Whither to Afghanistan?

George Will’s recent column, “In Afghanistan, Knowing When to Stop” September 1, 2009 has drawn quite a lot of heat from fellow conservatives, such as Bill Kristol, who wrote: “Will is urging retreat, and accepting defeat." With very little NATO support our troops slog on there, in a rather hopeless attempt at nation-building. According to Will, “The Brookings Institution ranks Somalia as the only nation with a weaker state.” After all, we won the war there, what else could we be doing? Will wonders: “Creation of an effective central government? Afghanistan has never had one.” As David Harsanyi has said, in support of Will, “Or is victory achieved when we finally usher this primitive tribal culture, with its violent warlords and religious extremism, from the eighth century all the way to modernity? If so, we're on course for a centuries-long enterprise of nation building and baby-sitting, not a war. The war was won in 2002.” Haven’t we learned anything from the failed Soviet attempt to control this tribal culture on some of the most inhospitable terrain imaginable? Will wasn’t the first conservative to raise the issue of whether or not we had overstayed our rationale for being in Afghanistan. Diana West wrote in, “Let Afghanistan Go,” on April 23, 2009:

This is not to suggest that there is no war or enemies to fight, . . . there most certainly are. But sinking all possible men, materiel and bureaucracy into Afghanistan, as the Obama people and most conservatives favor, to try to bring a corrupt Islamic culture into working modernity while simultaneously fighting Taliban and wading deep into treacherous Pakistani wars is no way to victory -- at least not to U.S. victory. On the contrary, it is the best way to bleed and further degrade U.S. military capabilities. Indeed, if I were a jihad chieftain, I couldn't imagine a better strategy than to entrap tens of thousands of America's very best young men in an open-ended war of mortal hide-and-seek in the North West Frontier.

West, by the way is an outspoken critic about the dangers of Islamic jihad, so she’s definitely not a pacifist or defeatist. West interview retired Maj. Gen. Paul Vallely who said: "There's nothing to win there. . . . What do you get for it? What's the return? Well, the return's all negative for the United States." Vallely went on to recommend a strategy of the using

"the maximum use of unconventional forces," such as Navy SEALS and other special forces, who can be deployed as needed from what are known in military parlance as "lily pads" -- outposts or jumping-off points in friendly countries (Israel, Northern Kurdistan, India, Philippines, Italy, Djibouti ... ) and from U.S. aircraft carrier strike groups.’ Such strike groups generally include eight to 10 vessels "with more fire power," the general noted, "than most nations." These lily pads become "bases we can launch from any time we want to," eliminating the need for massive land bases such as Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, by now a small city of 20,000 American personnel who continuously need to be supplied and secured at enormous expense.

"There's no permanent force," the general said. "That's the beauty of it." We watch, we wait and when U.S. interests are threatened, "we basically use our strike forces to take them out, target by target." This would work whether the threat came from Al Qaeda, Pakistani nukes or anything else.

He continued: "This idea that we're going to go in and bring democracy to these tribal cultures isn't going to work. If we have a problem with terrorist countries, like Iran, it's a lot cheaper to go in and hit them and get back out."

In other words, don't give up the battle; just give up the nation-building. "It's up to somebody else to build nations," the general said. "Not us."

While, like most Americans, I was in favor to invading Afghanistan after 9/11, it might be time to reassess our strategy there, and in the rest of the Middle East. American capabilities have been badly wounded by the financial collapse and we don’t seem to be learning from history: Most great empires (including reluctant empires like the USA) collapse after overextending themselves militarily, like Rome and Great Britain, and by living off past productivity and going into debt. While I thought the Iraq War was a strategic mistake, things change. Iraq seems like a more feasible location for any hubris of nation-building. Maybe we should focus where there’s at least a slim chance of a pay off.

Quiet on the Commonwealth front

Going into 2008, it's apparent that the gap in the quality and quantity of blogging output between conservative bloggers in the English-speaking Commonwealth and their counterparts in the US, is showing little sign of narrowing.

Although the population of the US dwarfs that of Britain, Canada, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, the English-speaking Commonwealth still has a population of over 110 million from which to draw upon. However, we are still failing to produce many bloggers in the class of US traditional and scientific conservatives like Daniel Larison, Steve Sailer, Randall Parker, Jim Kalb, Lawrence Auster, John Savage, and John Press.

As well as being a regular blogger, Mr Press has also produced a substantial book Culturism, which tackles the weighty issue of western cultural survival. Steve Sailer's blog appears to attract the lions share of reader comments, although Auster and Larison also appear to be attracting significant web traffic. (Hat tip to Daniel Larison for being my best referrer, with Oz Conservative second, and mainstream NZ blogger David Farrar third).

Among many others worthy of mention include the lucid and entertaining Dennis Dale, and punchy empiricist Audacious Epigone.

The most consistent and accomplished conservative blogger in the British Commonwealth remains Mark Richardson of Oz Conservative, who is now into his 5th year of lucidly and persistently de-constructing liberalism. However, he is conspicuous for the being the only conservative blogger in Australasia to consistently produce quality commentary on a regular basis.

On this side of the Tasman I regret to report that the Internet scene continues to be dominated by libertarians who seems to think defending western civilisation goes no further than ranting about tax rates.

Canadian output is similarly limited. Immigration blogger Hogtown Front stood out for the quality and accuracy of his postings on Immigration in Ontario, but ceased blogging on a consistent basic earlier this year. Similarly, Vancouver blogger Kevin Michael Grace has been pretty quiet this year, although he is no doubt making a valuable contribution through his work with the American Conservative.

Britain is producing some good bloggers with a law and order focus, with Laban Tall of UK Commentators one of the best in this regard. Unfortunately though, there are few UK bloggers who are willing to offer serious, original analysis of the type that US writers like Kalb and Sailer deliver on a regular basis (a possible star in the making, though is teenager Sam Tarran, who is already producing some good posts at a ridiculously young age).

Although Continental conservatives appear to be preoccupied with current events concerning Islamic immigration (and who can blame them) there are a few European pundits like Fjiordman and Conservative Swede who are going the extra mile and producing some serious critiques of modern liberal thinking.

Perhaps 2007's most important site from a Conservative perspective though, was not a political blogger, but a non-partisan Internet lobbying site, Numbers USA, which played a vital contribution to the downfall of George Bush's unpopular illegal immigration amnesty.