On Oct. 7, the United States marked the beginning of its 12th year of war in Afghanistan. Over the years, our military involvement has paid mixed dividends; our strategy is in need of a significant shift.
Take a look at the state of affairs in Pakistan, Afghanistan’s neighbor. In the news recently you may have seen the name Malala Yousafzai. In 2011 Yousafzai, a 16-year-old native of the Swat Valley in Pakistan, became a vocal critic of anti-education policies adopted by the Taliban. In response, the Taliban executed an attack against her in 2012. Despite suffering a bullet wound to the head, Yousafzai survived to continue her crusade against the suppressive policies of the Taliban. In an Oct. 8 interview, Jon Stewart asked for her thoughts on being a target of the Taliban. In response, she said that she would “tell him how important education is, that I even want education for [his] children…”
Now, educating the Taliban will not likely be a fruitful option, but the sentiment is admirable. Education can and should play a larger role in the United States’ engagement in the Middle East. Yousafzai’s remarks point to a key question: has our military intervention created substantive change? If these past 12 years have taught us anything, it is that our military involvement is an untenable solution to the problems in the region. Yes, we may have eradicated the Taliban government in Afghanistan and destroyed Al-Qaeda camps. We have also set up a new Afghan government and eliminated Osama bin Laden. Yet in the process we have created a separate war in Northwest Pakistan and a new Taliban insurgency. Military intervention may have marginally increased our domestic safety, but it has arguably worsened the lives of countless people in countries that neighbor Afghanistan by pushing extreme forces across Afghan borders.
Perhaps more importantly, our armed intervention has largely failed to extinguish the institutionalized oppression that is the foundation of fanatical Islamic groups such as the Taliban. Indeed, even though the United States achieved partial military success in ridding Afghanistan of Taliban control, the Afghan government is still perceived as one of the most corrupt in the world, according to a recent study by Transparency International.
Furthermore, the spread of extreme forces has made the military solution to terrorism impracticable. Issues of foreign policy, particularly the sovereignty of Pakistan, have limited the expansion of the U.S. military into foreign conflicts. In fact, the operation to eliminate Osama bin Laden was conducted covertly precisely to avoid this issue. Similar disputes over sovereignty will likely arise if the U.S. wants to intervene in other nations that house extremist groups.
A new policy should not focus on the eradication of these extremist groups, a task that has proven immeasurably difficult, but on the empowerment of groups, specifically women, that are traditionally subjugated by influential fanatical groups. The key to this strategy, as Yousafzai indicates, is education. Expanding education undermines the core of extreme groups in ways that armed conflict never could. It addresses systemic issues that lie at the heart of institutionalized oppression.
In Afghanistan, statistics have indicated some progress. The Afghan Ministry of Education’s records show that in the period from 2001 to 2011, there has been a sevenfold increase in primary school enrollment, including a rise in the percentage of girls enrolled from zero to 37. Providing these individuals with knowledge and information gives them the power to resist the forces of institutionalized oppression in their daily lives.
We have also overlooked the devastating effects on education in neighboring Pakistan. In the Swat district, for example, the Taliban enforces a complete ban on female education. This form of non-conventional warfare demands a non-conventional response. The United States cannot allow such bans to persist if it wants to achieve lasting stability in the region. As such, we should pursue more forceful negotiation efforts with the Pakistani government to coordinate aid.
To assist in setting up of an inclusive and effective education system in the region, the U.S. can help to improve the dilapidated infrastructure of roadways and bridges and administer the formation of a standard, unbiased curriculum. These steps will make education accessible and empower subjugated groups to resist oppression. In addition, a move toward broad co-education will challenge existing gender roles and promote equality. The failure of local governments to do so has forced our hand. Education is one of the most basic means of achieving greater equality in a society, if our own past is any indication. It is gender equality that the Taliban fears, much more so than drone strikes. As such, a strategy focused on building education will help create a long-term solution to the destabilizing institutionalized oppression that exists in the region.
Conor Kelly is a Viewpoint columnist for The Cavalier Daily.
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