Just Finished Reading: War Against the Taliban – Why It All Went Wrong in Afghanistan by Sandy Gall (FP: 2012)

It is no great surprise – to those who actually know their history – that Afghanistan has the well-deserved label of the Graveyard of Empires. Alexander tried to occupy the country and failed as did the British (3 times) and the Russians before the Americans and British (again) plus other allies tried again after the attacks on 9/11. Honestly the British at least should have known better.

Whilst comparatively easy to attack and invade it’s almost impossible to hold Afghanistan for very long with anything like acceptable casualties (on either side). For one thing the terrain is unforgiving both on man and machine. The roads are often of questionable quality and always open to ambush. The Afghans themselves are a deeply tribal people with allegiances going back generations and vendettas going back just as far. Kill one of them and a hundred others will dedicate every waking minute to gaining revenge no matter the cost. After hundreds of years of combat against the major powers of each era the Afghans have developed a belief that they cannot ultimately be beaten before the price in blood of the invaders is too high to sustain.

But these are not the only reasons that the latest adventure in Afghanistan has been doomed to failure from the very start. A good place to start is the impossibility of nation building where nationhood does not exist. Despite the fact that many Afghans would identify as such their first and only true allegiance is to their family and their tribe. Welding a deeply tribal culture into a more modern nationalist one will take many more years than the West are prepared to take – even if such a thing is possible. Then there is the drug trade and the corruption it fosters in an area already known for its patronage and nepotism. Pouring billions of dollars into the country to build roads and institutions only made a bad situation worse. But by far the biggest problem – even bigger than cultural ignorance – is Pakistan. Despite the denials it eventually became clear that Taliban fighters were treating northern Pakistan as a safe haven and that not only were they allowed to do so but that Pakistani Intelligence armed and trained many of the Taliban that would eventually attack Allied troops in Afghanistan. The reasons are deep and often complex but the evidence for Pakistan’s collusion is overwhelming. What could, or will, be done about this fact is an even more difficult question to answer.

The author is both incredibly knowledgeable and informed about the region and has been their repeatedly since the early 1970’s and has developed relationships with some of the key players on all sides in that time. His access to members of Pakistan’s High Command, Allied commanders and members of Taliban units was astonishing. Such access not enabled him to bring out the strategic aspects of the conflict so that whatever was being discussed was always in the context of wider regional and global concerns. The diversion into Iraq was instrumental in siphoning off vast quantities of men and material at a vital time in the Afghan conflict at best delaying any final resolution and quite possibly derailing the whole campaign. Only much later – what the war was almost lost – did resources start to flow back into Afghanistan to stave off total defeat.

This is a must read for anyone trying to wrap their heads around what on earth is happening in this most tragic place. You get a real sense of what’s happening on the ground both from the grunts point of view as well as normal Afghan civilians who just want the killing to stop and the foreigners to leave. Highly recommended and much more to come.