OPINION:
Most Americans pay little attention to the war in Afghanistan. It’s not like Vietnam. Newspapers and television news don’t focus on it every day and evening. It’s safe to say that most Americans don’t know or care how many U.S. troops are deployed there (about 18,000) or what they are trying to accomplish.
Only odd events catch people’s attention, as did the aftermath of the Taliban’s May 15 attack that nearly captured Farah, a provincial capital city.
The Farah battle was hard-fought, with considerable losses suffered by both the Taliban and the Afghan government forces. The latter won because American air power intervened decisively, as it has in so many other Afghanistan fights.
And then the U.S. Air Force used its Twitter account to write, “The Taliban Forces in Farah city #Afghanistan would much rather have heard #Yanny or #Laurel than the deafening #BRRRT they got courtesy of our #A10.”
You might ask why the Air Force is taunting the Taliban using Twitter. And, if you’re over 20 years old, you’ll probably wonder what “Yanny” and “Laurel” are, or why anyone cares.
The answer is that social media are the fastest and frequently most effective means of communication, as President Trump demonstrates almost daily. Government agencies — both U.S. and foreign — use them for that purpose. The CIA tweets regularly, as do other intelligence agencies, including the Israeli Mossad, whose Twitter account is managed by some imaginative writers.
The “Yanny-Laurel” reference comes from a 30-second audio clip that went viral on social media a few weeks ago. Some people hear the word “Yanny” and others hear “Laurel.” It’s an audio Rorschach test the results of which can reportedly be changed by adjusting the bass track.
That would be of no interest had a Pentagon reporter not questioned Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White about it, asking whether the tweet was disrespectful to the Afghanis who died in the fight.
The Air Force apologized for the tweet and removed it.
The seriousness of the Air Force’s apology goes far beyond the tweet. It demonstrates both the importance of social media and the weakness of our strategies in Afghanistan.
Social media can be a tool of war because the war against Islamist terror networks and the nations that support them is, at its essence, an ideological war. What we say and write — even on Twitter — will never be as important as killing the enemy, but it has a place in our strategy just like any published information can be.
The Air Force Yanny-Laurel tweet was factually incorrect (the A-10s didn’t fire their 30mm cannons in the Farah battle). Removing the tweet was appropriate, but apologizing for it demonstrates a justifiable lack of confidence in our Afghanistan strategy.
Our military leaders apparently believe that the Afghan government of President Ashraf Ghani is so weak and our position with them so delicate that we dare not — even inferentially — insult them.
Mr. Trump came into office believing that we should withdraw quickly from Afghanistan. He then came to understand, as he said in an August speech last year, that an American withdrawal would create a vacuum that the Taliban, al Qaeda, ISIS and other terrorist groups would fill, causing Afghanistan to revert to a safe haven for terrorists to mount attacks against us and our allies.
He was entirely correct. The Taliban believe that they can outlast us, and terrorist networks stand ready and eager to have safe haven in Afghanistan from which they can mount future attacks against. Osama bin Laden’s son, Hamza, is apparently waiting to reconstitute al Qaeda and continue his father’s war on civilization.
In January, the BBC reported that the Taliban were in control of 14 Afghan provinces and had an active and open presence in 263 more. Last week, the Afghan defense minister said that heavy fighting is underway in 15 provinces.
Two months ago, Defense Secretary James Mattis said that victory in Afghanistan is a political reconciliation with the Taliban, not a military victory. He said we aim to “peel off” enough Taliban who are tired of fighting to compel a lasting reconciliation. That cannot happen.
If a military victory is unobtainable, any negotiated settlement with the Taliban — funded and supported by Russia and Iran — can only result in their military victory over the Afghan government.
That brings us back to what the president said last August. If we withdraw from Afghanistan its government will fall quickly to the Taliban, who will eagerly provide a base from which Islamist terrorists can mount attacks against the West.
The Taliban demand direct negotiations with us, aiming to exclude the Ghani government from any settlement. That is unacceptable to us. More than 40 years ago, the North Vietnamese demanded the same sort of talks, seeking to exclude the South Vietnamese government. That dispute resulted in months of negotiations over the shape of the negotiating table.
Those who remember the very brief life of the political “reconciliation” between the United States and North and South Vietnam know what our current strategy will produce in Afghanistan.
We cannot tweet or apologize our way out of Afghanistan. Until we devise a strategy that will — for decades — prevent Afghanistan from returning to its pre-September 11 state, we will have to stay there indefinitely.
• Jed Babbin, a deputy undersecretary of defense in the George H.W. Bush administration, is the author of “In the Words of Our Enemies.”
Please read our comment policy before commenting.