Talking of Afghanistan

While Obama is in Kabul, I hope he gets the chance to talk to Rory Stewart, whose recent piece on Time.com “How to Save Afghanistan” has a lot of good sense in it. (Hat-tip Bob Consoli.)
Stewart is the former British SAS officer who published a very well-received book about walking across Afghanistan and who then returned to Kabul to set up a work project in the Old City. He’s on his way to head the Carr Center for Human Rights at Harvard.
The main point in Stewart’s essay that I applaud (and that I really hope Obama hears from him in person, while he’s in Kabul) is his argument that the solution in Afghanistan is not to deploy more US or other NATO troops there. He argues that the mission of the US/western troops who are there should be limited to counter-terrorism– leaving the Afghan government to get on with counter-insurgency and strengthening its administrative and political capabilities throughout the country.
Stewart is right to note that strengthening the Kabul government’s hold on the country (and its ability to deliver services to it) cannot be the job of westerners.
However, I think he is still arguing from within far too westocentric a perspective. He makes no mention of the possibility of any other actors than the western powers doing anything useful to help Afghanistan. Why not? After all, what the heck is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization doing in Afghanistan in the first place. Except prop up US power there, that is. But why should either the US or NATO be the prime providers of outside support to Afghanistan, and the prime deciders on the many, very tough security decisions that need to be made in that country. Afghanistan is– has anyone else noticed this?– very far indeed from both the US and the North Atlantic. It truly defies logic to suppose that the US and NATO should have any longterm special role there at all.
Maybe, too, Stewart should follow the logic of his argument that the “solution” in Afghanistan is not a western military solution a good bit further. He strongly suggests that western militaries would be better involved in Pakistan, Egypt, Iran, or Lebanon than in Afghanistan. But those would all be terrible mistakes! Under what mandate would they intervene in any of those countries? And what, pray, would US or other NATO troops actually do in Iran, Egypt, or anj of those other countires?
Bring the US and NATO troops home. Let their skills be put to good use rebuilding our own countries. Further military adventures overseas would be disastrous. The challenges in all those countries mentioned by Stewart have many, much sounder solutions than any that would involve the application of western military power.