[軍事一瞥]阿富汗戰爭:鼓起你的勇氣

阿富汗戰爭：鼓起你的勇氣

這是一個血腥的阿富汗一週，尤其是英國，這個時候不能失去信心。

據說阿富汗是帝國的墳場。19世紀這裏是英軍的傷心之地，20世紀又成了前蘇聯的傷心之地。阿富汗人以兇猛殘暴著稱。經過8年令人沮喪的戰爭，人們很容易地認爲，北約在重蹈過去在興都庫什羣山中災難的覆轍。現在不是灰心喪氣的時候。安全要改善，經濟活動要鼓勵，政權要鞏固，叛亂分子要利誘分化。但是，要讓這一切發生，必須讓塔利班看到，阿富汗政府和她的外國盟友正在贏得勝利，而不是失敗。

The war in Afghanistan: Hold your nerve

It has been a bloody month in Afghanistan but America’s allies, especially Britain, should not lose heart

AFGHANISTAN is said to be the graveyard （墓地）of empires. The British army came to grief there in the 19th century, the Soviet one in the 20th. Such was Afghans’ reputation for ferocity（兇暴） that Rudyard Kipling told those left wounded on Afghanistan’s plains: “Jest roll to your rifle and blow out your brains.” These days British soldiers are again dying in Afghanistan, along with Americans, Canadians and many others. The Taliban are resurgent（復活的，復興的）. Each fighting season is bloodier than the last.

President Barack Obama is deploying an extra 20,000 troops there this year. But some allies are already on their way out. The Netherlands will withdraw fighting forces next year, followed by Canada in 2011. Now the public in Britain, which has the second-largest contingent in Afghanistan, is agonising over the country’s role in the war after a dreadful month in Helmand (see article).

After eight years of disheartening warfare, it is tempting to see NATO’s mission as a repeat of past misadventures（運氣不佳的遭遇） in the Hindu Kush. The Soviets lost even though they had more troops than NATO has today, a more powerful Afghan army and were supported by a cadre of motivated Afghan communists. But such comparisons are wrong. Unlike the anti-Soviet mujahideen, who were backed by America, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the Taliban have no superpower sponsor. In the 1980s Soviet aircraft were shot down with American-made Stinger missiles; today NATO has mastery of the skies. The Taliban are a Pushtun （普什圖語的）faction, not a national movement; their insurgency is largely limited to the southern half of the country.

Afghans may feel anger over the death of civilians killed by foreign forces, frustration at the chaos and insecurity, and dismay （氣餒）at the corruption of President Hamid Karzai’s government. But opinion polls say that most want Western troops to stay; they remember the misery of the civil war and the oppression of Taliban rule too well. They want the West to do a better job of securing the country.

The price of friendship

For America Afghanistan is a war of necessity; it is from there that Osama bin Laden ordered the attacks of September 11th 2001. For many European allies, though, it is less vital—a war of solidarity（團結） with America, a war of choice. Such operations quickly turn unpopular when they go badly, and governments tend to inflate their aims. Gordon Brown, the British prime minister, talks of promoting “an emerging democracy”.

Critics say the effort is misconceived: the real danger is in Pakistan, where al-Qaeda’s leaders are now hiding. But helping Pakistan fight Islamic militants will only be harder if the Taliban and al-Qaeda can claim victory in Afghanistan. Others say the West is being over-ambitious. It can never hope to create a stable democracy in Afghanistan; all it needs is a small contingent（條件） to protect Kabul, and some special forces and bombers to deal with any returning al-Qaeda fighters. But such a minimalist （極簡抽象的）approach is what allowed the Taliban to regroup.

The cost to NATO countries is immediately apparent: tens of billions of dollars and the lives of more than 1,200 soldiers. The cost of leaving is harder to measure but is probably larger: the return of the Taliban to power; an Afghan civil war; the utter destabilisation of nuclear-armed Pakistan; the restoration of al-Qaeda’s Afghan haven; the emboldening of every jihadist in the world; and the weakening of the West’s friends.

America will naturally take on most of the task in Afghanistan. But allies are vital. They share the burden, they confer political legitimacy（合法性） and their joint commitment makes it harder for too many to drop out. Yet some are expending a disproportionate amount of blood. Britain is among them, but it is not alone. As a share of their population Canada, Denmark and Estonia have suffered more military fatalities.

Friends and allies
Britain’s ambition to be a global “force for good” comes at a cost. As America’s best friend, with privileged access to intelligence, it feels compelled to take part in America’s wars. As the most capable militarily of NATO’s European members (together with France), it helps to rally others. But fighting in Afghanistan is not just about prestige. With its large population of Pakistani origin, it has much at stake in helping to maintain the stability of Afghanistan and Pakistan. London has been attacked by al-Qaeda more recently than New York.

So what should Britain do? To begin with, the government must act with conviction（信念）, rather than wish the problem away. It cannot be at war with a peacetime mind-set. As a share of the budget, defence spending has shrunk since 2001. The defence ministry is a parking place for weak ministers or a stepping-stone for strong ones. Priority should be given to manning fully the army’s ranks, and probably expanding them. More must be done to provide helicopters, transport aircraft, drones and better-protected vehicles. This would wreck budgets and upset the navy and air force. So be it. Losing a war is even more demoralising than losing ships or jets. The government should have announced a Strategic Defence Review a long time ago, not delayed it until after the election.

At the very least Mr Brown should agree to the army’s request for a permanent uplift of 2,000 troops for Helmand. Western forces are never going to garrison the whole province, let alone Afghanistan. But what they hold must be held securely. And above all, they must train and expand the Afghan army and police so they can gradually take over. That will not be cheap, but it is the best way to bring home Western troops.

In many ways, the push to pacify（平息） Afghanistan is only just starting, now that the war in Iraq is ending. America’s marines launched a big operation in Helmand on July 2nd. Afghanistan’s presidential elections take place next month. It will not be clear until the autumn, and probably not until late next year, whether Mr Obama’s “surge” has worked.

This is not the time to lose heart. Security must be improved, economic activity encouraged, government strengthened and insurgents offered inducements to defect. But for those things to happen, the Taliban must see that the Afghan government and its foreign friends are winning, not losing.

Keke View：當美國總統布什向世界宣佈美軍要在阿富汗打一場樣式很特殊的反恐怖戰爭，以徹底消滅製造九一一事件的幕後黑手及其同盟者塔利班武裝之時，有眼光的戰略家們都認爲美國無疑會贏得這場戰爭。但是自10月7日美軍開打以後，特別是反塔聯盟在戰爭中發揮的作用，使世人愈感到始料不及，戰爭一次又一次地出現戲劇性變化，許多分析家們的預測都跟不上形勢的發展。