Okay We Won, Let's Go Home

The official word is out from NATO. Operation Medusa is finished. We won. We drove the Taliban out of Southern Afghanistan. They're on the run and they're not stopping any time soon. Yippee, now we can fix a couple of schools, patch some potholes, defoliate some poppy fields and get the hell out of there. Of course, you don't believe that but who would?

We defeated the Taliban, sort of, and not a moment too soon. The Brits in neighbouring Helmand province are just about all-in. According to a piece in The Guardian, relatives of British soldiers serving in Afghanistan have become quite vocal about the stresses these people are enduring. One woman complained her son has had but one day off in eight weeks. The rest of the time he's spent in gunfights with the insurgents. Similar stories are emerging from many other relatives back in Britain.

Of course we really haven't defeated the Taliban. We've moved into one area with overwhelming force and they left. That's what insurgents do. They leave so that they can come back, on their own terms, to fight another day. They go away, they lick their wounds, clean their weapons, round up reinforcements and plan where to take the fight next.

Take Kandahar province, Canada's territory. If we put a rifle in the hands of every cook and medic and motor pool mechanic, that is to say every Canadian soldier over there, we'd have ONE soldier to cover every TEN SQUARE MILES of Kandahar province. The reality is closer to one infantryman for every 30-square miles.

Now, the best news. The top NATO commander in Afghanistan predicts they'll have the Taliban completely destroyed within three to five years. How, he didn't exactly say, probably because he can't. Chances are he doesn't plan to be around to answer awkward questions when that magical moment arrives and passes. Oh well.

Of course it's impossible to predict the future of Afghanistan because that country is destabilized on so many levels - political, economic, ethnic and military - and is just one country in a whole region that is 'in play.' The future of Afghanistan will be shaped, in part, by the future of Pakistan, of Iraq, of Iran not to mention what the future holds for NATO and the United States itself.

No, anyone who gives assurances that the Taliban threat is going to be eliminated in three to five years is either deliberately dishonest or blindly delusional.