[House Hearing, 111 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office]
[H.A.S.C. No. 111-103]
AFGHANISTAN AND IRAQ: PERSPECTIVES ON U.S. STRATEGY, PART 1
__________
HEARING
BEFORE THE
OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
HEARING HELD
OCTOBER 22, 2009
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OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
VIC SNYDER, Arkansas, Chairman
JOHN SPRATT, South Carolina ROB WITTMAN, Virginia
LORETTA SANCHEZ, California WALTER B. JONES, North Carolina
SUSAN A. DAVIS, California MIKE ROGERS, Alabama
JIM COOPER, Tennessee TRENT FRANKS, Arizona
JOE SESTAK, Pennsylvania CATHY McMORRIS RODGERS, Washington
GLENN NYE, Virginia DOUG LAMBORN, Colorado
CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania
Drew Walter, Professional Staff Member
Thomas Hawley, Professional Staff Member
Trey Howard, Staff Assistant
C O N T E N T S
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CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF HEARINGS
2009
Page
Hearing:
Thursday, October 22, 2009, Afghanistan and Iraq: Perspectives on
U.S. Strategy, Part 1.......................................... 1
Appendix:
Thursday, October 22, 2009....................................... 31
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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 22, 2009
AFGHANISTAN AND IRAQ: PERSPECTIVES ON U.S. STRATEGY, PART 1
STATEMENTS PRESENTED BY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Snyder, Hon. Vic, a Representative from Arkansas, Chairman,
Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee...................... 1
Wittman, Hon. Rob, a Representative from Virginia, Ranking
Member, Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee.............. 1
WITNESSES
Barno, Lt. Gen. David, USA (Ret.), Director, Near East South Asia
Center for Strategic Studies, National Defense University...... 4
Cole, Beth Ellen, Senior Program Officer, Center for Post-
Conflict Peace and Stability Operations, United States
Institute of Peace............................................. 7
McCaffrey, Gen. Barry, USA (Ret.), President, BR McCaffrey
Associates, LLC................................................ 2
Waldman, Matthew, Fellow, Carr Center for Human Rights, Kennedy
School of Government, Harvard University....................... 9
APPENDIX
Prepared Statements:
Barno, Lt. Gen. David........................................ 47
Cole, Beth Ellen............................................. 53
McCaffrey, Gen. Barry........................................ 41
Waldman, Matthew............................................. 64
Wittman, Hon. Rob............................................ 35
Documents Submitted for the Record:
[There were no Documents submitted.]
Witness Responses to Questions Asked During the Hearing:
[There were no Questions submitted during the hearing.]
Questions Submitted by Members Post Hearing:
[There were no Questions submitted post hearing.]
AFGHANISTAN AND IRAQ: PERSPECTIVES ON U.S. STRATEGY, PART 1
----------
House of Representatives,
Committee on Armed Services,
Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee,
Washington, DC, Thursday, October 22, 2009.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 2:00 p.m., in
room HVC-210, Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Vic Snyder (chairman
of the subcommittee) presiding.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. VIC SNYDER, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM
ARKANSAS, CHAIRMAN, OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
Dr. Snyder. The hearing will come to order.
I actually have a wonderfully prepared written statement,
but I think we know why we are here. We are going to talk about
foreign policy and national security objectives primarily in
Afghanistan, but also as it relates to Iraq.
I will defer now to Mr. Wittman.
STATEMENT OF HON. ROB WITTMAN, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM VIRGINIA,
RANKING MEMBER, OVERSIGHT AND INVESTIGATIONS SUBCOMMITTEE
Mr. Wittman. Mr. Chairman, in that spirit, I have a written
statement that I will submit for the record. In the interest of
time, we will go ahead and dispense with my opening statement.
I thank the panelists for joining us today. We appreciate
your efforts. We know this is a very timely and important
issue, and we look forward to hearing your thoughts and ideas
on the current state of affairs, and where we need to go, and
how we can best get there. Thanks.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Wittman can be found in the
Appendix on page 35.]
Dr. Snyder. Our witnesses today are General Barry
McCaffrey, Retired, U.S. Army; Lieutenant General David Barno,
Retired, from the U.S. Army; Beth Ellen Cole, Senior Program
Officer, Center for Post-Conflict Peace and Stability
Operations, United States Institute for Peace; and Mr. Matthew
Waldman, Carr Center for Human Rights at the Kennedy School of
Government at Harvard.
General McCaffrey, we will begin with you.
STATEMENT OF GEN. BARRY MCCAFFREY, USA (RET.), PRESIDENT, BR
MCCAFFREY ASSOCIATES, LLC
General McCaffrey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Mr. Wittman,
and members of the committee, for including me in a very
distinguished panel. I know that you will enter our statements
into the record.
Dr. Snyder. Without objection, they will all be made part
of the record.
General McCaffrey. I ran through several iterations on
this. I was trying to end up with probably less a prescription
than the questions that the committee and the administration
has to ask themselves as they try and sort out the way ahead,
and I have also given you some other material relating to the
platform that I use as an adjunct professor up at West Point to
try and hopefully add to the debate with informed, objective,
and nonpartisan insights.
A couple of quick, brief comments, not to reiterate what I
put in my statement. Number one, what is the situation in
Afghanistan? It seems to me, I have known General McChrystal
since he was a lieutenant colonel, Petraeus since he was a
cadet. It is rare that I would make this statement: I think
these two are probably the most talented, determined people we
have had in uniform in many ways since World War II.
McChrystal, as you know, has run a parallel universe, Joint
Special Operations Command (JSOC), for 5 years. Publicly we
don't talk too much about that effort, except I have
characterized them as basically the most dangerous people on
the face of the Earth. We picked him. He listened to the
President's March strategy. He was a student of the interagency
process conducted January through March. The incumbent military
Joint Commander, North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO),
Commander Dave McKiernan, was asked to step off his
responsibilities. We put McChrystal on the ground, and
unsurprisingly he has made what I would strongly underscore is
a nonpolitical assessment of the situation.
Given the counterinsurgency strategy, and given the threat
situation on the ground, he has tried to come up with options
for the Commander in Chief. The only criticism I might level at
his analysis and recommendations is, and I sort of go to the
bottom line, it is always inappropriate to use metaphors that
are one wavelength off the subject, but I frequently tell
people that I learned in combat as a rifle company commander
that when under fire, you have three options. Two of them are
okay, and one of them is always wrong. The one that is always
wrong is hunker down under fire and hope something else
changes. The other two options are break contact and move back,
think through it and do something new. And the third option is
attack.
I think McChrystal has said, I heard your strategy
formulation, I know what you are trying to achieve, and he
banded his resource options to include a high end of 40,000 to
60,000 additional troops.
Personally I would argue if we were going to reinforce for
success, it would obviously not just be military, but the
military component of it would be more likely to be 100,000
troops than 40,000, obviously with a concomitant increase in
resources for road building and repair the agricultural system
and to get contractors in, probably since United States Agency
for International Aid (USAID) has not been rebuilt since
Vietnam, to try to dramatically change the situation. But
personally I don't think that is politically feasible.
Therefore, I think his analysis is probably on the downside.
I also think, and several I am sure will make the same
point, if this was an academic exercise talking theoretical
options, you can make a decent argument that we shouldn't be in
Afghanistan with 68,000 U.S., about to reinforce with 40,000
NATO allies, that we had other strategic options, but we don't.
We are there now, and so the consequences of our actions in the
coming 180 days will be immediate. They will have an impact not
just on the Afghans and our Pakistani neighbors. And many of us
will argue there are two vital national security issues at
stake in the United States in the coming five years, and one is
Saudi Arabia, and the other is Pakistan for a completely
different calculus, political and economic calculus.
But the impact of a strategic option that said let us
downsize, let us do over-the-horizon counterterrorism, which, I
might add, from a military and an intelligence viewpoint is
sort of a silly option, but if we had that option, if we
weren't where we are now, it would be a reasonable thing to
consider. So I don't think that we can downsize either.
The end result of all of this is to some extent this is an
inside-the-Beltway political debate we are taking part in with
an attentive U.S. public that is focused on the economic
recession, focused on immigration, focused on Social Security
reform, and not too keen about a major, decade-long effort in
Afghanistan. Too bad.
Sort of a final comment. As we look at the situation on the
ground, I would give great weight--I have known all of these
actors. Our U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan, Anne Patterson,
probably one of the top three Foreign Service officers I have
ever met in my life, enormously experienced, zero ego, common
sense, tremendous access, a voice that will help us understand
and interpret what the Pakistanis are going through. I will be
in country here in another few weeks, and I will again see
General Kiyani, and I will go take a look at the frontier
regions, but I would sort of suggest that we give great weight
to our own interpretation of what we are seeing on the ground.
She is absolutely first rate, as is the agency on the ground in
Pakistan.
Karl Eikenberry, now the U.S. Ambassador in Afghanistan,
well known to all of you, one of the few, besides Dave Barno,
military intellectuals we tolerated in the U.S. Army over the
years. He has a personal sense of affection and commitment to
the Afghan people, but I don't think he has ever lost his
objectivity and his understanding that he is serving U.S.
national foreign policy interests. Again, I think his
viewpoints ought to be given special understanding and great
weight.
Finally, one thing I must congratulate the Administration
on. One of the most bizarre and shameful periods in U.S.
foreign policy history was after the intervention in Iraq,
which I personally thought was the right thing to do, was to
take down Saddam at the time. I remember watching Secretary
Rumsfeld on television just in disbelief where he proudly said
he had never been asked about his viewpoint on military
intervention in Iraq, nor had he proffered one. And others in
the government said the same thing.
