The MacArthur Model for Afghanistan

Consolidate authority into one person: an American viceroy who’d lead all coalition efforts.

Afghanistan is an expensive disaster for America. The Pentagon has already consumed $828 billion on the war, and taxpayers will be liable for trillions more in veterans’ health-care costs for decades to come. More than 2,000 American soldiers have died there, with more than 20,000 wounded in action.
For all that effort, Afghanistan is failing. The terrorist cohort consistently gains control of more territory, including key economic arteries

.. First, he should consolidate authority in Afghanistan with one person: an American viceroy

The coalition has had 17 different military commanders in the past 15 years, which means none of them had time to develop or be held responsible for a coherent strategy.

  1. .. In Afghanistan, the viceroy approach would reduce rampant fraud by focusing spending on initiatives that further the central strategy, rather than handing cash to every outstretched hand from a U.S. system bereft of institutional memory.
  2. .. Troops fighting for their lives should not have to ask a lawyer sitting in air conditioning 500 miles away for permission to drop a bomb. Our plodding, hand wringing and overcaution have prolonged the war—and the suffering it bears upon the Afghan population.
  3. .. Third, we must build the capacity of Afghanistan’s security forces the effective and proven way, instead of spending billions more pursuing the “ideal” way. The 330,000-strong Afghan army and police were set up under the guidance of U.S. military “advisers” in the mirror image of the U.S. Army. That was the wrong approach.     .. frequent defections, which currently deliver the equivalent of two trained infantry divisions per year to the enemy.

.. a different, centuries-old approach. For 250 years, the East India Company prevailed in the region through the use of private military units known as “presidency armies.” They were locally recruited and trained, supported and led by contracted European professional soldiers. The professionals lived, patrolled, and—when necessary—fought shoulder-to-shoulder with their local counterparts for multiyear deployments. That long-term dwelling ensured the training, discipline, loyalty and material readiness of the men they fought alongside for years, not for a one-time eight-month deployment.

.. the viceroy would have complete decision-making authority in the country so no time is wasted waiting for Washington to send instructions. A nimbler special-ops and contracted force like this would cost less than $10 billion per year, as opposed to the $45 billion we expect to spend in Afghanistan in 2017.

.. The military default in a conventional war is to control terrain, neglecting the long-term financial arteries that fund the fight, and handicaps long-term economic potential.

The Taliban understand this concept well. They control most of Afghanistan’s economic resources—including lapis, marble, gold, pistachios, hashish and opium—and use profits to spread their influence and perpetuate the insurgency. Our strategy needs to target those resources by placing combat power to cover Afghanistan’s economic arteries.

.. We need to encourage the growth of legitimate industries to raise tax revenue while choking off the Taliban’s sources of income. It’s absurd that Afghanistan—which holds an estimated $1 trillion worth of mineral resources—still doesn’t have a mining law, after 15 years of American presence and “advice.”

.. Our failed population-centric approach to Afghanistan has only led to missed opportunities

.. A smarter, trade-centric approach will boost Afghanistan’s long-run viability by weaning it off donor welfare dependency.

.. Mr. Trump must not lose sight of the reason we became involved in Afghanistan: to deny sanctuary to those who want to destroy our way of life.

.. The U.S. should adjust course from the past 15-plus years of nation building and focus on pounding the Taliban and other terrorists so hard that they plead for negotiation. Until they feel real pressure and know the U.S. has staying power, they will win.

Quit calling Donald Trump an isolationist. He’s worse than that.

What Trump really believes is far more dangerous.

