by John Bolton
Barack Obama's latest act of
surrender in the war against terrorism comes in Afghanistan.
Administration sources are leaking that Obama is considering withdrawing
all American troops before Dec. 31, 2013, one year early, without
leaving even a small, residual force in the country.
Such a decision would simply accelerate
an already badly misguided policy. Faster draw-downs in Afghanistan are
bad enough but even worse is Obama's inability or unwillingness to see
the inevitably broader adverse consequences.
The inclination toward speedier
withdrawal is attributed to Obama's deteriorating relations with Afghan
President Karzai, who is apparently livid about U.S. negotiations with
Taliban terrorists. Obama hopes that appeasing the Taliban through
negotiations can avoid pictures of helicopters plucking Americans and
friendly Afghans from Kabul's rooftops, uncomfortably reminiscent of
last-minute scenes from Vietnam.
Moreover, according to polls, Americans
are weary of the Afghan conflict, so Obama sees another chance to
declare the war on terror over and also to score domestic political
points.
Americans are “war weary” about
Afghanistan for specific reasons. As president, Obama has repeatedly
insisted there was no rationale for a “war on terrorism” and that he
will end the wars he inherited. However, like much of his
national-security approach, Afghan policy has been erratic and poorly
explained. He has never made a sustained defense for fighting the
Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan, justifying his tactical decisions
only in limited terms and ultimately with an eye on complete U.S.
withdrawal, sooner rather than later.
Unfortunately, congressional Republicans
and others have rarely launched a sustained critique of Obama's
national-security failures or explained how the Afghan campaign fits
into the larger global struggle against terrorism.
So no wonder Americans are war weary.
Being very practical, citizens know they have more pressing concerns
than mastering arcane foreign-policy issues. Instead, they elect
presidents they expect will defend the country, explaining and
justifying sacrifices we are called upon to make, including foreign
wars, to protect our interests and way of life. When a president is
largely silent about foreign threats, voters logically assume (if
incorrectly, in Obama's case) that the risks are minimal and need not
concern them. And when the loyal opposition doesn't oppose, why
shouldn't Americans conclude, for example, that war in Afghanistan is
unnecessary and should be rapidly concluded?
Thus, the failure is not with the
American people for not grasping the strategic significance of defeating
the Taliban and al-Qaida in their bastions along the
Afghanistan-Pakistan border but the failure of elected officials in
Washington. Fortunately, however, this failure can be corrected by
finding leaders prepared to explain comprehensibly just what is at stake
in this long conflict.
To begin, we are conducting “defense at a
distance” in Afghanistan, fighting the terrorists there so they cannot
reconstitute themselves and gravely threaten us at home, as on Sept. 11,
2001. U.S. and NATO withdrawal seems nearly certain to lead to Karzai's
government falling, with the Taliban re-establishing control and
inviting al-Qaida back to Afghanistan as partners. At that point,
Afghanistan would again be a base for international terrorism, as we
experienced on 9/11, precisely the reasons we overthrew the Taliban.
And, tragically, we will have given up all we sacrificed to prevent just
such a recurrence of the terrorist threat.
Second, we now recognize an added
strategic threat if the Taliban retake control in Kabul, namely the
increased likelihood that Pakistani Taliban and other radicals could
seize control in that country. That would mean both another base for
global terror attacks and also Pakistan's substantial arsenal of nuclear
weapons falling into terrorist hands, including those in Iran.
Terrorists would have access to nuclear weapons they could detonate in
cities around the world, rendering decades of counterproliferation
efforts meaningless.
These are the strategic interests in
defeating the Taliban that justify our leaving forces in Afghanistan and
continuing active military operations against them for as long as it
takes. This is not the same as “nation building,” which rarely works in
practice and which is also truly unpopular with American voters, who see
it as a gravy train for ungrateful foreigners. We are not in
Afghanistan to benefit the Afghans, but to benefit ourselves.
Thus explained, Americans are far more
likely to support the necessary war against terrorism in Afghanistan. Of
course, if our political “leaders” fail to make this case, we will
learn the lesson only when the terrorists attack us again, perhaps this
time with nuclear weapons.
We can avoid this outcome but it
requires leadership plainly missing from Barack Obama. The question is
whether Republicans have the capacity and the will to fill in the void
Obama has left.
John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
Source:http://triblive.com/opinion/featuredcommentary/4344196-74/afghanistan-obama-taliban#axzz2Z7PPvuuD
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