Chorus grows against military
intervention in Afghanistan
By Ron Jensen, U.K.
bureau
RAF MILDENHALL, England — American cruise missiles and ground troops are not
useful weapons in a war on terrorism, some people have started saying about any military
intervention in Afghanistan.
"You can go in and rearrange a hell of a lot of sand and rock [with bombs and
missiles], but what is accomplished?" asked retired Rear Adm. Eugene Carroll, vice
president emeritus of the Center for Defense Information in Washington, D.C.
Carroll cautioned, too, against any ground force. Not only will land mines be a major
factor, he said, but the Afghan Taliban fighters have the advantage of the terrain, which
they know intimately.
"They’ll be behind you and around you and attack when they want to
attack," he said. "Osama bin Laden is not going to be found. How can you shoot
terrorists when you can’t find them?"
Historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. joined the chorus Sunday with an opinion piece in the
Los Angeles Times, claiming military intervention would serve the plans of bin Laden when
it failed to dislodge him or his Al Qaeda network.
"It would only demonstrate once again the impotence of the American
superpower," the double Pulitzer Prize winner wrote.
Such an attack, he wrote, would push moderate Muslims toward hatred of the U.S. and
produce a new generation of suicide bombers.
The historian and former adviser to President Kennedy said Afghanistan is "famous
for its unconquerability," a lesson learned by the British Empire and the Soviet
Union.
"American troops in Afghanistan would be even more baffled and beset than they
were a third of a century ago in Vietnam," Schlesinger wrote.
Schlesinger prefers to see the Bush administration spend its energy rallying the
support of the moderate Muslim states, convincing them that the fundamentalists who use
terrorism are not in their best interest.
To allow the situation to become a clash of civilizations, he wrote, would be a
catastrophe.
"Bin Laden has set a trap for the United States," he wrote. "Let us not
walk into it."
Jay Farrar, an analyst for the Center for Strategic and International Studies in
London, does not expect combat despite the talk and the movement of troops and war
equipment to the region.
"I think the possibilities are very remote," he said. "The reality that
we’re talking about here is, there is very little a conventional military force can
do."
The positioning of troops, aircraft and ships is not a bad idea, he said. It allows the
U.S. to react if necessary without telegraphing the punch.
But, he said, just because the force is there doesn’t mean it has to be used.
America’s military planners are aware of the difficulties of any attack.
"I think things will calm down," he said.
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