EMPOWERING SUCCESS

IN AFGHANISTAN:
Towards a New U.S. Grand Strategy

THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES:

STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM
 AFGHANISTAN STRATEGIC REVIEW BOARD

Dr. John T. Fishel, Dr. Steven Metz

Emeritus Professor from National Defense University, Chairman, Regional Strategy Department,
Lecturer, School of International and Area Studies of The University of Oklahoma Strategic Studies Institute,
U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA.
Dr. Charles "Chip" Hauss,
Alliance for Peace Building Dr. Jeffrey Reeves
Program Director, Culture and Conflict Studies
Andre D. Hollis Center for Advanced Defense Studies
Advisor to His Excellency Zarar Ahmad Moqbel “Osmani”
Minister for Counter Narcotics, Government of the LTC Tony Shaffer, USAR
Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Director External Communications, Center for Advanced Defense Studies
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Counternarcotics Author: Operation Dark Heart
Former DIA Operations Officer, OEF-Afghanistan
LTC David E. A. Johnson, USA (Ret.)
Executive Director, Center for Advanced Defense Studies Dr. Maria J. Stephan
Former Chief of Plans and Current Plans, CJSOTF-N/ CJSOTF-AP OIF Sub-National Governance/Civil Society,
Interagency Provincial Affairs, US Embassy Kabul
Major Richard Macnamee
Adjunct Professor Dr. Marc W.D. Tyrrell
Masters Program in International Affairs (MPIA) Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies,
The Bush School of Government and Public Service Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies
Texas A&M University Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada

© 2011 by The Center for Advanced Defense Studies

i| THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES

 PRINCIPAL AUTHOR
COL (Ret.) Robert C. Jones, USA
Director, Strategic Understanding
Former Director, Strategic Studies SOCOM

EDITORIAL STAFF
Jeffrey Reeves, PhD
Director, Culture and Conflict Studies

Ms. Sarah Catanzaro

Ms. Elise Hogan
Mr. Farley Mesko

Colonel Robert C. Jones is a recently retired U.S. Army Special Forces offi-
cer. He most recently served in 2009/10 as the Special Operations Liaison
to the U.S. Embassy, Kabul; and as the Chief of the Special Operations Liai-
son Element to Regional Command-South at Kandahar Airfield. Prior to that
he served two years at USSOCOM as the Chief of Strategic Studies; and four
years at Special Operations Command, Pacific where he served as the Di-
rector of Strategy and Plans, and also as the Director of Operations. He is a
graduate of the U.S. Army War College, Willamette University College of
Law, and Oregon State University.

THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES DOES NOT ADOPT SPECIFIC POLICY POSITIONS; OPINIONS EXPRESSED IN
THIS WHITE PAPER ARE SOLELY THOSE OF THE AUTHOR(S) AND DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE OPINIONS OF THE
CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES, ITS FELLOWS, RESEARCHERS, OR STAFF.

STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM | ii

 EMPOWERING SUCCESS IN THIS PROPOSAL RECOMMENDS A
POLICY SHIFT IN AFGHANISTAN. AN
AFGHANISTAN: ENHANCED UNDERSTANDING OF
TOWARDS A NEW U.S. THE SITUATION IN AFGHANISTAN
PROVIDES IMPLICATIONS FOR
GRAND STRATEGY EVOLVING U.S. GRAND STRATEGY.

Cover Image: U.S. Army photo by Spc. Nicholas T. Loyd. “Chatting with local children in Afghanistan” 28 March
2010 via Flickr. Creative Commons Attribution.

THE CENTER FOR

ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES
10 G STREET NE, SUITE 610
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iii | THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES

 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Strategy is the sum of three essential components of Ends, Ways and Means. Strategic debate tends to
focus on the Ways and Means. Such is the essence of “The Surge” that adopted a more population-
centric approach with increased emphasis on nation building. Violence, however, has increased by
nearly two thirds over the past year.i Americans are frustrated, America’s allies are frustrated, and most
importantly, President Hamid Karzai is frustrated.ii Success in the AFPAK region must begin by redefin-
ing the Ends. By adjusting the Ends first, new Ways and Means that are more suitable and far less oner-
ous emerge from the fog of war. The overall context for such an approach is one of Empowerment.iii To
that end, the U.S. must:

 End the “Wars” – Describing the most violent locations associated with efforts to defeat Al Qaeda as distinct wars to
be won or lost is inaccurate and carries unnecessary strategic risk. iv Combat operations will continue for years in this
effort, but a conceptual and legal framework of peace creates constraints that drive Ways and Means that promise
greater acceptability at home and abroad, and should increase effectiveness as well.
 Relinquish control – The coalition must adopt a more principled approach that empowers partner nations to deter-
mine their own governance and shape their own solutions. This will mend the damaged perceptions of local legitimacy
of government that are essential to stability. The controlling nature of containment strategies is an obstacle to popular
sovereignty.
 Strike at the roots – Causation that creates conditions of insurgency within a populace radiates out from government
in the form of domestic policy.v These are the conditions that the Taliban and Al Qaeda exploit.vi
 Redefine relationships with allies –The U.S. must guard against bullying allies into subjugating their own national
interests in favor of ours. Equally, the U.S. must guard against perceptions that we are somehow enabling certain gov-
ernments to bully their own populaces. Waning U.S. influence increases the pressure to succumb to more coercive
techniques of diplomacy, just as economic and security demands promote relationships with several of the world‖s
most oppressive regimes. The post-Cold War uptick in international and domestic terrorism, as well as the rise of or-
ganizations like Al Qaeda should be seen as indicators of the need to refine these approaches. The U.S. must shift
from a Cold War-based containment framework to one better designed for an emerging world that is growing flatter
every day.

STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM |1

  Bring Afghanistan into the strategic context – Peacetime approaches that focus on causation can be much smaller,
less expensive and more effective than current wartime approaches focused on mitigating the symptoms of that causation.
Wartime approaches focus on the defeat of those organizations and ideologies that emerge to exploit conditions of insur-
gency. The first step is to recognize that the “vital interests” most closely associated with the AFPAK region to stabilize
Pakistan and to “disrupt, defeat and dismantle” Al Qaeda are both best served indirectly.vii Attacking these interests directly
has moved them both in the wrong direction. Al Qaeda is primarily an idea, and as such cannot be contained or defeated in
some specific place. Physically Al Qaeda can be anywhere and ideologically they are everywhere; U.S. approaches must
evolve to reflect that reality. As to Afghanistan the key to stability lies in protecting the populace from the government as
well as the insurgent. Convening a Constitutional Loya Jirga that fairly represents the entire populace to “form new guards
for their future security” is the first step toward true reconciliation of the issues that feed the causation of the top tier of the
Taliban revolutionary insurgency. The associated reduction of Coalition presence will in turn mitigate the causation of the
lower tier Taliban resistance insurgency

U.S. Approaches to the AFPAK region are the primary strategic communication to the entire global com-
munity. A principled, peacetime, empowering approach better serves U.S. interests, and sends a power-
ful and positive message to friend and foe alike.

2| THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES

 ESTABLISHING A COMMON AND WORKABLE
LEXICON IS THE CRITICAL FIRST STEP
THIS WORK IS INTENDED TO HELP STRATEGIC POLICY MAKERS
RECONCILE THEIR NEEDS WITH THE SUCCESSES OF THE
OPERATIONAL LEADERS ON THE GROUND. MANY COMMONLY USED
TERMS HAVE MEANINGS THAT VARY BY ORGANIZATION AND LEVEL
OF ORGANIZATIONAL EMPLOYMENT. THE FOLLOWING DEFINES KEY
TERMS AS USED THROUGHOUT THIS PROPOSAL.
AL QAEDA is a non-state entity employing terrorist tac-
tics and an Islamist ideology for political purpose. AQ lever-
ages the tools of globalization to employ a networked ap-
proach to Unconventional Warfare, leveraging and inciting
organizations and individuals to act on their behalf where
conditions of insurgency already exist.
TALIBAN are a nationalist insurgency that is best seen
as two distinct tiers. An upper tier represented by the Quetta
Shura that is political and revolutionary in nature; and a lower
tier consisting of rank and file fighters and supporters that are
largely apolitical and resistance in nature.
WAR is declared or undeclared combat of strategic signifi-
cance that exposes one or more nations to defeat.viii
VITAL INTERESTS are interests that involve national
survival, including the preservation of assets that make sur-
vival meaningful.ix
INSURGENCY is an illegal political challenge to a gov-
erning body that may be either violent or non-violent in terms
of tactics employed or campaign design; a civil emergency
that often resembles war, but rarely is war.
CONDITIONS OF INSURGENCY are a state of
mind. Conditions of insurgency exist to some degree within
every populace. The likelihood of illegal political violence in-
crease as these conditions worsen in relation to the percep-
tions of poor governance. Left unchecked these conditions
are apt to be exploited by internal and/or external parties for
purposes of their own that may or may not have the welfare
of the affected populace in mind. Conditions of insurgency
are caused by the government but assessed through the per-
spective of the populace.
GOOD GOVERNANCE is subjective, and assessed
by each significant segment of a populace in their percep-
tions of the critical causal factors of Legitimacy, Justice, Re-
spect and Hope. Good governance may be either effective or
ineffective. The absence of Good Governance is Poor Gov-
ernance- the primary cause for the growth of conditions of
insurgency. Perceptions good governance will vary across a
state. Where good governance exists insurgency is unlikely.
COUNTER-INSURGENCY (COIN) is the action
of that governing body working to prevent or resolve the civil
emergency of insurgency by addressing the conditions of
insurgency while mitigating the symptoms.
SANCTUARY is some combination of legal status, the
support of a poorly governed populace, and some favorable
combination of terrain and vegetation. Functional sanctuary
associated with such status or support is more powerful than
physical sanctuary provided by any particular space, gov-
erned or otherwise.
LEGITIMACY is the recognition and acceptance by
the populace of the government‖s right to govern.
TERRORISM is the illegal use of violence to create fear
for political purpose. It is a tactic .
COUNTER-TERRORISM (CT) is a tactic de-
signed to disrupt, dismantle, defeat or otherwise bring to jus-
tice individuals or organizations criminally liable for attempted
or executed acts of terrorism.
UNCONVENTIONAL WARFARE (UW) is the
effort of any state or non-state actor to incite, lead, or facili-
tate insurgency among any populace of which they are not a
member.
COUNTER-UNCONVENTIONAL WAR-
FARE (CUW) is a campaign that includes a program of
engagement designed to foil the efforts of any state or non-
state actor to incite, lead, or facilitate insurgency among any
populace of which they are not a member.
STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM |3
 EMPOWERING SUCCESS IN AFGHANISTAN
V
ITAL INTERESTS AND
WARFARE
Any discussion of U.S. involvement in the AFPAK region
must begin with a discussion of national interests and war.
The current U.S. policy on AFPAK recognizes a “vital na-
tional security interest in addressing the current and po-
tential security threats posed by extremists in Afghanistan
and Pakistan.”x Recent proposals by both the Afghanistan
Study Group (ASG) and the Center for a New American
Security (CNAS) recognize two vital interests.xi The first is
the denial of the AFPAK region as a sanctuary for Al
Qaeda to stage terrorist attacks, and the second is the
stability of Pakistan and the security of its nuclear arsenal.
While one can debate if either of these interests rise to the
level of “national survival” that would place them in the
vital category, it is important to subject that assumption to
critical analysis.
Current and proposed approaches to mitigate the dangers
to these two interests are actually serving to increase vul-
nerability. Part of this is due to an application of a COIN
doctrine derived directly from the colonial experiences of
European powers‖ efforts to sustain their empires, and
adopted by the U.S in the first half of the 20th century for
our own colonial enterprises. This experience provided
the foundation upon which the subsequent 60 years of
Cold War and post-Cold War COIN is based. There are
two central flaws to this foundation. The first is that it is
based upon the assumption that COIN is war. The second
is that it is directed at the goal of creating and sustaining
in power a government that is more committed to serving
the national interests of some external power than those
of their own populace.
The definitions provided with this brief proposal are de-
signed to paint a more cogent picture of insurgency and
closely related issues than are found in current doctrine.
The problem can be viewed in a whole new light once one
recognizes that foreign and domestic policies are the pri-
mary drivers of terrorism and insurgency, and that govern-
mental responsibility is the critical first step to restoring
4| THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES
stability . Current approaches are too apt to ignore the role
of government in causation and go directly to seeking to
manage and mitigate the symptoms of the problem. Insur-
gency is simply illegal politics, and COIN is simply govern-
ance. Therefore the focus of COIN must be on under-
standing how the populace feels, which feelings are more
important than others, and then focusing the main effort
on fixing government, while supporting efforts seek to miti-
gate the symptoms of the problem.
AVOID ADDRESSING
SYMPTOMS WITHOUT
UNDERSTANDING THE DISEASE
The United States― campaign in Afghanistan addresses
the symptoms rather than the root causes of insurgency.
This course of action may suppress the symptoms at tre-
mendous cost in national blood, treasure and influence;
but will not resolve the conditions of insurgency. By con-
tinuing to define success as sustaining the central govern-
ment, rather than empowering the Afghan people, we con-
tribute to making the conditions of insurgency worse. Dur-
ing the past year of the surge, insurgent attacks are 67%
higher than for the same months in 2009, and at the cost
of $120 Billion annually for the U.S. alone.xii
A theory with a growing following is that of regional secu-
rity complexes creating partnerships that are both below
the state level, and crosscutting of multiple states at the
same time, as a more effective supplement to state-based
security mechanisms.xiii While there is certainly the poten-
tial to develop such a security complex in the AFPAK re-
gion in time, it is the divergent interests that dominate
those potential partners, forming what would more accu-
rately be termed a regional insecurity complex currently.
As the U.S. works to shift security in this trouble region to
parties that are more closely tied by shard populaces, is-
sues, and borders, regional security offers an alternative
to efforts dominated by any one state.xiv Currently, how-
ever, it is a state dominated approach, with Pakistan play-
ing a central, if conflicted, role.
The past nine years of political and physical efforts to
counter terrorism have had a significant effect on the inter-
nal stability of Pakistan and on détente between Pakistan
and India. Current approaches create a tremendous con-
flict of interest for Pakistan. Pakistan struggles to serve its
TOWARDS A NEW U.S. GRAND STRATEGY
own vital interest of maintaining good relations with a U.S.
that is growing increasingly close to India; while at the
same time seeking, through covert action, to maintain con-
ditions in Afghanistan viewed as vital to deterrence in their
cold war with India. By overly focusing on the vital interest
of defeating AQ, the U.S. may well be putting at risk the
vital interest of a stable Pakistan under the current strat-
egy.
Current approaches create domestic conflicts for NATO
allies as well. While the growing friction in Europe is not as
severe as within Pakistan, it is significant enough to re-
duce U.S. influence in Europe and to increase the likeli-
hood of AQ finding sanctuary and recruits within empa-
thetic pockets of Western populaces.xv
The fact is that extensive nation building and increased
US troop presence in Afghanistan, coupled with drone
attacks in Pakistan, only address the symptoms, rather
than the conditions of insurgency. The appropriateness of