I think the notion that this administration of ours is
deliberately walking through the options if nothing else is a
very sound signal within the administration that when they
reach a conclusion, they own it collectively. It is not just
the political calculus of the President of the United States,
but the reasoned thinking of his most senior people: Secretary
Bob Gates and Secretary Hillary Clinton and others I have
tremendous respect for.
On that note, let me just leave those thoughts on the
table, and I look forward to responding on your own interests.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you, General McCaffrey. You will have to
come back and see us after you get back from your next trip.
[The prepared statement of General McCaffrey can be found
in the Appendix on page 41.]
Dr. Snyder. General Barno, I should have pointed out that
you are the Director of the Near East South Asia Center for
Strategic Studies at the National Defense University (NDU). We
appreciate your being here, and you are recognized.
STATEMENT OF LT. GEN. DAVID BARNO, USA (RET.), DIRECTOR, NEAR
EAST SOUTH ASIA CENTER FOR STRATEGIC STUDIES, NATIONAL DEFENSE
UNIVERSITY
General Barno. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member
Wittman. Thanks for inviting me back again to the subcommittee
on a topic near and dear to my heart, having spent 19 months
out there as the overall Coalition Commander from 2003 to 2005.
As many of you know, I had my youngest son out there serving in
the 101st Airborne Division just back in January of this year.
It is still an arena that I spend a significant amount of time
on, given my job at NDU, and also one that I have a personal
commitment to.
Today's views, despite my government affiliation, are my
own personal views. I would like to make that point up front.
I think one of the challenges that we face today with
regard to our efforts in Afghanistan is what I would
characterize as a crisis of confidence in the United States and
among our NATO allies at this particular juncture. In the
aftermath of a very deeply flawed Afghan election which was set
in the context of rising American and NATO casualties over this
summer, the U.S. has some significant challenges in front of
us, and I want to talk to at least four of those here today.
I believe, like General McCaffrey, that General
McChrystal's recent assessment was a very sound one, very
thorough, and deserves a very careful read, and in some ways,
however, has fueled this debate. Perhaps in the broader scheme
of things, to look at where we are and where we are going, that
is appropriate.
I would start by asking the question of what, on a
strategic level--and I want to take this up away from the
number of troops for most of my remarks and talk about where we
are going. The fundamental question we have to ask is what is
the end game for the United States and the region? Where are we
going? What is our ultimate objective?
Until we can clearly answer this question, I think, to
ourselves, to our friends in the region, to our allies in NATO,
then we have a problem with having a sound policy. If we don't
have a clear definition of success and, in my judgment, worse
yet, if we signal that success equals exit and our ultimate
goal is exit, I think that we have created an unsound strategy
and one that undercuts our actual objectives in the region.
That is a bit of a paradox because most Americans, my cousins
who are farmers in northern Pennsylvania, my aunts and uncles
of retirement age, don't fully understand why we are in
Afghanistan, and I think we have to be clear about that.
I also think that the fundamental flaw in the American
approach to both Afghanistan and Pakistan lies in the lack of
confidence in the region in American staying power. When I left
Afghanistan in May of 2005, the biggest concern I had was the
lack of the belief among our friends there that we were in this
to succeed, and we would be in it for as long as it took to
win. I think this uncertainty in the region, for example,
drives our friends, the Pakistanis, to judge many of their
decisions based upon how will this decision look the day after
America leaves; what position will it put us in for the ensuing
conflict that is it certain to break out at that point in time.
I think we have to confront these fears as we think about
and talk about our policy and our goals and objectives in the
region.
I would cite four challenges in front of us as we now have
gone through this very fractious election, and we are on the
verge of some tough decisions about future troop strength.
The first challenge is to understand and defeat the Taliban
strategy; not simply defeat the Taliban, not simply kill more
Taliban, but to understand their strategy and have a plan that
defeats their strategy.
In simple terms, their strategy is ``run out the clock.''
If this were a football game, they believe they are in the
fourth quarter, they are ahead on the scoreboard, they are
controlling the football, and they are going to run out the
clock. They will be the last man on the field when the game is
over. We have to take that into account as we think about and
we talk about our strategy on the road ahead.
Many of our efforts at home inadvertently call into
question the very purpose and the strength of our resolve in
Afghanistan. This feeds directly into the Taliban strategy. The
more we talk about exit as our goal, the more we reinforce what
the Taliban are telling the people of Afghanistan, in their
terms: ``the Americans have all of the wristwatches, but we
have all the time. We, the Taliban, will be here when the
Americans are gone.'' So that is challenge number one.
Number two is to rebuild the trust and help the Afghan
Government; the next version of that, rebuild trust between
their government and their people. That trust has been badly
fractured over the last three or four years in Afghanistan. I
was there during the halcyon days after the first election of
President Karzai in 2004 and 2005. There was immense hope and
optimism and positive feelings there. Much of that has been
lost. Much of that trust has been squandered. I think we have
to focus our diplomatic efforts in Kabul on helping to shape
and reform this next government to be one that is viewed as
noncorrupt as opposed to having corruption as its salient
feature. Most of all, we have to help that work at the local
level. Our legitimacy is tied to this government. We have to be
able to see this government become a better government than the
one we have supported over the last three years.
Third is to achieve unity of effort. That was in some ways
the bane of our existence in the last three years, and bringing
NATO into Afghanistan, for all of the goodness that brought,
really brought a lot of dissolution of unity of effort that we
had under a more centralized command before. Much of that is
being addressed on the military side, but I think we have to be
careful that as we bring in new capabilities there, we bring in
as many civilian capabilities to meet the need there as we do
on the military side, and that that includes the effects at the
local level. If we are going to bring 1,000 new civilians into
Afghanistan by the end of the year, those have got to be out at
the local level primarily, not simply in Kabul. And I think
there has to be a fused effort between the Afghan Government,
its security forces, the international military coalition, and
the international civil forces all the way down to the local
effort to make things work for individual Afghans.
Finally, I think we have to reframe the narrative here at
home. The rationale for us staying and winning in Afghanistan
has become muddled here in the United States, out in your
districts and across the country. That is true in Europe as
well; perhaps worse there. Our national leaders have to clearly
articulate our goals, our end game, why we are in Afghanistan,
and what the costs of failure in Afghanistan are, which are
extraordinarily serious for us.
So the fundamental question may end up being: Do we stay or
do we go? Do we invest and endure, as my friend Ashley Tellis
here at Carnegie likes to talk about, or do we simply declare
success and leave and then have to reengage again, reinvade the
country again, as some pundits have suggested already? That, I
think, is a choice fraught with great danger.
I would close by saying that I think success or failure in
Afghanistan will set the terms of our involvement in that
region, not just Central Asia, but South Asia, India, Pakistan,
a very growing and important region for the United States, for
the next generation. Will our credibility suffer a fatal blow
among our friends out there? Will the NATO alliance survive a
defeat and withdrawal from Afghanistan? Will we see another 9/
11 because once again we have walked away from Afghanistan, as
we did after the defeat of the Soviets at the end of the 1980s?
Will our adversaries, the extremists, be catalyzed both in
the region and globally by our departure? And does this victory
reenergize a birth of this movement of extremism that many see
as waning today?
So I would say short-term gains need to be avoided here,
and we have to take a long, strategic view of the cost in blood
and treasure versus the downsides of failure. This may be the
most important national security decision we see here in the
next several years.
Thank you.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you, General.
[The prepared statement of General Barno can be found in
the Appendix on page 47.]
Dr. Snyder. Ms. Cole.
STATEMENT OF BETH ELLEN COLE, SENIOR PROGRAM OFFICER, CENTER
FOR POST-CONFLICT PEACE AND STABILITY OPERATIONS, UNITED STATES
INSTITUTE OF PEACE
Ms. Cole. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, and members of the
committee, I thank you for the opportunity to offer my personal
views today. I am Beth Cole. I am a senior program officer in
the Center for Peace and Stability Operations at the U.S.
Institute of Peace (USIP), and in that capacity over the past
few years, I have been directing a multiyear effort to produce
civilian doctrine for stabilization and reconstruction
missions. I have been working on these missions for about 15
years before U.S. troops crossed the River Sava to stabilize
Bosnia.
As you well know, the military is equipped with a very
complex system, with doctrine, lessons learned, planning,
training, education, and deployment. This complex system allows
the President to time and time again look to the military
leaders for guidance and for how to implement success on the
ground.
The civil side of the United States Government has no
doctrine, and the elements of this system are now just
emerging. They are extremely nascent. The system starts with
strategic doctrine that tells us what we are trying to achieve
in these missions.
USIP, with its Army partners at the Combined Army Center at
Fort Leavenworth, have just released the first strategic
doctrine for civilians on reconstruction and stabilization
missions. It follows on the U.S. Army Stability Operations
Field Manual that was published a year ago under the leadership
of Lieutenant General Bill Caldwell, who now has been nominated
to go out to Afghanistan. These manuals share a common face
because they are companions. The Guiding Principles fills the
civilian gap. This manual offers a shared strategic framework
from decades, four or five decades, of conducting these types
of operations. This has been vetted by United States Government
agencies, by the United Nations (U.N.), by NATO, by the
European Union (EU), by nongovernmental organizations, and many
others.
In every war-torn country over the past five or six
decades, we have strived for five core end states: a safe and
secure environment; the rule of law; stable governance; a
sustainable economy; and some minimum standards for social
well-being. A set of 22 necessary conditions have been
identified in this manual that we should meet to achieve these
end states. These are shared minimum standards, much like the
humanitarian community has minimum standards for humanitarian
relief and assistance. They were developed on the basis of a
comprehensive review of some 500 core doctrinal documents from
across the institutions that have engaged in these missions.
