Logistics!

Robert Haddick already pointed out that our dependence on overland supplies routed through Pakistan gives Islamabad an effective veto on our strategy:

Pakistan's closure of the Torkham crossing has revealed that the large buildup of U.S. and coalition forces inside Afghanistan has removed the option of applying pressure on Pakistan. Although the United States has negotiated with Russia to obtain an additional supply line into Afghanistan from the north, the tripling of U.S. forces in Afghanistan since Obama took office means that there is no escaping Pakistan's strong leverage, amounting to a veto, over U.S. military operations. ...100,000 U.S. troops [are] dependent on a fragile supply line through Pakistan. Pakistan's closure of the Torkham crossing shows that it will allow NATO to execute any military operations it wants just as long as these operations don't serious threaten the Afghan Taliban, Pakistan's invaluable proxy ally. Obama and his generals would no doubt like to wield the leverage that Pakistan wields over them. But creating such a reversal of fortune would require a military strategy that doesn't require endless daily supply convoys snaking through Pakistani territory.

This might seem to be strategy 101 (after all, Martin Van Creveld wrote a book about it!), logistics seems to be the sub-elephant in the room beyond the larger elephant comprised by the general Pakistan issue. But what many US policy analysts seem to ignore is the safety of the supply line as well. The costs of this ignorance were brought into sharp focus today, as militants attacked bunched-up convoys waiting for Pakistan to reverse its decisions to close the Torkham supply route.

While the overall damage was minimal, this sentence is rather chilling: "Nato supplies have little or no security. Islamabad police chief Kalim Imam said the entire supply operation was 'very vulnerable' to such attacks and it was impossible to provide constant protection." So Pakistan either is incapable or unwilling to provide security for a crucial strategic supply line that has already proven itself to be vulnerable to Pakistani Taliban and criminal gangs. And in the event of serious Pakistani political instability, what happens?

And most importantly, why is this not a big political issue at home? It seems we would rather gossip about whatever DC gossip Woodward dredges up than focus on how to secure the lifeline of our armed forces in Afghanistan.

Comments

[Stephen Pampinella]

Crap. Beat me to it.

[Joseph Fouche]

If we pretend such a thing as "politics" and "culture" don't exist for a moment and follow the pure logic of strategy, the optimal thing to do would be to seize the deep water Iranian port of Chabahar, declare an independent Baluchistan, and use the road that India has built between Chabahar and Delaram to bypass Pakistan entirely. The route bypasses such obstacles like mountains filled with hostile tribesmen. Another reminder that the difficulty of Afghanistan shrinks if you can approach it from the west. If the U.S. hadn't lost Iran, there probably wouldn't have been a prolonged Soviet occupation during the 80s and our current conundrum wouldn't necessarily exist.

[YNSN]

What's not mentioned is who owns the trucks hauling all the stuff. AQ blows up the trucks, then they are blowing up the trucks owned by some very influential people in Pakistan...

[A.E.]

Joseph, I agree--Iran would have made it easier.

YNSN, that's also an angle to investigate.

[YNSN]

I would say more. But, I work for a prominent Logistics unit out here in AFG.

Remember how up in arms congress was that we use Host Nation Trucking to the tune of a few billion out here... Well, yeah, that's for a reason.. A couple of them actually.

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=11811251]

Exactly. The American public doesn't complain when local national contractors are killed in attacks on convoys.

[T. Greer]

Putting Iran on the Axis of Evil was the worst foreign policy mistake America has made in the last two decades. Screwed us over in Iraq, is screwing us over in Afghanistan, and - assuming that current demographic and economic trends in Turkey, Israel, and Iran continue - it will continue messing with American policy in the Middle East for another generation.

[Cameron Schaefer]

the airlift community will end up absorbing a good amount of the work from this fallout which should be interesting as it's already been stretched pretty thin as of late

[A.E.]

These are all really good points, but I wonder in reference to Iran how much choice the US really had in the matter? E.g. most foreign policy analyses of the decline of US-Iran relations never focus on the strategic interests or perceptions of the Iranians pre-2003.

[T. Greer]

AE-

That is a very good question. I think the Iranians were much more open to reconciliation than most folks realize. Blog post pending.