AFG 1

As the US military's effort winds down in Afghanistan and their elections approach - which are supposed to solve many problems but won't - now might be a good time to engage in some reflection on the engagement. The military have an acronym for this, as they do for most things - AAR or "after action review." First, let me state my opinion that the Afghanistan hasn't worked out that well, so there has to be a mismatch between expectations and outcomes, especially with regard to execution. Second, this is in no way a criticism of the people in uniform, though i may be critical to their leaders and policy makers.

Because I was feeling that Afghanistan was turning into a modern-day Vietnam, I revisited A Bright Shining Lie and found some criticisms by LTC Daniel Davis who complained loudly that the war in Afghanistan was failing. He made several arguments as to why including the corruption of the Afghans, the failure to report status and progress accurately, and wasted aid money. Even though LTC Davis traveled widely around Afghanistan, those who defended our efforts said that he had a distorted and limited view of the situation. We;;. sounds like these critics are defending, because for what analysis can't that be said? Davis to me said some pretty reasonable things because I had similar experiences there. There was this curious dynamic in which people in uniform would take me aside and vent about what was going on in the vague hope that I, as a civilian, could influence what was going on.

So I could indeed add my personal observations to the list of people coming back from Afghanistan, but those too could be semi-easily invalidated by a government official who has access to greater information and the news media. However, Davis offered a pretty insightful observation, that there has been no clear articulation of the long-term strategic objectives, and that matches with my experience. I heard one general say that going to Afghanistan was in America's national interest, but that struck me as wrong. Why do we need to go, and possibly die, in an impoverished, land-locked, and resource-less country on the other side of the world. To my way of thinking, that's the opposite of national interest. Of course we had to go there in 2001, but for such an extended time to the tune of $700 billion? I don't get it. And when I got there, another general told me that in ten years, when Afghanistan was a great, modern, and successful country, then we'd understand why we were away from our families. That struck me as almost Obama-esque levels of aspirational as opposed to realistic language.

In opposition to these aspirational or purportedly inspirational arguments, Davis asked three strategic questions: (1) What metrics characterize Afghanistan? (2) How should the change over time? and (3) How do US military missions contribute to these metrics? This seems to be baseline and fundamental level of analysis before committing thousands of Americans and hundreds of billions of dollars, but apparently that wasn't done, especially as aspirational and inspirational rhetoric is easier to generate, more convincing, and less rigorous.

So how does one go about creating a quantitative strategic analysis that stands up better under criticism and informs operations? First of all, you can check out the book Estimating Impact by Kott and Citrenbaum, but I'm going to try to apply that framework to Afghanistan over the next few months as a way to improve policy because, while I greatly admire the efforts and bravery of my colleagues in Afghanistan, I don't they were as effective as they might have been because they were not well led.