Of these 22 conditions, I recommend prioritizing eight for
Afghanistan. The first is the primacy of politics, the need to
reach political settlements, not just at the national level
where the current crisis resides, but at regional and local
levels as well. We must redouble our efforts to separate
reconcilable insurgents from those who will not forsake
violence.
Second, we cannot achieve success without security.
Physical security for the population, their government centers,
education, health, economic centers will require that
international forces work closely with Afghan local forces to
protect the population.
Third, we must prioritize territorial security by
mitigating the threats that occur along the Afghanistan-
Pakistan border. Dealing with that border will require a higher
level of engagement between the Afghanistan and Pakistan
Governments, as well as elements of civil society that reside
along that border.
Fourth, we must redouble our efforts to achieve a
legitimate monopoly over the means of violence, something
General McChrystal is very focused on. The objective is not
only to train and equip police and military forces, but to
enhance the organizational development and professional
leadership of those forces.
Fifth, we need to continue to prioritize the identification
and disruption of finance networks, as difficult as that may
be, of the insurgents, organized crime and terrorist
organizations fueling the fires in Afghanistan. This means
shutting down foreign financing and disrupting the reliance on
the narcotic trade and other illicit activities.
Six, improving access to justice for the population will
require a bolstering and rebuilding the informal mechanisms for
dispute resolutions that Afghanistans have long employed, that
the insurgents have now largely replaced, and supporting the
traditional justice system that has a justice continuum from
police to prosecutors to judges to corrections.
Seven, we must build the capacity of the government to
deliver essential services to the population and to be seen as
the deliverer of those essential services. This is necessary to
separate the population from the insurgents who delegitimize
the government daily by providing those services themselves.
Eight, stewardship of state resources means that essential
services must be delivered by an accountable government.
Prioritizing support now for subnational institutions of
government, both informal and formal, will be key to ensuring
an entry point for those essential services and to boosting
this lack of confidence that the population has in any form of
governance.
Most of these are inherently civilian tasks. We have the
skills in the United States Government to deliver that
assistance, not just among our military forces. We now have a
civil-military plan in Afghanistan, and we are building a
civil-military structure from every level, from district up to
the regional commands. So we have a chance right now to put the
hard lessons that we have learned over the past eight years not
only in Afghanistan but also in Iraq to work in Afghanistan.
I look forward to your questions. Thank you.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you, Ms. Cole.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Cole can be found in the
Appendix on page 53.]
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Waldman.
STATEMENT OF MATTHEW WALDMAN, FELLOW, CARR CENTER FOR HUMAN
RIGHTS, KENNEDY SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT, HARVARD UNIVERSITY
Mr. Waldman. Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Wittman, and
members of the committee, thank you, first of all, for this
opportunity to be here today.
If I may, I will make some remarks about why I think we are
in the current difficulties that we are facing today in
Afghanistan, and some reflections on the approach that may
deliver better results going forward.
I think that it is clear that the international approach
after 2001 was manifestly insufficient, given the scale of
devastation that was caused over two decades of war, and that
it was founded on corruption. In other words, it compounded the
authority of the warlords and local strongmen. I think it is
clear international aid has been in many ways ineffective. It
has been fragmented, supply-driven, inefficient, and not
responding sufficiently well to Afghan needs and preferences.
I think also another problem with the international
approach has been that international military forces have
tended to prioritize the elimination of insurgents and winning
hearts and minds through assistance-related projects.
Now, I would submit that both of these objectives are
largely futile. Why is this? Well, I think, first of all, we
have to consider the context, the history of external
interference in Afghanistan; their proud independence,
conservatism, and mistrust of foreign forces. Consider also the
large population of unemployed young men with families to feed.
The international military are perceived as using excessive
force through airstrikes and raids, and are perceived as
propping up a regime that is seen as corrupt and unjust.
If you also consider the insurgent propaganda and their
systematic use of terror and intimidation against Afghans, it
is clear that the Afghan people, while they may not be
enthusiastic for the Taliban, are facing no credible
alternative.
When we see the insurgents using sanctuary and support from
inside Pakistan, and they appear to be winning, it is
understandable that Afghans, for reasons of personal safety,
are reluctant to oppose the insurgents.
I think the focus of Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs)
on militarized development doesn't achieve what it is intended
to achieve. It doesn't meet core development objectives.
Moreover, it is precisely the heavy involvement of the
military in civilian affairs that is substantiating the Taliban
campaign, which is framed as resistance to foreign forces. So
thus, the military and the Afghan Government are caught in a
mutually detrimental relationship in which both sides lose
credibility, the military by association with a corrupt
government, and the government by association with the foreign
military.
Now, I think General McChrystal's report is very
insightful, and I think he is right about the importance of
legitimacy and the population security; however, I think we
have got to realize that international military forces have a
limited capability to address some of these issues. First of
all, building Afghan national security forces is an extremely
long-term endeavor, and we know there are major problems with
the police force. Of course, they are the most critical
elements of a counterinsurgency campaign.
Also, there is danger in the integrated--the emphasis on an
integrated approach in which international forces increasingly
engage with Afghan civilians. I think this plays into insurgent
hands. I think it attributes unrealistic capabilities to
soldiers. I think it is burdening them, perhaps, with
responsibilities that they cannot meet. And I think it doesn't
address the key and the core issues.
I would suggest that what is required is a greater civil-
military delineation, greater political efforts that lie
outside of the core competency of the military. And that is the
fundamental point, that this is a political problem. In fact,
insurgency is not itself a disease, but the symptom of a deeper
disorder; namely, a government that is perceived as
illegitimate, self-serving, and that has excluded certain
groups and communities based on various reasons such as tribal
affiliations, ethnicity, and other factors. It demands a
response that is political. It has got to be indigenous,
inclusive, and address injustices and legitimate grievances.
Just some brief remarks about how we might change the
strategy going forward to deliver better results, and I think
there are probably five points.
Firstly, we should acknowledge the limits of outsiders in
effecting change in Afghanistan, given the enormous complexity
and the scale of the challenges. But what we should do is
empower Afghans to address these challenges; in other words,
focus on capabilities and building robust institutions, not
just delivering results.
Secondly, empathize with Afghans. I think if we do
effectively empathize, as I said, considering the context, the
history, the culture of Afghanistan, it leads to the conclusion
that we should reduce foreign military involvement in civilian
affairs and prioritize interventions which reflect Afghan
interests and preferences.
Thirdly, after determining what is possible, develop
strategies that fit the purpose, devote sufficient resources
and political will for accomplishment. Half measures, whether
it is police reform, governance development, are likely to do
more harm than good. We need to recognize the need for regional
political strategy, too.
Fourth, address obvious flaws in aid delivery. It
astonishes me that more has not been done to address very
rudimentary problems in the system of aid delivery, such as the
widespread use of contractors and consultants, the parallel
mechanisms, and the lack of transparency.
Finally, I think, as some of the panelists here suggested
early on, we should not expect swift results. This is an
incremental progress. It requires realism combined with long-
term commitment and a genuine political resolve.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you, Mr. Waldman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Waldman can be found in the
Appendix on page 64.]
Dr. Snyder. We will put ourselves on the five-minute clock
here. I will ask one question, and then we will go to Mr.
Wittman.
I think General Barno discussed this some in his statement,
and I asked this a week or two ago in the full committee
hearing on Afghanistan. When we made the commitment and gave
President Bush the authorization in mid-September of 2001 for
military force, we all knew what that was going to mean with
regard to Afghanistan, and some pretty strong statements were
made about following through after a military operation. What
is our moral responsibility to the Afghan people in all of
this?
General McCaffrey, we will begin with you.
General McCaffrey. Well, one is always tempted to go back
to former Secretary Powell's statement that if you break it,
you own it. I must admit, I have never entirely bought that
policy. I think there are points in time in foreign policy
where we intervene for our own purpose and don't pick up the
follow-on implied responsibility of turning the place into
Switzerland.
Nonetheless, here we are 600 miles from the sea, 32 million
Afghans, this giant, wild country, much of it rooted in the
14th century. We have made promises, explicit and implied, and
something that greatly bothers me in the current debate, the
notion that we are there and can't stay unless we appreciate
the nature of the chief of state bothers me. We are there for
U.S. national interest reasons, not because Karzai is corrupt,
good, bad, or whatever.
But there is no question in my mind as we look at the
situation now, we have told the region, our NATO partners and
the Afghan people, we are going to try to create a situation
where you won't be an international pariah, where your
agricultural system and your road network and the fundamentals
of health care will work, and we will then withdraw and
increasingly turn this operation over to you. I think there is
a moral responsibility at this point. It would be an
unbelievable disaster in the short run, meaning 10 years or
less, if we withdrew and left the population to the tender
mercies of Taliban retribution.
General Barno. I think one of the unique aspects of
Afghanistan is that we know what failure would look like. We
know what Taliban rule looks like. We know what it means for
women. There are six million children going to school today.
About a third of those are Afghan girls. There were zero during
the time of the Taliban. We know what it means for justice. We
watch people be beheaded in soccer stadiums for offenses that
were modest by Western standards. We watched the Bamyan Buddhas
be destroyed by the Taliban, some cultural artifacts that date
back centuries.
I always felt during my time in Afghanistan that that
inoculated the Afghan people against the Taliban's return.
