I’ll be discussing various parts of Lindholm’s argument over the next few days, but I’d recommend everyone read his response to my Foreign Policy piece asking 10 questions about Afghanistan.

I should note a couple of things.  I was not engaging in a cheap rhetorical trick by asking those questions.  I just really think answering them clarifies a lot.  I mean, don’t you know a lot more about Lindholm’s argument now?

Anyway, a few quick hits.  Lindholm starts off with a cheap shot:

To be precise, there are seven questions and three strawmen. And some
of the questions come close to being… well, outright inane,
like the one that asks (I’m paraphrasing), “How come the
Taliban would be hostile to Pakistan now, when they weren’t from
1996 to 2001?”

He’s wrong about the strawmen, as I will show later.  And I guess we disagree about how inane the question is.  The issue, ultimately, comes down to whether the current Pakistani government in unalterably opposed to the Taliban — and vice-versa — or whether it is contingently opposed.  I would argue the latter, and that disentangling the issue of American pressure and support as well as the mechanics of domestic politics in Pakistan is very hard to do.  If Lindholm believes that the current Pakistani government is so strongly anti-Islamist, he may very well be correct.  He knows more about the region than I do.  My assessment comes largely from the fact that until the Islamists overreached by moving in Buner, the current government seemed willing to cede autonomy over the Swat Valley to Islamist forces.  Now, was the Buner move a key turning point?  Was the Islamabad government just biding its time?  I don’t know.  But it certainly isn’t an inane question.  It is one, rather, that needs some serious consideration given (a) Pakistan’s tied to the Afghan Taliban pre-2001, (b) the fact that the Afghan Taliban seems to be operating semi-openly in Quetta to this day, (c) the existence of strong factions in the military and intelligence services with some sympathy for the Islamists, and (d) negotiated local autonomy deals with the Islamists in 2003 and 2007 and 2009.

Again, Lindholm may be right, but this is argument that needs to be explored and defended, not just asserted.  Lindholm has take a first step there, but I still think he asserts rather than proves the current Pakistani government’s anti-Islamist credentials.

Next.  In response to my claim that “The escalation of our commitment to Afghanistan is intimately connected
to the acceptance of population-centric counter-insurgency theory
popularized by General Petraeus in Iraq.”  Lindholm replies:

This is the first of Finel’s strawmen. I see no such “intimate connection”. In fact, I have repeatedly argued that the U.S. COIN campaign in Iraq has yet to prove its worth, and
that even if it did, it would be a fool’s errand to try to transplant
any of the lessons into Afghanistan

I am willing to defer to Lindholm on South Asian politics — though I may ask for clarifications at times and point out dissenting opinions — but on this issue Lindholm is just plain wrong and clearly is not aware of how this escalation was decided upon and sold in the United States.  This may not describe Lindholm’s views, but it simply a statement of fact that pop-centric COIN is the operational concept behind the escalation in Afghanistan in the United States.

Another one.  Lindholm writes:

Another strawman. Who are these “many proponents”? And where on earth
would this “moral obligation” stem from? I don’t get it – is Finel
suggesting this is a serious pro-war argument that needs defending?

Again, not to be a jerk about it… but I am not sure Lindholm is following the debate in the United States closely enough. COIN theorists like Kilcullen uses the moral obligation argument all the time. Journalists like Joe Klein use it.  Commenters on AM use it.  Rory Stewart sees it at the core of Obama’s philosophy on the war.

So, again, Lindholm doesn’t have to defend it… but the moral argument is very significant in American policy debates.

Lindolm also takes issue with a supposed strawman I write about American domestic politics… see a pattern here?  I ask whether we need to plan for a continued commitment based on domestic political risks.  Lindholm considers that laughable.  Again, what is showing is Lindholm’s lack of knowledge of domestic American politics.  I haven’t run into anyone in Washington who does not consider this a major issue.  Indeed, there are tons of skeptics of COIN in general and Afghanistan in particular who argue that it is pointless to even debate the commitment — the risk of an attack from Afghanistan following a withdrawal would be such a disaster politically that no one is going to be willing to run that risk unless forced to.

Finally, Lindholm writes:

And for a man who has suggested
that should the Taliban return to power, the West should — wait for it
— “credibly communicate our commitment to again remove them from power
if they in any way tolerate the establishment of anti-American
terrorist networks on their soil”, he is awfully quick to call other
people’s writing inane.

You’ll need to do more than just dismiss it out of hand.  The fact is that the U.S. military is a force superbly tailored to projecting power and breaking states. A strategy that is posited on repeatedly breaking states is clearly problematic… but I argue ultimately less so that one that requires that you can build stable states instead.  I have only hinted at this argument thus far — I have some longer pieces under review that spell it out in more detail.  But for now, I’ll note that I think I’ll continue to work on ideas for ways to leverage American military strengths even if Lindholm doesn’t understand the logic.

And Jari… bud… I think “naifs and retards” and “dorks”… well, that’s unnecessary isn’t it?

Call my arguments ill-informed or strawmen or stupid or whatever… but let’s leave the personal insults off the table.  I mean, if you call my arguments inane, I am happy to debate the point… but when you call me a retard… then what?

UPDATE:

Jari Lindholm responds:

First of all, apologies for the naifs, retards and dorks. I am unfortunately prone to this, while at the same time eagerly pointing out ad hominems when other people use them — admittedly not a very admirable personality trait.

As for my use of the words ‘inane’ and ‘ridiculous’, they were meant as humorous references to your own characterisation of some of my blog posts and those of Josh Foust.

But again, I shouldn’t take my exasperation out on someone who is actually trying to build a civilised argument as opposed to just spewing paranoid accusations as some do.

Regarding the strawmen, you have a point: I tackled your questions in the larger context of ISAF, not just the American debate. The mistake was mine, though I have to wonder why you would want to restrict the discussion to what is, after all, just one contributing country. Sure, the U.S.

contribution has been sizeable, but Afghanistan is by no means solely America’s war. I would also like to point out that until 2007, the U.S.

military presence in Afghanistan and, in fact, interest in the country was negligible given your vast resources and the importance of this theatre. I think this fact gets easily lost in the debate: has the U.S. contribution to Afghanistan since 2001 actually been adequate?

You’re correct in saying that my arguments are mostly just assertions. But so are yours. This is the nature of the debate — we’re not talking about what is, but what will or might be, if this or that happens. All we can do is extrapolate and hope for the best.

From my point of view, the bottom line regarding Western military interventions in third world countries is this: Either leave them be, or prepare to finish what you started. There’s no middle ground.

Best regards

Jari