Have any of you read "A New Way Forward: Rethinking U.S. Stragety in Afghanistan"?

[unhappycamper]

Web site: http://www.afghanistanstudygroup.org/
PDF: http://www.afghanistanstudygroup.org/NewWayForward_report.pdf

Inset on Page 3:

THE SITUATION

The U.S. war in Afghanistan is now the longest in our history, and is costing the U.S. taxpayers nearly $100 billion per year, roughly seven times more than Afghanistan’s annual gross national product (GNP) of $14 billion.1

Prosecuting the war in Afghanistan is not essential to U.S. security.

We have justified expanding our commitment by saying the goal was eradicating Al Qaeda. Yet Al Qaeda is no longer a significant presence in Afghanistan. There are only some 400 hard-core Al Qaeda members remaining in the entire Af/Pak theatre.

The conflict in Afghanistan is commonly perceived as a struggle between the Karzai government and an insurgent Taliban movement, allied with international terrorists, who are seeking to overthrow that government. In fact, the conflict is a civil war about power-sharing with lines of contention that are 1) partly ethnic, chiefly, but not exclusively, between Pashtuns who dominate the south and other ethnicities such as Tajiks and Uzbeks who are more prevalent in the north, 2) partly rural vs. urban, particularly within the Pashtun community, and 3) partly sectarian.

With the U.S. intervention in force, the conflict has also come to include resistance to what is seen as foreign military occupation.

Resolving the conflict in Afghanistan has primarily to do with resolving the distribution of power among these factions, and between the central government and the provinces, and with appropriately decentralizing authority.

Negotiated resolution of these conflicts will reduce the influence of extremists more readily than military action will. The Taliban itself is not a unified movement but instead a label that is applied to many armed groups and individuals that are only loosely aligned and do not necessarily have a fondness for the fundamentalist ideology of the most prominent Taliban leaders.


From Page 3:

Prospects for success are dim. As former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger recently warned, “Afghanistan has never been pacified by foreign forces.”2 The 2010 spring offensive in Marjah was inconclusive, and a supposedly “decisive” summer offensive in Kandahar has been delayed and the expectations downgraded. U.S. and allied casualties reached an all-time high in July, and several NATO allies have announced plans to withdraw their own forces.


Inset on Page 7:

THE COST OF THE AFGHANISTAN WAR

With the Afghanistan Surge, the U.S. will be spending almost $100 billion per year in Afghanistan, with a stated primary purpose of eradicating just 20 to 30 Al Qaeda leaders, and in a country whose total GDP is only $14 billion per annum. This is a serious imbalance of expenses to benefit.

* $100 billion per year is more than the entire annual cost of the Obama administration’s new health care plan and is money that could be used to better counter global terrorist threats, reduce the $1.4 trillion annual deficit, repair and modernize a large portion of U.S. infrastructure, radically enhance American educational investment, launch a massive new Manhattan Project-like effort on energy alternatives research, or be used for other critical purposes.

* The U.S. military budget has grown from $370 billion in 2000 to $707 billion in 2011, and the current Middle East war is now the second most expensive war in U.S. history, behind only World War II. The war is more expensive than the Vietnam and Korean Wars combined. It is now the longest war in U.S. history.


From Page 11:

CONCLUSION

The United States should by no means abandon Afghanistan, but it is time to abandon the current strategy that is not working. Trying to pacify Afghanistan by force of arms will not work. A costly military campaign there is more likely to jeopardize America’s vital security interests than to protect them. The Study Group believes that the United States should pursue more modest goals that are both consistent with America’s true interests and far more likely to succeed.

[Agony]

1. Better late than never for the reasoned rational approach, I suppose?

"Negotiated resolution of these conflicts will reduce the influence of extremists more readily than military action will."

I can't figure out why anyone would think that we would be capable of good faith negotiation. I sure wouldn't trust us...