Afghanistan in the Crosshairs
Broad agreement on the problems; no consensus on the solutions
April/May 2006
Barnett Rubin (standing), and Alex Thier gave contrasting accounts of Afghanistan's recent progress.
ssessments of Afghanistan's current political and military situations vary, but there is broad agreement on the nature of the problems facing the country: continuing attacks from the Taliban and other antigovernment militia, the need for economic development and justice sector reform, and, above all, the resurgence of the opium trade. The Institute recently held two meetings of the Afghanistan Working Group to discuss these problems and assess possible solutions. Beth DeGrasse, coordinator of the Institute's Afghanistan Working Group, moderated the discussions.
The first meeting focused on the security situation. Counterinsurgency experts Seth Jones of the RAND Corporation and Colonel David Lamm of the National Defense University [and now at the Pentagon]
briefed the group, saying that despite earlier predictions that the insurgency was dying down, it has, in fact, maintained its presence in the southern and eastern provinces. In 2005, the insurgency
produced almost 1,500 casualties, including 100 American deaths. This deteriorating situation has also caused several respected nongovernmental relief organizations to withdraw.
The past
four years of
assistance and
state building
have had little
impact at the
local level.
-Thier
The insurgents have also adopted new techniques, attacking "softer" targets such as government personnel and religious leaders, rather than the military.
Beheadings, kidnappings, and suicide bombings have all become more frequent. The insurgency is composed primarily of the Taliban and Mujaheddeen (the fighters who fought off the Soviet Union in the 1980s), but it is beginning to attract support from abroad—including al Qaeda and Islamic jihadists.
Lamm offered a more optimistic picture. As a result of intensified efforts, U.S. Special Operations forces, together with newly minted Afghanistan troops, have made great strides in tempering the
insurgency, he said. With cooperation from Pakistan, U.S. forces have eradicated insurgent sanctuaries as far as ten kilometers into Pakistan. Broadly, the U.S. counterinsurgency rests on five pillars, Lamm said: defeating the Taliban, enabling the Afghan security structure, reconstructing the country, sustaining area ownership, and engaging regional states.
Jones indicated that a particular cause for concern is the U.S. effort to transfer a significant portion of its responsibilities to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces. Although NATO has approved a more "robust" approach to peacekeeping, its focus is still on maintaining order rather than aggressively rooting out insurgent forces. Both Lamm and Jones argued that NATO needed to develop specialized counterinsurgency capacities if it is to assume control of southern regions of Afghanistan, where unrest prevails.
The second meeting of the working group focused on reconstruction. It featured Alex Thier, senior advisor in the Institute's Rule of Law program, and Barnett Rubin, director of studies at the Center on International Cooperation at New York University. Rubin spoke about the London Compact, the then just-completed agreement that outlines the responsibilities of the international community in Afghanistan's reconstruction. The compact represents the next big step forward for the Afghan government, said Rubin. Afghanistan has successfully completed its obligations under the 2001 Bonn Agreement, which called for democratic elections at the parliamentary and presidential levels, and deserves the international community's sustained attention and support as it continues with its nation-building efforts.
Afghanistan deserves the international community's sustained attention and support
as it continues with its nation-building efforts. -Rubin
The compact represents the views of high-level leaders, including U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, and the Afghan government. It focuses on three themes. The first is to strengthen Afghanistan's security forces. Soldiers' salaries will come out of the government's pocket rather than that of the donors. The goal is to create an army of 45,000 troops and a
police force of more than 60,000. A second theme is to develop a successful counternarcotics strategy based on the interdiction of traffickers, the generation of alternative livelihoods for farmers, and the creation of viable institutions in provincial areas. The third theme is to ensure the effectiveness of aid. More than $10.5 billion in aid has been pledged for the next five years, and overseeing its expenditure will require effective mechanisms emphasizing accountability and transparency.
Effective aid is essential, Rubin observed, because Afghanistan remains one of the poorest countries in the world. Infant mortality rates are soaring and literacy rates remain low. Life expectancy,
among the lowest on earth, has not increased since the overthrow of the Taliban.
Thier focused on the situation at the local level, where problems were most evident. He had just returned from three weeks in Afghanistan, where he had met with leaders of both the official state justice system and the unofficial, locally based system. The past four years of assistance and state building have had little impact at the local level, Thier said. Many Afghans have become skeptical about the central government and perceive it to be a client of the international community. Corruption is rife among local government officials. Justice sector reform has been a glaring failure. The Supreme Court is corrupt, personalized, and erratic.
Thier and Rubin agreed that a great deal of work remains. While the temptation is for donors to do the work themselves, it is vital that Afghans be given the chance to strengthen their own fledgling
institutions. Addressing the "mutual inter-dependence" between security, governance, and development is the key to Afghanistan's future.
