A Look At Why Even Good Plans Fail
By Douglas Farah
We often wonder why, even when armed with the best of intentions and perhaps even sound plans, counterinsurgency and counterterrorism efforts seem futile once the fighting stops. Billions of dollars later (and often a good many deaths of our military personnel and others), things head south.
Two stories today offer a partial answer to that question, and demonstrate vividly that a military victory is only a small part of what counterinsurgency and counterterrorism actually are. There have been victories in both Afghanistan (the U.S. and NATO) and Somalia (Ethiopia with U.S. support).
The first story is a reflection in the Washington Post Outlook section on total failure of the Afghan government to mitigate rampant corruption and abuse. The government has often been aided and abetted by international donors and others who value short-term fixes over true reform.
The point made is that the Taliban is resurgent, and somewhat accepted, because the government offers nothing better, or at least is perceived to be corrupt beyond redemption.
I think this is somewhat simplistic and misses some important issues (the Taliban's ability to finance itself through opium etc.), but people living through the current Afghanistan situation say the current level of corruption and abuse by those in power has made a mockery of the government and stripped it of all legitimacy. Perhaps the difference is that government drug traffickers and warlords work only for themselves while the Taliban sends at least some of its illicit proceeds on upgrading the fighting capabilities of its forces.
If the government we support and pour billions of dollars into, cannot come off in the minds of the vast majority of citizens as clearly better, then the efforts are worth little.
The second story is the astounding news that, although the government controls nothing of importance in Somalia and the radical Islamist extremists are now in the capital again holding press conferences, the president and prime minister are at each other's throats. My full blog is here.
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