There is very little interest to no interest across Afghanistan
to see the Taliban come back. We know exactly and explicitly
what the outcome is going to look like should that occur.
Moreover, those who aligned with us, those who sided with
us and are working with us, from Kabul all the way down to the
smallest village out there, are going to pay that price. So we
have a fairly clear picture in front of us of what the
downsides of withdrawal and what the downsides of failure to
achieve our objectives look like, and we have to keep that
crystal clear in our minds.
Ms. Cole. In 2001, whether or not we were trying to fulfill
a moral responsibility or a national security responsibility,
today the facts on the ground suggest that people, Afghans,
nongovernmental organizations, many of whom are manned by U.S.
nationals, and our civilians on the ground are now at great
risk. They have chosen, by aligning themselves with us in this
fight against the Taliban and others in Afghanistan, to choose
a side. So we have moral responsibility now to carry out at
least some minimum standards, which I have tried to lay out
here today, for how the Afghan Government itself can protect
its population in the future. But we have a lot of exposed
people on the ground right now.
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Waldman.
Mr. Waldman. Well, I agree with some of the remarks that
have already been made. I think that at the time of the
intervention, the fact that it did take place as it did and the
promises that were made were quite extensive to the Afghan
people, and I think there is a duty on those nations who were
involved in that intervention to seek to meet those
expectations. And I think it is clear that in many respects we
are failing to do so, and in some very obvious ways.
I mean, it astonishes me that there is so little
transparency in terms of the delivery of international aid. It
is very difficult to critique it and identify what is going
wrong and then put it right. It is an elementary problem that
could be solved if there was sufficient political will.
I think there is a moral responsibility to try to improve
the lives of Afghans to the extent that it is possible, given
the widespread poverty and hardship that many Afghans face, but
it doesn't seem to me that we are taking the elementary steps
to do that.
On a wider level, I think it is clear that we need to
address the political problems, and I think the approach of the
international community has supported a system that thrives on
patronage, on impunity, on nepotism and corruption, and it is
our duty to try to address some of those problems. Of course,
there are limits as to what we can do. We should be clear and
realistic about what we can achieve, focus on those areas, and
show genuine commitment to improve the situation.
Dr. Snyder. General McCaffrey, if I understand your point,
and I think I agree with it, which is we had every right to
take out the Taliban and al Qaeda and then walk away
militarily; but we made very strong statements that we would do
a lot of rebuilding. We had every right to break al Qaeda and
the Taliban in Afghanistan, if I understood your point, but it
was very clear to a lot of us in those early days that we went
far beyond that in terms of rebuilding the country, and I think
that is where the moral responsibility comes from.
General McCaffrey. Exactly, as well as other tiered
responsibilities we have explicitly to NATO. Personally, I
would argue it would probably be the end of NATO if we
unilaterally and precipitously changed this strategy, never
mind its impact on Pakistan.
But at the people level, it still makes me wince every time
I hear a rifle platoon leader, Marine Corps, U.S. Army,
promising the locals we will be there for them to establish
continuing security. Clearly they are not in a position to make
that kind of compact, and neither is the military commander on
the ground or the U.S. Ambassador. That is the job of this
august body and the Administration. That is where we are: Will
we honor our commitments, yes or no?
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Wittman for five minutes.
Mr. Wittman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I want to thank the panelists for joining us today.
Is a stable Afghanistan critical to U.S. interests, and in
that context, is it also critical to Pakistan security
interests? And if so, is the strategy laid out of a full
counterinsurgency effort by General McChrystal the right way to
go to secure stability in Afghanistan? And how does that relate
to securing the future interest of Pakistan?
General McCaffrey. You know, I think that is the most
painful question that you can pose in this debate. I think one
can make a sound argument that Afghanistan is not a vital U.S.
national security interest. If you start from where we are now,
and you look at the secondary and tertiary effects of
withdrawal, particularly Pakistan, and our credibility in much
of the Muslim world, certainly to include the Saudis, you can
get closer to it, but at the end of the day, I can remember
being a lieutenant colonel at the U.S. Army War College that
involved analysis of whether one should ever intervene in
northwestern Afghanistan and Pakistan, and I reached the
concluding that axiom one for the United States Army is: Don't
carry out any military operations where you can't walk down to
the sea and a Navy ship. We are a long way from the coast. We
have to get there through a fragmented, incoherent Pakistan. At
the end of the day, we are looking at 32 million of the most-
suffering people on the face of the Earth who have nothing that
is vital to our economy, political system, social order, nor
are they a central or long-standing ally. We are where we are.
But I do believe the question you posed is the one the
American people are going to ask themselves: If our current
burn rate is $5 billion a month, if it will go to $10 billion a
month by next summer, which assuredly it will, if we are going
to start losing 1,000 killed and wounded a month--and, like
General Barno, my son just came out of combat in Afghanistan a
year ago--then you have asked a legitimate question which we
have to address.
Mr. Wittman. Mr. Barno.
General Barno. It is a very tough question. And again, to
harp back to General McCaffrey's initial comments, if we were
standing on the high ground in Kabul in December 2001 before we
had made commitments, we would probably look at this in
different ways and have different choices and options. Those
second- and third-order effects on Pakistan, on NATO, on our
commitments in the region would not be there yet. We might have
made different choices then, but we are where we are today.
I do think there is a growing recognition, in retrospect,
that this region, Afghanistan and Pakistan in particular--and
we should talk about how this plays in India, but Afghanistan
and Pakistan in particular-- instability in this region is
going to cause some very serious trouble for the United States
down the road.
Is the region's stability critical to the United States, is
it a vital national interest? I think it approaches that
because of the prospects for, once again, the region becoming a
hotbed of Islamic terrorism potentially that has some access to
nuclear weapons. That is a worst-case scenario, but it is not
an impossible scenario by any stretch of the imagination.
So we are now committed. We are seen with our major
military alliance, NATO, as having a commitment to see this
through to success. There is great damage that is possible
there if we fail, but there is also the tremendous risk if this
part of the region goes unstable, what does that mean to the
national security interest of the United States. For that
reason alone I think this may be a vital decision for us.
Ms. Cole. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime
reported this month that five times as many civilians among
NATO nations are being killed as the number of casualties that
we have taken in Afghanistan among coalition forces. If we
think about a narco-state with al Qaeda sitting over on the
other side of the border in Pakistan, I think that answers the
question. I don't think we can afford to have an unstable
Afghanistan in a very, very bad neighborhood supplying 92
percent of the world's opium.
I also think that it is useful to take a step back and ask
ourselves--because we constantly seem to forget that five
decades of these missions have shown us that we can stabilize
nations: Cambodia, El Salvador, Sierra Leone, Rwanda--many,
many places that have been completely torn apart and shattered
where there have been insurgents involved and al Qaeda and
other terror cells involved, we have managed to stabilize. We
can do it again. It is going to take a lot of effort and time,
as everyone said here, but it is not a lost cause.
Mr. Waldman. Congressman, I agree with the other panelists.
There are questions about the extent to which Islamic
terrorists may or may not operate inside Afghanistan, given the
fact that they are largely operating in northwest Pakistan.
As for the stability of the region, clearly that is in
America's national security interests. I think the fragility of
the Pakistani regime can sometimes be overexaggerated, and they
have shown in the past the ability to retain fairly sturdy
state institutions and cope with insurgencies despite obvious
difficulties in doing so. I don't believe that the Pakistani
state is in danger of collapse.
If I may, I would just respond to a question about whether
counterinsurgency is a correct response in Afghanistan. I think
counterinsurgency is the correct response, but whether we have
the design right and whether we have the tools for its
implementation is another question. I would submit the answer
to that is no. Why do I say that? Well, first of all, I think
it assumes that soldiers, American soldiers, have a capability
and a wide range of technical sectors beyond what they are
trained for. I think it assumes if you deliver rapid material
progress in rural areas in Afghanistan, then you will win the
hearts and minds of local people. As I said earlier, I don't
think that is the case.
I think, secondly, it assumes a vast and detailed knowledge
by soldiers of Afghan society. And actually the demands placed
on soldiers in the counterinsurgency manual are enormous and
are rarely met even by civilian workers, who stay there for
many years and speak the languages. The manual speaks about
armed social work. The real question is the extent to which
this is possible and the extent to which this promotes
stability at the local level, and actually, you know, deals
with the insurgents.
Finally, I think it also assumes that greater civil-
military integration is possible and delivers results, and I
think it is clear that the insurgents thrive on this overlap.
This is good news for them because the more they can portray
civilian affairs being dominated by the military, the better it
is for their nationalist Islamist campaign against aggressive
invaders.
Dr. Snyder. Mrs. Davis for five minutes.
I think we are going to have some votes around 3:00. We may
want to try to get everybody in, which may be impossible.
Mrs. Davis. Thank you all for being here.
I would like to follow up, because this is an area I really
have grappled with. It is a little bit of nation building
versus national security.
I think clearly the American people right now are
conflicted as well, certainly not with the kind of information
that you all have expressed today, but nevertheless the fear
that it would be years and years before and generations before
you are able to actually turn the situation around, and the
extent to which that is truly in our national interest.
But as you all speak, and certainly Mr. Waldman as well,
security has to be at the forefront of all of that. I recall
one of my times being in Afghanistan, remembering some of the
non-governmental organizations (NGOs) saying to us that our
ambassadors or people from the State Department have to travel
with military support, but they basically use their
relationships that they build as that kind of support because
clearly they are unable to do that.
Help me with this issue because we are continuing to raise
the issue of the role of women and whether or not we are
abandoning them in any way if we move into negotiating or how
we are able to have some kind of reconciliation in Afghanistan.
