A ‘sign of weakness’ in the propaganda of war

How many times have we heard this before? Didn’t then Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld dismiss the Iraqi insurgency as a last-gasp effort just when it was going into high gear?

How many times, in nearly nine years of covering the Indochina wars, did I hear Americans say: The North Vietnamese are desperate and on their last legs. There were the usual stories, often encouraged by American propagandists, of North Vietnamese soldiers being chained to their machine guns to stop them from running away - as if our Vietnamese adversaries ever lacked motivation.

Of course, as ambassador, Crocker’s job is to keep up morale. The entire American house of cards in Afghanistan is built on an illusion of progress. Progress is slow, and reversible, but “we are winning’’ is the line emanating from headquarters.

Our Pashtun adversaries’ job is to lower government morale. In that cause, one might concede that the Taliban assassinating three top government officials in one month is a considerable achievement.

Crocker is familiar with the Russian and British experience in wars against the Pashtuns, the ethnic group with which we are now at war. Crocker is also familiar with the concept of guerrilla wars, what we now like to call “asymmetrical’’ warfare. If you lack the firepower and airpower of your adversary, you use stealth and guile to make up for it. You refrain from frontal attacks. You melt away into the population where the enemy is strong, and you attack where he is vulnerable. Over the long haul you win by not losing. The foreigner will eventually tire and go home.