The White House has opened a new front in the Afghan war - or, rather, in their effort to shed the burden of the Afghan war. The Washington Post reports that cost will be a new and major element for consideration. The $113 billion spent this year for Afghanistan is described as unsustainable; the article concludes, "To many of the president's civilian advisers, that price is too high."
This is preposterous from an administration that budgets a tripling of our national debt by 2018. President Obama has twice submitted budgets that never eliminate deficit spending, yet now claims it cannot sustain the $107 billion to fight a war the president described as "no idle danger; no hypothetical threat," but a vital national security interest to our country. The Obama White House is trying to seize on conservative momentum to reduce federal spending by cutting the only government program they don't support: winning the war.
The civilian advisers quoted in the article cite the success of counter-terror raids like that which killed Osama bin Laden as the more cost-effective strategy. This approach ignores the negative consequences of operating punitively. Pakistan's outrage at the raid is justifiable, as is President Karzai's concern about raids on Afghan homes -- these are leaders accountable to their publics and they're barely able to justify their current cooperation with us. How would the administration retain those governments as partners if we do not invest in positive operations like strengthening their security forces? How would our counter-terrorism teams get the information necessary to those raids without the help of local security forces and people? Are we willing to tolerate the higher risk of failure associated with the counter-terror approach? Does it not drive up the cost of U.S. operations everywhere if all fragile countries see of us is our military strikes? How will that affect the United States' image in the world?
The American military is not culturally predisposed to nation building. They undertake it because it creates the highest likelihood of achieving our military objectives. What the White House is attempting to do is paint that approach as profligate, contrasting it to the cost-effectiveness of a narrower counter-terror approach. They ought to ask themselves why none of our military leadership is supporting the approach.
This feels like one more example of President Obama leading from behind. He has made little effort to build public support for the war -- he didn't even make a statement on the House debate over withdrawing from Afghanistan. By floating a cost-based objection to his own strategy, the president sets himself up to "respond to pressure" and constrain our effort in Afghanistan. This is terrible leadership on a crucial national security issue.
Responsible people can advocate different approaches to defending ourselves against the terrorist threat emanating from Afghanistan and Pakistan. They can also advocate further cuts to defense spending. But it is dangerous to argue the cost of prosecuting a war that, while high, is marginal to our expenditures and by no means the driver of our debt, cannot be afforded.
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