How can we snatch victory from the jaws of defeat in Afghanistan? There's one solution that has attracted analysts of all stripes: a "civilian surge," where development and political advisers working for (or contracted by) the State department and the U.S. Agency for International Development flood the country and turn the tide against the insurgents.
The logic, at least, is sound: It takes more than military success to defeat insurgents. Insurgency grows where a corrupt and weak government does not provide security, justice, and opportunity. Unless these underlying problems are resolved, the military can kill insurgents forever, and more will emerge. Insurgency is a symptom of deeper ills. The rub is that these deeper ills are not military, but political, economic, and social--things that armed forces are not prepared to fix.
The Obama administration certainly understands this. In July 2008, then-candidate Barack Obama said, "We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that we've set. We've got to have a civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well funded." Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has long trumpeted the need for more civilian capacity for counterinsurgency and stabilization.
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