humbled the Soviet Union two decades earlier.
For Washington's part, the problem from the start was that its proposed approach took too little account of the circumstances of 9/11. Many commentators at the time compared the attacks to the Japanese assault on Pearl Harbour in December 1941, but that was quite wrong (see John W Dower, "Cultures of War: Pearl Harbor/Hiroshima/9-11/Iraq", MIT World, 7 April 2008). Pearl Harbour was an attack on a distant military base by another state that was already perceived as hostile to the United States. Furthermore, it took place in the pre-television age.
By contrast, 9/11 was an bolt from the blue sky which struck at the heart of American economic and military power. The collapse of the twin towers, in particular, was deeply traumatic - seen live on television by tens of millions of Americans who witnessed the destruction of these huge symbols of commercial success and knew that thousands of people were dying inside. The effect was visceral, and its impact was not fully recognised abroad.
Moreover, the political context was crucial. If Al Gore had won (or been recognised as the winner) of the presidential election of 2000, there might well have been some kind of US action in Afghanistan but it is less likely that a more general "war on terror" embracing an "axis of evil" and regime-change in Iraq would have ensued. But George W Bush represented a very specific trend in US politics: the rise of neo-conservatism and assertive realism, and the conviction that a "new American century" was unfolding.
The first few months of his administration in 2001, after all, had already seen a raft of unilateral measures: among them withdrawal from the Kyoto climate-change protocols, the end of any chance of ratifying the comprehensive nuclear test-ban treaty, and opposition to the International Criminal Court (see "United States unilateralism: alive and kicking?", 23 January 2002). Charles Krauthammer summarised the attitude admirably in a piece for the Weekly Standard written just three months before the attacks:
"Multipolarity, yes, when there is no alternative. But not when there is. Not when we have the unique imbalance of power that we enjoy today - and that has given the international system a stability and essential tranquillity that it has not known for at least a century.
The international environment is far more likely to enjoy peace under a single hegemon. Moreover, we are not just any hegemon. We run a uniquely benign imperium." (see Charles Krauthammer, "The Bush Doctrine: ABM, Kyoto and the New American Unilateralism”, Weekly Standard, 4 June 2001).
A force under pressure
In looking back over the past seven years, many aspects offer some understanding of what has transpired and why the war on terror has had such unexpected and counterproductive results. Three such aspects stand out: none perhaps the most obvious but each throwing fresh light on the course of events in these years.
The first relates to the behaviour of United States troops in Iraq in the first couple of years of the war - behaviour thatis both fully understandable in the circumstances and does much to explain the level of opposition that the US came to experience across the middle east and southwest Asia.
(Keep reading ...)
Seven years and 370 columns later, the original Taliban regime has long since gone, as has Saddam Hussein, but the war on terror goes on. In Afghanistan, the Taliban movement has staged an extra ordinaryrevival and now threatens the security of much of the country; a devastating attack on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad, the capital's most notable elite gathering-point, has been described as "Pakistan's 9/11". In the face of escalating violence the United States is determined to increase its forces in Afghanistan while it extends the war into the west of Pakistan. Military analysts foresee a conflict of at least a decade.
There has been some easing of security in Iraq - after five and a half years of a bitter war that has cost over 100,000 civilians their lives, seriously wounded at least double that number, led to over 100,000 people being detained without trial and 4 million people living as refugees. The moderately increased stability remains fragile, with persistent bombings and a dangerous environment in Mosul in particular. Indeed, the fear of United States military leaders of a new upsurge of violence in Iraq makes them deeply reluctant to withdraw anything more than a fraction of their forces, notwithstanding the urgent need to reinforce the troops in Afghanistan.
A traumatic moment
That first column of 26 September 2001 (which followed a number of shorter contributions to openDemocracy's immediate post-9/11 online discussions) argued -perhaps forlornly - that forceful military action to terminate the Taliban was the wrong approach. The 9/11 atrocities should have been seen as appalling acts of international criminality rather than the trigger of a war; every effort should have been made to bring bin Laden and the others responsible to justice in the international arena. Instead, to deploy United States military power and forces in Afghanistan was probably what they wanted - direct engagement with their "far enemy", evidence of the imperial hegemon's ungodly ambitions in Muslim lands, and opportunity to wear down another superpower in much the same way that their predecessors had humbled the Soviet Union two decades earlier.
For Washington's part, the problem from the start was that its proposed approach took too little account of the circumstances of 9/11. Many commentators at the time compared the attacks to the Japanese assault on Pearl Harbour in December 1941, but that was quite wrong (see John W Dower, "Cultures of War: Pearl Harbor/Hiroshima/9-11/Iraq", MIT World, 7 April 2008). Pearl Harbour was an attack on a distant military base by another state that was already perceived as hostile to the United States. Furthermore, it took place in the pre-television age.
By contrast, 9/11 was an bolt from the blue sky which struck at the heart of American economic and military power. The collapse of the twin towers, in particular, was deeply traumatic - seen live on television by tens of millions of Americans who witnessed the destruction of these huge symbols of commercial success and knew that thousands of people were dying inside. The effect was visceral, and its impact was not fully recognised abroad.
Moreover, the political context was crucial. If Al Gore had won (or been recognised as the winner) of the presidential election of 2000, there might well have been some kind of US action in Afghanistan but it is less likely that a more general "war on terror" embracing an "axis of evil" and regime-change in Iraq would have ensued. But George W Bush represented a very specific trend in US politics: the rise of neo-conservatism and assertive realism, and the conviction that a "new American century" was unfolding.
The first few months of his administration in 2001, after all, had already seen a raft of unilateral measures: among them withdrawal from the Kyoto climate-change protocols, the end of any chance of ratifying the comprehensive nuclear test-ban treaty, and opposition to the International Criminal Court (see "United States unilateralism: alive and kicking?", 23 January 2002). Charles Krauthammer summarised the attitude admirably in a piece for the Weekly Standard written just three months before the attacks:
"Multipolarity, yes, when there is no alternative. But not when there is. Not when we have the unique imbalance of power that we enjoy today - and that has given the international system a stability and essential tranquillity that it has not known for at least a century.
The international environment is far more likely to enjoy peace under a single hegemon. Moreover, we are not just any hegemon. We run a uniquely benign imperium." (see Charles Krauthammer, "The Bush Doctrine: ABM, Kyoto and the New American Unilateralism”, Weekly Standard, 4 June 2001).
A force under pressure
In looking back over the past seven years, many aspects offer some understanding of what has transpired and why the war on terror has had such unexpected and counterproductive results. Three such aspects stand out: none perhaps the most obvious but each throwing fresh light on the course of events in these years.
The first relates to the behaviour of United States troops in Iraq in the first couple of years of the war - behaviour thatis both fully understandable in the circumstances and does much to explain the level of opposition that the US came to experience across the middle east and southwest Asia.
(Keep reading ...)
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