Perspectives on reconciliation options in afghanistan
The US Senate on Foreign Relations conducted a hearing on reconciliation options in Afghanistan on July 27. Though the testimony was posted on the SWJ blog, it seems to have been drowned out by the WikiLeaks drama.
Video and transcripts are found here. Though 169 minutes long, the discussion remains thoughtful, intelligent and genuine throughout. (A refreshing change from recent confirmation hearings....) It kept me engaged the entire time. (Note: the video doesn't actually start until 20 minutes in -- so you'll have to manually move the cursor forward.)
The panel included former Ambassador Ryan Crocker, David Kilcullen, and Ms. Zainab Salbi, Founder and CEO, Women for Women International.
Key points shared by the three panelists --
1) Leaving by 2011 is a bad idea. Even talking about leaving is a bad idea
2) Other regional partners besides Pakistan need to part of the long-term solution
3) The US's poor influence in the region reflects our shallow commitment historically...a cycle which seems to be repeating itself again in real time right now.
One big surprise -- Kilcullen announces that the effort in Afghanistan is NOT counterinsurgency...but rather stability ops. First time I've heard that. Could be true story.
Hubris, and 60+ years of policy based in controlling others
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Dayuhan
If we don't care who runs Afghanistan, why did we go there... and why did we stay? And while it's all well and good to say we'll work with whoever runs it, we have no assurance that whoever runs it will be remotely interested in working with us.
In many ways dumping Karzai and allowing the existing dysfunctional government structure to collapse makes perfect sense, though it begs the question of why we put that structure there in the first place. The question is whether we can do that without surrendering the objectives that led us to go there in the first place.
Perhaps it could have worked. Certainly if we would have helped them get a better Constitution it would have had a better chance. The current constitution virtually guarantees insurgency, corruption and the conversion of the government into a virtual dictatorship.
Consider the sole purpose for this huge Afghan Army we are working to build. Is it to deter or defeat foreign state militarize? No, it is primarily to hold back the very citizens of the state from storming the palace. Now, certainly Pakistan and AQ and a handful of others are conducting UW to varying degrees; and many of the Pastu populace that resists Karzai's regime may well be technically Pakistani citizens. That line on the map means little to the affected populace. We give it meanings that just aren't relevant to the affected populace. It is a Western fiction, and we create friction when we enforce such fiction. (The same was true with the line that Western governments drew to form the states of North and South Vietnam. Meant a lot to us Westerners and shaped our understanding of the problem there, but I strongly suspect it did little to change the intent or perspective of an insurgent movement that was hell bent on ousting Western Colonial governance and its local stooges. We just gave them a legal sanctuary to execute it from and gave them access to international diplomatic venues as well).
Good intentions count for a lot; but the road to hell is indeed paved with good intentions. The Afghan Constitution turned the government there into a giant Ponzi scheme. Foreign investment, Drug profits, and the protection of foreign armies are all keeping the facade of normalcy artificially alive. Pull the plug and watch this collapse faster than Bernie Madoff's house of cards. But freeze all of the accounts in the UAE where Karzai and his cohorts have been stashing our cash for years first.
Insurgencies are fought in the countryside, they are won and lost in the Capital. This one was lost when the Constitution was enacted.
Talking while fighting: UK conference
Thanks to Canadian pointer. Wilton Park, a UK conference centre, held a meeting a month ago on 'Talking while fighting: conditions and modalities' and has now released a summary and podcasts.
Link:http://www.wiltonpark.org.uk/en/news...s&id=532534382
Introduction:
Quote:
The conference examined a wide range of internal conflicts, including thematically focused case study sessions on Iraq, Nepal, Nagaland (Northeast India), Tajikistan, Darfur, El Salvador, and Afghanistan during the 1980’s. We concluded with an assessment of the generalised lessons from these case studies that might be of most relevance to Afghanistan.
The podcasts features: Ashok Mehta, Independent Security Analyst and retired lieutenant general, Noida, India; Mukkhidin Kabiri, Chairman, Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan, Dushanbe; Ahmedou Ould Abdallah, Mediator-in–Residence, United Nations, Department of Political Affairs (DPA), New York.
