Richard+and%20Myra

Afghanistan Aff

**Contention 1: Hegemony** **The war in Afghanistan will collapse American primacy – 3 internal links:** **First – credibility. Obama announced a July 2011 withdrawal date, but only small numbers will leave and it depends on conditions on the ground.** **CBS News 6/24** (Brian Montopoli, 6/24/10, " July 2011 Deadline for Afghanistan Troop Withdrawal: Politics Over Policy? ", @http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20008781-503544.html )

**The July 2011 announcement destroyed the __perception__ of US commitment to Afghanistan** **Rubin, 10** – resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute; senior lecturer at the Naval Postgraduate School's Center for Civil-Military Relations; and a senior editor of the //Middle East Quarterly//. (Michael, Public Square, 3/8, “The Afghanistan Withdrawal: Why Obama Was Wrong to Insist on a Deadline,” @http://www.michaelrubin.org/7033/afghanistan-withdrawal-deadline)

**Second –overstretch** **Counterinsurgency doctrine is overstretching the US military and exhausting American leadership – withdrawing to a counterterrorism strategy is key to preventing great power challengers** **Kretkowski, 10** – Frequently assists think tank in conferences and other work products that aid DoD's long-term thinking about threats that may not be addressable via weapons platforms. Spent six months in Afghanistan working with Army public affairs. (Paul, “Against COIN, for CT in Afghanistan and Elsewhere”, 1/7, Beacon (a blog), @http://softpowerbeacon.blogspot.com/2010/01/against-coin-for-ct-in-afghanistan-and.html)

**Afghanistan is a quagmire of attrition warfare that is destroying US morale and readiness.** **Kuhner, 9 -** the president of the Edmund Burke Institute for American Renewal (Jeffrey, Washington Times, “Obama’s quagmire; US should look to its own interests,” 9/7, Lexis Academic)

**This will devastate American primacy** **Pyne, 9 -** Vice Chair of the Utah State Legislative Compensation Commission and Vice President of the Association of the United States Army's Utah chapter and a Vice President of the Salt Lake Total Force Chapter of the Military Officers Association of America (David, “Obama failing our troops in Afghanistan,” 11/7, @http://westernfrontamerica.com/2009/11/07/obama-failing-troops-afghanistan/)

**American primacy is vital to accessing every major impact—allowing heg to collapse is the only threat to world peace** **Thayer, 6 -** professor of security studies at Missouri State (Bradley, The National Interest, “In Defense of Primacy”, November/December, p. 32-37)

**Contention 2: the war** **Counterinsurgency failure inevitable – the mountainous terrain and impossible troop requirements mean the Taliban can hide forever** **Stewart, 10** - Professor of the Practice of Human Rights and Director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard, studied at Oxford and served briefly in the British army before working in the diplomatic service in Indonesia and as British representative to Montenegro (Rory, “Afghanistan: What Could Work”, New York Review of Books, 1/14, @http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2010/jan/14/afghanistan-what-could-work/?page=3)

**A large military footprint combined with the perception of an illegitimate government make crushing the Taliban impossible – it can recruit faster than we can kill** **Galston 10 -** Senior Fellow of Governance Studies @ Brookings (William, Senior Fellow of Governance Studies @ Brookings, “A Question of Life and Death: U.S. Policy in Afghanistan,” Brookings, June 15th, @http://www.brookings.edu/opinions/2010/0615_afghanistan_galston.aspx)

**Pashtun nationalism and the lack of history makes combatting corruption or raising a sustainable security force impossible.** **Dorronsoro, 09** - visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (9/23/09, Gilles, The National Interest, “Afghanization,” @http://www.nationalinterest.org/Article.aspx?id=22218)

**Nationalism means that even if the US won every battle it couldn’t beat the insurgency** **Dorronsoro, 09** - visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (2/9/09, Gilles, The National Interest, “Going South in Afghanistan,”@http://www.nationalinterest.org/Article.aspx?id=20794)

**Couple impacts -** **First – Pakistan. A large counterinsurgency footprint drives insurgents to Pakistan, mobilizes the Pakistani Taliban and will cause Pakistan to collapse** **__Akhtar, 10-__** professor of international relations, and a senior analyst & writer. He was the dean of faculty of management, Baluchistan university, and former chairman of International Relations Department, Karachi university (1/26/10, Shameem, “Pakistan’s Instability : The US War Factor,” @http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1262372328640&pagename=Zone-English-Muslim_Affairs/MAELayout)

**Pakistan collapse causes global nuclear conflict – draws in China, India and Russia** **Pitt, 9**- a New York Times and internationally bestselling author of two books: "War on Iraq: What Team Bush Doesn't Want You to Know" and "The Greatest Sedition Is Silence." (5/8/09, William, “Unstable Pakistan Threatens the World,”@http://www.arabamericannews.com/news/index.php?mod=article&cat=commentary&article=2183)

**Second – terrorism –** **Risk of nuclear terrorism is high – Al Qaeda could attack by 2013** **Hall, 10** (Mimi, USA Today, “Obama seeks front against nuclear terror”, 4/12, @http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2010-04-11-nukesummit_N.htm

**Afghanistan is a vital safe haven for al Qaeda – terrorism is inevitable but nuclear risks can be reduced is the US drives them out** **Arkedis, 9** - director of the National Security Project at the Progressive Policy Institute. He was a counterterrorism analyst with the Naval Criminal Investigative Service from 2002 to 2007 (Jim, “Why Al Qaeda Wants a Safe Haven”, 10/23, @http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2009/10/23/got_safe_haven)

**Nuclear terrorism causes extinction** **Morgan, 9** - Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Yongin Campus - South Korea (Dennis, Futures, November, “World on fire: two scenarios of the destruction of human civilization and possible extinction of the human race,” Science Direct)

**PLAN: The United States federal government should reduce nearly all military presence necessary to pursue counterinsurgency in Afghanistan.**

**Contention 3: Solvency** **A substantial drawdown to a counterterrorism strategy solves the war on terror and maximizes US credibility** **Chellany, 09** - professor of strategic studies at the Center for Policy Research in New Delhi (9/14/09, Brahma, Japan Times, “An Advantagous U.S. Exit,” @http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/eo20090914bc.html)

**A counterterrorism posture empirically works – it reduces the threat of terrorism and can provide actionable intelligence without undermining US credibility** **Long, 10** - assistant professor at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs (Austin, “Small is Beautiful: The Counterterrorism Option in Afghanistan,” Orbis, Spring 2010, Science Direct)

**Withdrawal of combat troops will immediately turn the population against the Taliban and shore up Afghan government legitimacy** **Dorronsoro,9 -**Visiting Scholar, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (January 2009, Gilles, “Focus and Exit: An Alternative Strategy for the Afghan War,”@http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/afghan_war-strategy.pdf)

**Counterinsurgency is impossible in Afghanistan, multiple reasons** **Nelson, 9** – former director of a Joint Task Force in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, retired naval officer with assignments at the National Counterterrorism Center and National Security Council, and Senior Fellow at the International Security Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (Rick, “The Other Side of the COIN”, 10/1, @http://csis.org/publication/other-side-coin)

**Large military deployments exacerbate nationalism and instability** **Rubin, 08** - director of studies and senior fellow at the Center on International Cooperation at New York University, chair of the Conflict Prevention and Peace Forum of the Social Science Research Council, special adviser to the UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Afghanistan (June 2008, Barnett, “Afghan Dilemmas: Defining Commitments,” The American Interest Online WX)