such tactics begins to unravel when looked at in the con-
text of a deeper understanding of insurgency and uncon-
ventional warfare. These are the fine nuances of this type
of conflict that create the margin between failure and suc-
cess.
THE SITUATION HAS EVOLVED
Current operations in Afghanistan bear little resemblance
to the 2001 limited unconventional warfare campaign
aimed at denying Al Qaeda sanctuary in that country.
“Mission creep,” that constant adjusting of what one seeks
to accomplish as the situation changes around them, is
persistent in Afghanistan.xvi Aside from the changing situa-
tion on the ground, no two experts can agree on what in-
surgency is, or how to best address it. This is further com-
plicated by:1 -our general ignorance of the culture and
history of this region and the nature of tribal-family-
religious dynamics across AFPAK; 2 - the efforts of doz-
ens of stakeholders with varying, often conflicting, man-
dates; 3 -constant changes in tactics and priorities with
every change in leadership (at every level). To add to the
complexity, there are a wide range of external powers
working behind the scenes to promote their perceived vital
interests as well.xvii Little of this expensive, disruptive com-
plexity, however is directed at the root causes of insur-
gency.
The revolutionary aspect of the insurgency began to grow
noticeably in 2006, following Hamid Karzai‖s widely chal-
lenged claim to the presidency and ratification of a consti-
tution that effectively centralized all patronage in the entire
country in him.xviii By 2008, as Coalition forces grew in
number and operations grew more aggressive in nature,
the resistance aspect of the insurgency among the people
began to grow as well.xix The insurgency breaks into two
tiers along these lines. Efforts aimed at defeating insur-
gent organizations or creating greater effectiveness of
government overly engage the lower resistance tier and
can only suppress the insurgency at best. Success in Af-
ghanistan demands focusing on the upper revolutionary
tier of the insurgency. This is accomplished by addressing
the poor governance radiating out of the Karzai regime
and defining the nature of the conflict more appropriately
as a civil emergency rather than as a war.
THE CURRENT APPROACH
IS NOT WORKING
In this environment, an extensive nation building COIN
approach to the campaign in Afghanistan is neither suit-
able nor feasible. Alternatively, disengagement while
maintaining a precision strike capability is neither suitable
nor acceptable. Instead, the US should implement the new
National Security Strategyxx in a way that continues the
evolution from the strategies of Cold War Containment.
Under this paradigm, the United States can evolve from
strategies of “intervention” into more effective strategies of
“empowerment.”
A POLICY OF NATION BUILDING IS
NEITHER SUITABLE NOR FEASIBLE
Tactics rooted in a heavy intervention effort of security,
governance and development—or nation building—are as
apt to make the insurgency worse as better. It is one of
the classic clichés of COIN theory that ineffective govern-
ance causes insurgency, and that, conversely, creating
effective governance will cure it.
The causal drivers of insurgency are addressed by
“respective” governance. Rank and file supporters often
join for reasons found at the base of Maslow‖s hierarchy,
but the issues driving the leadership of insurgency are
found toward the top. “Respective,” i.e. good, governance
STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM |5
 EMPOWERING SUCCESS IN AFGHANISTAN
is the key to stability. Good governance draws its legiti-
macy from the governed and is committed to enforcing the
rule of law with equal justice; to ensuring that no segment
of society is treated with inequity as a matter of status;
and perhaps most importantly, to ensuring that legal, cer-
tain, and trusted means of affecting government are well
established.. Effectiveness is important, but it is a poor
guard against insurgency. Good governance is essential,
and need not be particularly effective to prevent insur-
gency. The concept of effectiveness comes from colonial-
based COIN, rather than an understanding of insurgency.
Colonial powers had no intent of granting the concessions
required to cure insurgency, therefore settled for the effec-
tiveness necessary to suppress it.xxi Even if effectiveness
of governance did cure insurgency, it would take decades
of sustained effort to build an effective Afghan nation. A
nation building approach requires a large foreign presence
which will exacerbate the resistance aspect of the insur-
gency.xxii, xxiii
As a resistance insurgency, the base does not fight for
ideology, politics or religion. They fight because, regard-
less of strategic intent, Coalition troops are perceived as
invaders.xxiv To resist occupation is the honorable thing to
do, and tribal codes, particularly Pashtunwali, require that
every man defend himself, his family, his home and his
land in order to live with honor.xv Finally, the base of the
Afghan resistance insurgency fights because they are paid
an honest wage to do so by the insurgent leadership. xxvi
Resistance insurgency is the natural response of a popu-
lace to occupation, particularly when coupled with percep-
tions of poor governance. Populaces do not fail govern-
ments; it is governments that fail populaces. Surging for-
eign resources to engage this base, in support of such
failed governance, is far more apt to make the conditions
of insurgency worse than better. The 67% increase in
violent attacks over the past year gives grim testament to
this fact.
This disconnect in our understanding of what actually
causes insurgency is a fundamental obstacle to stabil-
ity in Afghanistan. The US military can expend all the re-
sources at its disposal and still not repair how Afghans
regard their government on critical causal factors. A
‘nation’ cannot be externally constructed. Such an ap-
proach is inherently illegitimate. A nation must come from
indigenous efforts, goals and desires; and be led by a gov-
6| THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES
ernment that is recognized by the governed.
A POLICY OF DISENGAGEMENT AND
PRECISION STRIKES IS NEITHER
SUITABLE NOR ACCEPTABLE
While clearly an important tool in the operational arsenal,
precision strikes must be limited to Al Qaeda proper. By
narrowly tailoring the use of precision strikes one maxi-
mizes their positive effects. Precision strikes, when carried
out by drones, can penetrate sanctuary and contribute
significantly to reducing the threat perception of invulner-
ability; yet they do nothing to address the root causes of
insurgency. Further, if the populace and nationalist insur-
gents are targeted as well, these attacks can make recon-
ciliation of the issues contributing to the conditions of in-
surgency even harder.
Precision strikes are best suited to the critical nodes of al
Qaeda‖s Unconventional Warfare (UW) network
(leadership, special skills, finance, communications, cell
structure, ideology, etc.) employed to facilitate the insur-
gencies of others. Strikes should only target pure al
Qaeda and pointedly avoid the nationalist insurgent move-
ments that al Qaeda draws upon. Al Qaeda‖s true sanctu-
ary lies within the support of the Taliban. Alienating the
Taliban in pursuit of al Qaeda only reinforces their sanctu-
ary. Drone strikes and airpower can temporarily suppress
insurgent organizations militarily, but resilient organiza-
tions will adapt and reemerge.
Civilian casualties commit the populace to the insurgent
cause. Strikes perceived to be executed over the protest
of Pakistan also serve to erode the sovereign credibility of
their government and contribute to instability. Further-
more, a campaign of drone strikes is perceived as dishon-
orable and cowardly; and raids by a combined force of
Afghan and Pakistani Commandos empowered by Coali-
tion SOF would be far more effective.xxvii, xxviii Regardless
of the effectiveness of the precision drone strike campaign
in targeting senior leadership in the Taliban and al Qaeda,
Afghan and Pakistani perceptions of this campaign are
overwhelmingly negative, and this makes the insurgency
stronger, and strengthens the sanctuary found within this
populace.xxix
TOWARDS A NEW U.S. GRAND STRATEGY
A NEW PERSPECTIVE:
’CIVIL EMERGENCY’ AND
’EMPOWERMENT’
The US is encountering a two-tier insurgency in Afghani-
stan, with a top tier of revolution-minded leadership and a
base of resistance-minded supporters. This distinction
between the leadership and base is important to under-
standing why current COIN tactics do not present a holis-
tic answer to the Afghanistan problem. Current COIN ac-
tivities are focused at the base, which is the most visible
aspect of the insurgency and draws the most attention.
COIN‖s history is filled with countless examples of long,
drawn-out campaigns that often end in failure.xxx Practitio-
ners of COIN routinely engage the base of an insurgency
and frame it in the “win” or “lose” terms of conventional
warfare. Success in Afghanistan demands the resolution
of the political issues driving the top of the insurgency and
such operations are best framed as a civil emergency.
This approach allows for effective reconciliation of the is-
sues empowering an insurgency‖s leadership and the for-
mation of a more legitimate system of government that will
