The Afghanistan National Police (ANP)
Recently published by the OIGs of State & Defense:
Interagency Assessment of Afghanistan Police Training and Readiness
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Key Judgments
• The U.S.-funded program to train and equip the Afghan National Police (ANP) is generally well conceived and well executed. However, long-term U.S. assistance and funding, at least beyond 2010, is required to institutionalize the police force and establish a self-sustaining program.
• The U.S. Ambassador is responsible for policy guidance; the Commander, Combined Forces Command-Afghanistan (CFC-A) executes the police program through the Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan (CSTC-A). The senior embassy and military leaders have excellent relations and work together well to administer and improve the police program.
• Building the Afghan National Police (ANP) requires a comprehensive, integrated approach that encompasses leadership training, sustaining institutions and organizations, and oversight and internal control mechanisms. As it has rapidly evolved, police readiness requirements have expanded beyond training to include sweeping institutional reform of the ANP through the Ministry of Interior.
• Nevertheless, ANP’s readiness level to carry out its internal security and conventional police responsibilities is far from adequate. The obstacles to establish a fully professional ANP are formidable. Among them are: no effective field training officer (FTO) program, illiterate recruits, a history of low pay and pervasive corruption, and an insecure environment.
• The mentoring program is a key component to effect institutional change and build a capable, self-sustaining national police force. To reach its full potential, the mentoring program should be expanded and better managed to achieve program objectives.
• Management of the police training contract is problematic and requires more effective coordination between State Department contract managers and CSTC-A, which is responsible for executing ANP training programs.
• The procurement pipeline to Afghanistan for ANP equipment is slow, but is improving. There is inadequate accountability for equipment after it is turned over to the ANP, because the ANP logistics system is not yet effective. The ANP needs to establish and implement an effective end-to-end internal controls process.
• Until the Afghan criminal justice system, including law enforcement, judiciary, and corrections, has matured and is synchronized and coordinated from the national to the local level such that laws are standardized and uniformly applied, the ANP will function more as a security force than as a law enforcement organization.
• The U.S. and international effort for standing up the ANP is not limitless; therefore, transitioning full responsibility and authority to the MoI needs greater emphasis.
• Building an effective ANP program will require a long-term commitment from coalition and international partners. Premature withdrawal from this commitment will compromise the progress already accomplished and put at risk the U.S. goal to establish a professional police force embracing the values and practices of community policing and the rule of law.
The full report makes for an interesting read.
Cops or Robbers: The Struggle to Reform the Afghan Police
Cops or Robbers: The Struggle to Reform the Afghan Police (pdf file) - Andrew Wilder, Afghan Research and Evaluation Unit
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If police reform is to succeed in Afghanistan, and the big increase in resources to reform the ANP is not to be wasted, the major actors —
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especially the government, the US, and the EUPOL mission — will need to address five key issues.
1. Develop a shared vision and strategy for the ANP
The most fundamental issue that must be resolved
for police reform efforts to succeed in Afghanistan is the need for a shared vision of the role of the ANP, and a shared strategy on
how to achieve that vision. In particular, there is a need to reconcile the “German vision” of the police as a civilian law and order force, and
the “US vision” of the police as a security force with a major counter-insurgency role ...
2. Replace SSR pillars with an integrated and comprehensive rule of law strategy.
The failure of the government and the international community to develop and implement an effective strategy for reforming and strengthening
the judicial sector is a potentially crippling flaw of current police reform efforts. A civilian police force, no matter how well trained and
equipped, will have little ability to uphold and promote the rule of law in the absence of a functioning judicial system ...
3. Make donor assistance conditional on comprehensive MoI reform.
The most consistent theme that emerged in interviews for this paper was that without comprehensive reform of the MoI, police reform efforts will fail and the money spent on reform will be wasted. The MoI is notoriously corrupt, factionalised, and an increasingly important actor in Afghanistan's illegal drug economy ...
4. Prioritise quality of police over quantity.
There has been a damaging tendency to let immediate issues, such as the presidential elections and the growing Taliban insurgency, result in “quick fix” solutions that prioritise the quantity of police over the quality. A recent example was the 2006 decision to create the ANAP to assist
in counter-insurgency operations. Such measures to quickly increase police numbers are undermining the longer-term objective of creating
an effective police force ...
5. Prioritise fiscal sustainability of the security sector.
It is widely recognised that in the foreseeable future Afghanistan will not have the resources to independently sustain the security sector institutions that are currently being developed. Despite this knowledge, few concrete measures are being taken to address the problem, and
few decisions are being made to bring security sector costs more in line with what Afghanistan can afford ...
A massive amount of info about the Afghan police in this document. Very interesting reading, whether you agree with the recommendations or not.
Lemme see if I have this right.
GAO -- who would not have a job if they found nothing wrong -- found things wrong. Okay.
Three DoS, One DoD, one USAID and One DOJ type all commented on the wrongs GAO found -- and added couple to show they were concerned. Okay.
A part of the reported problem is failure to adequately equip the ANP. No mention is made of the part played by our ridiculous procurement laws and regulations -- most at the behest of the Congress that is conducting this 'hearing' -- which are almost certainly primarily responsible for that flaw. Okay.
Another part is that the Afghans works on a different timetable and have different mores than we would like. Okay.
Could the excessive bureaucracy herein displayed also play a part in the failure of the ANP to walk on water?
Oh, wait; not too much water there...
We can save money if we store this and release it again a year from now; save the cost of another hearing to discover little real change. Or we could say no such hearing until 2012 and give things a chance to get fixed...
Not to disparage your posting Jedburgh, I appreciate it and your postings. It's just every now and then, my mind really boggles at how utterly ridiculous and overweight we've become. Verily, I have vented... :mad:
Great post and I agree but I do think the
ever pragmatic Dutch have at least a partial solution. Won't work for and in the US but it might work for some nations and for Afghanistan. The Marechaussee LINK and the Gendarmerie LINK concepts are also widely copied in the ME. Iran for example, in the days of the Shahs had two police forces; the totally civilian National Police who performed all standard police functions in the towns and cities and the paramilitary Gendarmerie who policed rural areas AND provdiced the border Guard and a paramilitary force (which coincidentally served as a counterweight and coup deterrent to the Armed Forces).
The Turks also have a Gendarmerie. LINK. Note that in all cases, there's a dual chain, civilian and military and note also that the Turks are using Gendarmes in their counterinsurgency (as did the Dutch and French in their former colonies and as did the Viet Namese use their Field Police).
We have a bad tendency to believe that only US solutions are appropriate and to apply the 'not invented here' syndrome to some good ideas that others have. Of course, one argument certain to be deployed to support that ego centric American concept is that "It's hard enough to stand up one police force, much less two." To which I respond -- when you have an absolute and demonstrated NEED for two different kinds of police forces, that's not an issue, it's simply a minor impediment.