.. The problem is, Trump isn’t an isolationist. He is a militarist, something far worse. And calling Trump an isolationist isn’t an effective critique.
 .. What united them was their opposition to entering the Second World War after the devastation of the First. Judging the United States capable of repelling any outside invasion, they wanted to steer clear of armed entanglement in Europe and Asia.
.. The first America Firsters, then, were antiwar more than anti-Semitic or pro-fascist, strains that recent critics of Trump overemphasize. True, the group’s spokesman, aviator Charles Lindbergh, railed against “Jewish influence” months before Pearl Harbor. But the anti-Semitic diatribe crippled the movement rather than advanced it, and few America Firsters favored the Axis.
.. Ever since, foreign policy elites have deployed the “isolationist” tag to expel anti-interventionists from the bounds of legitimate debate.
.. It’s often an unfair label, but it’s especially nonsensical when it comes to the current commander in chief: Trump is no isolationist, whether caricatured or actual. Rather than seeking to withdraw from the world, he vows to exploit it. Far from limiting the area of war, he threatens ruthless violence against globe-spanning adversaries and glorifies martial victory. In short, the president is a militarist.
Scholars define militarism, broadly, as the excessive use and veneration of force for political ends, or even for its own sake, extending at times to full military control of the state. (Trump has appointed two Marine generals, Jim Mattis and John F. Kelly, to his Cabinet.) Militarism, the pioneering historian Alfred Vagts wrote in 1937, promotes values “associated with armies and wars and yet transcending true military purposes.”
.. Not even the European Union escapes Trump’s zero-sum squint: He casts it as a German vehicle to “beat the United States on trade,”
.. Previous presidents — Theodore Roosevelt, Richard Nixon — have scorned non-Western cultures and accentuated divergent interests among states. But Trump is unique in seeing America as a victim nation, a net global loser that must now fight back.
His single most consistent political conviction is that other countries have exploited the United States.
.. Trump’s sense of abuse and humiliation is potent. “The world is laughing at us,” he endlessly repeats.
.. Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany did not conquer territory for the thrill of it; their leaders acted out of perceived desperation, believing that they were losing a ruthless competition for power and status.
.. He talks of grabbing wealth from other countries, most vividly in his mantra to “take the oil” in Iraq. “Maybe we’ll have another chance,” he said in a speech at the CIA. Trump may be posturing, but the posture is militaristic.
.. To announce a lust for oil, to chest-thump about torture, to envisage military parades down Pennsylvania Avenue — these do not achieve strategic objectives so much as exalt brute force. “I’m the most militaristic person there is,” Trump said in the primaries. Perhaps he was telling the truth.
.. Drawing a moral equivalencebetween the United States and Vladimir Putin’s Russia, Trump rejects America’s traditional identity as an exceptional nation shining the light of freedom to the world. What identity does he offer instead? While ignoring the Founding Fathers, he constantly invokes the “old days of General MacArthur and General Patton,” the most extreme generals of the mid-20th century.
.. MacArthur and Patton are Trump’s new founders.
.. Trump’s disavowal of nation-building offers little comfort. His predecessors said the same during their presidential campaigns. Trump will avoid large-scale conflict only if he sets limited objectives and acts prudently.
.. “Our military dominance must be unquestioned,”

.. Last year Trump’s chief strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, professed “no doubt” that “we’re going to war in the South China Sea in five to 10 years” — and that’s on top of the “global war against Islamic fascism” that he believes to be in its opening stages.

.. When critics seem to assail Trump for being too peaceful, for questioning military alliances and hoping to cooperate with Russia, they reinforce his message. They verify that he’s against not only the establishment but costly wars to boot.
.. a peace candidate turned warmonger, a populist outsider serving arms dealers and autocrats.

Mike Pence Finds Himself in Unusual Role in Mike Flynn’s Firing

But Mr. Pence also learned he remains very much a junior partner in the still-forming White House power structure, as a timeline shows President Donald Trump knew about Mr. Flynn’s deceptions for two weeks without informing his No. 2.

.. The warning from the Justice Department about Mr. Flynn’s inconsistencies was delivered to the president’s chief counsel, Donald McGahn, who informed Mr. Trump. It’s unclear who else knew.

.. and a flashy style that cuts against the former Indiana governor’s religious beliefs.

.. is the latest incident to raise doubts about Mr. Trump’s creation of an informal power-sharing arrangement among top advisers. Unlike his predecessors, he has placed himself at the center of a spinning wheel of former campaign advisers, family, confidants and aides

.. “This is something entirely different. The ineptitude, the sloppiness, the incompetence and the chaos are unprecedented.”

.. This is all a part of the way he operates. He keeps his adversaries off balance and he keeps people guessing.”

.. Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has influence over everything from foreign policy to job creation and may be the person in the West Wing the president trusts most. Chief strategist Steve Bannon helped craft the president’s populist identity and also has a hand in foreign policy through a new seat on the National Security Council. Mr. Pence is the main point of contact for Republicans on Capitol Hill.

.. Some Republicans have been talking to Mr. Trump’s team and urging them to put in place a system that would impose more order. It isn’t clear that is what Mr. Trump wants. Friends say he likes to “curate” opinions from people he trusts inside and outside of government—sounding people out on what they think he should be doing.

.. A senior White House official said Wednesday that one course correction will be to hold more campaign-style rallies meant to deliver an “unfiltered” message to Americans. One such event is scheduled for Saturday evening in Orlando, Fla., and more will be coming, the official said.

.. Multiple candidates have turned down the position of White House communications director, forcing press secretary Sean Spicer to perform double duty

.. what some Republicans hope is that Mr. Trump will further empower Mr. Pence

.. After a tape surfaced during the campaign showing Mr. Trump making lewd comments toward women, Mr. Trump phoned Mr. Pence’s wife, Karen, to offer reassurance

.. Mr. Trump urged him to go see the Douglas MacArthur statue.

.. pay respects to one of the military leaders Mr. Trump most admires