undermine the insurgency at its roots.
This is a paradigm shift that challenges several popular
concepts of COIN that serve to shape the current Afghan
strategy. Such a shift will also challenge the Coalition‖s
relationship with the Karzai government. The central gov-
ernment‖s illegitimacy is the principle cause of this insur-
gency.xxxi Placing the onus for creating the conditions of
insurgency on government, rather than on some insur-
gent, some ideology, or some segment of the populace is
never popular with governments. The perceived fraudu-
lence of these elections contributed to this perception, and
elections under the current constitution cannot cure it.xxxii
The goal of engaging the top tier of the Afghan insurgency
is about empowering good governance, rather than ena-
bling more effective poor governance. It is about address-
ing the causal perceptions that contribute to the conditions
of insurgency within a society. It is the growth of these
conditions that make a populace ripe for exploitation. By
addressing such conditions a government inoculates their
populaces from insurgent instigators. The conditions of
insurgency stem primarily from the following four root
causal perceptions:xxxiii
 Legitimacy: The populace must recognize the right of
the government to govern. A writ of legitimacy can
only come from the governed. The absence of legiti-
macy often becomes the rock upon which the back of
a COIN campaign is broken. Public perception that
centrally-appointed state and local leaders in Afghani-
stan are illegitimate is arguably a major cause of in-
surgency in Afghanistan.xxxiv, xxxv
 Justice: The populace must perceive that the rule of
law as applied to them is just. Polls in Afghanistan find
that the Afghan populace believes they receive
greater justice from the Taliban than from the govern-
ment. While Taliban rule of law is not what they prefer,
they do prefer the justice they receive under it to the
rule of law as exercised by the Karzai government.xxxvi
In insurgency, perception is far more important than
fact. A COIN effort based in the effective exercise of
the rule of law, among a populace that does not per-
ceive the law to be just, will make the insurgency
worse.xxxvii
 Respect: No significant segment of the society can
perceive that they are excluded from participation in
governance and opportunity as a matter of status.
Traditional Afghan culture provides security and influ-
ence solely based on tribal and family affiliations.
When political power shifts in Afghanistan, it is not just
bureaucrats who lose their jobs, it impacts every offi-
cial in government, every businessman, and every
farmer who lacks the appropriate tribal and family po-
litical patronage.xxxviii This provides powerful motivation
to those who are currently excluded to seek any
means to affect change. It also provides powerful mo-
tivation to those who are currently in power to go to
any means to maintain the status quo. A wise father in
Afghanistan does not diversify his investments by
splitting his wealth between stocks and bonds; he di-
versifies his investments by having one son join the
Afghan National Police, and one join the Taliban. He
does not see a conflict in this approach. Rather, he is
merely seeking to insure the livelihood of his fam-
ily.xxxix
 Hope: The populace must perceive that they have a
trusted, effective and legal means of changing govern-
ance, when they believe such change to be neces-
STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM |7
 EMPOWERING SUCCESS IN AFGHANISTAN
sary. This is the great “off ramp” for insurgency, and
no such off ramps exist in Afghanistan. This leaves
the people two bad choices: acceptance or insur-
gency. For the large segment of the populace ex-
cluded from effective participation in governance or
economic opportunity, acceptance is not a realistic
option. It is the certainty of hope that ensures that pro-
test movements in a democracy do not devolve into
violent insurgency. Western constructs for hope, such
as elections, do not work well and undermine tradi-
tional methods of redress through Shuras and Jirgas.
In Afghanistan these traditional processes are disem-
powered by the Constitution, and there is no such
hope.xxxx
EMPOWERED GOOD GOVERNANCE IS
SUPERIOR TO ENABLED
EFFECTIVE GOVERNANCE
Enabled effective governance is measured by the capabili-
ties of the various branches of government and the effi-
ciency with which they pursue their missions. If that gov-
ernment is perceived as only serving the objectives of a
limited number of citizens, the government is an efficient
tyranny. In this environment, stability comes from security
and suppressed popular dissent. Under a legitimate gov-
ernment, security comes from stability. Security conditions
in critical provinces are within the capacity of a legitimate
Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan
(GIROA) to manage without significant external assis-
tance. Illegitimate governments must control their popu-
laces, but a populace served by legitimate government is
apt to be under control. Such stability should be seen as a
metric that repairs to governance are working, and not as
a prerequisite action to addressing governmental failures.
This perspective encourages coalition Foreign Internal
Defense (FID) and CT capabilities to shrink as scheduled,
and yet, the Coalition will still be capable of assisting the
development of the GIROA and preventing the reemer-
gence of al Qaeda. Violent insurgency will still exist, but at
manageable levels and trending in a positive direction.
Success is not the end of violence or the establishment of
effective government. Success is setting the conditions for
good governance and patiently empowering the Afghan
people and their government to find their own path to sta-
bility.
8| THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES
APPLYING EMPOWERMENT
TO AFGHANISTAN
To enact such a major paradigm shifts from Enablement
to Empowerment; from waging War under military leader-
ship to waging Peace under civil leadership will require
adjustments across government to how we think about
and approach such problems. The American people, our
NATO allies, and coalition partners know that what we are
doing is not working, and will respond favorably if the ra-
tionale for such a change is brought to them directly.
1. The President should take this on personally, to ad-
dress the American people and the world regarding a
major change of perspective and approach in regards
to Afghanistan specifically, but also in regards to the
larger policy and strategy context. Such approaches
are far more consistent with his stated positions on
how America should interact with the world, and ap-
plying these changes to the situation in the AFPAK
region provides him a rare opportunity to demonstrate
this connection.
2. Stop attempting to control political outcomes in Af-
ghanistan. The only legitimate outcomes will be the
ones developed endogenously. Self-determination
within clear parameters is far superior to forced de-
mocracy.
3. Stop making the preservation of the current admini-
stration in Afghanistan the measure of success. If they
step up to the challenge of providing good govern-
ance, they will survive.
4. Release NATO and Pakistan from an obligation to
participate in pursuing U.S. interests. Allow them to
better balance their own national interests without fear
of damaging their relationship with the U.S..
5. Make true reconciliation and the development of a
new constitution designed to promote good govern-
ance within the Afghan culture the top priority. Make
the continuation of any significant U.S. support contin-
gent upon that taking place.xl
6. Reduce military aid to Pakistan and refrain from posi-
tions encouraging them to extend western concepts of
sovereignty and governance into the Pashtu regions
of their country.
7. Establish an agreement with Pakistan that allows the
Coalition to enter Pakistan for short duration, intel-
driven, punitive raids that go directly after al Qaeda
TOWARDS A NEW U.S. GRAND STRATEGY
leadership and critical nodes of their UW network.
Justify these operations as simple retaliationfor the
9/11 attacks. Recommend development of an elite
combined Afghan/Pakistan Pashtun force on the lines
of the current Afghan Commandos. This unit should
operate under combined Afghan/Pakistan command
and control, supported with U.S. Special Forces advi-
sors and other critical enablers to form the core of
such operations.
8. Focus all governance, development and security as-
sistance operations on activities designed to directly
influence the key causal perceptions of Legitimacy,
Justice, Respect and Hope.
9. Put all military operations, beyond the narrow Counter
-Terrorism (CT) effort described above, into the con-
text of Foreign Internal Defense (FID) and Military
Support to Civil Authorities (MSCA). However, main-
tain combat allowances and recognition as this will
continue to be a dangerous combat mission .These
changes will also demand identifying a proper legal
context for Peace Support Operations as soon as
practical, as the rules will change. However, end the
war and COIN context immediately. Place all U.S.
assets under civilian control, answering to an Ambas-
sador, through an Office of Military Cooperation, em-
powered with clear tasking authority over all Defense
Department resources and capabilities in country .

