Stanley McChrystal and “Black” Special Forces
Benjamin Friedman notes new Afghanistan commanding general Stanley McChrystal’s background in the “sharp” or “kinetic” end of special forces work and raises some concerns:
In the (recently released!) book on the post Cold War evolution of the US military that I co-edited, Colin Jackson and Austin Long have a chapter discussing the politics of special operations command. They argue that the direct action theory of victory in counterinsurgency is a close relative to the air force’s theory of decapitation, which says you can defeat a nation by attacking its leaders from the air. They explain that direct action has long been the favored tactic of secret or “black” SOF organizations like Delta Force, but that the wars made it the dominant mission in SOCOM as a whole, crowding traditional “white” counterinsurgency missions like population protection, force training, and civil affairs. To them, that is a problem, because the direct action theory of victory is badly flawed. You can’t kill your way to victory in these sorts of wars, they argue. That’s particularly true in Afghanistan, I’d add, where distance and poor roads make the exploitation of intelligence far more time-consuming.
I don’t know to what extent McChrystal shares the black SOF worldview. He would probably say that direct action is just part of the toolkit. It is possible, however, that his appointment reflects a decision to downplay nation-building in Afghanistan and focus more on killing raids and training Afghan soldiers.
I think the use of the term “nation building” probably obscures more than it reveals in this context. The real crux of the matter is that in a geographical sub-portion of Afghanistan where there’s insurgent activity happening, US forces face a choice at the margin between trying to identify and kill insurgents, and trying to identify and protect civilian population centers.
18 Responses to “Stanley McChrystal and “Black” Special Forces”
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May 13th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
They’re probably going after Osama for a PR coup.
May 13th, 2009 at 1:34 pm
The preferred term is African-American special forces, thank you very much.
May 13th, 2009 at 1:35 pm
First off, killing Osama is way more than a PR coup, it’s also a rough, acceptable form of Justice. Second, that doesn’t seem to be the intention anyways.
This appears to be a tactical dicision aimed at defeating the Taliban militarily. Aiming directly for their leaders strikes me as a good strategy for defeating an Afghani tribe, which at the base level is what the Taliban is.
It’s time to accept that the Afghani people don’t want us in the country. We need to strike directly at the most proiminant threats to regional stability, then get the hell out of the country.
May 13th, 2009 at 1:36 pm
Nixon was a rabid anti-Vietnam war candidate back in 1968.
Yet, when he won the election…he flipped over to “we can win this thing.”
Looks like Obama’s going through his Nixon/Caesar phase now.
It should pass…in about 5 years.
May 13th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
jamie has a good post on this over at Blood & Treasure:
http://bloodandtreasure.typepad.com/blood_treasure/2009/05/cleaning-the-slate.html
May 13th, 2009 at 1:45 pm
It’s time to accept that the Afghani people don’t want us in the country. We need to strike directly at the most proiminant threats to regional stability, then get the hell out of the country
Which is what the Pakistani military is waiting for. Once the US leaves Afghanistan, the Pakistani military will turn to the Taliban again to unseat the current Indian-friendly government of Afghanistan thereby giving themselves “strategic depth” against their old nemesis.
But sure, if we leave and just pretend that Afghanistan and Pakistan don’t exist I’m sure everything will turn out fine.
May 13th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
I think this is being put in too stark, either/or terms. We clearly need to do both white and black ops to get the job done. And within the context of limited goals – that is, Obama I think has said that the goal is not to liberate Afghanistan or democratize them or fix them or whatever. The goal is to eliminate the threat of al qaeda. And in this limited context, which most of us think is preferable to total war to transform Afghanistan, I think it is fine to have the special forces command types in charge. We are not asking them to use direct force to topple the entire country or to pacify it or to democratize it. We are asking them to get into the border areas and kill enough insurgents/al qaeda as to minimize their ability to strike the US. Think of it this way: if we were doing the pure law enforcement model, which I would probably prefer to the COIN model anyway, wouldn’t we want the black ops people in charge? So my point is that the smaller scale the goals are, the more ok I am with the special forces guys in charge.
May 13th, 2009 at 2:00 pm
But sure, if we leave and just pretend that Afghanistan and Pakistan don’t exist I’m sure everything will turn out fine.
There is no doubt that us leaving will have a serious negative effect on the region. At this point however we have to start looking at lesser evils. As it currently stands the Afghani situation is slightly better then it was before we invaded.
However there does not appear to be any noticible gains in quite a few years. And no bright light on the horizon. We just need to cut our losses and move on.
Will the Taliban take over after we leave? Yes, that is a strong possibility. But they were there before as well, Pakistan managed to survive. As long as we can keep strong intellegance units running within the country, I feel like we can get out of there with no threat against the U.S. remaining.
Weaken the Taliban and get out. We might be able to claim success then, though probably not real victory.
May 13th, 2009 at 2:11 pm
Thank God the book referred to only cost $140. Otherwise I’d have to wait for the paperback.
May 13th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
Looks like Obama’s going through his Nixon/Caesar phase now.
Uh, Obama campaigned the whole time on the position that we didn’t have enough troops in Afghanistan and needed to immediately bolster them. Just because he was anti-Iraq doesn’t mean he was an anti-war candidate. He just thought the Iraqi war was stupid and that we should be focusing on the actual people who attacked us.
May 13th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
The Taliban didn’t attack “us” Adam.
In fact, they offered to turn Osama bin Laden over to us.
How many have to diew for Obama’s ego I wonder?
