A Turnaround Strategy

In May 2006 a unit of American soldiers in Afghanistan's Uruzgan valley were engulfed in a ferocious fire fight with the Taliban. Only after six hours, and supporting airstrikes, could they extricate themselves from the valley. But what was most revealing about the battle was the fact that many local farmers spontaneously joined in, rushing home to get their weapons. Asked later why they'd done so, the villagers claimed they didn't support the Taliban's ideological agenda, nor were they particularly hostile toward the Americans. But this battle was the most momentous thing that had happened in their valley for years. If as virile young men they had stood by and just watched, they would have been dishonored in their communities. And, of course, if they were going to fight, they could not fight alongside the foreigners.

In describing this battle, the Australian counterinsurgency expert David Kilcullen coins a term, "accidental guerilla," to describe the villagers. They had no grand transnational agenda, no dreams of global jihad. If anything, those young men were defending their local ways and customs from encroachment from outside. But a global terrorist group—with local ties—can find ways to turn these villagers into allies of a kind. And foreign forces, if they are not very careful, can easily turn them into enemies.

Reduced to its simplest level, the goal of American policy in Afghanistan should be to stop creating accidental guerrillas. It should make those villagers see U.S. forces as acting in their interests. That would mark a fundamental turnaround.

Let's be clear. The war in Afghanistan is not going well; almost all trends are moving in the wrong direction. But I don't believe it is a quagmire—yet. We still have time to focus our goals, improve our strategy, calibrate our means. The two men in charge now, Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, are extraordinarily talented. But what should they do? We need to overhaul U.S. policy in four steps, each more complicated than the last.

Do counterinsurgency right. Despite Petraeus's demonstrable success in Iraq, U.S. forces have to this point largely relied on more old-fashioned tactics—raids, search-and-destroy missions, air attacks. Partly this is because the U.S. military has deployed too few troops to hold territory that's been cleared. "In Afghanistan, we do what we can. In Iraq we do what we must," Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen explained in 2007. It is also because many American troops believe that they are chasing global terrorists who must be captured or killed urgently.

Instead of aggressive and punitive—in military parlance, "kinetic"—operations, Petraeus's counterinsurgency approach emphasizes the need to make local populations feel secure. Troops are meant to live among the people, use less force, gain trust, not overreact to every provocation and be seen as a positive force within the community. Above all, the priority is to get local forces—in this case, the Afghan National Army and the police—to do as much as possible, even when the job might not be done as well as by foreign troops.

The number of additional U.S. troops needed is not large. Afghanistan is predominantly rural, and the large population centers that truly need protection are limited. U.S. forces would also need to control the key roads and transit points. In fact, the commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David McKiernan, has begun to focus his efforts on this approach. Between the addition of two to four more American brigades and a ramp-up of the Afghan Army, there should be enough troops to execute the strategy.