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This is an interesting report, though I leave it to others to determine its accuracy
http://csis.org/files/publication/11...t_End_2011.pdf
Some excerpts:
http://csis.org/files/publication/11...t_End_2011.pdf
Some excerpts:
The US invasion {of Iraq} did bring down a remarkably unpleasant dictatorship, but at cost of some eight years of turmoil and conflict, some 5,000 US and allied lives and 35,000 wounded, and over 100,000 Iraqi lives. The Congressional Research Service estimates that the dollar cost of the war to the US alone is over $823 billion through FY2012, and SIGIR estimates that the US and its allies will have spent some $75 billion on aid – much of it with little lasting benefit to Iraq.
...
Regardless of which outcome occurs, the result will still be strategic failure in terms of cost-benefits to the US and its allies. The Afghan War has cost the US and its allies over 2,700 dead and well over 18,000 wounded. There are no reliable estimates of total Afghan casualties since 2001, but some estimates put direct deaths at around 18,000 and indirect deaths at another 3,200-20,000. And the war is far from over.
The Congressional Research Service estimates that the dollar cost of the war to the US alone is over $527 billion through FY2012, and SIGAR estimates that the US and its allies will have spent some $73 billion on aid – much of it again with little lasting benefit. Similar cost estimates are lacking for Pakistan, but they have also taken significant casualties and received substantial amounts of US aid.
...
Graphic estimates of the differences in these reports, as well as in estimates of casualties are summarized in a separate Annex to this report entitled Afghanistan: Violence, Casualties, and Tactical Progress: 2011, which is available on the CSIS web site at:
http://csis.org/files/publication/11...e_n_CivCas.pdf
This Annex shows that estimates of the security impact of US and ISAF tactical victories in given areas is very different from the patterns of major attacks.
This does not mean that ISAF and the US are not scoring gains in these areas, and have not reversed insurgent momentum. It does mean that there are not enough credible unclassified indicators to show the insurgents cannot simply outwait the US and ISAF, as well as GIRoA’s cohesion and funding.
Colonel Harry Summers once noted in a conversation over the Vietnam War that he had been talking to a North Vietnamese officer after the war and had stated to him that the US had won virtually every battle. The Vietnamese officer paused, and then said, ―Yes, but this was irrelevant.‖ Like Vietnam, Afghanistan (and Pakistan) are not going to be won by military force alone, and tactical victories can be all too hollow.
...
In the real world, "classic COIN" is an almost mindless oxymoron. No two insurgencies are ever the same, and most longer insurgencies involve constant adaptation in tactics and civil-military operations. Serious insurgencies arise when states fail to meet the needs of enough of their people at the political, economic, and security level to maintain popular support, avoid driving key factions towards violence, and lack the capacity to enforce security and govern in significant parts of the country.
...
Working-level studies indicate that foreign spending will total some 40% to 75% of Afghan GDP in 2011. No one can currently predict just how serious the drop in outside spending will be by 2014, or in the years beyond, but estimates of the cut in current military spending in Afghanistan range from 70% to 90%.
...
The US, however, has yet to present a credible and detailed plan for transition that shows the US and its allies can achieve some form of stable, strategic outcome in Afghanistan that even approaches the outcome of the Iraq War.
Far too many US actions have begun to look like a cover for an exit strategy from Afghanistan, and the US has never provided a credible set of goals – indeed any goals at all – for the strategic outcome it wants in Pakistan. Unless the US does far more to show it can execute a transition that has lasting strategic benefits in Afghanistan and Pakistan well after 2014, it is all too likely to repeat the tragedy of its withdrawal from Vietnam.
...
Regardless of which outcome occurs, the result will still be strategic failure in terms of cost-benefits to the US and its allies. The Afghan War has cost the US and its allies over 2,700 dead and well over 18,000 wounded. There are no reliable estimates of total Afghan casualties since 2001, but some estimates put direct deaths at around 18,000 and indirect deaths at another 3,200-20,000. And the war is far from over.
The Congressional Research Service estimates that the dollar cost of the war to the US alone is over $527 billion through FY2012, and SIGAR estimates that the US and its allies will have spent some $73 billion on aid – much of it again with little lasting benefit. Similar cost estimates are lacking for Pakistan, but they have also taken significant casualties and received substantial amounts of US aid.
...
Graphic estimates of the differences in these reports, as well as in estimates of casualties are summarized in a separate Annex to this report entitled Afghanistan: Violence, Casualties, and Tactical Progress: 2011, which is available on the CSIS web site at:
http://csis.org/files/publication/11...e_n_CivCas.pdf
This Annex shows that estimates of the security impact of US and ISAF tactical victories in given areas is very different from the patterns of major attacks.
This does not mean that ISAF and the US are not scoring gains in these areas, and have not reversed insurgent momentum. It does mean that there are not enough credible unclassified indicators to show the insurgents cannot simply outwait the US and ISAF, as well as GIRoA’s cohesion and funding.
Colonel Harry Summers once noted in a conversation over the Vietnam War that he had been talking to a North Vietnamese officer after the war and had stated to him that the US had won virtually every battle. The Vietnamese officer paused, and then said, ―Yes, but this was irrelevant.‖ Like Vietnam, Afghanistan (and Pakistan) are not going to be won by military force alone, and tactical victories can be all too hollow.
...
In the real world, "classic COIN" is an almost mindless oxymoron. No two insurgencies are ever the same, and most longer insurgencies involve constant adaptation in tactics and civil-military operations. Serious insurgencies arise when states fail to meet the needs of enough of their people at the political, economic, and security level to maintain popular support, avoid driving key factions towards violence, and lack the capacity to enforce security and govern in significant parts of the country.
...
Working-level studies indicate that foreign spending will total some 40% to 75% of Afghan GDP in 2011. No one can currently predict just how serious the drop in outside spending will be by 2014, or in the years beyond, but estimates of the cut in current military spending in Afghanistan range from 70% to 90%.
...
The US, however, has yet to present a credible and detailed plan for transition that shows the US and its allies can achieve some form of stable, strategic outcome in Afghanistan that even approaches the outcome of the Iraq War.
Far too many US actions have begun to look like a cover for an exit strategy from Afghanistan, and the US has never provided a credible set of goals – indeed any goals at all – for the strategic outcome it wants in Pakistan. Unless the US does far more to show it can execute a transition that has lasting strategic benefits in Afghanistan and Pakistan well after 2014, it is all too likely to repeat the tragedy of its withdrawal from Vietnam.