Afghanistan: A one man banned

June 30, 2010: The firing of General Stanley McChrystal for his candid comments about the progress on the war in Afghanistan proves how the country earned its title, "Graveyard of Empires."

Little has changed since last July when I first wrote about the war effort that was in it's eighth year. Now in it's ninth year, the war by all accounts has seems to be headed in the wrong direction as the Taliban have grown stronger in the more densely populated regions of Kandahar and Helmond.

The Afghanistan government is still as corrupt as ever, villagers are still as terrified as ever and those who cooperate with NATO forces are still being murdered. All in all it's a mess.

So who can blame General McChrystal for speaking his mind out of frustration at his civilian bosses, who have played the Afghanistan card wrong from the start?

In the interview with Rolling Stone magazine, where McChrystal's candid comments got him sacked, he spoke about how the Obama administration and it's Afghan advisers have failed to stick to a plan and then support that plan in the field.

But the problems in Afghanistan shouldn't be a surprise to students of history. The British were driven out in the 19th century and the Soviet Union was driven out by the same people responsible for the insurgency today, twenty years ago.

The treacherous terrain, the corruption, the intimidation and the fact that many Taliban leaders are in safe havens across the border all spell trouble for an effort that has many in Washington D.C. calling it the lost war.

As I wrote last year, Louis Dupree, a Fulbright senior scholar and knower all things Afghan history, identifies four factors that seem consistent in the Afghan's history of breaking foreign powers: the occupation of Afghan territory by foreign troops, the placing of an unpopular leader on the throne, the harsh acts of ruling Afghans against their local enemies, and the reduction of the subsidies paid by regime change minded political agents.

These factors are still in place today and have grown even more problematic with the influx of billions that have been used to create a buyers market of corruption and dissension within the Afghan people. 

The firing of General Stanley McChrystal for his honesty will do nothing to solve the underlying challenges that face American troops in Afghanistan.