Eradicating opium through development

More disconcerting news coming out of an international Afghanistan donors conference in Tokyo this week. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime issued its annual winter survey of poppy planting patterns and predicted a poppy harvest close to last year’s record.

Afghanistan could fail as a state

A new independent study by retired Marine Corps Gen. James Jones and former U.N. Ambassador Thomas Pickering has a dire warning for Afghanistan, according to The Associated Press which obtained an advance copy.

Study: Afghanistan could fail as a state, Anne Flaherty (The Associated Press), 29 January 2008. Afghanistan risks sliding into a failed state and becoming the "forgotten war" because of deteriorating international support and a growing violent insurgency, according to an independent study.
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"Afghanistan stands at a crossroads," concludes the study, an advance copy of which was obtained by The Associated Press. "The progress achieved after six years of international engagement is under serious threat from resurgent violence, weakening international resolve, mounting regional challenges and a growing lack of confidence on the part of the Afghan people about the future direction of their country."

A major issue has been trying to win the war with "too few military forces and insufficient economic aid," the study adds.

Among the group's nearly three dozen recommendations: increase NATO force levels and military equipment sent to Afghanistan, decouple U.S. management of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, establish a special envoy to coordinate all U.S. policy on Afghanistan, and champion a unified strategy among partner nations to stabilize the country in five years.

You can read the study here.

Also read the Atlantic Council report released the same day, Saving Afghanistan: An Appeal and Plan for Urgent Action. It states bluntly that "NATO is not winning in Afghanistan" and urges quick changes in course, including a coherent security and reconstruction assessment, appointment of a UN high commissioner, and the creation of a comprehensive regional strategy including all neighboring actors like Pakistan and Iran.

A third interesting report comes from Oxfam which recommends changing the "centralized, top-heavy and insufficient" aid-distribution process to a more indigenous approach that emphasizes "more even distribution of aid, greater alignment with national and local priorities and increased use of Afghan resources" and focuses more on rural development and agricultural aid.

Never mind, Ashdown

Lord Paddy Ashdown has withdrawn his name from consideration as the UN envoy to Afghanistan, after President Hamid Karzai and other officials expressed opposition last week, concerned about the extent of his power. 

Briton Opposed by Afghans Won’t Take U.N. Post, by Carlotta Gall (The New York Times) 28 Jan. 2008: The Afghan foreign minister, Rangeen Dadfar Spanta, said Mr. Ashdown had been rejected because of negative press and public reaction to his appointment, but diplomats said it had more to do with Mr. Karzai’s desire, one year before Afghan elections, to improve his image by standing up to Western powers. In addition to opposing Mr. Ashdown’s appointment, Mr. Karzai has also opposed a plan to widen the position’s authority.

The Afghan UN Ambassadar Zahir Tanin told the BBC that the preferred candidate is NATO’s deputy commander in Europe, Gen. John McColl.

James Bone of the London Times sees it as “part of an old-fashioned power-struggle that would be instantly recognisable to any village khan - or UN bureaucrat.” NATO wants better “coordination” in the face of soaring opium production and insurgency, but the Afghan government wants to retain control. Karzai may also have been worried about Ashdown’s far-reaching powers in Bosnia – where he could fire officials and overturn laws -- trickling into his position in Afghanistan.

Independent panel calls for troops, equipment to keep Canadian troops in Afghanistan

A Canadian independent blue-ribbon panel sets two conditions if Canadian combat troops are to stay in Afghanistan past February 2009. First, other ISAF countries have to send 1,000 combat troops to Kandahar province to reinforce ISAF’s “clear, hold and develop” strategy and train local armed forces.  This apparently is a response to Canadian resentment of many NATO countries sending troops to Afghanistan under caveats that protect them from combat.

New Report on the ‘Forgotten War’

The European Council on Foreign Relations has a new report out calling for U.S. and European governments to “overhaul their strategies and strike a 'grand bargain' to stabilise the country.” Significantly, it urges enticing moderates into the fold of governance and legitimacy through money and other incentives.

There will be no stability in Afghanistan unless “moderate” insurgents embrace constitutionalism and enter democratic politics. Since the Bonn Agreement in the wake of the September 11th attacks, the coalition has supported the United Islamic Front for the Salvation of Afghanistan, better known as the Northern Alliance, which brought together the main Tajik, Uzbek, and Hazara groupings. For obvious reasons it had no significant links to the Pashtuns who make up 42% of Afghanistan’s population.22 After 2001, despite Karzai’s Pashtun background, Pashtun tribal leaders were largely excluded from government and have been ever since. Many have thus aligned themselves with the resurgent Taliban. The coalition and the Afghan government must work to convince them that they can pursue their interests democratically.

