Afghanistan After ISAF By Vanda Felbab-Brown | September 24, 2013 | 4:17 PM Summer 2013 brought one of the most violent fighting seasons in Afghanistan since the US military and state-building effort began in 2001. On the cusp of the momentous 2014 presidential elections and a year before the majority of international coalition forces would depart from the country in the midst of transferring security functions to the coalition-supported Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), the Taliban is dug in and still ferocious. It is testing the Afghan security forces, which since June 2013 are supposed to be taking the lead in providing security throughout the country while international forces are increasingly disengaging from combat and departing Afghanistan. The military plans of the Obama administration (including the 2010 surge) assumed that by the time the coalition forces began scaling down their presence, they would be able to hand over to the Afghans large parts of the country’s territory secured and cleared of the Taliban. Four and a half years later, some real progress had been achieved, such as in central Helmand and Kandahar—both of which used to be either intense battle zones or under the Taliban’s sway. But the territory cleared of the Taliban is much smaller than had been projected. The US and NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) are handing the Afghans a stalemated war, attempting to increase the ANSF’s capacity enough to beat back the Taliban insurgency while simultaneously constricting their own capacity to operate in Afghanistan. With every passing day, the Taliban adage “foreigners have watches while the Taliban has the time” is felt more strongly in the hot and dusty Afghan summer air. The 2014 Triple Earthquake Indeed, 2014 will bring a triple earthquake to Afghanistan – a security one, an economic one, and a political one. The Security Earthquake With the departure of the ISAF for Afghanistan, security will inevitably deteriorate. The Afghan forces have become much better than they were at any time during the past decade, but they are nowhere on par with the ISAF forces. They continue to suffer from deeply inadequate logistical, sustainment, and other support capabilities and are also deeply pervaded by corruption, nepotism, and ethnic and patronage fissures. Many questions surround the security transition: Will the Afghan security forces stay together after 2014 or will they break up along patronage lines and ethnic cleavages? Will their morale stay sufficiently strong to fight the Taliban and associated insurgent groups such as the Haqqani network, or will they give up the fight? Will the rising militias that reflect heightened ethnic tensions among and within Pashtun, Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, and other ethnic groups create local security dilemmas that will escalate? Will the Afghan Local Police, one of the militia forces sponsored by ISAF to provide security to remote communities abused by the Taliban and often neglected by the government, be an effective supplement to fight the Taliban or will they become yet another mechanism of abuse by predatory local Afghan powerbrokers?. Questions regarding US military and other support for Afghanistan after 2014 remain unresolved. The international community has repeatedly committed itself not to abandon Afghanistan like it had in the early 1990s after supporting the mujahideen forces to fight the Soviet invasion. When international attention and support for Afghanistan ended in the early 1990s, Afghanistan exploded into a vicious civil war that ultimately gave rise to the Taliban. A part of this post-2014 support that the US has also embraced is to continue military support for counterterrorism operations and to continue training and mentoring the Afghan security forces. But this support is conditioned on the US and Afghanistan signing a bilateral security agreement permitting and defining the presence of US troops after 2014. So far the negotiations have been deeply troubled and stalled. It is equally unclear how small the number of any remaining US and international forces will be and how narrowly their support and counterterrorism mission will be defined. If the remaining forces – currently assumed to be between 3000 and 10,000 – will be too small and too narrowly focused on hitting Al Qaeda and international terrorist networks in Afghanistan and Pakistan, they will not be of much help to ANSF and could easily end up just protecting themselves. The Economic Earthquake With the departure of international troops, the Afghan economy will also take a major dive. The economy is already distorted by the decade-long presence of international forces and problematic flows of vast, but largely unmonitored economic aid. Many economic reconstruction and development efforts, costing hundreds of millions of dollars, have fallen flat. Many failed to address the structural deficiencies of one of the most damaged and underdeveloped countries in the world. In fact, the desire to extract rents from this unmonitored gush of dollars intensified corruption, criminality, and insecurity due to exploitation by local powerbrokers. Halting this counterproductive money flow to Afghanistan will be no loss. But the economy, including hundreds of thousands of jobs created in response to a youth bulge, has been tied to the presence of ISAF forces. With the ISAF’s departure, Afghanistan will experience a major drop in GDP and soaring unemployment. One of the key accomplishments of the past decade has been the vast expansion of education and the growth of a dynamic educated young generation. But many of these impressive young Afghans will not be able to find jobs. The idea of Afghanistan becoming a new regional trading hub, a New Silk Road, may well be a beacon of hope for the future, but it is a long way off. So is the extraction of an estimated one trillion-dollars-worth of mineral resources from Afghan soil. For the mining economy to take off, Afghanistan needs security, better contract enforcement, and rule of law. The Afghan elite also needs to be willing to equitably share this new wealth, should the resources ever be extracted, and invest it in human capital and macroeconomic growth instead of hauling it off