'Dithering' May Be Good Policy

Regardless of outcome, what does the Afghan strategy and policy review tell us about President Obama's approach to governing?

We are used to seeing domestic policy debates played out as part of the normal push-and-shove of the legislative process. A good example is the seemingly endless and very public health care policy debate. But we are less used to seeing Executive Branch foreign-policy reviews played out practically in the open, as with the ongoing Afghan policy review.

Certainly, this whole process is sharply different from the "I'm the decider" approach of George W. Bush.

Our suggestion last December, in a RealClearWorld comment, was that Obama would follow the "multiple advocacy" model of presidential decision-making. In it, the president encourages active policy debate and vigorous advocacy of alternative views, and ultimately chooses one or creates a synthesis from among the competing views.

While the approach itself is not unique (President Kennedy also favored it), its openness to media and punditry alike is unusual - at least for a subject so sensitive. The Western response to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the unification of Germany and the ultimate collapse of the Soviet Union we now know were guided by similar processes of multiple advocacy - but they were played out behind closed doors.

Though nowhere near as central to world order as the collapse of the Soviet Union, the strategic reassessment of the U.S. role in Afghanistan has been remarkably well covered in the media.

The media are good at juxtaposing conflicting views, but not at capturing nuances. General McChrystal's request for more troops to successfully pursue a counter-insurgency strategy is contrasted with Vice President Biden's advocacy for targeted strikes against Taliban strongholds and terrorist leaders. Yet the more fundamental questions about strategic interests and the over-all mission in Central Asia are sidetracked by simplistic "escalate" versus "disengage" arguments. As the review has dragged on, it is not surprising that the positions of various advocates have been leaked abundantly to further kindle media and public attention and fire up Congressional rhetoric.

Republican critics, who argue for a repeat of the Iraq "surge" in Afghanistan, now attack the president for undue delays in responding to General McChrystal's request for more troops. In their view the drawn out review will snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Indeed, one of the key drawbacks of the multiple-advocacy decision-making approach is delay -- or in the words of former Vice President Cheney, "dithering" - which, can be interpreted as weakness. Ironically, the same voices that now oppose disengagement because it will lead the world to perceive the U.S. as "weak" were those who not long ago claimed that it doesn't matter what the rest of the world thinks.

Democratic critics turn the Republican arguments on their head. They recommend a sharply curtailed over-all mission, troop withdrawals, and targeted high-tech attacks on Taliban and Al- Qaeda leaders. They keep reminding the public that the Afghan war is now 8 years old, that the Afghan regime is riddled with corruption and cronyism while large portions of the countryside are Taliban-controlled. The analogies with Vietnam are again dominating their rhetoric. Why, their argument goes, should the U.S. and NATO pour good money and expend an increasing number of lives into a "quagmire" with at best uncertain consequences. And, they argue, if the historic experience of foreign attempts to "tame" Afghanistan is any guide, the prognosis for the U.S. and the West is dire indeed. As they see it, just as in Vietnam, the central government supported by foreign troops is a corrupt enemy of the people in tribal villages and regions.

But Afghanistan is not Iraq in terms of terrain, transportation and communication grids, history or culture. It is much more complex, with regions and villages controlled by local chieftains who have promoted and protected their interests. If NATO and American troops are perceived as an "occupying army" by Afghans in these areas, then the amount of force needed may be even greater than the numbers requested by Mc Chrystal.

Most Afghans probably do not want to live under Taliban rule. Yet neither do they want to be occupied by foreign troops. While some Americans may think that Afghanistan can become a multiethnic and multireligious country that mirrors the US, they forget it took hundreds of years for Americans to achieve this.

Decision-making theory has no easy answers to questions of speed versus efficiency in America's responses to challenges. Graham Allison and others have argued that crisis conditions (defined in terms of imminent threat, limited time in which to respond, and total surprise) do not offer presidents the luxury of extra time to review alternative proposals and make systematic, rational choices. But the current Afghanistan conundrum is not an urgent crisis, while it is a strategic decision with long-range consequences.

So the truly important outcome of the Afghan review must be a crisp statement of American (and to a considerable extent, Western) strategic interests in Central and South Asia.

The threat posed by Al-Qaeda is no longer based in Afghanistan, but more broadly spread and extremely hard to either locate or exterminate. How does the U.S. distinguish between combating Al-Qaeda and the mission in Afghanistan?

Brutal and anachronistic though the Taliban are, they do not pose a threat to the U.S. and its allies. To what extent should the U.S. (and NATO) assume responsibility for modernizing a traditional tribal society or "nation-building" in an area that has never really been a nation? If tribal and internal conflict degenerate into civil war, should the U.S. and NATO attempt to stabilize and pacify as they did in the Balkans? Is the drug trade, which appears to finance much terrorist activity as well as Afghani corruption, a more fundamental threat than the Taliban?

What is the role of Afghanistan in regional stability? Will an unstable or a Taliban-dominated state be a safe haven for others who wish to destabilize Pakistan or foment new conflict in Iraq?

'The answers to these questions are far more important in the long run and will set the context for the short-term response to General McChrystal's request. After all, the use of military force is an instrument of policy, not a policy. The Afghan review must clearly define strategic interests in the region. By using a multiple advocacy process and giving it time to play out, the President seems to understand that - even though it lays him open to attacks from both right and left at home.