CREATE A FRAMEWORK FOR SUCCESS

The method used to reduce forces will have a major impact on American influence for years to come. The specter of Vietnam
has been used so powerfully by opponents to coalition efforts in Afghanistan because of the traumatic transition. Not only must
downsizing occur in a measured fashion, it must be under civilian control and supported by a campaign plan that includes inte-
grated strategic communications and some basic conceptual changes.

REFRAME the Problem

 Empowerment: Bring Afghanistan efforts within the context of the spirit of the National Security Strategy.
 Understanding: Applying an understanding of insurgency is more important than applying knowledge of COIN.
CHANGE from Warfare to Lawfare:
 Declare: The war is over, but the mission continues.
 Deny: Al Qaeda‖s greatest sanctuary is in their legal status. Deny this, not terrain.
FOCUS on the Top Tier of the Insurgency:
 Resolve: The top tier of the insurgency is a revolution. Resolve this to end the insurgency as a whole. Afghan-led recon-
ciliation of the issues driving the revolution is the key.
 Mitigate: The bottom tier of the insurgency is a resistance. Mitigate this, until the top is resolved. Natural reintegration on
Afghan terms following reconciliation, rather than artificial reintegration driven by Coalition funding and programs, is best for
all.
RECOGNIZE Conflicts of Interest:
 Empathize: U.S. interests and values are not universal. Appreciate how the ends, ways and means of key partners and
opponents will differ in general and vary by issue.
 Release: Release key partners such as Pakistan and NATO from positions which have forced them to compromise critical
interests at home in order to service the single interest of maintaining a strong relationship with the U.S.
REPACKAGE the Global Campaign from one of Countering Terrorism or Insurgency to one of Countering Unconventional
Warfare:
 Evolve: Counterterrorism is a tactic, employ it as such. COIN is the business of a host nation, leave it to them.
 Promote: Advocate for principles over values and promote the broad concept of good governance rather than the narrow
metrics of effective governance.
 Outcompete: Al Qaeda, though a terrorist organization, has become the champion of many oppressed populaces. Out-
compete al Qaeda globally by providing the hope born of legal resolutions to their nationalist challenges with poor govern-
ance at home, rather than the false promise of illegal violence and terror.

This integrated campaign plan should provide guidance to all branches of government to link national strategy to operations.

STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM |9

 EMPOWERING SUCCESS IN AFGHANISTAN
AN EMPOWERMENT APPROACH IN
AFGHANISTAN SERVES STATED
US STRATEGIC INTERESTS
Presumably the U.S. has forces in Afghanistan to pursue
the end state for the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT)
that began on 11 September 2001 and to promote U.S.
national interests in general.xli This lack of clear parame-
ters enables and encourages mission creep.
Afghanistan has only been important to U.S. national inter-
ests when it served interests elsewhere-for example, con-
tainment of the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Placed
in that context, the U.S. could immediately down-size its
stake in Afghanistan once the Global War On Terror
(GWOT) Ends are attained. This requires defining the
Ends of the GWOT.
Ends for a war are determined at the beginning; President
Bush defined the end-state desired in the Global War on
Terrorism as “a world…where the threat of terrorist attacks
does not define our daily lives.”xlii That is a subjective stan-
dard rooted in the perceptions of the American populace.
Most Americans would attest that concerns over terrorist
attacks do not define their daily lives.
More recently, the AFPAK Strategy defined new Ends as
being “to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Paki-
stan and Afghanistan and to prevent their return to either
country in the near future…”xliii U.S. strategy has trans-
formed from a goal of working globally to ensure that “the
threat of a terrorist attack does not define our daily lives,”
to one of “disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda in Paki-
stan and Afghanistan and to prevent their return.” The re-
sult is mission creep and over-emphasis on one particular
region.
The ends described by President Bush cannot be
achieved solely in the AFPAK region. Efforts to completely
eradicate AQ in the AFPAK region will drive them to oper-
ate from elsewhere. Consider the following points:
1. Al Qaeda is a non-state entity. They find their sanctu-
ary in a combination of their legal status (no state ties,
operating outside the law) and the support of poorly
governed populaces; not from any particular space, be
it governed or ungoverned. If denied the space of Af-
10 | THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES
ghanistan and Pakistan, they will simply migrate to a
more convenient space.
2. Combating an insurgent organization, like the Taliban
(or a UW organization that feeds on the insurgencies
of others, such as Al Qaeda), only targets the manifest
symptoms of the underlying conditions of insurgency.
Any approach that does not also address these condi-
tions will only temporarily suppress the problem.
The U.S. went to Afghanistan primarily to retaliate against
al Qaeda for the attacks of 9/11 and help Americans to
feel as safe as they felt on 9/10. Based on those ends,
the U.S. “war” in Afghanistan has been successfully
completed for a long time. The mission in Afghanistan
continues, but it is a mission in need of redefining.
OTHER VOICES:
Dr. Marc W.D. Tyrrell,
Institute of Interdisciplinary Studies,
Canadian Centre of Intelligence and Security Studies
Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada
I'm really glad to see someone in the US actually
talking about Grand Strategy. Most of the so-called "strategy"
I hear is, really, operational at best and, usually, grand tacti-
cal, with no comprehension of how the actual AO is currently
shaped. I think you have really put together something that is
trying to get at all of the complexities, although I believe there
are still a few "weak areas":
 I have always found it interesting that we talk about
Ends, Ways and Means but not about Intentions.
“Intentions” are more than “Ends”; they are the boundary
conditions for many possible ends (think about the differ-
ence between potential and actual in physics). Grand
Strategy should, in my opinion, be focused more on In-
tentions, the boundary conditions for particular Ends.
 The Talban, at least the Quetta Shura crowd, would, I
suspect, view themselves as a "government in exile" and
not an “insurgency”. They, as with other "governments
in exile", have a certain amount of legitimacy that insur-
gencies lack. How can this be modeled?
 [Conditions of Insurgency] is quite debatable, especially
in the case of the Taliban. I don't think a Western model
of causality works here – possibly the Chinese model of
“mutual arising” would be a better model to use. This has
implications for both how we model insurgency and what
metrics are used. For example, “security” doesn't come
from stability so much as from predictability; the two are
TOWARDS A NEW U.S. GRAND STRATEGY
close, but there are crucial differences.
 Coalition based COIN campaigns, such as Afghanistan,
are inherently more difficult to run that those in which
only one or two nations are involved. This difficulty
arises simply because each stakeholder brings a differ-
ent set of intentions to the board. A properly constructed
coalition strategy must be viewed by all stakeholders as
one that they can all agree on, at least in terms of inten-
tions. In the case of Afghanistan, however, I would sug-
gest that many of the nations involved feel that it is not
an alliance, so much as a gang being bossed by the US
simply because the "strategy" terms and debates are
being imposed by the US and not developed in common.
This perception, in turn, increases the erosion of US po-
litical capital in the global diplomatic arena.
 One of the central concerns I have with most models of
Insurgency and Counterinsurgency is that they tend to
be cast in the form of a two player "game". I believe that
this model breaks out of that to some degree but, I would
suggest, not far enough to encompass both the diasporic
communities involved and the various, and multiple,
populations living in participating nations. Given the cur-
rently available communications technologies (e.g. Face-
Book, Twitter, YouTube, etc. ad nauseum), I would sug-
gest that this global audience also plays a critical part in
defining "legitimacy" and really should be included.
Dr. Steven Metz,
Chairman, Regional Strategy Department,
Strategic Studies Institute,
U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA.
I generally agree with your assessment of the situation but
have some reservations about the solution (if I understand
correctly). We tend to identify "good governance" as we de-
fine it as the solution to preventing or ending insurgency. But
the Afghan and Pakistani elite are not dumb. So we need to
ask ourselves why, if the solution is so obvious, have they
not adopted it? I think that their concept of politics is very
different than ours. They are much more willing to tolerate
conflict (so long as it doesn't actually overthrow them) then
they are to abandon a political and economic system which
benefits them. Thus our priority is an end to the conflict and a
stable system; their priority is sustaining the system with as
little change as necessary to hold power and, if possible,
sustaining outside assistance.
To me that means that really convincing these elites to build
what we consider good governence is either impossible or
would be extraordinarily expensive--far out of proportion to
the strategic benefits the US would gain by it. So while I
agree with your notion of "de Americanizing" the conflict, I
think we need to recognize that is going to end the willing-
ness of the Afghan and Pakistani elites to make even the
token changes they currently make in order to sustain our
interest.
Unfortunately, then, I'm pessimistic that we can get anything
other than a "decent interval" in the conflict that we can use
to wash our hands of it.
Dr. John T. Fishel,
Emeritus Professor from National Defense University,
Lecturer, School of International and Area Studies of
The University of Oklahoma
I am a great believer in the use of the operational defini-
tion where the definer says what the term means. If you
are going to define insurgency so that it encompasses the
civil rights movement, then, if I want to talk to you I must
use your definition. The only thing I insist on is that your
definition be clear, complete, and exclude other defini-
tions. thus, while i wouldn't define insurgency the way you
do, i understand what you are doing - and in that context I
agree with you. (However):
 Nation building, itself, is not addressing symptoms but
an attempt to address root causes. It may be a wrong
headed approach to nation building with a focus on
the national government rather than from the bottom
up ie the tribes and the villages, but it is not an ap-
proach dealing with symptoms. As far as drone at-
tacks in Pakistan go, this is an enemy centric strategy
that may be attacking the wrong center of gravity.
 The problem with your approach is that in a civil emer-
gency you can‖t just go out and shoot the really bad
guys in the “upper revolutionary tier.” In a war you
can. (doesn‖t mean you should always do so, but you
can).
 I must respectfully disagree (regarding the ability of a
foreign power to create a legitimate government). We
have evidence from Japan and Germany after WWII,
and in this hemisphere more recently from El Salvador
and Panama that external powers can establish gov-
ernments that have or attain high degrees of legiti-
macy.
I would ask, having read the entire draft, how your pro-
posed strategy of empowerment helps to empower either
STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM | 11
 EMPOWERING SUCCESS IN AFGHANISTAN
the current Karzai govt to move in the direction of good
governance or, alternatively, empowers new leadership to
do so and, in the process, replace the Karzai regime. If
you will recall, it was our disillusionment with Diem that
