Outside View: The Soviets' Afghan lessons: "No Afghan strategy will succeed without a broader southwest Asian initiative. Like Barack Obama, Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev inherited a deteriorating military conflict in Afghanistan. According to Coll, 'Gorbachev advocated U.N.-brokered regional negotiations aimed at stabilizing Afghanistan and isolating Islamist extremists. It failed, however, in part because the United States, until the end of 1991, continued to fund and support a 'military solution' for the mujahedin favored by Pakistan's army and intelligence service.'
The Obama administration cannot afford to make the same mistake. Linking the new Afghan strategy with a broader southwest Asia formula would reinforce U.S. and ISAF efforts within Afghanistan by securing its borders both militarily and politically."
