RNA - The US invaded Afghanistan in 2001, and President Trump committed to a continued war there with seemingly no end in sight just over a month ago. Corker’s entire term in office has been during the Afghan War, and when he leaves, planned for 2019, America’s longest war will still be ongoing for many more decades to come. Even Corker admits this will probably continue to be the case, but says the real question will be what troops are doing there in another ten years or so.
So the “decade” timespan is less than the Pentagon regime is really talking about at this point, as War Party officials seem to view Afghanistan, as with Iraq, Syria and Yemen, as more or less a permanent occupation at this point, and have tried to get around controversy about troop levels decades into the war by announcing that troop levels will not be made public knowledge going forward.
At any rate, this is a place the US cannot and will not leave it to the ebb and flow of geopolitics. The Korean Peninsula and the Middle East come immediately to mind. Afghanistan also belongs on that list - something President Trump insists on - months after taking office. Although he doesn’t offer a specific number, Trump is poised to send thousands more US troops to the South Asian country, the site of the longest war in America's history. Like their countrymen already in Afghanistan, these troops will be a combat force. They will carry out airstrikes against a resurgent Taliban and ISIL affiliates but at the same time will be killing even more civilians down the line.
Washington will broaden the US role in Afghanistan. That country matters – “this war matters” - because America can stay and entertain, sell weapons, and maintain its regional influence. President Trump claims there is a danger of Afghanistan again becoming a terrorist haven, as it once was for Al-Qaeda before 9/11? Without a doubt this is just an excuse. Afghanistan’s military has what it takes to tamp down the carnage – with a little bit of help from the international community.
If ISIL militants have established a foothold in the eastern province of Nangarhar, that’s because Washington and the mere extras want so. President Trump didn’t inherit the chaos that is Afghanistan, it's his Republican party which started this whole mess in the first place. Simply put, he is only in watch now. If he is finally forging an Afghan strategy, that’s because so much is at stake.
The US and the company have turned the country into a rogue state, and thus an ideal training ground for terrorists with designs on attacking targets in the region, Europe and beyond. Just like in Syria and Yemen, the US is also letting its terror proxy forces and rogue groups dig deeper into Afghanistan. This gives yet another excuse for Trump to increase the US role there – the same Trump who in one of his occasional peacenik fits on the president campaign trail, expressed enthusiasm for ending the war because “it’s a mistake.” Now that he's in office, however, he's mulling another surge of troops to support the endless war.
The final argument is this: Nobody knows what victory in Afghanistan would even look like. The US originally invaded the country in order to remove the Taliban government, which at the time controlled most of the country and provided a safe haven to Osama bin Laden and Al-Qaeda. Bin Laden is dead, but Al-Qaeda has moved on to establish safe havens elsewhere, and the Taliban now controls more territory than at any point before the invasion. ISIL is getting in on the action too, having claimed a stretch of land along the porous Pakistani border.
Progress is being made, in other words, but not by the US. Trump's generals hope the additional troops will help remedy the situation. It is pipe dream. How such a modest surge would do much to defeat the Taliban, or bring them to the negotiating table, is anyone's guess. Far and away the most likely scenario is that it just prolongs the current stalemate, which at this point seems to be America's only real goal in the country.
Long story short, US defeat may be inevitable, but can be prolonged indefinitely, that's the whole idea behind this saga. Afghanistan remains a sideshow, one only rarely talked about on the Capitol Hill. Washington has reduced the longest running war in US history to background noise. This makes sense, to a certain extent, because why would they bother themselves with a problem with no solution? Leaving now would be traumatic for the War Party psyche. This is the war they waged to avenge the greatest attack ever launched against the US; how can they admit to themselves that the fight is ending in what could be obviously called yet another defeat - just like the ones in Iraq, Syria and Yemen?
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