The Love That Dare Not Speak its Name? George W. Bush: State and Nation Building in Afghanistan, 2001–2

Abstract

George W. Bush was an unlikely statebuilder. This controversial activity—one that he and many others persistently referred to as ‘nation building’—held little appeal for America's 43rd president. He did, however, learn to appreciate Charles Krauthammer's axiom that ‘no sane person opposes nation building in places that count’. This article posits that, contrary to the conventional wisdom, a more nuanced reading of the evidence shows that Bush rapidly and fairly consistently adopted something that resembled statebuilding, even if he was reluctant to acknowledge this in public. Bush's early decisions in Afghanistan merit a second look, not least because they pivot on a U-turn that established the foundations for a lengthy broad spectrum commitment that would last more than ten years.

Keywords:

• United States
• Afghanistan
• statebuilding
• nation building
• George W Bush

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank David Brown, Anoush Ehteshami, Martin A. Smith and both anonymous reviewers for their useful insights and suggestions. The views expressed in this article are the author's own.

Notes on Contributor

Donette Murray is Senior Lecturer in Defence and International Affairs at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. Her main research interests are US foreign policy, the ‘rise’ of China and US–Iran relations. She is the author of several books and articles on US foreign policy, including US foreign policy and Iran (Routledge, 2009) and co-editor of Multipolarity in the 21st century? (Routledge, 2012). ([email protected])

Notes

1 By 2012 the US had spent some $443 billion in total on the war in Afghanistan.

2 My thanks go to Dr David Brown for bringing this concept to my attention.

3 Prior to the Bonn Agreement UN Envoy to Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, presented a report to the UNSC outlining three security force options, the first and third of which—an Afghan force and a peacekeeping force—he rejected as being impractical. The middle option, as he saw it, was for a multinational force. In this he was clearly overruled.

4 Yunous Qanooni, who headed up the United Front (Northern Alliance) group at the Bonn talks was reportedly opposed to such a force.

5 The unnamed official informed Biden ‘we are not going to nation-build because Clinton did that and we spent 8 years beating the living bejeezus out of him for doing that, so we are not going to do that, but we have got to be in there with both feet or we know nothing is going to happen’.