In the recent award of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama, the American President, has marked the third time in the last decade that a leading American Democratic political figure has received the prestigious award. In 2002, the former president, Jimmy Carter and in 2007, the former vice president, Albert Gore, were recipients of the award for their roles in promoting solutions to major international problems.

The fact that Obama was awarded the prize less than a year into his tenure as President, whereas the other recipients received their awards after leaving office, has led to some speculation about the reasons for the award. For his critics, the award is, at best, premature and, at worst, undeserved. For others, the award is an acknowledgment that Obama has pursued a major effort to reorient American foreign policy and to pursue a strategy of multilateral engagement with the wider world. In effect, Obama's award is a reward for abandoning the farce and tragedies of the Bush-Cheney administration's "global war on terror."

Whatever the reasons for the Nobel prize, Barack Obama is now confronted with developing a strategy that would allow the United States-in Obama's terms from his speech in Cairo on June 4, 2009 - to "seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world: one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect; and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive, and need not be in competition."

Considerable attention has been focused upon the Arab-Israeli conflict in the Middle East, the stabilization of Iraq and plans for the withdrawal of American forces, and the search for an entente cordiale between the United States and Iran as key components of that new beginning under the Obama administration. The recent disputed Presidential election in Iran which has provoked a serious internal crisis of legitimacy within the Islamic Republic and the return to power of a Netanyahu-led coalition in Israel have dampened hope for quick progress in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf. The sectarian tensions and violence in Iraq remain a threat to the country's stability but the search for the terms of domestic and regional accommodation continue to be the focus of negotiation for a post-occupation Iraq.  Notwithstanding these hurdles, the Obama administration has remained focused upon engaging with the states of the region in an effort to build momentum for the stabilization of the region, to create a Palestinian state, and placing limits upon Israel's territorial expansion through the demarcation of the country's borders. For Obama, engagement with the Middle East states provides a way to escape the image of "the ugly American" that defined the Bush-Cheney administration and its blunders in dealing with Iran, Iraq, Syria and Saudi Arabia.  

However, the Afghan conundrum remains, as it did in 2001, the epicenter of intra- and inter-religious conflict and instability within the Eurasian landmass. It is a country troubled by the historic divisions between Sunni and Shia communities, the effective limitations upon any central government posed by the mountainous terrain, and a culture shaped by strong traditions of local governance. The country's evolution will have serious implications for relations among its immediate neighbours - China, the Central Asian republics, India, Iran, Pakistan and Russia- and their competing agenda in the struggle for access to and control over the energy rich resources of Central Asia. The overthrow of the Taliban regime by the American-led NATO invasion in 2001 has failed to dislodge the Taliban as a political and military force in various parts of the country and its survival has effectively undermined the NATO occupation. The institutional weakness of the NATO-backed government of Hamid Karzai has done little to reassure anyone that the colonial project of creating a Western-oriented regime will be successful. As the recent fraudulent election has shown, the domestic legitimacy of the Karzai regime remains in question.

It is in this context that Barack Obama is confronting a major challenge to the American relationship with the Muslim world. The NATO occupation of Afghanistan has not led to the establishment of a client regime that would facilitate the American effort to play a larger role in Central Asia, and to contain the expansion of Russian and Chinese influence in the region. The Bush administration's assumption that it could use military force in Afghanistan and Iraq, while simultaneously seeking to isolate and threaten Iran, had failed to impress the Islamic world. The administration's support for the Ariel Sharon government's efforts to destroy the Palestinian Authority and the subsequent Israeli campaign to invade Lebanon in 2006 have created a breach that Barack Obama is now constrained to repair in order to reverse the perception that the United States is "the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire." Bringing an end to the NATO colonial project in Afghanistan will be an important step in reshaping the terms of the American engagement with the Islamic world, with its NATO partners, and with the major powers which share borders with Afghanistan. In essence, Afghanistan is an important pivot upon which a new American global strategy of engagement will turn. 

The test of Obama's commitment to turning the page on the Bush-Cheney misadventures in the Islamic world is already upon him with the current debate about the way forward in dealing with Afghanistan. It is no secret that there are reservations among the members of NATO about the American approach to Afghanistan and the reckless use of military force that has resulted in the killing of civilians. Further, the tactical alliance that has emerged among China, Iran, and Russia has been shaped by the perceptions in these countries that the US has sought to use Afghanistan as a base for contesting their influence their influence in Central Asia. As a consequence, the American strategy has fostered a degree of cooperation among these states that has constrained the American search for influence in the region. In real terms, the American role in Afghanistan has contributed to deepening the strategic and diplomatic collaboration of China and Russia and their active promotion of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in Central Asia as a multilateral forum for containing the growth of NATO influence. The growing integration of Russia and China has already redefined the politics of the Eurasian landmass and will have a wider effect on the global balance of power.

