Without equivocation I voted for Barack Obama and haven’t regretted that decision for a second; however, I do feel that the president has allowed himself to be drawn into a political quagmire with regard to his policy toward Afghanistan where our latest course of action involves an expansion of US military presence with precious little tangible support from our European allies. As a point of observation, the relevancy of NATO is questionable–the world’s allegiances are no longer a matter of compacts among Europeans; colonialism, even if it is only a façade, is an insuperable obstacle to gaining much needed cooperation from third world countries. Europe has not found its own way to polarity so that it can respond effectively in critical situations and continues to dissipate its energy and efforts while it embraces the US with one hand and condemns it with the other. While the US cannot avoid its responsibility for the shadow of culpability intimated by the comments of various heads of state, those who willingly ate from the same trough did so, perhaps, as a result of their own natural proclivities. It is time therefore to acknowledge that the regressive ideology and methodology of the Bush administration has been relegated to the status of footnote in the world’s evolving political dynamics; it is time for our allies and our adversaries to recognize that even scapegoats have expiration dates.
Among a host of other strengths, President Obama offers a thoughtful, measured approach to governance and coalition building among allies as well as pragmatic diplomatic overtures to those nations with which there are pronounced and substantive political difference. It is precisely because of this characteristic of thoughtfulness that I find the decision to escalate the role of the US in Afghanistan as so out of sync with the other aspects of Obama’s administration. I did not support either the US’s incursion into Afghanistan or its subsequent war with Iraq. In both instances the measures were acts of retribution to absolve the government of failed political policies that short-sightedly treated symptoms instead of pursuing a more holistic approach to diagnose the cause of the ailment first and then to attempt to provide an appropriate remedy. The necessity of war is always justified with the fallacy of spontaneous generation: an assumption which fails to acknowledge the inseparable connection of causality and time. The conditions for war have never been immediate but rather developed over time due to acts of commission or omission and negligence; therefore, a specific outcome is not automatically mandated. Alternatives depend on our imagination and industry, whereas war relies on our ability to sanctify killing as a pre-eminently divine right of retaliation–we see our enemies in a context similar to the one portrayed in Jonathan Edwards notorious sermon: Sinners in The Hands Of An Angry God. George Bush rode the wave of anger and retaliation into the backwater of Talibani fundamentalism and repression–ironically a form of extremism that shares the same fervor and rigidity as fundamentalists of any religion, including a plethora of organizations in the US–for the expressed purpose of apprehending or killing Osama bin Laden, the Saudi mastermind of the brutal September 11 attacks. He accomplished neither and abandoned Afghanistan after implanting a rag-tag government which, while not as violent as the previous political regime, has become feckless and corrupt. The wound inflicted on the Afghani people as a result of our seeking retribution for the deaths and the dishonor the nation suffered in the attacks on September 11 festered and became infected with a different and more resistant strand of hatred because the leaders in the Bush administration were less than honest about their purpose or objectives. Afghanistan was abandoned for all intents and purposes while Bush pursued his true agenda which was born out of that righteous indignation common to all fundamentalism. In the vacuum created by our indifference, dissidents increasingly gained strength until just as in Iraq radical elements have re-established themselves and have begun to flourish.
As cliched as it is, the phrase, Mighty Satan, has never lost its meaning nor has its referent changed: the US remains an evil villain which, to the twisted thinking of those who subscribe to such a theory, provides them with ample reason to continue to wage a war against all who oppose them or those who don’t support their cause. As the US continues to increase its presence in Afghanistan by sending in more troops and supporting civilian personnel, it exacerbates an already tenuous situation. Hamid Karzai has failed to rise above the tribalism and nepotism that dominates a culture which remains largely hidden to us and obscured by the excesses occasionally documented in press reports. In a democracy the disaffected generally seek nonviolent and legal resolution to their grievances; however, the history of Afghanistan suggests that its version of town hall meetings is more likely to be conducted with scimitars and kalashnikovs than debates on ideology or points of order. The inertia gripping Afghanistan has been compounded by decades of war, the colonial ambitions of foreign powers, poverty, and religious extremism. As the number of American troops grows, the inertia will become more profound and irreversible.
Unfortunately, the withdrawal of troops will not automatically guarantee a cessation of the woes plaguing the people of Afghanistan; however, such an action is a prerequisite to achieve a larger, more inclusive strategy in the region. Meanwhile, the state of the US economy dictates a re-evaluation of the nation’s overall military objectives in addition to those in Iraq and Afghanistan. The black hole of war consumes the nation’s resources instead of being applied to rebuilding the crumbling and outdated infrastructure of the US and providing much needed assistance to the downward spiral of American businesses and the havoc unleashed on citizens of this country as a result of these failures. Amid the gloom there are points of light but our policy in Afghanistan is not one of them nor can we ignore the foreboding implicit in our failure to develop a constructive relationship with two counties that border Afghanistan: Iran and Pakistan. While Obama’s pragmatism is a welcome change from the Shock and Awe of the previous administration and will certainly promote a much different atmosphere among nations which will be more conducive to fruitful dialog and conflict mediation, it will also court failure if it does not avoid the perils implicit in escalating military activity if the opposition remains entrenched and its resistence becomes more violent. Victory has always really been a calculus of the degree of pain one combattant inflicts on another; even the finality of death does not guarantee defeat of one’s enemy, it only inflames the hunger of his allies for retribution. The hand extended in friendship and reconciliation is an empty gesture if it remains unclasped; profound religious and ideological questions remain with regard to Islamic nations which can only be addressed internally. If the citizens of these nations have neither the will nor the inclination to engage in serious self-examination, the region will continue to suffer through political, social, and economic instability and increasing violence. And even if we have a respite of sanity in the middle east, North Korea casts a growing shadow from the far east. I suggest that Barack Obama add William James‘ The Moral Equivalent of War to his Lincoln reading list and compare the earlier pragmatism of James with his own and update the former with contemporary thinking, and perhaps, just perhaps, forge a way to help improve the outlook for all people the world over and seek an end to the nihilistic scourge of war.