to Dubai. The Political Earthquake The 2014 presidential and provincial elections in Afghanistan may also trigger major violence. The Afghan government and other political authorities of the past decade suffer from a profound legitimacy crisis. They are seen as rapacious, abusive, exclusionary, and indifferent to the plight of the Afghan people. The 2009 elections were pervaded by widespread fraud that for the third time (twice through elections) restored President Hamid Karzai to power. The 2014 elections could restore some legitimacy to the Afghan government if they are seen as reasonably clean and if security enables good participation of all ethnic groups and political factions. Yet there are many ways for the elections to go wrong. Even if President Karzai does not attempt a trick to remain in power, the elections could provoke major violence. The fight over the remaining rents of the ending political dispensation and the need for the winning group to deliver spoils to coalition partners in order to consolidate its power will not be conducive to consensus decision-making and good governance. Given how brittle and fractured the political landscape in Afghanistan has become, even a clean and safe process does not guarantee peaceful acceptance of the election outcome. Those who legitimately lost may refuse to recognize the results. Pashtun groups in violent areas can feel excluded. Local militias and powerbrokers can be perceived to be manipulating elections. Indeed, fearing such a flare-up of violence, Afghan politicians have been searching for a consensus candidate, thus far without success. Encouraging that election processes and results are as broadly acceptable as possible is crucial. If there is major violence or pervasive fraud, not only will Afghanistan’s governance problems intensify, but it may also be impossible to sustain future international support for the country’s economic and political development. The international community should provide early assistance to the ANSF to plan election security and offer appropriate funding and training for the election commission staff. The international community should also use its leverage to motivate President Karzai and other political leaders to keep the elections free of fraud. Should there exist support for electoral reforms, such as efforts to change the single nontransferable voting system or to move toward proportional representation, the international community should encourage it. Sadly, some of the more ambitious and badly needed electoral reforms have been stuck in the Afghan parliament for months, with the Arg Palace (the presidential seat), eager to kill any reforms that would reduce President Karzai’s freedom to anoint his successor. The US and the international community must not give the impression that they can deliver clean and legitimate elections to the Afghans. Afghan politicians and civil society will need to push for and implement such reforms and processes. The international community no longer retains the leverage to do it for them, and the worst outcome would be to promise and then fail to deliver. The Long and Winding Road to 2014 How is it that this enterprise, which started out with a rapid toppling of the Taliban regime, now, more than a decade later, hangs by a thread, with many Afghans fearing a civil war? How has the Taliban withstood the pressure of what at its peak were 100,000 US soldiers and another 50,000 coalition forces?. Many have argued that the US and the international community tried to do too much in Afghanistan. Presumably, they got bogged down in a “nation-building” mission that attempted to bring “Valhalla,” as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates phrased it at the start of US President Obama’s administration, to a people who wanted to be left untouched by the outside world. The foreigners expended resources on a state-building task alien to the locals who did not want a central government and were satisfied with their tribal ways. A state-building mission therefore was bound to fail. The US and its allies should have concentrated on simply destroying the Taliban regime and Al Qaeda’s capabilities and safe haven in Afghanistan, the argument goes. In reality, the US and the international community never strongly and consistently demanded that the Afghan government give the people what they craved most in addition to security—namely, justice, the rule of law, and an accountable government. Instead, the post-Taliban state has frequently failed to deliver the elemental public goods and services the people desire, and has been characterized by rapaciousness, corruption, tribal discrimination, and predatory behavior on the part of government officials and their associated power brokers. Land theft, contract violations, embezzlement, cronyism, and other crimes spread rapidly throughout the country. Moreover, the US and the international community struggled to resolve whether their mission in Afghanistan is one of narrowly defined counterterrorism or a broader and more resource-intensive counterinsurgency—that is, state-building and the legitimate provision of public goods. The US and its allies have been wrestling with a fundamental predicament: the Taliban insurgency feeds on the condition of inept and corrupt governance, yet the coalition partners have been unable and often unmotivated to induce better governance from the Karzai regime and unofficial powerbrokers. Oscillation between the two definitions of the US-ISAF mission both raised and disappointed the expectations of the Afghan population. In this context, the Taliban was able to exploit persistent government deficiencies to gain traction with local populations. Enjoying extensive safe havens in Pakistan and outright, if complex, support from the Pakistani state (nominally, but hardly, an ally of the US), the Taliban has thus managed in many places of Afghanistan to step into the lacuna of effective and accountable governance. It has offered itself as a protector to marginalized communities and those unable to capture rents from the post-2001 windfalls, acting as a patron capable of redressing these deficiencies. Although brutal and repressive, the Taliban nonetheless appeals to those alienated from the Afghan government and