Nuclear Security and Strategic Analyses Dr Marko Beljac

Australia Should Not Support Expanding the War in Afghanistan

We stand on the cusp of a major expansion of the war in Afghanistan. The Taliban based insurgency continues to gather momentum, as does the US led response. It seems almost daily now that we hear of reports of US air strikes killing scores of civilians. The foreign presence no longer has the support of large segments of the population. All the signs point to a "surge" in the operational tempo, level of firepower and troop presence in the Afghan theatre. More ominously, it also seems we may well be on the verge of an expansion of the war into Pakistan, similar to the rolling expansion of the Vietnam War through Indochina.

Although the Rudd Government has withdrawn combat forces from Iraq, with the bulk of Australia's military presence remaining in place, there are indicators pointing to Canberra acquiescing to any US request for additional troops for the war in Afghanistan, given continued European reluctance to send additional forces. The Government has received a US request for Australian advisers to be sent to Pakistan, as part of a more expansive US strategy in the region.

There seemingly exists a wide-spread view in Australia that Afghanistan, in contrast to Iraq, is a "just war". The underlying justice of our military presence in Afghanistan is hardly questioned in editorial and intellectual commentary. It is this view that to no inconsiderable degree accounts for the ability of successive governments in Canberra to rationalise Australian military operations in Afghanistan.

The differing attitudes of the leadership of the Labor Party to these two wars, including amongst the Left hierarchy, does not really arise from a sense of contrasting justice. Both engagements were always tied in to a certain conception of the requirements of Australia's mythical alliance with the United States. All other rationalisations are mystifications served up for public consumption.

However, Iraq had, much to the surprise of the political classes, widespread popular opposition especially amongst Labor's core constituency. The engagement in Afghanistan does not have the same level of public opposition, but that opposition is growing, both in Australia and the wider Western world.

Given the value placed upon the mythical alliance with Washington in Canberra, the contrasting attitudes of the Labor Party are explicable by the fact that Australian support for US strategy in Afghanistan does not incur the same domestic political costs as does overt support for the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, which Labor still continues to militarily support.

It would therefore be irrational for the Rudd Government to upset relations with the United States in the absence of internal political constraint. For those who place great store, by contrast, upon the morality of our conduct in international relations the over-riding task to be faced is to raise the domestic costs of Afghan policy, where we maintain a combat presence, and to do that first requires dealing with the notion that Afghanistan is a just war.

The Taliban regime's sheltering of al-Qaeda prior to the attacks of September 11, and a refusal to hand over its leadership after September 11, forms the core of the argument. If the Taliban insurgency were to succeed then al-Qaeda again would gain sovereign sanctuary for large-scale terrorist operations, it is argued.

However, the diplomatic record reveals that the Taliban did not refuse outright to hand over the al-Qaeda leadership. Rather, Afghanistan asked for evidence of al-Qaeda involvement prior to any handover. It was Washington that refused to provide such evidence, unilaterally invading regardless. The reason for that is clear. It was a demonstration of Washington's refusal to be bound by the dictates of international law, as was its initial refusal to acquire Article 51 sanction for the invasion of Afghanistan from the United Nations Security Council, even though such sanction would have been easily acquired.

The proper response to terrorism is to capture and bring before trial, in a legitimate court governed by legitimate processes, those responsible. For the invasion of Afghanistan to have been just all means other than war should have been exhausted prior to military action. Instead, the employment of military power was almost reflexively the first instrument adopted, and was employed seemingly as an end in itself.

It is proving to be a blunt instrument and one quite counter-productive for it is one of the underlying factors driving the expanding intensity of the Taliban insurgency. Military force also helps spread extremist ideologies.

The US backed Karzai administration continues to depend upon foreign troops and Northern Alliance warlords for its survival. The dilemma faced in Afghanistan is simple. The United States is politically weak, relying upon superior firepower to quell an insurgency. The use of large-scale military power seems to be helping fuel the insurgency as the death toll mounts. US planners are adamant that al-Qaeda and Taliban sanctuaries in the tribal regions of Pakistan provide them a safe base of operations.

There is intense debate in Washington, especially following the resignation of President Musharraf, on expanding the war into Pakistan. There have already been air strikes across the border. A major incursion, perhaps even with ground troops, threatens to spread the insurgency into Pakistan. It might thereby develop into a general Pashtun based insurgency throughout the region, de-stabilising nuclear armed Pakistan. Based on comments by the Defence Minister, Joel Fitzgibbon, following his recent visit to Washington, Australia might well support such an expansion.

This all seems eerily reminiscent of the expansion of the war in South Vietnam into Laos and Cambodia. The rational response in Afghanistan would be to split the Taliban by offering moderate elements a share in government, not expanding the war into Pakistan or increasing its lethality in Afghanistan proper.

In fact, declassified documents reveal that splitting the Taliban was a strategy contemplated by the US following September 11. It was a pity that Washington choose not to adopt it.