Recommended: No one at the wheel in Afghanistan

President Obama's Afghan strategy, outlined in his speech at West Point last night, depends heavily on growing participation by the Afghan government. As Juan Cole points out in his December 2 piece No one at the wheel in Afghanistan, this is a highly questionable assumption.

To be fair, President Obama doesn't have any good options in Afghanistan, only bad options and worse options. And his troop surge may be the best of the bad options. But to the extent that his strategy involves "nation building", it is unlikely to succeed in the Afghan culture. True, the White House has learned not to use the term "nation building", but what they propose - massive investment in civilian infrastructure while training up a competent army and police force - certainly is "nation building" by another name.

And you may recall from a post a few months ago the reports from observers in Afghanistan that many of the army and police recruits take the basic training for the pay, and then vanish back to their villages, perhaps to reappear a few months later under another name and take the training and pay again. Hardly a promising start for a new army or police force.