provides its own brand of draconian—but predictable—order. At the same time, the Taliban insurgents have also simply imposed their rule on the population through the barrels of their Kalashnikovs. Since 2012, numerous anti-Taliban uprisings have sprung up around Afghanistan. But they are often as much against the Afghan government as they are against the Taliban. They might reduce the Taliban influence in some areas, but many will also be sources of insecurity and trigger infighting. US and the international community have not adequately focused on restraining pernicious power brokers and corruption, nor have they used their leverage to promote accountability. Rather, they systematically subordinated good governance to short-term battlefield priorities. Although Washington attempted to embrace a state-building effort, immediate security concerns and the difficulties of improving governance in an increasingly corrupt system constantly eroded its commitment to promoting accountability. The international community also often defined good governance in ways that were contrary to the criteria held by many Afghans. President Karzai was also able to shift the responsibility for bad governance in Afghanistan to the international community, blaming it for corruption and a host of other problems. While the blame for bad governance in Afghanistan lies first and foremost on the shoulders of the Afghan government and the many problematic Afghan powerbrokers, the US and its allies have made mistakes that entail “sins” of omission as well as commission.The Bush administration over-promised what it could accomplish in Afghanistan, under-reached in its goals, and under-resourced its efforts, creating expectations in both Afghanistan and the US it could not fulfill. Though in 2001 Operation Enduring Freedom began as a swift regime change to drive the Al Qaeda–harboring Taliban from power, by the mid-2000s, the US military intervention in Afghanistan morphed into a full-blown counterinsurgency effort against the Taliban’s drive to retake control of the country. The Obama administration, on the other hand, mostly defined its goals and expectations in Afghanistan in ways that were indifferent to Afghan aspirations. In 2009 the Obama administration inherited the US and international mission in a condition of deep crisis. The Bush administration’s economy-of-force, minimal-input approach to Afghanistan and its prioritization of Iraq had left a structural vacuum in Afghanistan. National and local powerbrokers returned to their narrow pursuit of immediate power and profit at the expense of building effective and accountable governance. Although the Obama administration tried to reverse this negative syndrome, its imposition of a time limit on the deployment of US forces only reinforced the short-term, self-interested calculus of the Afghan power brokers. The result has been a continuing uphill struggle to improve governance and sustain security gains. The Obama administration came into office determined to make the war in Afghanistan and its spillover into Pakistan a key focus of its foreign policy, significantly increasing military, economic, and civilian resources available for the war. Yet, it has found itself facing some of the same dilemmas and challenges as its predecessor. Insufficient security has prevented many of the civilians in ISAF and those working for coalition governments from interacting fully with the Afghans. Isolated at the bases, they have had to acquire information and intelligence from problematic interlocutors who often distort their reports to serve their own interests. Consequently, Washington has often been unable to identify those responsible for discriminatory and abusive policies or to persuade Kabul to crack down on such behavior. Even when Washington was able to identify them, it often failed to develop and retain the wherewithal against these so-called malicious actors. The limited willingness of the US and its allies to devote the necessary resources for the larger state-building mission, including the military aspects of counterinsurgency, has led to problematic shortcuts on the battlefield—crucially the reliance on manipulative powerbrokers and controversial paramilitary forces, such as the Afghan Local Police. Both at times bring security in the short-term, but can be extremely problematic for stability and counterterrorism objectives in the long term. It was often the powerbrokers’ political-tribal-criminal patronage networks that came to shape the stabilization and state-building effort in Afghanistan. Many Afghan people themselves refer to the post-2002 political dispensation and the rise of non-Taliban protagonists as mafia rule. Mafia rule can gain a great deal of legitimacy and political capital among the population, especially if it performs better than the state in providing security, services, and socioeconomic benefits. But the mafias that have emerged in post-Taliban Afghanistan have been highly abusive, capricious, and critically deficient in providing security or economic benefits to the population. Since many of the mafia-like powerbrokers have been linked to the Afghan government and even frequently held positions in the government, many Afghans have come to see the state itself as a thuggish mafia racket. Negotiations with the Taliban: A Route to Peace? Amid much fanfare and to the consternation of many, the Taliban opened a political office in Doha, Qatar in June 2013. Immediately, international diplomats and negotiator-wannabes from around the world descended onto Qatar. They wanted to deliver the Taliban negotiations, a process that over the past four years has become the Olympics games of international diplomacy. For a long time, the US resisted negotiating with the Taliban, fearing that negotiations would legitimize the group and that the Taliban would continue tolerating (if not outright) supporting Al Qaeda and other international terrorist groups. Yet European countries in particular emphasized that the war in Afghanistan could not be won militarily and that only a negotiated outcome could bring peace and stability to Afghanistan. In 2010, the US finally acquiesced to negotiations, insisting that the Taliban needs to publicly break with Al Qaeda, disarm, and support the Afghan