Limited Victory

It’s not a surprise that the war in Afghanistan has lasted ten years and that even after bin Laden’s death, we cannot say it has truly been won. That’s because the U.S. went into Afghanistan with an awkward coalition and a mishmash of aims (counter-terrorism, women’s rights, human rights, oil), without all key players completely on board (namely Pakistan, whose still unsecure border is crucial for fresh militants and supplies, and whose intelligence service has long had an ambiguous relationship with the Taliban and militant groups), and attempted a definitive victory in a region with too many factors out of U.S. control. Moreover, it’s hard to fight an insurgency and build democracy at the same time, particularly as the U.S. remains an outsider with a duplicitous history of covert operations in the region. This is why we’ve begun to negotiate with the Taliban, rethink and refocus military approaches to counter-terrorism, and take regional players much more seriously. But there’s no large victory here; the media must remain content instead on the isolated “small” victories of a village school going up or a town being secured. Though these efforts are not to be diminished, what remains important is the US’ reflection and reassessment of what victory means in this kind of conflict.