The persistence of delusion

Go read Billmon's post "Kabul Follies" about how we're managing to lose two wars simultaneously on the same continent. He links to William S. Lind's latest post at Defense and the National Interest:

At present, the bombing is largely tied to the latest Somme-like “Big Push,” Operation Mountain Thrust, in which more than 10,000 U.S.-led troops are trying another failed approach to guerrilla war, the sweep. I have no doubt it would break the Mullah Omar Line, if it existed, which it doesn’t. Even the Brits seem to have drunk the Kool-Aid this time, with the June 19 Washington Times reporting that “British commanders declared for the first time yesterday that their troops were enjoying success in the restive south of Afghanistan after pushing faster than expected into rebel territory.” Should be in Berlin by September, old chap.

For those of you who don't know him, Lind is director of The Free Congress Foundation, a very conservative think tank. Uh, oh.

Lind offers a short refresher course in Guerilla Warfare 101:

• Air power works against you, not for you. It kills lots of people who weren’t your enemy, recruiting their relatives, friends and fellow tribesmen to become your enemies. In this kind of war, bombers are as useful as 42 cm. siege mortars.

• Big, noisy, offensives, launched with lots of warning, achieve nothing. The enemy just goes to ground while you pass on through, and he’s still there when you leave. Big Pushes are the opposite of the “ink blot” strategy, which is the only thing that works, when anything can.

• Putting the Big Push together with lots of bombing in Afghanistan’s Pashtun country means we end up fighting most if not all of the Pashtun. In Afghan wars, the Pashtun always win in the end.

• Quisling governments fail because they cannot achieve legitimacy.

• You need closure, but your guerilla enemy doesn’t. He not only can fight until Doomsday, he intends to do just that—if not you, then someone else.

• The bigger the operations you have to undertake, the more surely your enemy is winning.

Of course the geniuses at the WH haven't a clue about warfare or any kind, guerilla or not.

Billmon draws the obvious parallel to Vietnam, when US generals would regularly trot out and give glowing reports of the "progress" complete with body counts. (I'm old enough to remember them). I watched "The Fog of War" again this weekend, the excellent, if chilling, documentary about Robert McNamara.

I was struck all over about how history repeats itself, and how stupidity appears to always win out. In LBJ's time, we had a war against "tyranny" and "aggression." These days we have a war against "terror."

The only thing that's changed is the style of uniform the dead soldiers are wearing.