We want to focus on them. Where does security lie, because
clearly the military has paved the way for many efforts in
Afghanistan. There is no doubt about that. Yet on the other
hand, I understand that it is perhaps overly ambitious for us
to believe that all of those efforts with the military and
civilian capacity both are not necessarily in the best--are
picking up the best interests of the Afghan people or the
region, assuming that Pakistan we are talking about as well.
Ms. Cole. I think, like with governance and all of these
other issues, we have to enlarge our view of security. Security
is not just something that military forces can bring to the
communities of Afghanistan. In the United States, we think of
security as school guards and bank guards and people who
protect judges. It is not just a question of military or police
forces, border guards, people who are looking at money
laundering and bank operations. In that sense the debate about
troops is a very, very important debate. But we have to think
about the other assets that we have to bring to bear, including
with the Afghans, including putting women as police officers in
certain places, or as school guards, which we have shown we can
do in Liberia.
This question of just having soldiers that are armed to the
teeth engaged in combat operations has us thinking, I think,
too narrowly. We have people who know how to do witness
protection in the Marshals Service, and we have people in the
Department of Justice who know how to train police and do
police mentoring and development. We have forensic
investigators who look at money laundering.
This is much more than just the military. If we think about
it that way, I think we can arrive at actually producing
security in a much more efficient way.
Mrs. Davis. General Barno.
General Barno. Two thoughts. One, on the issue of security,
I think you are correct; it is not a sequential problem of
security and then reconstruction and development. It is really
concurrent. These have to go on in parallel with each other.
Based on the amount of security, or lack thereof, you will have
a greater or lesser military presence and a greater or lesser
civilian presence. But I think clearly because of the security
dynamic, you will always have to have these elements working
together. I disagree a bit with Mr. Waldman on that.
You also alluded to what does it mean to women if we
negotiate with the Taliban. That is a paraphrase of what you
were saying. I think we have to be aware, in my estimation,
from a policy standpoint, having the Taliban be part of the
government in Afghanistan is not where this is going. It is not
the objective. Having reformed Taliban, ex-Taliban, Taliban
that have rejected violence, put down their weapons and joined
the political process, that is a very different outlook; the
small T, if you will, the individuals, not the movement. That
is where we have to be careful that we don't inadvertently send
this message that we are willing to negotiate with the Taliban
because we are trying to exit, as opposed to we are willing to
see these former Taliban fighters lay down their arms and
become part of this political process.
Our goal when I was there was not to kill the Taliban
collectively in the big strategic picture, it was to make the
Taliban irrelevant, make no one want to become part of the
Taliban, no one aspire to the Taliban. That takes a very
nuanced approach of many different elements other than just
security and military forces.
Mrs. Davis. Mr. Waldman, quickly may I have a response from
you?
Mr. Waldman. Sure. In terms of security, it really varies.
It is a very serious situation at the moment. On average, every
three days two Afghans are executed for having any association
with the government or military forces. I think that underlies
the concern about integration of civil military affairs. But it
clearly is the critical issue. Of course, there are some
obvious factors for the current situation. The complete failure
to really reform the police, lack of resources and political
will, I think, are largely responsible for that. That certainly
contributes to the current situation. Less than 10 percent or
around 10 percent of the police are capable of operating
independently.
But as has been said by Ms. Cole, the national security is
much broader, and, of course, really security will be achieved
if there is a proper political strategy which is indigenous,
which is inclusive, which addresses some of the fundamental
injustices and the grievances that are driving this conflict.
And as I said, I think this is essentially an Afghan political
conflict, and it requires that political solution to be brought
about. Of course, as I said earlier, there are some things we
can do to help make that happen.
In terms of women, you are absolutely right to raise this.
This is a very serious issue. When one travels the country and
talks to Afghans, it is very clear that they want their girls
to go to school. With two million girls in school, it is a
universal desire to see that happen, for women to be able to
work and have rights and freedoms and rights that men have. It
is alarming that the Shia law was passed recently, as you are
probably aware of, and I certainly think one has to ask about
the commitment of the current administration to women's rights.
Mrs. Davis. Which is doubtful.
Mr. Waldman. Yes, it certainly is. We have yet to see real
substance behind their work to try to empower women and support
their opportunities and rights.
But you are also right that there is concern about women's
rights as negotiations move forward. Of course, reconciliation,
truth and reconciliation is essential in Afghanistan,
particularly after the decades of war that it has undergone.
But on the one hand, there is reintegration. As General Barno
mentioned reintegration efforts, this is low-ranking, perhaps
midranking fighters, and bringing them in, requiring them to
disarm and so on, and integrating them into society. There is
another set of ideas and approaches which concerns political
engagement and accommodation with more senior members of the
Taliban, and in that respect I think a great deal of caution is
required, and indeed the essential rights reflected in the
Afghan Constitution should be respected.
Mrs. Davis. Thank you.
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Rogers for five minutes.
Mr. Rogers. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Listening to the discussion about the possibility of the
Taliban becoming a dominant force again, obviously I find what
that--the implications to women would be abhorrent to me.
I was listening to Mr. Waldman and Ms. Cole talk about what
I consider nation building. I don't think our military is
required for that.
What I am particularly interested in from the two generals
is what do you see as realistic goals and objectives for our
military in the short term, and by that I mean in the next two
to three years? And what is unrealistic? I think some of the
things that we are talking about long term here, I am not sure
that our military needs to be used for that.
So General McCaffrey mentioned, and I think he is accurate,
that this is a 14th century civilization, and apparently a lot
of folks there want to keep it that way, and that is fine. But
what can we do with our military that is realistic? That is the
number one question.
And secondly, is it practical for us to shift a lot of our
troop strength to the border, particularly on the Pakistan
side, and let Afghanistan do whatever Afghanistan is going to
do as long as it doesn't disrupt the security or stability of
Pakistan?
General McCaffrey.
General McCaffrey. I listened to that question with a great
deal of sympathy. And I don't profess--several people on this
panel have enormous personal experience on the ground in
Afghanistan. I am in and out of there periodically and listen
very carefully, particularly to our own battalion commanders on
the ground.
A couple of comments. First of all--I think General Barno
said it--we have to write down and agree on what we are there
to achieve. And I think you can form a pretty good argument, we
are not there to fight al Qaeda. National Security Advisor
talked about 100 al Qaedas being in Afghanistan. That is a
nonnumber. If you want to fight al Qaeda, that is Tier 1 JSOC,
that is political, that is international, that is financial
management, arguably better there in Afghanistan than in
Frankfurt, London, Hamburg and Indiana, which is currently
where we worry about them.
I think, secondly, you can say we are not there to fight
the Taliban. And indeed I would argue the Taliban are not
across the border; they are also across border because there
are 40 million Pashtuns on both sides of the Durand Line. But I
don't think we are there to fight the Taliban, and had the
Taliban not acted as a sanctuary for the disastrous attack on
the United States, we wouldn't be in Afghanistan today. We
would have left it the way it was.
I don't think we are there to free half the population that
are women. The plight of women in that region is abysmal. As we
went in, I asked one of our intel officers, a U.S. Army full
colonel woman. She said, you know, essentially better to have
been a donkey than a woman under the reign of the Taliban. And
that situation, particularly in the Pashtun south, continues.
And by the way, it isn't Shia restrictions. That is tribal, and
that is cultural and historical.
So what are we there for? It seems to me that we are there
to try to create--we haven't made this explicit--a state that
is operational, has its own security forces and does allow us
to withdraw.
Mr. Rogers. Can that be done in three to five years?
General McCaffrey. I personally think this is a 10- to 25-
year job. The first two to five years may involve a lot of
combat, but essentially it is a long-term commitment. And
building a police force is an example.
I think the other thing we ought to be realistic about is
USAID is 3- or 4,000 people, not 15,000. They don't have the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' capability to run large projects.
I am still appalled that we are not in Afghanistan with an
engineer two-star general, 500-person staff, and 3 or 4 U.S.
Army engineer brigades hiring thousands of Afghans and
mentoring and tutoring them. But I don't believe that many of
these civilian agencies in the short run or the medium term can
operate in Afghanistan. That is one of the perils of the U.S.
Armed Forces is we can do it. We can do neighborhood councils,
call-in radio shows, women's rights groups, sanitation projects
in downtown Kandahar. That is what is in the short run our only
option.
I do not believe--in fact, I differ from other panel
members possibly on this. I do not believe in the short run
that what we are talking about in Afghanistan is witness
protection programs. There is no--at district capitals there is
no operational police force, no court system, no jail. Nothing
is there except raw power.
And I also don't even--I wouldn't characterize this as an
insurgency. That implies there is a central government against
which we are fighting, as opposed to seeing this more likely as
an ongoing tribal ethnic war for the control of that part of
the world, though I think in the short run, it is armed power
with multiple purposes and a considerable amount of U.S.
resources.
Mr. Rogers. Thanks. My time just expired.
Dr. Snyder. Ms. Pingree for five minutes. And then we will
do it fairly strictly on our five minutes since we are going to
have votes here.
Ms. Pingree. Absolutely. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I will
try to be brief here.
I appreciate everyone's testimony on this complicated issue
that we are spending a lot of time trying to sort through as we
think about what should happen next, and I really appreciate
all of your perspectives. I will start with Mr. Waldman, and if
anybody else agrees on this particular point, I would be happy
to hear from anyone else's perspective.
