By contrast, just at this moment along comes Mikhail Gorbachev with a warning to Obama that victory in Afghanistan is impossible and he should withdraw. The former Soviet president has long been isolated from the new Kremlin rulers. Whether it is on economic and social justice, the role of international banks, the need for environmental restraint or the value of democracy, Gorbachev is closer to enlightened western thinking than he is to the new class running his country.
Though he has no power, his views deserve to be heeded, and especially on Afghanistan. Like Obama, he inherited a war of choice that his predecessors had rushed into without sufficient thought or planning. Negotiations will not be easy, he reminded Obama, and in the late 1980s they were undermined by the US and Pakistan who claimed they wanted a neutral and democratic Afghanistan even as they were training militants – \\\"The same ones who today are terrorising Afghanistan and more and more of Pakistan,\\\" as Gorbachev put it. In many ways, Gorbachev had it easier than Obama does. Key members of the Soviet high command had became disillusioned with the Afghan intervention by 1985 when Gorbachev first signalled he intended to withdraw. Though the remaining hawks persuaded the Soviet leader to let them have a surge of intensified military activity in 1986 (but no extra troops), they soon saw it was not going to make a strategic difference. The war could not be won by force and the Kremlin changed its goal from keeping Afghanistan \\\"friendly\\\" to merely \\\"neutral\\\".
Today\\\'s war is at roughly the point where Gorbachev was in late 1985 – except that the generals in the field are united in still hoping for military victory. Obama\\\'s top commander, David Petraeus, has not given up on his surge, and if he decides to overrule his top brass the US president is in a harder political position than Gorbachev was in the Soviet Union\\\'s undemocratic system. The international context is also worse, given that Pakistan and Iran take opposite sides today.
As for the \\\"new\\\" Russia\\\'s position on Afghanistan, the irony is that Moscow is less willing to see a US withdrawal than Obama appears to be. Medvedev and Putin will not send their own troops, but they firmly want the Americans to stay.)(The End)
(COURTESY GUARDIAN)
Though he has no power, his views deserve to be heeded, and especially on Afghanistan. Like Obama, he inherited a war of choice that his predecessors had rushed into without sufficient thought or planning. Negotiations will not be easy, he reminded Obama, and in the late 1980s they were undermined by the US and Pakistan who claimed they wanted a neutral and democratic Afghanistan even as they were training militants – \\\"The same ones who today are terrorising Afghanistan and more and more of Pakistan,\\\" as Gorbachev put it. In many ways, Gorbachev had it easier than Obama does. Key members of the Soviet high command had became disillusioned with the Afghan intervention by 1985 when Gorbachev first signalled he intended to withdraw. Though the remaining hawks persuaded the Soviet leader to let them have a surge of intensified military activity in 1986 (but no extra troops), they soon saw it was not going to make a strategic difference. The war could not be won by force and the Kremlin changed its goal from keeping Afghanistan \\\"friendly\\\" to merely \\\"neutral\\\".
Today\\\'s war is at roughly the point where Gorbachev was in late 1985 – except that the generals in the field are united in still hoping for military victory. Obama\\\'s top commander, David Petraeus, has not given up on his surge, and if he decides to overrule his top brass the US president is in a harder political position than Gorbachev was in the Soviet Union\\\'s undemocratic system. The international context is also worse, given that Pakistan and Iran take opposite sides today.
As for the \\\"new\\\" Russia\\\'s position on Afghanistan, the irony is that Moscow is less willing to see a US withdrawal than Obama appears to be. Medvedev and Putin will not send their own troops, but they firmly want the Americans to stay.)(The End)
(COURTESY GUARDIAN)