The war in Afghanistan has also had a spillover effect upon the politics of Pakistan where there has been increasing unease with the growing influence of American strategic concerns in shaping Pakistan's domestic priorities. In addition, the emerging strategic relationship between the United States and India has increased Pakistani sensitivities about the direction of American policy and has led to the Pakistani courtship of China as a counterweight to the growing impact of US-Indian collaboration in South Asia. The Pakistani military have also been quite cynical in their manipulation of the Afghan situation to ensure that the United States recognizes the need for Pakistani support to manage the war against the Taliban. Like Israel, Pakistan has used its longstanding ties to the United States and the American military to ensure that Pakistan's interests are served within the wider region in which it is located.  Thus, Pakistan remains a complicating factor in American relations with Afghanistan, India, and China, and it will require astute footwork by the Obama administration to manage the complex strategic environment that has emerged from the NATO occupation of Afghanistan in South Asia.

An Afghan policeman stops vehicles at a checkpoint in Kabul on October 29. Taliban gunmen stormed a UN guesthouse in Kabul October 28, killing at least eight people in a suicide attack as the Islamist militia signalled a bloody countdown to new Afghan elections next week. -Photos: AFP

The contemporary geo-political context of the war would suggest that the Obama administration will need to think very carefully about its goals and options in Afghanistan. The recent proposal by the American military commander in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, to boost American forces by some 40,000 additional troops smacks of a desperation born of neglect. The decision by the Bush administration to pursue its adventure in Iraq effectively crippled the American military effort in Afghanistan. According to McChrystal's own assessment in his request for more troops:

The situation in Afghanistan is serious; neither success nor failure can be taken for granted. Although considerable effort and sacrifice have resulted in some progress, many indicators suggest the overall situation is deteriorating. We face not only a resilient and growing insurgency; there is also a crisis of confidence among Afghans - in both their government and the international community - that undermines our credibility and emboldens the insurgents. Further, a perception that our resolve is uncertain makes Afghans reluctant to align with us against the insurgents.

As a consequence of the Bush administration's failures and the growing recognition of the limitations of military power in the Afghan context, the Obama administration has inherited the challenge of redefining the terms of the domestic debate about Afghanistan after years of simplistic assessments that it constituted one front in the "global war on terror." Recent polls suggest that American public opinion is increasingly questioning the significance of the Afghan war to American interests. McChrystal's recommendation of an increase in troop commitments generated little enthusiasm except among Republican leaders who are desperate to portray Obama as weak on national security policy. Obama in his address to the United Nations on September 23 gave an early indication of his own thinking about Afghanistan when he said:

"We have set a clear and focused goal:  to work with all members of this body to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat al Qaeda and its extremist allies - a network that has killed thousands of people of many faiths and nations, and that plotted to blow up this very building.  In Afghanistan and Pakistan, we and many nations here are helping these governments develop the capacity to take the lead in this effort, while working to advance opportunity and security for their people."

It was obvious that Obama was signaling his willingness to work with the UN and the international community to resolve the problem of Afghanistan. His statement implied a focus upon the destruction of Al Qaeda and the consolidation of stable governments in Afghanistan and Pakistan - a far cry from the Global War on Terror and unilateralist policies pursued under the Bush-Cheney administration. 

Obama has shown himself to be a much more cautious leader than his immediate predecessor, George W. Bush, and that caution has been displayed in the rethinking of policy towards Afghanistan. While he has solicited the advice of the military commanders on the ground, he has made it clear that there will be no rush to privilege the advice of the military. Given his understanding that Afghanistan will be assessed as a reflection of his commitment to multilateral engagement, Obama is treating Afghanistan as an issue that is much larger than military strategy. His approach has been supported by none other than the former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, who argues that:

"The summit of neighboring (or near-neighboring) countries proposed by the secretary of state could, together with NATO allies, begin to deal with this anomaly. It should seek an international commitment to an enforced non-terrorist Afghanistan, much as countries were neutralized by international agreement when Europe dominated world affairs. This is a complex undertaking. But a common effort could at least remove shortsighted temptations to benefit from the embarrassment of rivals."

Kissinger's recommendations suggest a pragmatic search for ways to reach multilateral agreements that would limit the possibility of Afghanistan emerging as a threat to international peace and security, and as a theatre of escalating confrontations among the various alliances and other external actors For Kissinger, diplomacy as a strategy for resolving the Afghan conflict is to be accorded primacy rather than the pursuit of military escalation. 

