Quick quiz: Whom are we fighting in Afghanistan? If you say “the Taliban,” you’re only giving the easy answer. What exactly is “the Taliban?” Who comprises it? What are its motives, its goals?

Most people would say that the Taliban is a hardened group of “terrorists,” an extremist group of murderers bent on destroying freedom and eliminating the West. This view is understandable — it’s all anyone hears from the politicos and pundits, who, in their laughably narrow debate over the war (has anyone in power seriously advocated immediate withdrawal?), paint “the enemy” in broad strokes and leave little doubt that we’re engaged in a conflict of ideas.

But the facts don’t support this claim. According to U.S. military sources, only 10 percent of the fighters whom we label “the Taliban” are really hardcore ideologues — the rest are simply partisans trying to kick us out of their country. As The Boston Globe reported in October, “Nearly all of the insurgents battling U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan are not religiously motivated Taliban and Al Qaeda warriors, but a new generation of tribal fighters vying for control of territory, mineral wealth and smuggling routes.”

What, then, motivates our continued presence in the country?

Put simply, it’s a myopic vision of a vaguely defined, long since-exhausted moral crusade. After 9/11, our country assumed its usual stance as the arbiter of all that is Good and Free, and proceeded to invade two Muslim countries, bomb others and generally make a mess of things. But no one likes to admit a mistake, so — now that we’ve been bogged down for eight years in the Graveyard of Empires — we persist in our claims that we’re fighting the Good Fight, and that anyone who fights us is necessarily a “terrorist.”

And what options do we have left, besides admitting our mistakes and turning tail? Unlike America’s formative experiences as the World’s Policeman — the big war against fascism and the little wars against Communism — there is no existential threat mixed in with the moral one here; as dangerous as some of the folks hiding in the hills may be, they’re nowhere near the threat that the Nazis or the Soviet Union were. The only rationale we have for fighting on is that we are doing the world a service by standing up to the bad guys.

But it’s becoming ever clearer that few of them are actually that bad. Our high-minded escapades in the Middle East are now almost entirely directed against native insurgents who simply want to clear their land of occupying forces, and our reflexive pontification on the evils of “terrorism” sounds more out-of-touch by the day.

So we attempt to hide our obstinacy in a cloak of moral authority. The cognitive dissonance we suffer when considering the resources and passion we’ve committed in Afghanistan and Iraq and the actual nature of those wars causes us to take shelter in the vision broad, abstract mission. Many of the people leading our current conflicts are also just plain greedy — there’s nothing like a good old war to line the pockets, and the comments, of oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens vis-à-vis Iraqi oil contracts (United States companies are “entitled” to their oil) are emblematic of what motivates many of our leaders. But average Americans are usually somewhat more idealistic: They truly believe that the red, white and blue is doing what needs to be done. Unfortunately, any attempt to clarify the nature of our enemy flies in the face of that mission.

The danger inherent in this obfuscation is not only that we lose sight of the truth, but that we commit ourselves to never-ending war. When we refuse to recognize the ambiguities of the “War on Terror” (an oxymoron) or “the terrorists” (most of whom are really just trying to expel an imperial power from their homeland, much as we did two centuries ago), we get stuck in a rut. The Afghani insurgents are fighting us because we will not leave; we will not leave because they fight us.

And so, we construct enemies. The term “terrorist” is stretched beyond any reasonable definition to apply to all those who would oppose us. Suspects are spirited away to black holes like Bagram, to be tortured and set free when no information is forthcoming. We infiltrate mosques and whisper sweet nothings into the ears of susceptible young Muslims, accusing them of terrorism when they put those ideas into action.

People will go to great lengths to convince themselves that they’re in the right — all evidence to the contrary — and only sober reflection, combined with reckoning for those who have committed crimes, can stop the cycle. Clearly, we’re far from that stage. Even the more liberal members of the media and political establishment decry torture investigations as “counterproductive” and withdrawal from the Middle East as “dishonorable.” A recent piece on what went wrong in Baghdad in The New York Times — allegedly the paragon of sober, left-leaning analysis — was entitled “Lessons for the Next War.”

In order to convince ourselves that we’re noble, we need ignoble enemies. When those are in short supply, we will use all manner of self-deceiving rhetoric to maintain our self-esteem. And while this farce lasts, the world suffers.

Perhaps it’s time for a good, long look in the mirror. Honestly.

Ted Hamilton, a senior in the College of Arts and Sciences, is one of the Sun’s Arts and Entertainment Editors. He may be reached at thamilton@cornellsun.com. Brain in a Vat appears alternate Wednesdays this semester.