constitution, including women’s rights. But the process has been slow and stalled once again immediately after the opening of the Qatar office. The Afghan government was appalled by the Taliban raising its flag and barely acknowledging the Karzai government. The Arg Palace decried the process, insisting that the US suspend negotiations. The insurgents, in turn, wanting to negotiate directly with the US, dismissed the Karzai government as a puppet. All that the Taliban has to gain from the negotiations – attention, increased legitimacy, and direct channels to the US – Karzai finds deeply threatening. Like the Afghan government, Pakistan has been worried that the US will cut a separate deal with the Taliban and get out, leaving a security vacuum. Pakistan continues to sponsor the Taliban, but does not want to lose its reins on the group. Pakistan also continues to intensely and perniciously meddle in Afghanistan affairs and has major security stakes in the outcome of negotiations. Many Afghan minorities and Pashtun tribes also deeply fear negotiations, remembering the brutality of the Taliban in the 1990s and being unwilling to lose their political and economic power. Indeed, prominent members of the former, now divided Northern Alliance, such as Tajik leaders, have repeatedly threatened a civil war should Kabul or the US strike a deal with the Taliban that they find unacceptable. Nor has the Taliban persuaded many civil society groups, such as women’s organizations, that it would not revert to the oppression and excesses of the 1990s. Civil society groups continue to oppose negotiations, or at minimum feel excluded from the negotiating structures and processes, such as the Afghan High Peace Council appointed by Karzai to engage the insurgents. They worry that desperate to get a deal, the Karzai government and the international community will sacrifice human rights and political inclusion. Indeed, the Karzai government has been riding roughshod over both, increasingly leaning on a very conservative ulama, or council of religious leaders, to cloak itself in any sort of legitimacy. As much as the US might wish it, any pre-2015 deal is highly unlikely. It has much to gain from participating in negotiations – yet almost no incentives to agree to any sort of a deal before 2015. Should by some miracle a deal be struck before 2015, it is highly unlikely to hold. Bringing the negotiations to a successful conclusion – one that is a platform for stability and security in Afghanistan and American counterterrorism objectives, and not merely a deal for the sake of a deal or a fig leaf for US and Western departure – is linked to the US maintaining a credible presence in Afghanistan after 2014. That includes a security presence, however much the Taliban is keen to negotiate it away. A successful outcome to the negotiations is also linked to the 2014 presidential elections being seen as reasonably clean and accepted by the majority of the Afghan people, allowing the next Afghan political authority to have legitimacy and popular support. Ultimately, a negotiated deal will truly enhance Afghanistan’s stability and security only if the negotiations are designed in a way that equally engages the Taliban and the Afghan government and powerbrokers to advance rule of law and minimize impunity. Continued US Interests in a Complex Region Yes, the US and its international partners in Afghanistan are exhausted and focused on leaving. But however difficult the post-2014 transition and however stable or violent the country will become in the next several years, a variety of US and international interests will still be at stake in Afghanistan for a long time. They include regional stability and competition, counterterrorism objectives, and humanitarian and moral interests -- as well as obligations. Even if no international troops are left in Afghanistan after 2014 and the influence of the coalition countries will have diminished, the US and the international community will continue to be engaged in Afghanistan. Some countries, such as Pakistan and India, may once again turn Afghanistan into the location of their proxy wars. Iran, Russia, and perhaps even China too will compete with each other in extending their influence to protect their respective geostrategic and economic interests. In one form or another, perhaps with very restricted means, the US will be engaged in an increasingly fragmented and opaque political landscape with complex security arrangements. The Beacon of Hope: A New Afghan Generation Despite these negative developments and the deep anxiety with which many Afghans anticipate the 2014 transition, a failure of the international effort to leave Afghanistan with a reasonably stable government, or at least some stable localities, is not preordained. Afghanistan is a complex place, where local realities are often highly diverse. There are glimmers of hope. Security has improved in some parts of the country. Afghan security forces exhibit growing capabilities, even as they continue to be challenged by many deep problems. A new generation of Afghans is rising. Many are educated and capable. They are motivated to take on the problematic power brokers, rise above ethnic cliques, and bring the rule of law to Afghanistan. They need and deserve the support of the US and the international community. Such support needs to be multifaceted, including a robust security component consisting of training and mentorship of Afghan security forces and a push for better governance. The more restricted its means of operation and the more limited its presence, the more the US will feel itself dependent on problematic powerbrokers for intelligence and the advancement of its interests. Yet in the long run, US interests will be maximized if it can work with the international community to empower those Afghans who are determined to pursue the broader interests of the people over narrow power and profit maximization. DR. VANDA FELBAB-BROWN is a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution and author of Aspiration and Ambivalence: Strategies and Realities of Counterinsurgency and State-building in Afghanistan (Brookings Institution, 2013).
Posted on: Fri, 27 Sep 2013 16:59:28 +0000
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