.Can America Fight a Smarter Air War in Afghanistan?
Residents of a village in western Afghanistan are still furious at American forces, a week after a series of airstrikes there killed dozens of innocents.
“Why do they target the Taliban inside the village?” one villager asked the New York Times’ Carlotta Gall. “Why don’t they bomb them when they are outside the village? …Why don’t they bomb their targets, but instead they come and bomb our houses?”
Once again, the civilian death toll in Afghanistan that threatens to undermine support for the war against the Taliban. As Gall puts it, “The events in Granai have raised sharp questions once again about the appropriateness and effectiveness of aerial bombardment in a guerrilla war in which the insurgents deliberately blend into the civilian population to fight and flee.”
And so, once again, the U.S. military is taking a fresh look at how it attacks targets from the sky. In a Senate hearing yesterday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates made it clear: The military would not halt airstrikes in Afghanistan — but it would use air power more judiciously.
“The challenge for the new military leadership is finding the right balance between providing the necessary protection for our own forces and rethinking some of their operational planning in terms of a cost-benefit analysis,” he said. ”And it really — it really boils down to are we on defense or are we on offense? And on defense, I don’t think we should make any changes. We need to protect our troops.”
In other words, Gates sees a bright line between a “troops in contact” scenario – coming to the aid of troops under attack — and going deliberately after a target. When planning offensive operations, Gates said, “I think we need to take a closer look at the operational concept and our planning and how we’re going forward with this in a way to minimize the — the chance of innocent civilian casualties.”
Back in 2004, Lt. Gen. David Barno, the top U.S. general in Afghanistan, ordered that pre-planned airstrikes be halted. Instead, air power would only be used during “troops in contact” situations. Barno felt that Afghan support for the presence of U.S. troops was a finite “bag of capital” that would be spent down rapidly if the military caused too many civilian casualties.
A lot has changed since 2004, however. Afghanistan then was an “economy of force” mission, meaning that troops were spread thin and had to rely on air power to compensate for a lack of boots on the ground. Increases in U.S. troops are supposed to remedy that. But Gates in his testimony seemed to be alluding to something different: A new command approach.
Gates recently replaced Gen. David McKiernan, with Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the former chief of Joint Special Operations Command. McChrystal has won high marks from military pundits, who have pointed to his ability to pinpoint and go after high-value targets in Iraq. Often, his troops managed to do it without resorting to airstrikes. But killing or capturing individual targets is one matter; restoring the trust of Afghan civilians may prove much harder.
Wired
“Why do they target the Taliban inside the village?” one villager asked the New York Times’ Carlotta Gall. “Why don’t they bomb them when they are outside the village? …Why don’t they bomb their targets, but instead they come and bomb our houses?”
Once again, the civilian death toll in Afghanistan that threatens to undermine support for the war against the Taliban. As Gall puts it, “The events in Granai have raised sharp questions once again about the appropriateness and effectiveness of aerial bombardment in a guerrilla war in which the insurgents deliberately blend into the civilian population to fight and flee.”
And so, once again, the U.S. military is taking a fresh look at how it attacks targets from the sky. In a Senate hearing yesterday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates made it clear: The military would not halt airstrikes in Afghanistan — but it would use air power more judiciously.
“The challenge for the new military leadership is finding the right balance between providing the necessary protection for our own forces and rethinking some of their operational planning in terms of a cost-benefit analysis,” he said. ”And it really — it really boils down to are we on defense or are we on offense? And on defense, I don’t think we should make any changes. We need to protect our troops.”
In other words, Gates sees a bright line between a “troops in contact” scenario – coming to the aid of troops under attack — and going deliberately after a target. When planning offensive operations, Gates said, “I think we need to take a closer look at the operational concept and our planning and how we’re going forward with this in a way to minimize the — the chance of innocent civilian casualties.”
Back in 2004, Lt. Gen. David Barno, the top U.S. general in Afghanistan, ordered that pre-planned airstrikes be halted. Instead, air power would only be used during “troops in contact” situations. Barno felt that Afghan support for the presence of U.S. troops was a finite “bag of capital” that would be spent down rapidly if the military caused too many civilian casualties.
A lot has changed since 2004, however. Afghanistan then was an “economy of force” mission, meaning that troops were spread thin and had to rely on air power to compensate for a lack of boots on the ground. Increases in U.S. troops are supposed to remedy that. But Gates in his testimony seemed to be alluding to something different: A new command approach.
Gates recently replaced Gen. David McKiernan, with Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the former chief of Joint Special Operations Command. McChrystal has won high marks from military pundits, who have pointed to his ability to pinpoint and go after high-value targets in Iraq. Often, his troops managed to do it without resorting to airstrikes. But killing or capturing individual targets is one matter; restoring the trust of Afghan civilians may prove much harder.
Wired
posted by madtom at 9:48 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home