There have already been signs that this is at least possible. Though President Karzai’s overtures to reclusive Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar were rebuffed, the Taliban, while insisting on a number of conditions, have been receptive to the idea of negotiations as proposed within Karzai's "Peace Jirga". The British Prime Minister Gordon Brown recently gave his backing to these negotiations, again with conditions attached, but the US administration remains sceptical.

Political agreements - like the failed Musa Qala deal in 2006 overseen by the then ISAF commander, General David Richards – should aim to isolate the “hard-core”, many of whom are foreigners, from more moderate, indigenous groups. Such political agreements would also help avoid the violent tactics that may have won NATO military victories last year but cost vital public support because of high civilian casualties.

An effective policy in the short term would be to identify insurgent leaders willing to cut a deal. The coalition could then operate a system of “divide and rule”, whereby intransigent insurgents would see their erstwhile comrades rewarded with a package of financial and other incentives which add up to a better deal than that offered by the Taliban. (emphasis added by editor).

The report urges European governments to send more troops to Afghanistan, eliminate or reduce the national caveats on their troops, and reverse their “underperformance” by increasing reconstruction aid. On the flip side, the report pushes the U.S. to shift its combat strategy to a more political one and abandon its counter-narcotics plans of aerial spraying or buying up opium crops. It recommends the U.S. shift the onus of the problem onto traffickers and concentrate on arresting and prosecuting drug lords and their governmental supporters.

Gates irks NATO allies

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has irked NATO allies after telling the LA Times that European allies do not know how to fight insurgencies, often using inappropriate tactics and overly forceful airstrikes, which could be helping the Taliban’s cause. Ironically, as The Guardian points out, this argument is often used by British defense officials to attack American military operations.

This episode stirs up latent tensions and disagreements on how best to fight the burgeoning Taliban insurgency and keep the NATO mission afloat. NATO officials have in the past blamed insufficient U.S. troops at the beginning of the 2001 invasion for the current Taliban resurgence.

Paddy Ashdown to be new UN Rep

It’s official. Paddy Ashdown, the former EU-UN High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, has accepted the post as the new UN envoy to Afghanistan, according to a source quoted by Reuters. The UN Security Council is expected to approve and publicly announce this on Monday. Ashdown's biggest challenge will be coordinating and reconciling military and civilian efforts from all the various countries involved in Afghan reconstruction and security, while ensuring that the Afghan government is not left behind in these efforts. See Afghanistan Watch’s earlier post on this.

Intrigue of expelled diplomats deepens

The intrigue surrounding the expulsion of EU acting representative in Afghanistan, Mervyn Patterson, and UN diplomat Michael Semple, is deepening. A London Times report over the weekend quoted Afghan government sources claiming that the two were trying to “turn” the brother of the late Taliban commander Mullah Dadullah.

Overcoming the Obstacles to Establishing a Democratic State in Afghanistan

Col. Dennis Young of the Strategic Studies Institute at the US Army War College adds to the chorus of voices urging the Bush administration to divert troops, effort and financial aid to Afghanistan. He also suggests five adjustments to current ISAF and U.S. strategies:

Expelling Diplomats

The expulsion of two senior diplomats from Afghanistan last week is causing much consternation. Irishman Michael Semple, the EU acting representative in Afghanistan, and Mervyn Patterson, from Northern Ireland, working with the UN assistance mission, were accused of jeopardizing national security after reportedly talking to the Taliban during a trip to Musa Qala in Helmand Province. They were stripped of their diplomatic immunity and expelled from Afghanistan last week.

Rory Stewart writes in the London Times that “it would seem that they have been expelled for precisely what made them uniquely useful to Afghanistan and the international community: their courage, relationships, energy and skills, which took them to the most remote and dangerous areas.”

What makes the expulsion particularly galling, says Stewart, is that diplomats are normally expelled by hostile dictatorships, not budding democracies.

(Afghanistan) is supposed to be a constitutional state with an elected parliament, financed with billions of dollars of international aid and supported by more than 40,000 foreign troops. There is supposed to be no difference between the Afghan government and its western allies.
Why, then, would the Afghan government insult its closest and most powerful partners by expelling their senior diplomats? Why does the Afghan government not want highly informed foreigners to meet locals in Musa Qala?
The unprecedented western investment in Afghanistan assumes that the Afghan government is serious about eliminating drugs and defeating the Taliban. Did Semple and Patterson discover something different? Or is the Kabul government simply fed up with foreigners who micromanage and second-guess their decisions?
Whatever the reason, both Afghanistan and the international community lose by this expulsion.