Al Qaeda, the real target

President Obama is struggling with a decision that could define his presidency: Should the United States commit more troops to the war in Afghanistan in the interest of “nation building,” or limit our role there to hunting down Al Qaeda?

I have previously voiced serious concern about an open-ended commitment to Afghanistan wherein the U.S. pours in more young American soldiers and billions more American dollars. Even conservative commentators like George Will have questioned an endless commitment to the conflict there.

Now, at the highest levels of the Obama administration, Vice President Joseph Biden has expressed a position that would bring U.S. policy in Afghanistan more into line with reality. Based on his decades of experience on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the vice president has argued forcefully for a more limited American role in Afghanistan that would refocus on our original mission there: rooting out the leadership of Al Qaeda and disrupting its ability to carry

out acts of terrorism against America.

The V.P.’s analysis rests on another important conclusion: The U.S. cannot mire itself in a war against an indigenous Afghan Taliban that has successfully presented itself to large segments of the Afghan population as a defender against foreign occupation. Remember that Afghanistan has a long history of ferociously resisting foreign occupiers, from the British to the Russians. And in the case of Russia, the U.S. armed and trained many of the same mujahedeen warlords we now face as enemies there.

It is also useful to keep in mind that the American effort to defeat Al Qaeda has been largely successful. The organization’s leadership is in hiding and on the run. Its terror networks have been significantly degraded. And much as in Iraq, where the U.S. successfully courted key warlords, there are elements of the Taliban that might be broken off from Al Qaeda if the Afghans do not perceive the U.S. simply as an occupying power.