From Limited War to Limited Victory: Clausewitz and Allied Strategy in Afghanistan

Christopher Griffin (1)

1 CHUS - Centre de recherche Humanités et Sociétés

The United States and its allies entered Afghanistan with nearly unlimited war aims, but with the intention of only using limited force. This strategic error undermined the intervention and made success difficult or impossible. Through an examination of Clausewitzian thought about popular war, limited war and the culminating point of victory, this article shows the enduring value of Clausewitzian concepts in contemporary conflicts against nonstate actors. These concepts are tested in three cases – the involvement of the United States, the United Kingdom, and France in Afghanistan – to examine the relationship between their war aims, resource commitments, and war outcome. Of the three, France deployed relatively the most forces to Afghanistan, but the allied engagement remained insufficient to overcome the insurgency. Lacking sufficient mass, the limited forces were insufficient to establish the strategic superiority necessary to achieve nearly unlimited goals. This was compounded by a failure to concentrate against the insurgents crossing the border from Pakistan. In the absence of a clear political determination to reconcile means and ends, the culminating point of victory passed in 2006. It is not the intention here to recommend that contemporary military deployments follow Clausewitzian ideas to the letter; that is not what Clausewitz intended. It is clear, however, that NATO allies in Afghanistan failed to be stronger than the enemy where it was necessary, even when the insurgent groups were diffuse and only loosely unified.

Mots clés: Clausewitz; military strategy; allied strategy in the Afghanistan War

Domaines: Sciences de l'Homme et Société

Christopher Griffin. From Limited War to Limited Victory: Clausewitz and Allied Strategy in Afghanistan. Contemporary Security Policy, 2014, 35 (3), pp.446-467. ⟨10.1080/13523260.2014.959259⟩. ⟨hal-04030314⟩