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Blossom Patrol: Not a walk in the park. (Defenselink)

The Obama administration has released its white paper on the way forward in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Noah Shachtman at Danger Room adds some color here; Michael Yon described the president’s speech as “disappointing” here; and our friends at SWJ and Abu Muqawama have begun the discussion here and here. I offer my own critique, objective-by-objective, after the jump.

To start, the paper asserts that the “core goal” of U.S. policy is:

to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda and its safe havens in Pakistan, and to prevent their return to Pakistan or Afghanistan.

One theater of operations. (NY Times)

This policy statement ducks two critical issues. First, whatever the nominal sovereignty issues may be, Pushtunistan is one theater of operations. Second, in some cases nations may be little more than lines on a map with near to zero control over portions of their territory and population. Afghanistan and Pakistan are two of those cases.

Building from this core goal, the paper lays out five “realistic and achievable objectives.” Let’s go through them.

• Disrupting terrorist networks in Afghanistan and especially Pakistan to degrade any ability they have to plan and launch international terrorist attacks.

The 9/11 attacks were launched from Hamburg. Yes, we need to attack the base areas, but it is simply silly to over-promise as the administration is doing. Even if Afghanistan was made into Switzerland, jihadists would still have the ability to plan and launch international terrorist attacks.

• Promoting a more capable, accountable, and effective government in Afghanistan that serves the Afghan people and can eventually function, especially regarding internal security, with limited international support.

Afghanistan has never had an effectual national government and is less likely to have one now than in 1960 — before the decades of Wrecker War. We don’t know how to create one. The best we can do is work at the margins but this is very long-term, messy stuff and our population is not being educated that this is a very long-term engagement that cannot be done with bright ideals and clean hands.

• Developing increasingly self-reliant Afghan security forces that can lead the counterinsurgency and counterterrorism fight with reduced U.S. assistance.

Pakistan is a failed state that never worked. Our ability to change this is marginal and everything needed to do so works against our military needs in the border areas. (We are essentially asking the Pakistani civilian government to do things that are deeply unpopular in Pakistan — not exactly a winning scenario for Pakistani leaders.) Our growing relationship with India also complicates maters.

• Assisting efforts to enhance civilian control and stable constitutional government in Pakistan and a vibrant economy that provides opportunity for the people of Pakistan.
• Involving the international community to actively assist in addressing these objectives for Afghanistan and Pakistan, with an important leadership role for the UN.

The rest of the world does not see the problem in our terms and is unlikely to provide additional meaningful help. Indeed, the further we get from 9/11 the more politically expensive it becomes for them to try. The British are the only ones that see direct internal danger from what is happening in Pakistan. The others think they can handle the threat via internal security measures.

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