The lonely outpost

U.S. General Stanley McChrystal has asked for up to 40,000 more troops in Afghanistan.  He says that in part it's needed to defend our current troops against an increasingly violent insurgency and in part to bring a successful outcome to the war.  "Although considerable effort and sacrifice have resulted in some progress, many indicators suggest the overall effort is deteriorating," McChrystal said of the war's progress.

Against a picturesque backdrop of poppy fields, American troops saw more casualties this week than at any point since the war began in 2001.  The poppies fuel a drug enterprise that is the economic engine of the country and the empowering force behind local warloads that divide and rule some of the most remote and distant terrain imaginable.

Few americans know much about the geography of Afghanistan.  So let's compare it to South Vietnam, since there are other similarities.  South Vietnam is 67,000 square miles, mostly at sea level.  Afghanistan is 250,000 square miles, with altitudes from 4,000 to 20,000 feet.  There are 19M people in South Vietnam and 28M in Afghanistan.  It is said that as bad as Vietnam was, the troops were never far from emergency assistance - from helicopters, other troops, or artillery.  In Afghanistan, many military units say that when help is needed, it is not readily available or nearby.  And that many helicopters cannot reach the higher altitudes when they're called.

At one point, the U.S. had nearly 550,000 troops in the Vietnam conflict.  There were 58,000 casualties (KIA or MIA) and over 90,000 wounded.  In Afghanistan, the U.S. has lost over 800 soldiers (KIA), and the total number of wounded exceeds 3,400.   Considering that U.S. soldiers covered less ground in Vietnam, it is amazing that there are only 60,000 troops laboring in Afghanistan today (only 32,000 from the U.S.).  

Who has the will to fight this conflict?  Not the average American family with teenage boys.  Not the politician that wants to be re-elected.  Not the Canadians or French or British.  But that's no reason to leave our soliders stranded on a mountain or in a poppy field.  In fact, some military analysts offer that given the geography and the nature of the war (an insurgency conflict) our troop levels should be more like 600,000.  But there are only 60,000.  What is accurate and what is political rhetoric?  Obama is justifiably thinking very carefully about the answer to that question.

There have been arguments for using more drones and fighting a more technology-based conflict.  But on October 4, 2009, when tribal militias and Taliban fighters over-ran a remote outpost, they killed 8 americans primarily by the sheer number of attackers.  The soldiers defending the outpost fired so much ammunition that many of their weapons overheated and became useless.  And while air support did eventually arrive, it was not soon enough to save the 8 soldiers. 

How does more technology help defend an outpost 20 miles from the Pakistan border?   Some type of high-tech barbed wire?   I think of my 18 year old son, and how shocked and outraged I would be if he was unprotected and in danger in a lonely outpost like that.

So, we either need better - or more - technology or more troops to protect our sons and daughters who are fighting a war in a country three times larger than South Vietnam - with about 10% of the soldiers deployed there.  And by all accounts, we lost that war.