Why The Taliban would negotiate and give up AQ
As SWC regulars (and irregulars) appreciate I am a big believer in the criticality of reconciliation of the issues of poor governance that are at the heart of causation for the Taliban Leadership in Pakistan. This to be followed up by Constitutional Loya Jirga that is focused on producing a constitution that prevents any one organization, ethnic group or office from gaining too much power (create trust) and identify and protect key individual rights, and defining a trusted, certain and legal construct that makes sense to these people for selecting leaders and enacting laws at all levels.
Vocal opponents to such logic stand, proclaim "Why would the Taliban negotiate?!" and sit back down, their argument made and their business complete.
Why indeed. The Taliban are proving to be quite resilient to the Coalition's surge, and according to many reports are actually gaining in strength and influence. Either they will "win" outright; or perhaps, if the West is willing to settle for a "decent interval" to declare success, break contact and return home, they can surge then in their own right a seize power by force. This is all quite logical.
But how long could they hold such power once they surrendered the sanctuary of their non-state status for the vulnerability of a sovereign state? How long would it take the U.S. to go back in and conduct a strategic raid to send them fleeing right back into Pakistan. Days? Perhaps weeks?
It is this misunderstanding of "sanctuary" that drives a fault line of illogic through our entire current approach to this operation. The Taliban can win Afghanistan, but in so doing loses their sanctuary and are quickly defeated. The same is true for AQ and the Caliphate. If AQ ever gained even a single state, they would lose the sanctuary of their status and merely become another weak state and be quickly defeated. THEY understand this, it is the West that for whatever reason fails to grasp this essential point.
So, the entire argument that we must stay and prop up Karzai's regime regardless of how outrageous his behavior or corrupt and "poor" his governance is for fear that the Taliban may return to power and grant AQ the sanctuary of the sovereign Taliban State is specious. They could only do so for those few day or weeks, then they would all be on the run once again back to their caves. The same is true for the argument that we must prop up despotic leaders across the Arab world and help them build capacity to suppress the nationalist insurgencies within thier populaces for fear that AQ will form a Caliphate.
We are like the sheriff in blazing saddles, holding a gun to our own heads:
"[the Johnsons load their guns and point them at Bart. Bart then points his own pistol at his head]
Bart: [low voice] Hold it! Next man makes a move, the nigger gets it!
Olson Johnson: Hold it, men. He's not bluffing.
Dr. Sam Johnson: Listen to him, men. He's just crazy enough to do it!
Bart: [low voice] Drop it! Or I swear I'll blow this nigger's head all over this town!
Bart: [high-pitched voice] Oh, lo'dy, lo'd, he's desp'it! Do what he sayyyy, do what he sayyyy!
[Townspeople drop their guns. Bart jams the gun into his neck and drags himself through the crowd towards the station]
Harriet Johnson: Isn't anybody going to help that poor man?
Dr. Sam Johnson: Hush, Harriet! That's a sure way to get him killed!
Bart: [high-pitched voice] Oooh! He'p me, he'p me! Somebody he'p me! He'p me! He'p me! He'p me!
Bart: [low voice] Shut up!
[Bart places his hand over his own mouth, then drags himself through the door into his office]
Bart: Ooh, baby, you are so talented!
[looks into the camera]
Bart: And they are so *dumb*!"
Only no one's going to help us either, only we aren't so clever as the good sheriff. We're more like the townspeople.
Be firm with Karzai and demand reconciliation and a new constitution to protect the populace from the government. At the same time open talks with the Taliban (realize not a monolith, but no major group will want to get cut out of the final deal) support their re-entry into Afghan political process so long as they turn over key AQ figures and evict the rest, along with the various groups of foreign fighters. Remind them that while we are quite willing to support whatever form of self-determined government comes out of the loya jirga, that if the Taliban try to pull a fast one and return to their old ways we will be back with a vengeance, and not nearly so many will be able to escape the next time. They can gain power without us, but they can only retain it with our blessing once the lose the sanctuary of non-state status.
If Karzai refuses to play ball? Go home. It will be him who abandoned us, not the other way around.
As you'd expect, a thing or two to say about that...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bob's World
As SWC regulars (and irregulars) appreciate I am a big believer in the criticality of reconciliation of the issues of poor governance that are at the heart of causation for the Taliban Leadership in Pakistan.
