Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced July 29 that President Trump wanted a U.S. troop drawdown in Afghanistan before the 2020 election—something the president has wanted in the past, but it has yet to happen.
It’s been nearly 18 years since the United States invaded Afghanistan on Oct. 7, 2001, in response to the 9/11 attacks on the United States. That’s more than 6,000 days. Yet such withdrawals remain in heavy debate, even among members of the Trump administration.
In early July, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) addressed this very issue with the release of their report “Tell Me How this Ends.”
The report details the reasoning behind the United States remaining in Afghanistan 18 years after the first deployment of troops.
A key reason American forces remain in Afghanistan is due to nation building, an idea that “seeks to create the Western vision of a modern nation,” according to the report.
At a CSIS panel discussion on the report July 10, Mark Cancian, senior adviser of the International Security Program at CSIS and author of the report, said that the shift toward nation building isn’t a recent phenomenon.
“In [2002 to 2004], there is a shift to nation building, and the belief that that’s the only path to producing a lasting, sustainable solution,” Cancian said.
However, Cancian and the report disagree with the notion that nation building will be successful.
“The report argues that nation building can’t succeed; there are examples where it has succeeded, but it takes two generations,” Cancian said. “In other words, it’s a very long-term commitment.”
The report also drew comparisons from the military intervention in Afghanistan to previous interventions in Japan, Germany, and Vietnam, as well as South Korea.
“As for South Korea’s socio-cultural maturity, that might be marked by the 2005 revision to the constitution,” the report read. “So, if we take South Korea as a model for Afghanistan, we can estimate that the transformation will take 50 to 60 years.
Cancian sees some of the same concerns for Afghanistan.
“[Nation building] proposes to take a society that is politically decentralized, religiously devout, socially conservative, clan and tribe based, and patriarchal and turn it into the Western vision of a twenty-first century society.”
Despite those challenges, President George W. Bush made his intentions to nation build Afghanistan known in 2002.
“We know that true peace will only be achieved when we give the Afghan people the means to achieve their own aspirations,” Bush is quoted in the report.
The report also noted Donald Rumsfeld, the then-secretary of defense, who had a different vision.
“Solving corruption in Afghanistan or building a secular democracy in the Middle East are not America’s problems to tackle,” Rumsfeld said. “They are not our broken societies to fix.”
The Obama administration had similar ideas to Rumsfeld, according to the report.
“I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaida in Pakistan and Afghanistan, and to prevent their return to either country in the future,” President Barack Obama said in 2009.
In March of the same year, Obama alluded to continuing the nation building efforts that Bush implemented.
“Our efforts will fail in Afghanistan and Pakistan if we don’t invest in their future,” Obama said, according the report.
During Obama’s presidency, troop deployment levels reached record-highs in 2009 and 2010, with around 100,000 soldiers.
Since the peak in 2010, troops have seen a steady decline until recently.
From 2018 to 2019, the level in troops saw a slight increase, which the report attributed to “Taliban success on the battlefield.”
While the American troop level is at about 15,000 troops, and the fiscal cost is decreasing, the munition levels are at a record high. The report relates this to coalition forces withdrawing their troops.
Munition drop levels in 2018 reached more than 7,000. Prior to that, the highest number of munitions dropped was in 2010, when more than 5,000 were deployed.
While munition levels continue to ascend, approval ratings for military action in Afghanistan continue to drop. In 2018, approval ratings for military action in Afghanistan hit a record-low 20 percent. Since 2009, the approval rating has seen a steady decline.
Now, the question has turned to: How does the War in Afghanistan End?
According to both the panel and the report, there are numerous solutions in order to arrive at the end state solutions.
The report also goes on to say that nation building in Afghanistan would entail multiple components, including an effective central government, “impartial rule of law,” a democratic process for choosing leadership, religious tolerance, free speech, a free marketplace, and respected human rights, including female empowerment.
The report states that this is the process “envisioned by the United States and its international coalition.”
Better Dialogue
The report states that while the idea of improved dialogue seems simple, it’s more complicated than it looks.
“Many senior civilian leaders have strong opinions that discourage dialogue,” the report said.
The report also notes that civilians and militaries deal with problems differently.
More Clarity from Civilian Officials
According to the report, “updating Authorizations of the Use for Military Force (AUMFs) might act as a mechanism to force a dialogue between senior civilian officials and military officials.”
AUMFs permits the president to use all necessary courses of action.
“Constructing and then legislating AUMFs is, of course, difficult to do, but it would be an excellent tool for encouraging dialogue,” the report said. “It would also improve the accountability of the executive branch and enhance the moribund role of Congress is deciding issues of war and peace.”
There have been multiple attempts to update the AUMFs, but they have all failed.
According to the report there are more solutions, as well, such as continuing to develop military strategies, taking seriously the history and experience of others, and revising doctrine manuals to include a discussion of end states.
“As much as some in the United States would like to avoid involvement in nation building, failed states are a reality that cannot be wished away,” the report said. “As the situation in Afghanistan has demonstrated, the United States and the international community ignore collapsed or weak states at the peril.”
Trenton Abrego is a staff writer for Homeland411.
© 2019 Homeland411