Aryn Baker’s Oct. 24 article rightly points to the considerable challenges that we face in Afghanistan but overlooks our reason for being here: under a brutal Taliban regime, this country served as a launching pad for the 9/11 attacks. An insurgency continues — with external support — but there has been immense progress in disrupting and defeating al-Qaeda. And our work towards sustainable stability in Afghanistan guards these gains.
Afghans today plainly enjoy more freedom and better socioeconomic conditions than they had under Taliban rule. The contrast between Afghanistan now and Afghanistan under the Taliban is not just a hopeful “narrative,” as the article suggests but reality. That reality points to a better future that is manifestly in our interest and in Afghanistan’s.
Working with our Afghan partners, the United States and our allies have trained over 22,000 health care workers and supported over 5,000 hospitals, clinics and health care facilities. As a result, life expectancy has increased each year since 2004, instead of decreasing as Ms. Baker contends.
The level of literacy is rising. Vocational and adult education has been provided to hundreds of thousands, and today over 7 million children are in school, 37% of them girls. In 2001, under the Taliban, adults were denied education and fewer than a million children, mostly boys, were in school.
Ms. Baker suggests that we measure the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) progress only through force size. In fact, we have a detailed system by which we evaluate the ANSF’s qualitative performance. And the ANSF will be the mechanism for safeguarding the security of the Afghan people and defeating the insurgents. Over the past two years, the insurgency has been damaged and insurgent leaders have been killed or captured. There has been an uptick in Taliban combatants reintegrating into Afghan society — several thousand in just the past year. And the decline in enemy-initiated attacks is 27% when compared year over year, not the 2% as cited by Ms. Baker.
To be sure, there will be challenges ahead, as we move forward with the process of transition to an Afghan security lead and an international force recovery. But we are addressing that by negotiating an agreement for a long-term strategic partnership. It will show Afghans we intend to stand with them well beyond 2014.
The goal, then, is a carefully managed transition of security lead to the ANSF, coupled with sustained support for economic and social development. While many challenges remain, the international community is fulfilling its compact with the Afghan people. Seven out of 10 Americans polled by Gallup recently understand that and support the plan.
Likewise, Afghan opinion polls show that, far from yearning for the Taliban, most Afghans feel their country is headed in the right direction and oppose a return to Taliban rule. In 2010, an ABC News Poll indicated 90% of Afghans disapproved of the Taliban. Unlike the Taliban, we and our international partners are here to build and protect Afghanistan, not destroy it.
So yes, it’s hard, and there is much to do, but it is wrong to say this war is unwinnable. We can win through hard work, determination and partnership among Afghans, the international community, and Afghanistan’s neighbors.
Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker, U.S. Embassy, KABUL and General John R. Allen, Commander, International Security Assistance Force