November 01, 2018
General Scott Miller, the new US Commander in Afghanistan, has admitted that the war in Afghanistan will be won politically and not militarily. During his interview with the NBC news, General Scott Miller further said that he recognizes that the solution in Afghanistan will be political, and not military. “This is not going to be won militarily,” Miller said. “This is going to a political solution.”
He further said that the Taliban also realised that the war could not be won militarily and hence should work towards a political solution. “My assessment is the Taliban also realizes they cannot win militarily. So if you realize you can’t win militarily at some point, fighting is just, people start asking why. So you do not necessarily wait us out, but I think now is the time to start working through the political piece of this conflict”, Miller further said.
However, Miller, also said that the US was now in a more offensive mindset in terms of military operations against the Taliban. “We are more in an offensive mindset and don’t wait for the Taliban to come and hit [us]. So that was an adjustment that we made early on. We needed to because of the amount of casualties that were being absorbed”, he added.
The Afghan War – America’s longest war in history – is getting worse with each passing day. The adversity of the situation is such that US President Donald Trump has also started reconsidering the idea of privatising the war in Afghanistan.
In that regard, Erik Prince, the founder of the infamous Blackwater, recently visited Afghanistan to meet important stakeholders in the country. Moreover, where the US was previously unwilling to entertain any idea of a negotiated settlement in the country, recent developments, including Zalmay Khalilzad’s meeting with Taliban representatives, suggests that Washington might finally be considering a negotiated political settlement for Afghanistan.
