David Grange: Comparing Afghanistan and Iraq
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CNN military analyst David Grange
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(CNN) -- Afghan President Hamid Karzai was on Capitol Hill Wednesday, telling a Senate panel that his country needs more U.S. help and that Afghanistan should remain a priority, even if the United States goes to war against Iraq. Retired Brig. Gen. David Grange, CNN's military analyst, spoke with CNN anchor Daryn Kagan about Karzai's visit to Washington. The following is an edited transcript.
KAGAN: There is so much interest on Hamid Karzai and Afghanistan, considering a prerun of what might be taking place in Iraq if indeed Saddam Hussein is removed from power and the United States does go to war with that country ... It looks like the U.S. government (is) trying to learn some lessons of some stuff that has gone right in Afghanistan, and some that has not gone as planned. Hamid Karzai does not control Afghanistan. He, with the help of some international forces, (is) just in control of a very small portion, while warlords control the rest of the country.
GRANGE: Exactly. The different factions, in this case warlords, definitely control. They're the voice of authority in certain areas in Afghanistan, and President Karzai has the minimal control. I think he's a terrific leader, with U.S. backing and other international backing, but there's a long way to go to go through the reconstruction of Afghanistan with the Democratic governance, a good market economy and the rule of law. It's a tall order.
KAGAN: Let's move and look at Iraq. We're maybe perhaps not talking warlords, but we are talking some very different groups that have different visions of who should be controlling Iraq. The U.S. is going to do it different and not perhaps -- at this point back -- up a specific leader, instead wait and see what happens first?
GRANGE: Your last course of action. The United States, I believe, will wait. The ... U.S. will be definitely, I think, (be) in charge early of some kind of international body early on, and won't transition to Iraqi governance, maybe one, two years after the post-war forces do the MiGs they have to do. The problem you have, is you have the internal factions very similar to Afghanistan, in this case, Kurds, Shiites, Sunnis, and then you have, of course, outside influences like Turkey and Iran, and Saudi Arabia ... So this reconstruction force that's in Iraq has a tall order. It's going to take thousands of troops to maintain a secure environment ... to (do) something better for the people of that country. So it's going to take awhile to transition to that.
KAGAN: In fact, some of the numbers that we're seeing, they just continue to go up and up and up. And now we're hearing from the head of the Army that it could be several hundred thousand U.S. troops that would have to be inside of Iraq for a couple of years at least. That's not necessarily what the American people had been hearing up to this point.
GRANGE: Well, I would think that it's going to be over 100,000. It may not be all U.S. Hopefully, international support will come in. After the war, if in fact, there is a war, I think other countries that are not -- don't want to be involved in the fighting part, will definitely jump on this thing. Ideally, you would have country support from around the region that would participate in this ...
KAGAN: ... Fascinating to hear the president of Afghanistan talk about the work before him, and again, perhaps a foreshadowing of what will be taking place in Iraq. We take so much for granted in this country of what we have in terms of the infrastructure that they're making these efforts in Afghanistan. But when you hear things like they have no census, they have no census for their population. There's no registered voters. So much work to do in Afghanistan, and if, indeed, the opportunity comes up, in Iraq as well.
GRANGE: That's right, I think, you know, looking ahead to what may happen in Iraq, looking at Afghanistan is a good example on how long these things take. How I put it in perspective myself is I just look back at our own history, when we had our Constitution, the 13 original states and how long we struggled to try to get that right, and we're still working on it.
So it takes some time and commitment, and sometimes Americans are focused on a 100-meter dash, and these are marathons. I that's just a good perspective to take.
