Johnson - The Afghan way of war: how and why they fight

THE AFGHAN WAY OF WAR

ROB JOHNSON

How and Why They Fight

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Copyright 2012 by Robert Johnson

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Published in the United Kingdom in 2011 by C. Hurst & Co. (Publishers) Ltd.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Johnson, Robert, 1967
The Afghan way of war : how and why they fight / Rob Johnson.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-19-979856-8
1. AfghanistanHistory, Military. 2. Asymmetric warfareAfghanistan.
3. Strategic cultureAfghanistan. I. Title.
DS361.J64 2011
355.009581dc23 2011026869

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Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper

This book is dedicated to Ingrid

Tawan be halq firu burd ustakhan-i darusht, walay shikam bedarad chun bigirad undar naf.

(You can swallow a rough bone, but once it is embedded in your bowels, it cuts up your guts.)

The purpose of this book is to offer a fresh perspective on the various conflicts that have beset Afghanistan from the nineteenth century to the present. The scholarship that exists on the Afghan wars and frontier actions of Pakistan, worthy though it may be, is written almost entirely from a Western viewpoint. It is disappointing to note that, in these Western military histories, Afghans are often deprived of agency and are portrayed as capable only of reacting to external pressures. Even modern accounts have tended to reduce the Afghans to stereotypes and to deprive them of strategic, operational or even tactical initiative. Ironically historical commentators with direct experience of the country were rather more generous, and, it has to be said, that Western Coalition forces operating on the ground in Afghanistan have been acutely aware that the Afghan insurgents exhibit great skill and adaptability in the tactical arena. However, there is also a tendency to gloss over the intrinsic problems faced by Afghan insurgents and to attribute to them capabilities which they do not possess.

This book, part of the Changing Character of War series, represents more than just another military history of the Afghan Wars. It seeks to open a new chapter in the debate about Afghanistan using methodology that not only makes use of several disciplines, but also attempts to reconstruct changing historical encounters with Afghan perspectives. It is not the intention to suggest that the Afghans have a fixed method of fighting, a way of war, that is unchanging through time. Scoured by the strategic shocks of the past, the Afghans are pragmatic and adaptive. It is change, not continuity, that characterizes warfare in Afghanistan. Thus, military officers and policy-makers looking for strong lines of continuity from the campaigns the British fought against the Afghans in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in order to grasp lessons that can be applied instantly may be disappointed. This is a history of transformation. That said, there are characteristics of conflict in Afghanistan that endure, not least the difficulties presented by its human and physical geography, and Afghans have often interpreted events through a cultural lens that is distinct from the West, leavened, of course, with that strong sense of pragmatism.

This book has been formulated over many years and after frequent visits to Afghanistan, although I am deeply conscious that, since I am not an Afghan, attempts to reconstruct the Afghan perspective will be seen by some as inherently flawed and distorted. Anthropologists and other scholars will, no doubt, find fault with the methods and the shorthand nature of the terminology used. Space does not permit a full exposition of all the literature, while endless definitions, although useful to the academic scholar, would interrupt the line of argument too frequently. At best, this book is an interpretation which brings a new dimension to the debate about Afghanistans security. Criticisms of its brevity and assumptions I can leave to others.

I am deeply grateful to a great range of people and institutions for support in producing this book. I have been able to reflect on the work that many scholars, service personnel and policy-makers have brought to the Oxford Changing Character of War programme. Thanks here are due to Professor Hew Strachan, the Chichele Professor in the History of War at All Souls College, Oxford, who directs the programme and never ceases to labour for a greater understanding of war and a more intellectual application of strategy. I am also deeply grateful to Professor Henry Shue, Professor Anne Deighton, Professor Richard Caplan and Dr David Rodin, who have brought their own disciplinary expertise to bear and exposed me to new thinking. This is also true of my other colleagues at Oxford and friends at Cambridge, Kings College London, London School of Economics and Exeter, including Professor Judith Brown, Dr John Darwin, Dr Georg Deutsch, Dr Faisal Devji, Dr Adrian Gregory, Professor Chris Bayly, Professor Anatol Lieven, Professor Theo Farrell, Dr Antonio Giustozzi and Professor Jeremy Black. Rodric Braithwaites Afgantsy came out as I was finishing the chapter on the Soviet War. He has kindly given me permission to use passages he has translated from the Russian and I have drawn on several of his references, for which I am most grateful. I am indebted to the British Army and RUSI for the contacts they have made available and the chance to gain a better insight into recent Western military operations. I am deeply grateful to Michael Dwyer for his support in the commissioning and production of this book. There are those in the United States who have contributed to my understanding of Afghanistan, including the War College at Fort Leavenworth, the Tribal Analysis Center, RAND Corporation and friends in Washington DC and Kabul. Special mention must be made of the men and women who work on the ground, including the service personnel of the British and the United States armed forces, government agencies and civilian NGOs; especially those who have made courageous efforts to go and speak with and work amongst the Afghans in the cause of a better peace, like Michael Webb and Rory Brown. They have each given me unprecedented access to their work and to their Afghan interlocutors across the country. Most important are my Afghan friends and colleagues, including Nadir, Latif and Mohammed, the Afghan Army officers who have hosted me on several occasions, and all the Afghans who endure the current conflict with great stoicism but still make time for warm hospitality to foreign visitors.