Critics of the war in Afghanistan are quick to make comparisons to the war in Vietnam, but is it valid to compare the two? Peter Beinart, senior political writer for the Daily Beast, says no.
[cnn-photo-caption image= http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/images/10/08/beinart.jpg caption="Peter Beinart says there are other historical analogies one can make for the war in Afghanistan."]
Beinart spoke to Kiran Chetry on CNN’s “American Morning” Thursday. Below is an edited transcript of the interview.
Kiran Chetry: You wrote an article called, "Bury the Vietnam Analogy." There have been a lot of people saying there are comparisons to be made between Afghanistan now and Vietnam then. Why do you think that's off base?
Peter Beinart: First of all, South Vietnam, a country we were trying to defend, was not a real country. It was an artificial country created in 1954 by the French as they were leaving. The country was to be reunited with North Vietnam in two years.
The problem in Afghanistan may be that we have a government partner that's problematic. Afghanistan is a real country that Afghans generally believe in. They have an Afghan national identity. That didn't exist in South Vietnam.
That's why we might be able to do better in Afghanistan than Hamid Karzai. We could never have been done better in South Vietnam than Diệm because South Vietnam itself was not a country that people felt loyalty to. That was one of the big differences. There were other big differences. For instance, the fact that the Taliban is much, much less popular in Afghanistan than the Vietcong were in South Vietnam. In Vietnam, the Communists essentially controlled the nationalist movement. They had the nationalist legitimacy. That's not true in the same way with the Taliban.
Chetry: In the New York Times recently, columnist Frank Rich wrote that while JFK was deciding about Vietnam, “military leaders lobbied for their new mission by planting leaks in the press. Kennedy fired back by authorizing his own leaks, which like Obama's indicated his reservations about whether American combat forces could turn a counterinsurgency strategy into a winnable war.” When we take a look at what's happening now, it seems to be a bit of the case.
Beinart: Yeah, but that was also true in Korea where Harry Truman faced off against his general, Douglas MacArthur; in Bosnia where Colin Powell, very publicly as chairman of the Joint Chiefs, opposed Clinton's efforts to try to get the U.S. more involved there. That's true of most wars, that there are conflicts between military and civilian leaders that play out in the press. It does not tell you anything about whether Vietnam on the ground is like Afghanistan.
Chetry: At the end of the article you write, “…let's not flatter ourselves with Vietnam comparisons. In Vietnam, we lost because the war was unwinnable from the start. In Afghanistan, we had a grateful population, an unpopular enemy and a just cause, and we frittered it away. Afghanistan isn't Vietnam; It’s worse.” So we’re eight years out and some say it seems as though we are starting back at square one. How do you win?
Beinart: I don't know if we can win. I think what's clear is that the resources we put in Afghanistan have been absolutely minuscule compared to Vietnam and compared to Iraq. In 1968 we had over 500,000 U.S. troops in South Vietnam. We had up until a couple of years ago only about 20,000 [in Afghanistan.] We were spending 2.3% of GDP in South Vietnam. In Afghanistan, we are spending 1/7 of that. So what’s clear is we haven't made anywhere near the kind of commitment to Afghanistan as we made to Vietnam. The question is, is it now too late?
Chetry: It seems to me that when people compare Vietnam to any current conflict – because we heard it with Iraq as well – they say one of two things. One is that we are fighting a losing battle. The other thing many people say is can we learn from our mistakes? What can be learned, if anything? What's the value looking back on Vietnam and saying is there a way we can learn from our mistakes in our current conflict?
Beinart: Well, I think the American military deserves a lot of credit for having learned. Particularly from the experience in Iraq. The American military clearly has gotten a lot better at understanding how to do counterinsurgency. Trying to reduce the number of civilian casualties, focusing on protecting people so that their loyalties will shift. I think the American military has done a great job of learning. Afghanistan is a very challenging case. Above all because there is a question of whether we have a good partner in the Karzai government.
But we should learn from Vietnam and learn from lots of other conflicts. People invoke Vietnam because it’s a synonym for failure, but there are other U.S. wars that have gone better that also have something to teach us. People said Bosnia would be a Vietnam. It didn't turn out to be a Vietnam. So there are lots of historical analogies we can look to.