On my run today, listening to @Tmgneff on this podcast, I thought about the various discussions I've been having with veterans since the Afghanistan Papers story came out.
I realized I had been conflating two things: was this wrong, and was this news? (1/?-book list to follow)
I realized I had been conflating two things: was this wrong, and was this news? (1/?-book list to follow)
I realized I have almost skipped past the wrongness, long ago having become accustomed to the official dissembling, what @AdrianBonenber1 calls "the absurdity and cravenness of this chartified process." It makes me angry, but it no longer surprises. newrepublic.com/article/155918…
So it is surely wrong for the gov't to lie & mislead for decades. But is it news? This is the part I had focused on, and on this score, I stand firm. Anyone paying attention (everyone should be) knew the US military has been disingenuous since...well, let's say the post-WWII era.
But in the interest of being constructive, not simply complaining "everyone should have known this already," let me give some recommendations that explain HOW we knew the Afghan war was a mess for years. If you are newly interested in this topic, here's somewhere to start:
First, and most important, Linda Robinson's "100 Victories," published in 2013, that explains how US spec ops, through aimless raids and vendetta-settling, basically reconstituted the (previously defeated) Taliban in the mid-2000s. nytimes.com/2013/10/13/boo…
. @Anand_Gopal_'s "No Good Men Among the Living" (pub'd 2014), one of the most deeply reported books on any war that I've ever read. nytimes.com/2014/04/27/boo…
Qais Akbar Omar's astounding "Fort of Nine Towers" (2013), which should have been mandatory reading for every US soldier and diplo heading to Afghanistan. washingtonpost.com/opinions/a-for…
. @jaketapper's "The Outpost" (2012), which is more than a min-by-min recreation of a gun battle for a under-resourced and strategically unimportant post that was later abandoned - it's a microcosm of the war. npr.org/2013/02/20/172…
. @cjchivers's "The Fighters" (2018). Side note: Chris asked me years ago why I wasn't more angry about the state of the wars. He warned me that I'd probably get much angrier when the mil started lying to my face. He was right. (Thanks for the heads up) nytimes.com/2018/08/14/boo…
And if you read this far, you could try my book on the fruitless search for the bomb makers of Afghanistan (pub'd in 2016). taskandpurpose.com/ied-rocked-mod…
The point is, 90% of the Post's reporting was known and knowable, in easily accessible (and occasionally best-selling, about-to-be-a-movie) mass market books. Be angry, but not surprised.
