As the United States Congress moves toward rubber-stamping yet another
"emergency" supplemental bill that includes more than US$33 billion for
military operations, mainly to fund the latest surge in Afghanistan, maybe we
should take a page from the new British government.
Facing debilitating deficits, the conservative Tories and their Liberal
Democrat partners are proposing painful cuts to governmental budgets, including
military operations in Afghanistan. As the Independent put it, quoting a senior
military source, "Essentially, the Americans know we are broke and we are
getting blokes killed for no good reason. Whatever the [British Ministry of
Defense] says, it absolutely isn't business as usual." In other words, an
overstretched government, low on chips and
recognizing a losing hand in Afghanistan, is finally moving to cut its losses,
perhaps even to walk away from the table.
The question is: Why can't the United States join them? We're losing even more
chips (adding up to a staggering US$299 billion for the war in Afghanistan, and
counting) and "blokes" (more than 1,000 US troops killed, with their average
age dropping). Isn't it time to know when to walk away, as Kenny Rogers sang in The
Gambler, before we have to cut and run?
Instead of recognizing a losing hand and folding, however, Washington continues
to double down, whether our gambler-in-chief is named George W Bush or Barack
Obama. And so we're putting on our game face again, as we shove tens of
billions more into the Afghan pot, along with roughly 100,000 of our troops
supported by an even greater number of private military contractors, hoping
that, against the odds, we'll draw to an inside straight even as our opponents
hold flushes.
And, in case you're not a poker player, a flush beats a straight every time.
Of poker and war
If my poker metaphor sounds frivolous for a deadly nine-year-old war, consider
it a bow to the great Prussian war theorist, Carl von Clausewitz. He
classically described war with all its uncertainties as resembling, above all,
a game of cards.
To extend the metaphor in Afghanistan, we're engaged in a high-stakes poker
match at our opponent's table, and his card sharks are remarkably adept at
dealing from the bottom of the deck.
Of course, we're alert enough to know that the game is fixed, but strangely,
that only makes us more determined. We are, in fact, insistent that ultimately
we'll make his table ours; in the meantime, we'll bribe or browbeat his
bottom-dealers for better cards, bluff or shoot our way out of losing hands. Or
so we gun-slinging Americans like to imagine.
Meanwhile, back in the US, land of risk-takers and winners, our Washington
Beltway policymakers have become inured to the risks this sort of compulsive
gambling entails. They continue to throw money and men on the table, no matter
the odds in the unkindest of houses (and, whatever else they've been, Iraq and
Afghanistan certainly haven't been kind to American agendas).
Think about it. In the next year or two, no matter how well or how poorly we
play our cards in Afghanistan, it doesn't appear that we'll seriously consider
folding and walking away.
Take, for example, our latest do-or-die offensive about to be launched in
Kandahar, the country's second-largest city, and environs. If all goes well
this summer and the US military wins a few hands in the Kandahar region,
Washington's addictive mentality will doubtless take this as evidence that the
tide has turned, our luck has changed. In short, we'll double down.
And if our offensive goes poorly? Undoubtedly, Washington will take this as
evidence that we had a chance, but didn't ante-up enough chips or simply hit a
stretch of bad luck. Then, like compulsive gamblers everywhere, they'll insist
on playing a few more hands, but this time just a little more smartly. In
short, they'll double down.
So, if they win, it's "we're on a roll"; if they lose, it's "next hand, baby,
next hand." And what about President Obama's pledge to walk away from the
Afghan poker table beginning in 2011? Fuggeddaboudit.
Knowing when to fold 'em War, as any sane person knows, is a life-or-death gamble, usually at long
odds - and let's face it, we've been gambling at the longest odds for years
now. It was never a smart move to invade either Afghanistan or Iraq and then
try to plant pseudo-democracies in soil that was unlikely to sustain them. In
Afghanistan, it wasn't smart to squeeze local card sharks and tough guys even
as they squeezed us, whether by stealing outright or forcing us to pay
protection money in a rigged game. It wasn't smart to woo hearts and minds
while busting heads and bodies ("aggressive interrogation") and plugging
mid-level thugs ("targeted assassinations") with missiles and slugs, all the
while knocking off far too many civilian noncombatants as we went.
Under the pressure of so many losing hands, our tactics in Afghanistan have
become increasingly erratic, swinging from idealistic plans for nation-building
to pragmatic "clear-and-hold" counterinsurgency, from upbraiding Afghan leaders
to uplifting them. Like a flustered gambler, we've lost all sense of the cards
staring coldly back at us.
Now, let's return to our British partner, sweating it out at the table. Low on
chips and holding bad cards, he'd like nothing more than to swallow his pride
and get out of Dodge. He looks for a nod from us, some recognition that walking
away with our shirts still on our backs is better than losing it all.
Yet his Washington partner stubbornly plays on, compelled to double down yet
again in spite of the odds.
Tell me: Is the fight truly worth it? Is Afghanistan really the place for us to
go "all-in", whatever the cost to our military, our economy, even our way of
life?
Only a compulsive gambler would answer yes.
William Astore (wjastore@gmail.com) is a TomDispatch regular. A
retired lieutenant colonel (USAF), he taught at the USAF Academy and the Naval
Postgraduate School and currently teaches History at the Pennsylvania College
of Technology.
(Copyright 2010 William J Astore.)
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