You brought up this issue that I think is often pointed
out, but very difficult for us to think about in terms of our
military involvement because we like to think about a military
solution, and you suggested this point that people say perhaps
our very presence, the paradox of our presence is the problem.
So when we think about committing to more troop strength, even
further involvement of our military to deal with the chaos
there, we often think about the other side, you know, maybe our
presence is the problem.
So I just would like to hear you talk about that a little
bit more, particularly in light of the fact that even you said
on the other hand, many of the people doing civilian aid and
the NGOs there are corrupt, there is not enough transparency
around that. So while we can talk about philosophically, well,
we will put more people in the country to rebuild the
institutions there and really get back to the kind of place
where perhaps there could be a major shift in this power
struggle, we haven't been successful at that either.
So can you talk a little bit about something that I think
for many people is a dramatically different--difficult concept
to swallow, but perhaps is exactly what we should be doing?
Mr. Waldman. Yes. Thank you.
I think that what you have indicated, though, is correct.
There is this problem that in some ways international forces
are part of the difficulties that we are seeing. And, of
course, on the other hand, a rapid withdrawal would--could be
extremely destabilizing. So I think it needs--it needs to be
dealt with very carefully.
I mean, I think, first of all, rather than treat numbers,
the question is on the one hand, what are the troops doing, and
how are they operating? Of course, that means minimal force. We
have seen quite a significant number of casualties, and they
are coming down now. And I think General McChrystal can be
acknowledged to have played an important part of achieving
that. But keeping casualties very low is crucial and making
sure redress to Afghanistan civilians when they suffer through
operations is inevitable in that sort of situation.
And then I think, as you have indicated, we have got to do
better at the state building, and I would suggest that actually
you find that the real problem--actually NGOs take only a
limited proportion of the amount of aid going to Afghanistan,
but by far a bigger proportion of it is run through foreign
government agencies, and there, I think, is a lot we could be
doing better.
For a start, the Foreign Service personnel have actually
got to be engaging with the local people, getting out there,
not living behind fortified compounds, and there has got to be
better understanding of Afghan society so that we can really
respond to Afghan needs. But at the same time, make sure we
don't--we can't do everything, and we have got to be clear
about what is possible and focus on that. The National
Solidarity Program is an example where, by focusing on
communities themselves that traditionally in Afghanistan have
great capability to provide for themselves, that you can
really--you can start to see progress.
But I also think--I come back to this point--that
ultimately the real solution here is going to be a political
one, and it requires us to engage on a political level and
address some of these problems and concerns. I mean, I think
the excessive concentration of power in the hands of a limited
number of people of dubious records, let us put it that way, is
one of the major problems. I think we also need to address the
imbalance of power between the center of government and local
government.
But again, trying to support the development of just some
basic functioning representative institutions, these are the
sorts of steps that really could see--we could start to see a
solution in sight.
Ms. Cole. I think the question of whether the United States
troops are drawing attack and, if they were gone, that they
wouldn't have a problem is maybe not the right way to look at
this. I mean, if you think about post-9/11, the U.N. has been
attacked, the International Committee of the Red Cross has been
attacked. Humanitarian workers are constantly under attack. The
Brits, all of our other allies are constantly facing attacks.
So it is not a question of removal of our forces, it is a
question of winning the peace. And I think that we need to
shift and think about that a lot more.
Dr. Snyder. Mr. Platts for five minutes.
Mr. Platts. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I first thank all of the witnesses for your testimony,
obviously great expertise that you bring to our committee, and
we are grateful for that.
Two things. First, a quick follow-up on my colleague's
question on the issue of Afghanistan being a vital national
interest. And I think--I look at it in the sense of how we
would have looked at this country in 1989 when we helped the
Afghanis, in essence, throw the Soviets out. And if asked--in
fact, I think Congress was asked in 1989 is it of national
vital interest to be there, and the answer was no. And we, in
essence, walked away, and we learned 12 years later, well,
yeah, it was, when it came to the lives of 3,000 American
citizens that were taken on 9/11, that it is going to be
difficult, but just standing back and watching what happens was
not in the best interests of our citizens.
So I think it goes to where we are today, unless we want to
repeat that era and allow it again to become a safe haven for
those who want to take American lives, it clearly is of vital
interest. So it is not going to be easy how to ensure that that
doesn't happen going forward from where we are today, but my
specific question actually is regarding the comment of the
military presence is one of the problems for us in Afghanistan.
Having been in Afghanistan five times now, and one of the
most informative visits I had was several years back in
Jalalabad where our PRT team, civilian USAID officer working
hand in hand with an Army lieutenant colonel and just doing
amazing work. And in our time with them, we met with the local
mullahs that gathered, tribal leaders that came in and we met
with. And it was clear what a positive relationship that both
the USAID officer had and the female Army lieutenant colonel
had with those local leaders and the advancement they were
achieving there.
I don't know how we do the development in the environment
we are in without that partnership, hand in hand, because I
wouldn't want that USAID officer out there without the military
security to protect. I think it is more how we approach it. So
I guess it is really, Mr. Waldman, how do you do the
development in the environment today without the security that
the military brings to those USAID and other officers?
Mr. Waldman. Thank you. I think that is an excellent
question, and it poses real challenges for aid workers and
civilians that are operating in development in Afghanistan.
I think we do have to at some point consider the fact that
of the 26 provincial reconstruction teams that exist in
Afghanistan, in the provinces in which they operate, there has
not been a diminution of insurgent activity. In fact, it has
increased.
Now, I am not saying there is a direct relation, but we
have to, I think, ask ourselves whether the PRTs are able to
achieve stability objectives, and I think the answer to that is
no. And as I said, I think the reason for that is because it
doesn't take into account the complex, the very complex and
diverse, rich context of Afghanistan, the history of this
resistance to outsiders, that culture, that conservatism and a
number of other factors, including the action of insurgents.
Mr. Platts. Is it possible that how we have resourced them
has played an important role, that we have a team there, but
what we actually give them on the development side?
Mr. Waldman. No, I don't think that is the problem. In
fact, I think the problem is that because they exist, a lot of
the aid has gone to those PRTs. And, in fact, what you are
doing is you are breaking the accountability of Afghan leaders
to the Afghan people, because there is a parallel foreign
mechanism that has been inserted into the society. So what the
real focus is to build Afghan institutions----
Mr. Platts. If I can ask on that real quickly. In Pakistan
I know USAID is doing some development work that it is in the
arena of counterinsurgency, but where it is actually done under
the name of the Pakistan Government or in partner with. So we
are not the lead. Is that what you think is a better approach
not just in Pakistan, but in Afghanistan?
Mr. Waldman. Well, I think really what we should be doing
is the military should focus on security issues. And I think
the military have some legitimacy in that area, and I think
Afghans expect them and actually want them in many cases to do
that, to focus on that issue.
But actually civilians need to be the primary--the central
channel for civilian activities, and actually there are a
number of mechanisms. I mean, first of all, you have, of
course, Afghan NGOs, and many are desperate for money, for
funding to actually operate. And in areas in the south and
southeast, we found--who I used to work for--sorry. My
apologies.
Dr. Snyder. I don't think we have time, unfortunately,
right now for an augmented answer that begins ``first of all.''
But I apologize. We will come after a series of votes.
Mr. Spratt, I want to give you a chance before the votes,
and we will come back afterwards.
Mr. Spratt. Rather than keeping the whole group here, I
will----
Dr. Snyder. We have time.
Mr. Spratt. Just a quick question.
General McCaffrey in particular, to pick up where you left
off, if our original purpose in going to Afghanistan was to
crush al Qaeda, to exact a full measure of retribution upon
them and to render them ineffective, have we strayed from our
original objective? Have you said we set the wrong objectives
and raised the bar unnecessarily highly in Afghanistan?
General McCaffrey. Again, I--back to the fundamental
challenge we face is we are where we are today, but I think the
original notion was one of anger, retaliation, vengeance, all
of it appropriate. Afghanistan deserved to be part of that
target of reaction.
We essentially achieved our initial purpose to some extent.
I think it was a strategic surprise of immense proportions that
the U.S. Armed Forces struck at them 700 miles from the sea,
7,000 miles from the United States, something I think had
enormous heuristic benefit for al Qaeda globally deployed.
By the way, we ought to take into account we have killed or
captured much of the senior al Qaeda leadership. Indeed there
is an argument that 10 years from now, our principal threat
will be Hezbollah, not al Qaeda.
But I think we have been a force in search of a mission,
and the sensible mission, in my viewpoint, if the American
people and the Congress and the administration support it, it
would be to build a viable state over the decade to come. And
we can do that at significant cost, probably 60 billion to 80
billion a year, and another 30- to 40,000 killed and wounded.
We would probably achieve that objective.
Now, one caveat, and I think Mr. Waldman and I would not be
on the same side of the sheet on this one. I have over the last
30 years of public service been astonished at the courage and
the creativity and the language skills of the international NGO
community. They are beyond belief, to include Oxfam. But there
is a handful of them.
Afghanistan is big muscle movements, it is 30 million
people. Nobody moves in the south except the Marine rifle
company. Nobody is out in the east except a PRT. I think these
have been huge payoffs. They simply couldn't exist. They would
be blown away in the wind within an hour of us extracting the
military component.
We still have a choice, but I don't think there is a choice
of waving a magic hand and saying, we can turn this over to
civilian agencies. We can't turn it over in State Department,
Treasury, Agriculture. They can't do it. They won't do it. When
I asked the agricultural guy in a PRT, what are you, an Iowa
farmer, what is your background, he will invariably say, sir, I
am an artillery lieutenant colonel, I retired a year ago. And
he gave me a 2-week course, and I am over here teaching them
how to plant rice.
