Life on the 5G Highway
J. Scott O’Meara
Security, Americas
Huawei has emerged as a national champion for China in 5G, and the United States is falling behind in the competition.
How do you end a war that by its nature has been described as endless? What are the probabilities of achieving a successful outcome that minimizes risk? and what form of peace agreement will be required to achieve this?
These are the fundamental questions U.S. ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and his team of negotiators have been wrestling with for the last eight months. Tapped by President Donald Trump to lead negotiations with the Taliban, Khalilzad is caught between two objectives that on the surface seem almost irreconcilable. The first: signing an agreement that will enable the removal of a significant number of troops from Afghanistan after eighteen years on the ground. The second: ensuring Afghanistan does not revert to its previous status as a safe haven for extremist networks that threaten the United States and our allies.
How do you square the circle? Three words: prudence, persistence and patience.
Americans have paid a high price in blood and money. Many have lost friends and family in Afghanistan. Understandably the American will to continue is waning. With a high percentage of the American population soured on the war altogether, patience is the last thing they want to hear. And for good reason. The statistics of this conflict have been mind-boggling. Over $744 billion of U.S. taxpayer money has been spent. Tragically, 2,430 U.S. military service members have been killed, thirteen this year alone. By Afghan president Ashraf Ghani’s own calculations, tens of thousands of Afghan soldiers and police officers have lost their lives since 2014. The amount of financial waste, theft, and abuse throughout the conflict has been staggering. Barely a month goes by until the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction releases another scathing audit of Washington’s aid program in the country.
Prudence being fundamental to wise statecraft, rash actions to end a war can be as dangerous as blindly entering one. What we all need to recognize, however, is that stabilizing any country awash in violence is an incredibly complex undertaking. Informed, deliberate, patient statesmanship a must. There is no room for bias optimism or ideological governed approaches.
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