Webb on Veterans, Afghanistan

Senator Webb spent time with Hampton Roads’ sometimes cranky, self styled secular humanist radio personality Tony Macrini who paid tribute to veterans last week. Webb was more than enthusiastic discussing the sacrifices of veterans, like a member of his platoon in Viet Nam, Dale Wilson. Then there was Afghanistan.

Beyond the personnel currently serving, Webb recalled those who he terms the “people of daily courage...We talk about courage and we honor and respect courage on the battlefield or moral courage when you have to make the really tough decision. Then there are the people who step forward to serve and who then come back grievously wounded and who have whatever it takes to keep going and to make something out of their lives despite the hand that they’ve been dealt…every day.” He included the families who have lost loved ones and must continue on without them.

In a personal aside, he spoke of Wilson who is now living in North Carolina; a triple amputee who was in Webb’s platoon in Viet Nam. It takes 15 minutes every morning for him just to put on his prosthesis and get going. But Wilson has managed to get his college degree, a wonderful wife and three children. “He has had the courage, every day, to step forward and live his life in a constructive way.”

Macrini, a critic of the Iraq and Afghan campaigns from inception, could not pass the opportunity to lead the conversation to the decision on Afghanistan facing President Obama:

“We’re hearing all these different reports about what General McChrystal has asked for. We’ve heard today that four plans have been presented to the President and he says “keep trying you guys.” Ambassador Eikenberry, former high ranking military officer, General, who’s the Ambassador, “This is a corrupt situation here. Don’t send more troops,” if the Washington Post is to be believed. Senator Webb, your thoughts…” – Macrini

When Webb looks at Afghanistan, the conclusion he arrives at is that it is not Iraq…it is not Viet Nam…it is Lebanon. It is a country that has never had a strong central government. What we hear being said is that we are going to build a strong national army coupled with a national police force of about 400,000 in a country that has never had more than some 90,000 in its national army. This is a “nation” with a very strong tribal culture that has always been decentralized. So add to the issue of an army that has never existed, a national government that has never existed which we imagine can somehow exert strong central control.

Webb’s three components to the Afghanistan decision:

• What is the situation?
• Can we build a national army and the government it will serve?
• What are we doing?

Compounding this problem is that there is some point at which we develop such a presence (generally associated with force size but it includes the other elements of national power we neglected during the Bush administration) with which we attempt to impose enough influence to create stability that we are going to be seen as occupiers. This in and of itself with be counterproductive. It will make our objective even more difficult to achieve. We must ask ourselves if we are going to be viewed as occupiers, as so many other nations who have tried this before.

Webb asks: Is our goal in Afghanistan to perform nation building or are we there to fight international terrorism? Do we really want to throw ourselves into nation building in a country that has never had a strong central government? Are we there to fight forces that are intrinsically mobile? Look at Iraq, Webb suggests. Al Qaida came to Iraq after we got there and they left sometime afterwards. We built and are now trying to dismantle the large infrastructure we perceived was necessary to fight international terrorism there. Al Qaida was maneuverable enough to leave Iraq and go to Pakistan. They are not in Iraq or Afghanistan right now. Rather, we are seeing them in places like Somalia.

One thing Webb says he wants to emphasize is that “I don’t see these debates as a military versus the administration.” There are Generals Eikenberry (Ambassador) and Jones (National Security Advisor) involved in the analysis. General Jones, according to Webb, has more actual combat service than any of the Generals on active service today. Plus he commanded NATO forces; including those in Afghanistan. General Eikenberry commanded American forces in Afghanistan. “We’re trying to get a lot of smart people at the table because we are going to have to live with the consequences.”

“The people who are trying to set this up as General McChrystal and the military versus the administration are not being accurate…I think it’s about time for the President to make a decision, but I don’t think he should be faulted for taking care here.” – Webb

Macrini asked a fundamental question: “When do we hope to have this 400,000 man army built.” And Webb’s response was that we are looking at a four year plan; McChrystal’s plan. But, as Macrini pointed out, this is a nation with a very low literacy rate (variously reported between 10 and 28%) and Webb asked: Who are these 400,000 people going to be even if they’re smart? Webb continued that we have to be very careful in terms of defining objectives that are achievable and are tied into what our national goals should be. We have to be realistic in terms of what can be achieved by a national government in Afghanistan. Webb concluded:

“Let’s go back just to ‘01 after 9/11 and after the Taliban were kicked out of Afghanistan. They had a conference in Bonn. I use this as a kind of a prototype of what I had hoped would happen in Iraq. They got a lot of different countries to the table and the reached an agreement that resulted in a constitution, the present constitution for Afghanistan and they had elections in ’04. So this whole situation with Karzai and the national government is very new in Afghanistan. And, I think in the constitution they probably erred…it was a victory for the time, quite a feat for the time, but I think the erred in putting too much power in a central government in a country that has no tradition, no history of a real central government. They probably ought to go back to the constitution and find a way to devolve it, to decentralize the power structures and adapt a proper constitution to the traditions and the history of the country. You’re not going to do that in the next two weeks. But if I were going to lay down one of the benchmarks, if I were advising then President on this, that is one of the things I’d put on the table…let’s find a way to get some agreement to do that. Karzai probably wouldn’t like that, but I think that’s where we need to be heading.”