I think that is worth talking about, whether that is the
appropriate thing to do. But in the short run, that is reality.
Dr. Snyder. We have no time left on the votes. We better go
vote. What we are going to do is we have about a half hour of
votes, and then there will be a motion to recommit. So we will
come back right after that vote before the motion to recommit.
We will have the time for debate, and then we will probably
have another half hour of questions for anyone who wants to
come back. It will be about a half hour or so for the
witnesses.
[Recess.]
Dr. Snyder. Well, that didn't quite work out like we
thought it would, did it? I apologize for that. They changed
the order of votes and didn't have a vote we thought we were
going to have. Mr. Wittman has a conflict, and I appreciate
your patience. You have all been public servants for a long,
long time, and we have asked you to go further once again than
we thought we were going to.
I want to ask, and I may direct this to General McCaffrey
and General Barno, and the other two can feel free to join in
also if you would like. General McChrystal's report, at least
the unclassified version that we read publicly, he mentions the
12 months several times. I would like you, General McCaffrey
and General Barno, if you would comment on, without my leading
you down a road, when you saw the 12-month number, what does
that mean to you in this report in terms of what we need to be
thinking about as we are making our decisions looking ahead?
General McCaffrey. Part of it may well be that General
McChrystal, having served here, understands the dynamics of
Washington as well as he does of the battlefield. I personally
can't imagine that 30 days, 60 days, 90 days, 180 days one way
or another actually makes much of a difference, but he's also
understanding it takes us normally 2 years to make a
significant policy decision in this Capital, as my own rule of
thumb, and it takes a year for the military to make substantial
reinforcements of a war that is in a 7,000-mile away theater.
So I think his assessment on the ground, and I will
probably have a better informed viewpoint by the end of
November, is that the tactical situation deteriorated
remarkably. You know, the currently serving unbelievably
talented general officers we have got in the war zone don't
like me using this language, but we are seeing battalion-size
units of the Taliban, 200, 300, 400-man outfits who are doing
reconnaissance for 30 to 90 days of a target and are then using
rockets, indirect fire, mortar, fire maneuver. It is
astonishing. Some of them are using electronic intercept. They
are wearing REI camping gear. They are a remarkably dangerous
force. I have warned several of them about our own tactical
arrogance. We are going to lose platoon and company-size units
if we don't watch our step here in the coming year.
So I think General McChrystal, who is probably the best
fighter that has emerged from the Armed Forces in 25 years, was
looking at that situation and said you had better get some
resources to me rapidly, a conclusion with which I totally
agree.
General Barno. I think in a way this goes back to my
comment about the Taliban running out the clock, and they
realize the clock in Washington is moving at a more rapid place
than the clock in Afghanistan or Pakistan, even among our NATO
allies in some regards, and I think General McChrystal is
looking at that from the standpoint that the enemy is moving
very rapidly. He has the initiative right now. He is doing
offensively a great deal. He is getting to choose the time and
place of his actions without a lot of constraints, and I think
McChrystal in a sense of wresting that initiative back from the
enemy, feels he has to do that in the next year or the enemy is
simply going to be too strong for us to have the capability to
turn this around.
It also, I think, plays into General McChrystal's
perspective that this is a strategy behind which after another
year or so there may be inadequate public support to continue.
So I think he sees the next 12 months as critical.
Dr. Snyder. Now I am asking you to say what you think he
meant, but let me put it this way: It would be a mistake for
folks on this side of the dais to say 13, 14 months from now,
well, it has been 12 months and we are still having problems.
That is not the lesson we should take from the way McChrystal
has phrased that language; is that a fair statement do you
believe?
General McCaffrey. Absolutely. I cannot imagine--I must
admit I think Secretary Gates is one of the most remarkable
public servants we have had in office in 15 years; however, the
notion that we are going to make a substantial change in a year
to 18 months strikes me as the inappropriate level of
expectations. I still believe this is two to five years of very
hard work, including some serious fighting, followed by a
decade or so of nation-building activities.
General Barno. I would generally agree with that. I think,
as General McCaffrey pointed out, it takes a good bit of time
to get those additional forces into the theater. So even if the
decision was made today to add, let's say, five brigades of
additional combat forces, you are not going to see those
brigades for at least six months, perhaps longer than that. And
it takes time, as we saw in Iraq, for those units to actually
get on the ground, get established, and then begin to have an
influence.
In my judgment, the way I would look at this, is the next
12 months is basically the time to stabilize the patient and
then after that you are going to look at basically getting, you
know, the patient back into full health and go on a
counteroffensive to take the momentum away from the enemy, but
you are not going to see a complete turnaround in this
situation in 12 months by any stretch of the imagination.
Dr. Snyder. Because I think you probably talked the most,
General Barno, in your opening statement about framing this
right for the American public so they understand it, we need to
make sure that people understand this is going to be some hard
fighting. Now, maybe things will go better than we think.
Things could go more difficult than we think. But you are
putting in a range, General McCaffrey, of two to five years.
Maybe it will turn out to 18 months to 6 years. I mean we don't
know. But that is part of the difficulty of fighting a war. I
think it is important the American public be prepared for some
uncertainty.
Again asking you both to comment, but you have probably
framed it in your opening statement, General McCaffrey, when
you talked about--I think you said three basic options: Hunker
down, drop back and re-evaluate where you are, or go ahead.
How do you evaluate where we are at right now today?
General McCaffrey. Well, the good news is in the short run,
you know, if you fly over Afghanistan, which all of you in the
room have done, and you saw it right after we got in there and
you saw it today, there has been enormous change for the
better. There is a road network emerging, there are
institutions, there is a military academy, there is a physics
lab in Kabul, court systems have started. So tremendous
progress in some ways have occurred.
The other tiny bit of good news is, and I remind military
audiences, we have lost--the U.S. Armed Forces lost a brigade-
size unit essentially twice in Vietnam. We had divisions
dismantled twice in Korea. We lost a field army, most of it,
twice in World War II, at Bataan and the Battle of the Bulge.
So there is no reason why we are magic out there in a rough
world. In Afghanistan today it is hard for me to imagine a
tactical disaster of any serious consequence. You can't overrun
a U.S. Marine battalion with the entire Pashtun nation today.
So that is the good news. The bad news is the situation is
spinning out of control, and clearly the answer isn't military.
It is a lot of things at the same time: legitimacy of the
government, economic rebuilding, most of which ought to be
agriculture.
But those--one of our panelists mentioned witness
protection programs. I mean those are the kind of things that
are step 10 of a 10-step process, and we are still on step one.
General Barno. I think I would agree with that. But I would
also maybe take a step a bit higher and say I think the
pervasive feeling in Afghanistan today is broadly uncertainty
as they look at the international effort, and I think that is a
debilitating perception because it causes people to have to
judge based on not knowing what the U.S. military is going to
do, not knowing what the NATO force is going to do, not knowing
what the United Nations are going to do, not knowing what NGOs
are going to do. They don't know who is going to be standing at
the end of day out there, and they are having to make tough
decisions without really seeing a clear path.
So I endorse the thought that this is a deliberate
decision-making process here in Washington, but there is also a
need once that decision gets made to violently and aggressively
and fully execute it and implement it as rapidly as possible in
Afghanistan because there is a perception--every day that we go
on with our process, as necessary as it is, there is a
perception out there that we are wavering and we are looking
for a way to get to the exits, and that I think is very
dangerous to us in our overall objectives.
Dr. Snyder. Thank you.
Mrs. Davis for such time as she needs.
Mrs. Davis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Again, thank you all for waiting through the votes. We
certainly appreciate that. We know you have very full
schedules.
I wanted to just follow up for a moment because there was
the article today about the Nawa area, and there has been a lot
of discussion about whether or not troop levels even of 40,000
is really what would be required. They mention the fact in this
particular article--I guess this is the Post--of 1 to 50 ratio
to the population, and that is basically what they tried to do
in that area. They have had some success, but sometimes that is
a fleeting success. It doesn't necessarily mean that it
stabilized the whole area.
So could you respond to that perhaps, General McCaffrey and
General Barno, whoever would like to do that? I actually hate
to get into a discussion of the exact number of troops, but on
the other hand isn't what is truly required if we were actually
going to be trying to change the projections that you would
need so many more troops than that?
General McCaffrey. Well, there are probably two different
aspects of that very legitimate question. One is I personally
don't buy algorithms that are fixed such as 1 to 50. I think
some of that is nonsense. The Brits ran a lot of these places
with five smart Oxford boys who studied Greek and used native
levies to, you know, achieve balance among the tribes.
My own view would be, and I think McChrystal's report is
focussed on this, the only center of gravity of the struggle in
Afghanistan is building the Afghan security forces, along with
jump-starting the economy, social institutions, political
institutions. But at the end of the day it is the Afghan
National Army and the police. The police is a 15-year job; the
army is a 5-year job. You can't do it overnight. You have got
to get officers, sergeants, equipment, training. They have got
to have their own helicopter lift force. The Afghan National
Security Force is the answer. I do not think the notion that we
are going to embed U.S. Army and Marine rifle platoons in
Pashtun villages is the way we are going to turn this around.
So some of that in the short run we have got to do. I
understand. But thank God we have got the Stryker Brigade in
there so that at least now I am convinced that day to day the
road network we can keep open.
So it is the Afghan National Army (ANA). That is the center
of gravity of the war from the U.S. military's perspective in
my judgment.
Mrs. Davis. General Barno.