May 13th, 2009 at 6:46 pm
What is the strategic interest that the US is pursuing in Afghanistan?
If they are after Al Qaeda fighters, then they’re Shit-outta-luck because there are none there – they’re all in Pakistan. If, on the other hand they’re trying to eliminate Taliban influence and prop up a US-supportive gov’t, then they better get used to the idea of a never-ending conflict where an inexhaustible supply of jihadists from the madrassass (sp?) will always be there to confront them.
The ultimate quagmire.
May 13th, 2009 at 6:57 pm
someone doesn’t know what strategic depth is or where India and Pakistan are in relation to one another
The DOD and CIA have always preferred black ops. They are easier to conduct and have an immediate payoff if successful.
This is all a precursor to the US having roving bands of assassins taking out terrorists and their supporters around the globe ala “Munich.”
May 13th, 2009 at 7:00 pm
The real crux of the matter is that in a geographical sub-portion of Afghanistan where there’s insurgent activity happening, US forces face a choice at the margin between trying to identify and kill insurgents, and trying to identify and protect civilian population centers.
And the choice at the margin has been made to ID and kill insurgents, because the other option requires a lot more boys and girls in BDUs.
In my opinion, the Taliban offer to turn OBL over was not in good faith. They never specified what quality of evidence was sufficient to cut him loose. Given how deeply OBL was entrenched in the Taliban government, and the ties of obligation developed from back in the Soviet fighter days, I serious doubt they would ever have given him up.
May 13th, 2009 at 7:35 pm
Since Bush had no evidence bin Laden was involved at the time, the Taliban position was correct. However, it’s clear that faced with the option of being overthrown and giving up bin Laden, they probably would have done it. I believe this issue has been analyzed fairly thoroughly and the consensus is that Bush moved too soon.
Not to mention that Bush’s REAL motivations for attacking Afghanistan have to do with “Pipelinestan” more than anything else – just as his invasion of Iraq was entirely to do with oil than anything else.
The notion that if you kill a few warlords or tribal leaders that you’re going to have peace in Afghanistan and/or Pakistan is just naive. There are always going to be “leaders” of those those tribes and warlords have sons and relatives. The more you kill – short of genocide – the worse your problems are going to be.
While it is true that “armies cause problems by killing many when the solution to all problems is to kill one – the right one”, that doesn’t work when your fundamental problem is that YOU are the aggressor in the first place.
The US had no business invading Afghanistan regardless of whether bin Laden would or would not have been handed over or whether Al Qaeda was or was not being supported there. This is merely US exceptionalism in action: the notion that the US has the right to overthrow anybody in the world who displeases us.
Both bin Laden and Al Qaeda could have been dealt with in a more efficient and less harmful manner than overthrowing a government. By doing so, the US became the invader, the occupier, the aggressor, and the entire nations of Afghanistan and Pakistan are now opposed to the US and will only grow more so the more the US is revealed to be indifferent to civilian deaths in the pursuit of “terrorists” – “terrorists” who are merely resisting occupation.
If you label everybody who opposes the US in Afghanistan and Pakistan a “terrorist”, pretty soon you’ll be fighting at least 35-41 million Pashtuns – because that’s how tribal societies react to that sort of thing.
People do not understand that these are tribal societies – if you kill the tribal leaders, the ENTIRE TRIBE will come after your ass. This has been explicitly demonstrated numerous times where after Predator attacks in Pakistan, entire tribes have threatened to join the Taliban and start conducting attacks in Afghanistan.
There IS NO strategy that will enable the US to make any progress in either Afghanistan or Pakistan – except leaving.
The notion that the Taliban in either Afghanistan or Pakistan will suddenly seize power, grab nukes (in Pakistan) and start harboring terrorists intend on destroying the US is the same BS “domino theory” used to justify Vietnam.
The Taliban in both Afghanistan and Pakistan are mostly highly inward-looking and have no interest in conducting operations against the US outside their borders. And once again, Al Qaeda can be dealt with regardless of where they are “harbored”. You deal with them when they stick their noses out of their “safe harbors”. It’s not rocket science.
May 13th, 2009 at 10:47 pm
I knew a Black Ops asset who was also into Wet Work. A rather rum business, I gather.
May 14th, 2009 at 2:54 am
Go White on the population vis-a-vis the Taliban. Go Black on actual Western-oriented Al Qaeda (this will involve drastically less U.S. kinetic action than we now see, but depends hugely on networked intelligence. That is where we will win or lose). Minimize civilian casualties across the board. DON’T go Black on Taliban just for the sake of killing. Train Pakistanis & Afghans to do that, for they better understand the political limits on direct action against indigenous mvts. Make the locals fight the local fight so that we can accomplish our international objective and get out. There’s your strategy.
May 14th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
1. I’m at a loss as to why these two different approaches are mutually exclusive. On the contrary. I think there should be more nation-building and more killing of Taliban at the same time, and one won’t actually ‘win’ the war without the other.
You can’t expect to help people by building infrastructure if it’s being blown up by guerrillas when you’re finished building it. You can’t convince people you’re there for their best interests if all you’re doing is bombing their villages. And – oh yeah – could the USAF please learn to stop bombing villages? This is an infantry war, please leave the tactical bombers (e.g. the Taliban recruiting machines) at home, thanks.
2. To all of those surrealists who still think this was about a pipeline, or who insist that the Taliban were somehow just nice people who got caught in the middle and wanted to help, all I can say is, what difference does 09/11 make – the Taliban were contemptible people, morally worth attacking regardless. Sort of like neoconfederates, only with poorer marksmanship.