(CNN) — The ancient Persians called it “the land of the unruly.” Historians call it “the graveyard of empires.” President Obama calls Afghanistan something else: The “central front” in the battle against terrorism.

President Obama wants to add troops and increase aid to Afghanistan.

Afghanistan has defied armies led by military leaders including Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan. Now Obama’s new administration will attempt to accomplish what few leaders have been able to do: stabilize Afghanistan.  Obama says he wants to start by adding U.S. troops to Afghanistan. Although some believe that a “surge” helped in Iraq, there is no military solution for stabilizing Afghanistan, several military and political experts say.

“Controlling the Afghan people is a losing proposition,” says Stephen Tanner, author of “Afghanistan: A Military History from Alexander the Great to the Fall of the Taliban.” “No one has ever been able to control the country.”

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is struggling to control the country now, Tanner says. The landlocked nation, which is roughly the size of Texas, has no strong national police, he says; its citizens are averse to taxes and a strong central government.

Afghans seem to unite only when a foreign army occupies their country, Tanner says.

“The people are so disunited within that they can’t resist an invader at the border,” Tanner says. “But once you’re in, you’re surrounded by them.”

The resurgence of the Taliban will complicate Obama’s plans as well, Tanner says.

The Taliban are making a comeback. Since 2004, the last year of relative calm, annual acts of violence have increased from about 900 to 8,950 in 2007 and roadside bombs from 325 incidents to 1,469, Tanner says.

U.S. and coalition documents, based on NATO statistics, show more than a 30 percent increase in such attacks from January to December 2008. Last year, attacks by Taliban and al Qaeda forces around the country increased 31 percent. Since January 2008, U.S. and NATO troop deaths rose 26 percent, according to the statistics. Afghan security forces deaths rose 64 percent in the same period.

The government has also degenerated. It has become a corrupt “narco state,” with opium trade providing nearly half of the country’s gross national product, Tanner says.

There are about 30,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, but there are plans to add 15,000 troops. Defense Secretary Robert Gates briefed Obama on Monday about adding U.S. troops to Afghanistan, which would ultimately involve sending two additional combat brigades and a brigade of trainers for Afghan security forces.

It is clear that Obama intends to focus more on Afghanistan. He called it “the central front in our battle against terrorism” in a CBS “Face the Nation” interview.

“I think one of the biggest mistakes we’ve made strategically after 9/11 was to fail to finish the job. … We got distracted by Iraq,” Obama says.

Said T. Jawad, the Afghan ambassador to the United States, says the Afghan people would welcome a temporary increase in U.S. troops to make the country and its borders more secure. But the U.S. military will alienate Afghans if it continues to strike with unmanned Predator drones instead of surgical commando operations to go after the Taliban, Jawad says.

“In the long run, the real security solution is to be found in the capacity of the Afghan police and army,” he says.     Next