Why is it so hard to withdraw from a theatre of conflict? Why does violence intensify?
Can the Americans, and their allies, in particular for the moment, the Pakistan Army succeed in crushing the Pashtun resistance, and what are the implications if they succeed?
Counter Insurgency(COIN) is the method of colonization adopted the French, at first, successfully in Algeria, Morocco, Indo-China (Vietnam) and Madagascar. These methods developed by various generals were a departure from the methods of Napoleon that ran into problems in Spain. The emphasis is on systematically holding and clearing ground by establishing “beachheads” and spreading influence so that the spreading ink blots join up and overlap.
The current attempt at depopulating areas of the North West of Pakistan is a prelude by this theory for massive, intensified bombing and drone attacks. Pacification in colonial theory is preceded by the installation of fear among the civilian population, and with torture some rough methods have to used. So too, as with the case of torture, you spread lies and disinformation, and trust that the propaganda spread through the song bird media outlets, such as The New York Times and The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, will convince the domestic population about the rightness of the noble cause. The noble cause is a feeling, an emotional response, not a plan.
Colonialism works on the basis of imposing an alien culture and economy on a subject people, and it is supposed by the colonialists that it is a superior one and that it works better than the existing systems. The fact that you have to smash up others countries, murder in mass, is merely incidental to the control of resources and geo-strategic positioning.
Theoretically, it all works a treat if you have military forces with superior technology, combined with aerial dominance. The problems are the cost, its long term commitment, its obvious brutality, the creation of ethnic fractures leading to civil war and national collapse, the flow of poor and impoverished refugees and the acquiesce of weak, supplicant political leadership that lose support among the subject populations. The requirement is be quick – five years at most. Propaganda is absolutely essential.
There are some problems for the colonialists in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Afghanistan is bigger than it looks on the map. The people have never trusted the invaders of whom they have had plenty of experience, and trust the mercy of the war lords even less. Collaboration, as in Occupied France, carries the immediate reward of riches,and retribution in the long term. The disaggregation of Pakistan, a process underway, with a population of over 170 million carries implications that either the brave or foolhardy will imagine.
The psychology of defeat for a “great power” based on technology and expenditure, the implication civilizational superiority – as laughable as that may be – and on machismo, violence, aggression is very high. The military-industrial complex with its promise of secure, well-paid jobs sucks people in like a vacuum cleaner. The military-industrial complex, despite the current global financial crisis, is entrenched into the political culture of the world power, consisting of soft power and hard power.
It is interesting to observe that when violence is confronted with nonviolence, utter cruelty is employed as we see evidence in Palestine. Protesters are shot in the head by snipers. It is the inherent nature of violence to increase, despite the counter-insurgency theory, and to spin out of control.
Still the purpose of overt violence is to impose structural, or embedded violence. For that purpose it is very useful, apparently, to have a class of people who speak the imperialists language and worship their god, so we observe the apparently odd and inconsequential attempt to spread the Bible in native languages sourced from the American Army.
The corollary of the brutality of counter-insurgency, remembering Afghanistan has experience something in the order of thirty years of guerrilla, civil and imperial war is that the tribal political structures have become adapted for permanent emergency. It is interesting to remember that the Bush Administration, aided by Karzai, put a stop to the attempt at reconciliation, on the Northern Ireland model, and Obama has never taken up the option. The persuasive agreement apparently is that more violence will fix the problem.
So what happens if violence does not work?
ELSEWHERE:
Robert Dreyfus, in The Nation, argues the situation in Pakistan is not one for panic – but why take chances?
Associated Press reports that Obama’s Security Adviser said “we are not going to fight with one hand tied behind our back”, despite Karzai’s call to end air strikes. So the tribal resistance is fighting with one hand tied behind its back – a fair and noble fight. The barbarism of the self-defined civilized is always nicer than that of the primitive ones.
Chris Hedges at Truthdig draws attention to the progress in technology that war affords. On this occasion iron fragmentation bombs, next upgraded drones with longer range and firepower.
Robert Fisk notices, initially in The Independent, via Truthdig that “Our military tactics are now fully aligned with Israel.”
David Lindorff on the blame shifting to the dead at Counter Punch.