Strategic Clarity in Afghanistan

by Patrick Seale

Released: 26 Jul 2010

The United States and its allies have at last formulated a plan to bring the nine-year old catastrophe in Afghanistan to an honourable end. It may not be a wise plan and it may prove unworkable, but it has the advantage of clarity. In a word, it could be called “Afghanisation.”

Its key provision is the gradual transfer of security responsibilities -- that is to say the war against the Taliban -- from foreign forces to the Afghans in all 34 provinces by the end of 2014.

For the first time since the U.S. invasion of 2001, the Afghans are to recover control over their national destiny. They are to recover their sovereignty.

To make the transfer possible, the United States has pledged $1 billion a month to train and equip an expanded Afghan National Army (ANA), whose numbers are expected to soar dramatically from 102,000 today, to 134,000 in 2011, 260,000 in 2012, and 300,000 in 2014.

The expansion is more than likely to prove over-ambitious. Indeed, the figures may be totally unrealistic. But if by some miracle the ANA were to grow into an effective fighting force, foreign armies could then leave Afghanistan -- to the great relief of public opinion in their respective countries. President Barack Obama has said that the first withdrawals of U.S. forces will begin as early as June 2011.

This policy of providing for an orderly exit from the war by gradually transferring security responsibility to the Afghan government has several consequences. First, it is a vote of confidence in President Hamid Karzai. Doubts about his abilities, about his willingness to clamp down on corruption; about the fairness of the last presidential election have, for the moment at least, been swept under the carpet. He is the man who must now oversee what has been called the “Kabul process.’

Secondly, by adopting the transfer plan, the United States and its allies have, in effect, rejected more radical options. These include anything which might be considered “cutting and running.” Some countries, notably Germany and Poland, have indicated that they plan an early withdrawal of their forces, but the bulk will remain. The new British Prime Minister David Cameron has said that British forces, the second largest contingent after that of the United States, will remain until 2015.

Another radical solution, which has recently been aired, is to abandon the Pashtun south of the country to the Taliban, while concentrating economic development and good government in the north. This, in effect, is what Robert Blackwill, a former U.S. ambassador to New Delhi, has proposed in a recent article on the U.S. website Politico. “De facto partition,” he wrote, “offers the best available US alternative to strategic defeat.”

But Blackwill’s prediction that America’s counterinsurgency strategy in Afghanistan is heading for failure has been firmly rejected by General David Petraeus, the new commander-in-chief, and by NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen.

Thirdly, NATO is evidently counting on Pakistan to pursue the war against Taliban sanctuaries in the north-west tribal areas, and to prevent Taliban forces infiltrating across the border into Afghanistan. Pakistan is clearly a key partner in the implementation of the new plan.

To encourage President Karzai to proceed with the plan, the international community has agreed to channel 50 per cent of development aid through his government within two years, rising to 80 per cent. This will put real resources into his hands as well as operational control over major development projects.

At the same time, Karzai’s efforts to strike a deal with the Taliban -- by seeking to integrate local fighters who renounce violence, and by attempting to start a dialogue with the Taliban headquarters in Baluchistan -- has received what is, in effect, an international seal of approval.

As is now clear, the new policy in Afghanistan has taken shape in a series of steps, of which the first was Karzai’s peace jirga in June, at which reconciliation with the Taliban was debated. This was followed by the major international conference in Kabul on 20 July attended by 40 foreign ministers, including U.S. Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, as well as many other international representatives.

At this gathering -- the greatest in Afghanistan’s history -- Karzai pledged to improve the performance of his government, to tackle corruption, to conduct fair and transparent elections, and to eliminate violence against women.

These pledges will be tested at Afghanistan’s parliamentary elections in September, and will be assessed at the NATO summit in Lisbon in November when, it is hoped, security, economic development and administration in some relatively peaceful provinces will already have been transferred to the Afghan government.

Foreign forces seem bound to face a tough summer in Afghanistan. Casualties will be high. Success is by no means assured. But the new plan provides a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel.

Patrick Seale is a leading British writer on the Middle East. His latest book is The Struggle for Arab Independence: Riad el-Solh and the Makers of the Modern Middle East (Cambridge University Press).

Copyright © 2010 Patrick Seale – distributed by Agence Global

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Released: 26 July 2010
Word Count: 801
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