General Barno. We talked about that actually a bit at the
break with Beth Cole here that this ramp-up of the Afghan
security forces is going to be absolutely critical, and we have
got Lieutenant General Bill Caldwell nominated to go out there
and take over that mission. That is going to be the most
important thing that happens in Afghanistan in the next three
years. And his challenge will be to muster as much energy from
Washington to help him get that done as he can because if that
doesn't work, then the rest of the enterprise is not going to
work for us. Those are going to eventually have to be not
Marines at Nawa but Afghan forces at Nawa, both police and
army.
Ms. Cole. Just to add to that, I think we also need to step
back again and realize that part of the country we are trying
to stabilize, the other part of the country we are actually
doing reconstruction. It is not all combat all the time. So
whatever algorithm you want to arrive at, we need to identify
the areas where there is high insurgent activity and try to
stabilize those while keeping our eye on the other places where
we actually--where we have stabilized and we are actually in a
reconstruction mode. It is not all combat all the time.
Mr. Waldman. Just one or two remarks about Afghan national
security forces. I think certainly there needs to be a great
deal of caution not to sacrifice quality in a drive for
quantity. And of course General McChrystal has suggested
doubling the number of police and perhaps more than doubling
the number of military serving in the Army. And they are on
short time frames as well. And I think certainly with respect
to the police it is arguable that some of the actions at a
local level have perhaps consolidated and strengthened the
insurgency. So a great deal of caution is required there, I
think.
We also need to think about sustainability. The Afghan
Government has a revenue of about a billion dollars. Now, the
United States, as I understand it, is spending about $3.5, $3.6
billion on the Afghan national security forces this year. So it
is going to be important to think about the financial
sustainability of the armed forces.
I mean, the other points I would make that are really
critical to this is effective political engagement at
addressing some of these problems. Until some of these
fundamental problems are addressed in society, then these
conflicts will continue. And I mean this is an incredibly
complex area. It is, I think, very difficult for outsiders to
understand, but I think we can at least recognize that that is
the case and to take steps to help institutions and political
systems to be able to address that.
And I just want to put on the record, I did want to mention
I think it is important to clarify that nongovernmental
organizations can operate in insecure areas, and actually in
the south and southeast there are many that do operate there
today. I mean, NGOs operated under the Taliban regime right up
until the intervention. There are mechanisms of doing that, and
of course the priority has got to be those organizations which
are going to be there into the future and that are Afghan that
can respond to Afghan needs, and then you are starting to build
up accountability within society for how resources are used to
benefit people.
So I would stress that side of the state-building agenda.
Mrs. Davis. Thank you. I appreciate that. I think what the
American people are having a very difficult time understanding
is whether or not we would continue an effort where we don't
perceive nor do the people that we are trying to help perceive
that there is a legitimate government.
In that context is there a role that you think we should be
doing differently in the upcoming election and are we using
whatever leverage we have, which should be great but I think we
haven't necessarily used it much, in trying to really impress
upon the leaders that we need to see some action, whether it is
in the corruption area or what have you? What is our leverage
that you see, and how do we explain to the American people that
this is an effort done really with a void in terms of the
governing?
General Barno. I was the overall military commander during
the 2004 presidential election, and we made the main effort for
the military that year of setting conditions for that election
because we recognized it was the most important strategic event
in Afghanistan in 2004. The election this year was the most
important strategic event in Afghanistan. In many ways it was a
serious failure. The international community, the United
Nations took a very minimalist role where they had the ability
to take a much greater role to prevent the outcome that we saw
occur after August 20.
So now there is almost an opportunity to do this the second
time. So one of the things I think that absolutely has to
happen is a much deeper international and United Nations effort
to ensure this election is held in a supervised manner, which
the last one was not. Now, the timelines make that
extraordinarily difficult to do. So I think that is an area.
On the other side of the coin I would say the fact we are
going to a run-off reflects some strength in the process. There
were enough safeguards in the process so that the initial
election result rightfully was called into question, was
challenged, was evaluated, and enough votes were thrown out to
force a run-off. That is a success story, although a dusty,
muddy one, I am afraid, but it is still a success story. Now
the legitimacy in this next election is critical to ensure that
the outcome of that has the confidence of the Afghan people.
Ms. Cole. I think we actually have an opportunity right
now, as was demonstrated with Senator Kerry negotiating with
President Karzai, to identify those people in the government
who we know that are corrupt and we know the Afghan people
don't respect and to try to deal with them at this moment and
then to embrace and empower the ones that we know are
legitimate and are accountable. And we have all worked with
wonderful Afghan leaders, ministers and others, who are the
leaders for the future, but I think we have a moment in time
right now where we have to press this case, the international
community, all of those nations that have invested in
Afghanistan, and do it with the Afghans themselves. But I think
it is time to press it.
Mr. Waldman. I would just add to that, I think many of the
policies that we have implemented have actually compounded
these problems of corruption, in fact. It was policies that
forged alliances with local strongmen and warlords in
Afghanistan that have I think led to this you know modus avendi
of corruption, and it is not surprising that that is, you know,
reflected in the current administration. And I think it really
does require America and other states to usually reach to
change their position with respect to those kinds of alliances
of convenience and take principled stands on some of these
issues.
You know, I also think that there are other things that can
be done better; for example, the work on governance. If you
look at the thousands of consultants that are deployed in what
is an uncoordinated fashion, many have little experience. Some
are you know very talented but many have little experience.
They don't have familiarity with the country, of course paid
enormous sums money, and I think there really needs to be a
very serious consideration, a rigorous consideration of what
they are delivering. Of course they are necessary to some
extent, but I think we have to accept there are deep flaws in
the contracting and the consulting system that currently
exists.
Dr. Snyder. I want to ask another question, again directed
primarily to the military folks but the others can join in if
they would like. Would you all put yourself in the position of
the Pakistani military as they are undertaking what appears to
be some very difficult work on the Pakistani side of the
border? How do they view this discussion that is going on? What
do they want to have happen on the Afghan side of the border
with regard to the NATO forces?
General McCaffrey. I am always fascinated--I always start
off in Pakistan, spend some period of time there and listen
very carefully to the Pak military and the Inter-Services
Intelligence (ISI) and Pakistani politicians and go to the
other side of the border, to include the U.S. team. Sometimes
opposite sides of the coin. It is astonishing why there is this
division, why there is this deep loathing on the part of the
Afghans, many of them, toward the Pakistanis that gave them
some support and sanctuary for so many years in their struggle
against the Soviets and, conversely, the lack of the sort of
empathy on the part of the Pakistanis for the millions of
Afghan refugees who are stuck in their own territory. It has
been surprising to me.
The Pakistani military, and a couple of us were talking
about this before, I am not an expert on Pakistan but I am sure
of one thing: That is not a single monolithic state. It is four
separate nations under one weak federal system. And when you
look at the federal system, there has been a history of
corruption and incompetence on the part of the political
parties and the leadership. And the one institution that has
been load bearing in Pakistan was the army, and the army is
also the ISI and the army is the Frontier Corps, and the army
loans their generals to run ministries.
So it has tended to be--and it is also, and this disturbs
people, the most respected institution bar none in Pakistan. So
we end up with a situation--by the way, neither the army nor
the political system never had one bit of control over the
Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), never mind much of
Balochistan. There are places in downtown Quetta where the ISI
won't go at night. So under our urging, they have intervened in
these border areas. They are a remarkably small, professional,
badly equipped force. They are primarily--if you talk to the
Pak military, they spend 99 percent of their time worrying
about the Indians and the confrontation to the east. Gradually
they have come to support us.
I personally think that without the support of the
Pakistani Government and the military, our presence in
Afghanistan would disappear and die of lack of oxygen within a
year. So we have to be very careful of what we say in public
and what we do in private. I think the initiative to provide
nonmilitary aid to Pakistan is really a good one.
So we are broadening our contact with these people in the
last year. That is the good news.
General Barno. I would broadly agree with that. I spend
lots of time with Pakistani officers. I have got 50 of them
coming to my center here in a week for another 2-week session,
which we have done several times in the last year. They are
conflicted in some ways because now they recognize they have an
internal security threat with the so-called Pakistani Taliban,
who are somewhat different and distinct from the Afghan Taliban
across the border. They are now--their activity in the
Pakistani army in fighting this Pakistani Taliban in Swat and
now about to start in Waziristan is impressive. It is notable.
It is a major change and it very much supports our interests
and their interests.
They have a bit of a different approach, I think, with
regard to the Taliban in Afghanistan. And I think it is most
positive that there is ambivalence, that they--they neither
support them directly or fight them directly and have had a
historical connection to that group that has given them
capability to influence events inside of Afghanistan. They
don't want to let go of that connection entirely because they
are simply uncertain about what we are going to do and whether
we are going to be there three years or five years from now.
So I think they deserve full credit for what they are doing
in fighting their own internal threat which they now recognize,
and I think we need to continue to work with them on convincing
them we are there for the long haul so they can disassociate
themselves further from the Afghan Taliban that are fighting
our forces now in the southern and eastern portions of
Afghanistan.
Dr. Snyder. Susan, do you have anything further?
Mrs. Davis. No.
Dr. Snyder. Once again I apologize for the delay due to
votes, but you have all been through that before. We appreciate
your service. We appreciate your attendance here today. Feel
free to send us anything written for us to look at that will
also be made part of this record if you think of something that
you would like to add. Thank you, again, for being here today.
We are adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 4:55 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
=======================================================================
A P P E N D I X
October 22, 2009
=======================================================================
PREPARED STATEMENTS SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD
October 22, 2009
=======================================================================
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