caused the USG to tell the coup plotters we would not op-
pose them - hoping to get better governance out of them.
That turned out really well....
LTC (Ret) David E. A. Johnson, USA
Executive Director,
Center for Advanced Defense Studies
This work adds two important things to the current discus-
sion: 1) It shifts the focus from the unfortunately opera-
tional to the truly strategic; 2) It adds to our understanding
of the nature of the insurgency that destabilizes this re-
gion. The offered solution suggests that a change of per-
spective will result in good governance and stability in Af-
ghanistan, along with a reduction in US forces. While the
operational-strategic recommendations are sound, the
regional “insecurity” complex bears further attention.
The nature of Afghanistan and the interests of its
neighbors and other stake holders will combine to prevent
a stable Afghan central government regardless of the
quality of internal governance. Interests in the region may
converge on issues of counter-narcotics and the presence
of Al-Qaeda temporarily, as noted in “Kabul in the Middle”
by Amy Levine. However, the disruptiveness of the grow-
ing influence of India in Afghanistan and resultant Paki-
stani actions, tribal relationships external to the state, and
the economic interests of the Shanghai Cooperation Or-
ganization (SCO) will combine to prevent an internal solu-
tion to Afghan challenges.
Luckily, the solution to US interests is external to Afghani-
stan. We can rebalance relationships with India and Paki-
stan. We can reach out to be an observer with the SCO.
We can leverage shared interest in eliminating Al-Qaeda
presence and controlling the flow of narcotics. We can
return to pre-2002 use of local proxies, as we reduce our
presence. This should be done in complement to the em-
powerment approaches in Afghanistan described by this
paper. This is an application of the empowerment ap-
proach at the strategic echelon. Afghan stability cannot be
found within its borders, but US interests can be main-
tained regionally. To simply look at this as a "war" to be
won, or in terms of modern COIN/CT perspectives, limits
12 | THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED DEFENSE STUDIES
both our perspectives and our effectiveness in securing
U.S. interests in the region.
Dr. Maria J. Stephan,
Sub-National Governance/Civil Society,
Interagency Provincial Affairs, US Embassy Kabul
You make an interesting point that INS is really just “illegal
politics” but is COIN really just “governance”? Also, is it
true that the U.S. has no existential threats in AF-
PAK? AQ sanctuaries don‖t pose such threats? In your
“strike at the roots” slide I wonder what you mean by “main
effort must ―counter despotism‖ not by building effective
governance, but by building respective governance.” How
do you distinguish effective from respective (or do you
mean respected)? Would the costs of applying such a
strategy in Afghanistan be more or less than the current
approach? What would be the costliest parts of imple-
menting the strategy?
Anyhow, those are just a few thoughts. Great that folks
like you are thinking deep thoughts and encouraging a
paradigm shift.
A CHANGE OF POLICY CAN
INCREASE U.S. INFUENCE
Notwithstanding the dedicated efforts of thousands of
brave American soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, diplo-
mats, civilian contractors, Allies and Afghan patriots, there
is a solid consensus that a change of policy is needed in
Afghanistan. The time is over ripe for a major reduction in
forces and a transition to civilian control. A clear shift from
waging war, to preserve the Karzai regime, to conducting
peacetime operations to disrupt, dismantle and defeat Al
Qaeda, creates the opportunity to begin such a reduction.
Pure logistical considerations will ensure this is a meas-
ured and thoughtful effort, which is essential, as how this
is accomplished will have a lasting effect on U.S. strategic
influence. Civilian leadership of this force reduction effort,
coupled with a clear strategic communications campaign
to convey the wisdom driving the change of perspective
and approach, can make this an event that enhances
American influence around the world. An understanding of
insurgency‖s nature reveals the Coalition has overly fo-
cused on symptoms instead of causes by relying too heav-
ily on colonial-based COIN. The great lesson of the con-
flict in Afghanistan is the need to move forward from the
TOWARDS A NEW U.S. GRAND STRATEGY
control-based strategies of colonial COIN and Cold War
containment and seek a more appropriate U.S. Grand
Strategy to drive our operational and tactical approaches
to the emerging world.
The Strategy of Empowerment is consistent with the op-
erational construct of a Defense-Diplomacy-Development
approach, which recognizes the limitations of military solu-
tions. In Afghanistan, the creation of a new partnership,
with stronger ties to the region and greater shared inter-
ests in a stable Afghanistan, will ensure the continued pro-
gress to that end following major reductions in U.S. pres-
ence. The transition of operations to State Department
control will result in a less war-like approach to the chal-
lenges to stability than what naturally occurs when such
operations are tasked to the military. A refinement of the
already successfully demonstrated bottom-up focus on
education, health, and development programs to efforts
designed to support perceptions of legitimacy, justice,
respect and hope will enhance the long term U.S. relation-
ship with the Afghan people, regardless of governing
structure.
The Strategy of Empowerment answers the threats con-
fronting the Coalition in Afghanistan. Containment, Inter-
vention, and Preemption are not sufficient to address to-
day's challenges. Clearly, even with a focus on empower-
ment, pragmatic boundaries will remain in place to protect
the interests and rights of States. History is replete with
examples of predatory, but legitimate, governments.
Threats caused by State actors can be addressed with
traditional responses. However, it will require a Grand
Strategy that is easily justified by Public Diplomacy abroad
consistent with national values at home to increase US
influence globally in the manner necessary to deal with
emerging non-state challenges that are largely uncontain-
able and immune to the traditional responses that have
served so long.
STRATEGIC UNDERSTANDING PROGRAM | 13
Endnotes:
i. Rajiv Chandrasekaran, “As U.S. Assesses Afghanistan, Karzai a
Question Mark,” Washington Post, December 13, 2010.
ii. Id. President Karzai goes on record that he would prefer to work
with the Taliban than the U.S. as he moves to ban Western pri-
vate security firms; meanwhile insurgent attacks grow from a
peak of roughly 100/day in August 2009 to 167/day in August
2010.
iii. Amy Levine, “Competing for Kabul: Conflicting Agendas in South
Asia,” Center for Advanced Defense Studies Monograph 10-04,
2010, http://www.c4ads.org/node/735 (8 December 2010).
iv. A clear definition of war is: “Declared or undeclared combat of
strategic significance that exposes one or more nations to de-
feat.” John M. Collins, “Military Strategy, Practices, and Historical
Perspectives,” Potomac Books, 2008, p. 307. Al Qaeda poses
no such threat to the U.S., and as a non-state entity does not
possess the status to qualify as a party in war.
v. Colin Cookman and Caroline Wadhams, “Governance in Afghani-
stan – Looking Ahead to what we Leave Behind,” Center for
American Progress, May 2010 “Currently, all roads lead back to
President Karzai, who appoints more than 1,000 government
officials throughout the country at all levels of government with
minimal public input or oversight.” The causal effect of such co-
option of historic local processes of bestowing legitimacy on gov-
ernment cannot be overstated.
vi. Robert C. Jones, “The Jones Insurgency Model - A Tool for the
Prevention and Resolution of Insurgency,” Small Wars Journal,
May 18, 2010. In exploring the continuous dynamic between
government and the governed, popular perceptions of four critical
aspects of governance emerge as the primary source of causa-
tion that makes a populace ripe for insurgency. Managing these
perceptions becomes the focus then for COIN.
vii. “A New Way Forward: Rethinking U.S. Strategy in Afghanistan”
by the Afghanistan Study Group
(www.afghanistanstudygroup.com)August 16, 2010;
“Responsible Transition: Securing U.S. Interests in Afghanistan
beyond 2011” (www.CNAS.org), December 2010.
viii. John M. Collins, “Military Strategy – Principles, Practices, and
Historical Perspectives,” Potomac Books, 2008. P 307.
ix. Id.
x. A missing link in U.S military doctrine, CUW provides an opera-
tional framework for missions currently bundled most often under
the tactical heading of CT. CT is actually a narrow subset of
CUW and drives an overly threat-centric, Intel-heavy approach
that tends to skew priorities and approaches toward symptoms of
problems rather than their root causes. The U.S. and the Soviets
both conducted UW and countered each other’s UW efforts as a
standard part of their Cold War competition. Today it is Al
Qaeda’s UW efforts that require a more balanced approach to
effectively counter.
xi. Bruce Reidel, “White Paper of the Interagency Policy Group's
Report on U.S. Policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan,” http://
www.whitehouse.gov/assets/documents/
afghanistan_pakistan_white_paper_final.pdf
xii. “Afghanistan: Measuring strategy's effects,” Washington Post,
December 13, 2010 depicts graphically how violent attacks in-
creased, with normal seasonal fluctuations, as troop strength
increased. In an open letter to President Obama by Alex Strick
