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Two Recent Takes on Where We Are in Afghanistan, and How We Got There

A Vulcan's Tale: How the Bush Administration Mismanaged the Reconstruction of Afghanistan By Dov S. Zakheim Brooki Brookings Institution Press, 2011 320 pp., $32.95 ISBN: 978-?-8157-2122-2Understanding War in Afghanistan By Joseph J. Collins NDU Press, 2011 158 pp. ISBN: 978-1-78039-924-9A REVIEW ESSAYFor serious students of Afghanistan specifically, and stabilization operations more generally, two recent books are worth a look. Both Joseph J. Collins's UnderstandingWar in Afghanistan and Dov S. Zakheim's A Vulcan's Tale: How the Bush Administration Mismanaged the Reconstruction of Afghanistan focus on U.S. policy toward that tortured South Asian country.Dr. Collins's book, which draws on his broader writing on the topic, is, in his own words, "an intellectual primer on war in Afghanistan." And it strikes its target admirably. As the word primer suggests, the work is spare, focusing on the essential facts about Afghanistan and the nature and history of warfare there. Simply put, the book is a gem, summarizing in its short 158 pages an enormous treasure trove of information on everything from the topography of the land to the tribal code of the Pashtun ethnic group to Western policy options to conclude the Afghan war.Here the reader finds important data on the ethnic makeup of Afghanistan, historical roots of many current rivalries, and insights into topics that otherwise might be invisible to the soldier or reconstruction worker encountering Afghanistan for the first time. An example of the latter is Dr. Collins's short but useful foray into the trilateral dynamics among Afghanistan, Pakistan, and India, an invisible but potent interplay that affects the actions of all three important nations.Scattered throughout Understanding War in Afghanistan are "mini" analytical syntheses that, without this book, would be distilled only after extensive research by readers. In the chapter on "Land, People, and Culture," for example, Dr. Collins notes that Afghanistan history and current politics result from a complex interplay of four factors: the rugged, landlocked topography; the low level of factor endowments that "makes poverty a natural condition"; local and tribal power structures; and the nation's location among more powerful neighbors contending over its fate. My personal favorite, since I grappled with this set of issues while working at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), is the book's treatment of the counterpoint between "a drastic need for modernization," on the one hand, and the "entrenched interests" and "very conservative populace in the countryside that jealously guards its autonomy," on the other. Without an understanding of this dynamic, and the related "center versus periphery" issues that Dr. Collins also covers, it can be extraordinarily difficult to reconcile the seemingly conflicted attitudes of many Afghans toward programs to improve their lives.Even when Dr. Collins moves beyond the facts of geography and culture, he retains an admirable economy of words and objectivity. His summation of four broad policy options (essentially large-scale counterinsurgency [COIN], counterterrorism, capacity-building, or "reconciliation") makes the complex political/security situation digestible for newcomers, without insulting more sophisticated readers.This is the book I wish I had when USAID deployed me to Kabul to reopen its office in January 2002. It is the book that military personnel and civilians deploying to Afghanistan now, even if for the second or third time, should take the time to read. I do not know if anyone at the Pentagon, State Department, or USAID is contemplating buying this important book in quantity for those deploying to Afghanistan, but - while I am not Dr. Collins's agent - all of those institutions should be doing just that.The work by Dr. Zakheim, former Department of Defense Comptroller and Chief Financial Officer during the early days of the Bush administration, goes in a different direction. …