This assumes what has yet to be established. How do we know that "poor governance", rather than the simple desire to reclaim the sole power that they once had, is "at the heart of causation for the Taliban Leadership in Pakistan"? I suspect that if Karzai were an Afghan Thomas Jefferson the Taliban leadership would still want him off the chair, because they want the chair themselves. Of course if Karzai were an Afghan Thomas Jefferson the Taliban leadership would probably not be able to draw enough followers to get the job done, but it wouldn't be for want of trying.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bob's World
This to be followed up by Constitutional Loya Jirga that is focused on producing a constitution that prevents any one organization, ethnic group or office from gaining too much power (create trust) and identify and protect key individual rights, and defining a trusted, certain and legal construct that makes sense to these people for selecting leaders and enacting laws at all levels.
Do you really, truly believe that trust can be created among people who have been killing each other continuously for 2 decades simply by adopting a new Constitution? Do you really, truly believe that a Constitution can "prevent any one organization, ethnic group or office from gaining too much power", if the groups in question decide to abandon or ignore it as soon as it is to their advantage to do so? More to the point, do you think the Afghans believe it?
More important, why should we think that a Constitutional Loya Jirga would in fact be "focused on producing a constitution that prevents any one organization, ethnic group or office from gaining too much power (create trust) and identify and protect key individual rights, and defining a trusted, certain and legal construct that makes sense to these people for selecting leaders and enacting laws at all levels". Unless we control the process, thus rendering it irrelevant, we cannot expect it to be any such thing. More likely each group involved would be focused on protecting itself and finding an opportunity to stab the others in the back, or in the front if opportunity presents itself. Why should the prevailing political culture vanish simply because we decide that they are going to have a Loya Jirga and we decide that this Loya Jirga is going to produce a Constitution that's going to solve all the problems? Why, based on precedent, should we think that they will decide what we decided they should decide?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bob's World
But how long could they hold such power once they surrendered the sanctuary of their non-state status for the vulnerability of a sovereign state? How long would it take the U.S. to go back in and conduct a strategic raid to send them fleeing right back into Pakistan. Days? Perhaps weeks?
Are you so sure we'd go back? We didn't go back into Vietnam when the GRVN crumbled. It takes a whole lot of political will to go back into a place where we just had a long, costly, unpopular and unsuccessful war (if we have to go back, then it was by definition unsuccessful). How do we know the Taliban aren't betting that if they force us out we won't come back? How do we know they're not right?
Of course there's some divergence in interests here between AQ and the Taliban: the Taliban want us gone, AQ need to have a foreign aggressor in Muslim lands to justify their existence. A problem, but not insurmountable. If we're forced out of Afghanistan or simply worn out, AQ can always try to bait us into Yemen or Somalia instead of Afghanistan.
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bob's World
The same is true for the argument that we must prop up despotic leaders across the Arab world and help them build capacity to suppress the nationalist insurgencies within thier populaces for fear that AQ will form a Caliphate.
Possibly a bit of a straw man there: who, if anyone, is arguing that position?
Personally, I think that we went wrong on Afghan governance issues the moment we decided to try to govern Afghanistan, or to determine how Afghanistan would be governed. It is simply not within our capacity to bring anything that we would call "good governance" to Afghanistan. Any government we install will end up being, by our standards, bad. The political culture in place assures this. The Afghans may in time evolve something that they can agree on as "good governance", but it's not likely to resemble anything we would call "good governance" and we can't do it for them, or make them do it.
Our task from the start should have been not to embark on a futile quest to bring "good governance" to Afghanistan, but to make absolutely sure that whoever ended up governing Afghanistan badly knew beyond doubt that attacking us or sheltering those who do will bring immediate and horrible consequences. That would have been done more effectively if we'd made our point very vigorously and left, before a prolonged occupation could remind everyone of our limitations and weaknesses.
If I may tag on to that...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Entropy
On this point I am in 110% agreement with Dayuhan, who, legitimately in my view, brings this point up time and again in response to your solutions for fixing other people's governance problems whether that's Tunisia, Saudi or Afghanistan.
As have I and Bill Moore for the last couple of tears. There've been others from time to time. You tend to just ignore it. However, it is a recurring point made by several here.
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In short, we need to quit trying to change the governance structures of other nations and instead deal with them as they are.
True and we need to understand that the US is not and has never been a beacon of truth, liberty and justice regardless of what some would like to believe -- and, far more importantly, that it is not a likely model for most nations. In fact, I submit almost no other nation could make it work -- not that we do all that well... :wry:
Not to pile on or anything, but...
RCJ, with reference to that other thread, can Ken, Bill, and Entropy be on the jury? :D