For McChrystal, the reverse seems to be true. Central to his argument for a new strategy is the belief that "Success demands a comprehensive counter-insurgency (COIN) campaign." It is a measure of the American military leadership that it has taken some eight years of occupation in Afghanistan to learn that salutary lesson. More important, while this assessment has come late in the day, it also seems to have failed to take into account the Soviet experience in Afghanistan where the Soviet invasion, occupation, and counter-insurgency campaign had failed to win the confidence of the Afghan people. Hubris has never served as a sound foundation for military strategy and the American military, after its own experience in Vietnam, appears unable to learn from its own, and the Soviet failure, in the world outside of Europe. In 2005, the Israeli military historian, Martin van Creveld had described the decision to invade Iraq as "launching the most foolish war since Emperor Augustus in 9 BC sent his legions into Germany and lost them". It was a harsh judgment but one which served to emphasize that the Bush administration had shown itself to be strategically incompetent.

The Obama administration, as it weighs its options for a strategy to manage the conflict in Afghanistan, will need to take a long view about the roots of the country's crisis in the 1970s which culminated in the Soviet invasion in 1979. The Soviet invasion was a blunder that led to Afghanistan emerging as a stimulus for the Islamic solidarities that has fostered the jihadi movement which brought Osama bin Laden to prominence. In addition, the Soviet intervention triggered the collaboration among Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, the Islamic Republic of Iran, and the United States in support of the Afghan anti-Soviet insurgent forces and their jihadi allies. In effect, the Soviet military failure in Afghanistan served as a catalyst for the end of the Cold War and, arguably, for the end of the Soviet Union. The emergence of the post-Cold War international system in which Islamist activism nurtured in Afghanistan has unleashed an ongoing challenge to the "other" superpower was one legacy of the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. It is perhaps an irony that the contemporary NATO occupation of Afghanistan has demonstrated that Afghanistan remains true to its reputation as a graveyard of empires.

In 2009, the situation in Afghanistan offers an opportunity to reset the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world. Military escalation, as advocated by General McChrystal, offers increased military conflict without a guarantee of resolution and will require greater financial outlays at a time of serious economic difficulty in America. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been costly to America on the global stage in military, diplomatic and financial terms. However, the wars also triggered the profound crisis of political and constitutional legitimacy that overtook the Bush administration. Barack Obama was elected to the Presidency in the shadow of that crisis of legitimacy and he faces a dual challenge to refurbish America's reputation in the international system and to restore the credibility of the domestic political order.

Afghanistan provides the Obama administration with an opportunity to set America on a path to reassert both domestic and international legitimacy. In that quest, it may be useful for the administration to revisit the wisdom of the most successful American general of the 20th century and one of its most able Presidents, Dwight Eisenhower. As he was departing the Presidency in January 1961, Eisenhower warned against the growing influence of the military-industrial complex in American life and government:

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

After the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, the Bush administration embarked upon its "Global War on Terror" and the effort to concentrate power in the office of the Presidency in pursuit of that war - both at home and abroad. These policies were a serious threat to the American constitutional order and were a powerful reminder of Eisenhower's concerns in 1961.

There was also a very trenchant observation that Eisenhower made in that speech which has a resonance for contemporary America and the Obama administration:

"As we peer into society's future, we - you and I, and our government - must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow."

It is advice that the Obama administration should heed as it surveys the wreckage in Afghanistan and at home that has resulted from the Bush-Cheney administration's injudicious pursuit of wars of choice.

The Nobel Prize Committee has recognized in Barack Obama the potential for leadership to chart a new course for America in its domestic and foreign policies. While serving as a state legislator in Illinois, Obama had reportedly offered a prescient critique of the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq in 2003. It was an early indicator of an astute ability to see beyond immediate political context, and that ability was again evident in his successful presidential campaign against both his Democratic rivals and the republican John McCain. It is a quality that will be required to extricate America from its contemporary predicament and the crisis of legitimacy bequeathed to Obama by George W. Bush. Eisenhower's 1961 advice to his countrymen expressed his sense of foreboding about the incipient militarization of American life as the Cold War gained momentum and he sought to alert the wider society to the dangers of that development. In 1967, Martin Luther King, Jr. issued his own warning about the impoverishment of the society in response to the carnage unleashed by the American military escalation in Vietnam:

"I watched this[poverty] program broken and eviscerated, as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war, and I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic destructive suction tube."

The Nobel Prize for Obama will be deserved if he were to recognize the sagacity of his Republican predecessor's advice and use his decisions on Afghanistan and Iraq to rethink the culture of war that has defined American politics and foreign policy since the 1960s. Peace offers a surer path to escape "the insolvent phantom of tomorrow" than does the pursuit of a futile war of imperial occupation.

First published in the Tobago & Trinidad Review, November 2, 2009