van Linschoten, and signed by dozens of multi-discipline profes-
sionals with extensive experience in the AFPAK region, they also
questioned if such results were worth the $120 Billion expense or
the U.S. and the loss of over 680 soldiers across the Coalition.
http://www.afghanistancalltoreason.com/
An_Open_Letter_to_President_Obama/
To_the_President_of_the_United_States_.html
xiii. Tuva Kahrs, “Regional security complex theory and Chinese
policy towards North Korea,” East Asia, Winter 2004, Volume 21,
Number 4, p.62.
xiv. Levine, supra.
xv. On December 13, 2010 the Washington post ran an a piece
clearly showing how acts of violence in Afghanistan was 67%
higher in 2010 than over the same period in 2009. Similarly, U.S.
approval ratings in Pakistan, while never high, continue to fluctu-
ate between 7-18%, with Afghan approval dropping 5 points to
43%. (Gallup poll data released September 20, 2010)
xvi. TF 180 Citation : Donald P. Wright, PhD et al. “The United
States Army in Operation ENDURING FREEDOM (OEF), Octo-
ber 2001-September 2005: A Different Kind of War” (Ft Leaven
Worth, KS: Combat Studies Institute Press, June 2009)
xvii. Amy Levine, “Competing for Kabul: Conflicting Agendas in South
Asia,” Center for Advanced Defense Studies Monograph 10-04,
2010, http://www.c4ads.org/node/735 (8 December 2010).
xviii. Kenneth Katzman, “Afghanistan: Post-War Governance, Secu-
rity, and U.S. Policy,”CRS Report for Congress, Order Code
RL30588, Updated November 12, 2008, pp 26-28.
xix. Id. at27-28.
xx. National Security Strategy, May 2010, http://
www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/
national_security_strategy.pdf (29 September 2010).
xxi. In Malaya the British famously “separated the insurgent from the
populace” and doggedly pursued the insurgents until they lost the
will to fight. Less heralded, is that parallel to this effort Britain
relinquished their total control over Malayan governance and
granted legal access to the political process to the long-
suppressed Chinese-Malayan populace that had sustained 90%
of the casualties during the emergency and was the base of in-
surgent support. In effect, the insurgent had actually won as he
forced in his defeated efforts the essential changes of govern-
ance. In Vietnam, where the U.S. employed similar tactics the
results were the opposite; as the U.S. doggedly clung to sustain-
ing in power the illegitimate governments we had created.
“Casebook on Insurgency and Revolutionary Warfare,” Special
Operations Research Office, December 1962.
xxii. Special Operations Research Office, “Casebook on Insurgency
and Revolutionary Warfare: 23 Summary Accounts,” 1962 http://
usgcoin.org/library/USGDocuments/AD416553.pdf (29 Septem-
ber 2010).
xxiii. Special Operations Research Office, “Human Factors Considera-
tions of Undergrounds in Insurgencies,” DA PAM NO. 550-104
Chapter 3.1, 1965, http://www.cgsc.edu/carl/docrepository/
dapam550_104insurgencies.pdf (29 September 2010).
xxiv. Norine MacDonald, “Afghanistan Transition - Missing Variables,”
The International Council on Security and Development, Novem-
ber 2010. “Over 90% of interviewees in the south are not familiar
with the events of 9/11 which brought NATO-ISAF to Afghanistan
(p28) and 40% of respondents believe that foreigners are in Af-
 ghanistan to destroy the country, to occupy Afghanistan, or to
destroy Islam (p27). Underlining another area of serious concern,
72% of southern interviewees view foreigners as disrespectful of
their religion and traditions (p22).”
xxv. Erinn Banting, “Afghanistan the People,” A Bobbie Kalman Book,
Crabtree Publishing, 2003, p.14.
xxvi. During the Author‖s tour of duty as the chief of the Special Opera-
tions Liaison Element to Regional Command-South at Kandahar
Airfield in 2009/2010 several studies and reports highlighted how
migrant workers switched readily to working for the Taliban once
the poppy harvest was complete.
xxvii.Id. The Afghan Commandos demonstrated a unique and effective
capability on the battlefield, calming and gaining the support of
the populace as they aggressively pursued the threat.
xxviii.Peter Bergen and Patrick C. Dougherty, “Public Opinion in Paki-
stan's Tribal Region,” New America Foundation, 2010, http://
counterterrorism.newamerica.net/publications/policy/
public_opinion_in_pakistan_s_tribal_regions (28 September
2010).
xxix. Id.
xxx. The U.S. experience in Vietnam being most poignant insurgency
experience in the minds of Americans. While Afghanistan is cer-
tainly not Vietnam, it does share one essential common factor: In
both cases the U.S. committed itself to the support of a govern-
ment widely perceived as illegitimate in the eyes of its own popu-
lace.
xxxi. Jones, supra. Conditions of insurgency grow within a populace
based upon critical perceptions of the goodness of governance
radiating out in the form of domestic polices and the manner of
their application. It is these conditions that are then exploited by
various insurgent leaders and organizations for their own ends.
xxxii.MacDonald, supra. “Although there is confusion about the term
‚democracy‛, there is extensive support for the right to vote: in the
north, 89% of interviewees voted in recent parliamentary elec-
tions, while in the south, despite serious insecurity and Taliban
intimidation, 44% voted (p69). In addition, three-quarters of
respondents support elections for the posts of governor and dis-
trict governor (p92).” The illegitimacy inherent in elections held
under the current constitution is resolved in adopting new guards
for the governance of these people that allows the populace to
employ trusted processes to elect district and provincial leader-
ship.
xxxiii.Jones, supra.
xxxiv.Robert Naiman, Edited by Emily Schwartz Greco, “Legitimacy in
Afghanistan,” Foreign Policy in Focus, Institute for Policy Studies,
November 12, 2009. http://www.fpif.org/articles/
legitimacy_in_afghanistan
xxxv.MacDonald, supra. P 43.” When asked about the good qualities
of the Taliban, the interviewees across all districts highlight their
ability to provide security, justice, a generally positive attitude
toward local communities, efficient government and honesty. This
underscores how the Taliban has positioned itself as a legitimate
alternative to the failing institutions of the Afghan government.”
xxxvi.Troy Anderson, “COIN Common Sense: Insurgent Justice,”
COIN Common Sense 1, no. 3, July 2010, http://
www.isaf.nato.int/article/coin/insurgent-justice.html (29 Septem-
ber 2010).
xxxvii.David McCullough, “1776,”Simon and Schuster Paperbacks,
2006, p 14 Following the disaster of the Battle of Breed‖s Hill in
Boston, King George addressed the Parliament on October 26,
1775 stating his intent to send an additional 20,000 Regulars to
Boston to enforce the rule of law. In following debate in the
House of Commons, John Dyke Acland declared his support of
the King “‖reducing America to just obedience‖ should not be
underestimated, he said, but where ―the interests of a great peo-
ple‖ were concerned, ―difficulties must be overcome, not yielded
to.‖” Over the cautions of
xxxviii.“Land and property disputes in Eastern Afghanistan,” Norwe-
gian Refuge Council, 2004. http://www.internal-
displacement.org/8025708F004CE90B/
(httpDocuments)/3E2AD065B3616B2D802570B7005876F4/$file/
Land_disputes_NRC_june04.pdf.
xxxix.Ann Marlowe, “Evolution of Kandahar and its Insurgency,” En-
tanglements: Arguing America and the World, Edited by Law-
rence F. Kaplan, The New Republic, December 31, 2010. During
the Author‖s 2010 tour in Afghanistan members of the Special
Operations Task Force interviewed a father west of Kandahar
who indeed had one son in the ANA and one in the Taliban, and
this was not considered rare, or as a conflict.
xl. David O. Stewart, “The Summer of 1787 – The Men who In-
vented the Constitution,” Simon and Schuster Paperbacks, New
York, NY, 2007. P23. The current constitution of Afghanistan,
like the U.S. Articles of Confederation, was designed not to pro-
mote what was needed for good governance going forward, but
rather to prevent what was perceived as the cause of poor gov-
ernance in the past. Just as the Articles vested all sovereignty in
the separate states to avoid the abuse of a strong central govern-
ment, the Afghan constitution vests all sovereignty in the Presi-
dent to avoid the abuses of warlords. Such transition may well
be necessary to get to what is ultimately required, but to cling to
such transitional forms of government creates new hardships and
abuses that serve to fuel new insurgent challenges.
xli. Ahmed Rashid, “The Way Out of Afghanistan,” New York Review
of Books, January 13, 2011. Rashid also emphasizes the cen-
trality of reconciliation with the segment of the populace repre-
sented by the Taliban, balanced with assurances to that segment
of the populace represented by the current Northern Alliance –
based government. It is the purpose of an effective constitution
to create structures that enforce proper behavior in such low-trust
environments as exists in Afghanistan today; and in a United
States such as existed in 1787. The current constitution in Af-
ghanistan works to promote, rather than prevent, governmental
abuses and insurgency.
xlii. National Security Strategy, May 2010, http://
www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/
national_security_strategy.pdf (29 September 2010).
xliii. National Strategy for Combating Terrorism, February 2003,
12.****
xliv. Barack Obama, “Remarks by the President on a New Security
Strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan” The White House Press
Office, 2009, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/
Remarks-by-the-President-on-a-New-Strategy-for-Afghanistan-
and-Pakistan (29 September 2010).
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