Afghanistan is a unique situation (ok, all are, but a couple factors really affect this place)

1. The cultural reality of Afghan patronage. This is an all or nothing society. If you are on the in team, you have full chance at power, land, influence, wealth. If you are on the out team you get scraps. When there are major swings of political power it drives an equally major swing of patronage. Over the past several decades the swings forced by Soviets, Muj, Taliban, and US/Northern Alliance have flipped patronage like a pancake, and the effects on the country are hard for non-Afghans to fully comprehend. Who has best title to that rich river bottom land that has switched hands 4 times in 40 years? What tribe should control that cash machine route from Kandahar to Quetta? etc, etc.

We forced the latest swing, and not patronage is firmly in the hands of the Northern Alliance Friends and Families plan. The current constitution and centralized government we were so keen on facilitating not only solidified the Northern Alliance monopoly on power, wealth and influence across Afghanistan (and made all government from District level up into "government in a box" - a box built by the constitution and filled by Karzai) but also turned the flow of patronage into a one-way upward sucking sound as everyone owes their patronage to Karzai and nothing to the people they are sent out to shake down, er, "serve."

The losers cannot accept this. They cannot accept this outcome and they cannot accept this constitution. Both offer little but effective slavery for entire families, tribes and regions. This guarantees insurgency.

I do not know if it is possible to regulate a reconciled form of patronage that breaks up this ageless system and divides power wealth and influence more equitably across the populace. Perhaps, but only if we recognize that this is critical and that must be forced on Karzai and the Northern Alliance, as it is not in their interest lead reform and give up what they hold now by both might and right.

I have not seen any general or any Ambassador see this for the problem it is and take it on.

2. External manipulations, British, Russian, US, etc. The Durand line is much like the line dividing North and South Vietnam. Westerners see these lines as real, legal and definitive. For the affected populaces they were and are largely moot. The only form of legitimacy that matters for insurgency is that in the eyes and minds of the affected populace. The Pashtun populaces in Pakistan are as much "Afghan" as those in Afghanistan. Both are really what I call "self-governed populaces" but both are equally affected by the impact on patronage as described above so are stakeholder populaces in this insurgency.

We'd do well to ignore the Durand line for purposes of defining the insurgency. This really is only a factor if one is out looking for threats to defeat. The brand of COIN I promote is primarily waged in Kabul and focused on tearing down the mechanisms of governance that are at the causal roots of the insurgency. Do that well and the good effects will flow across the Durand line as if it is not there (and for COIN and insurgency it is not there)

I listen to smart military leaders say silly stuff like "we defeated the insurgency in South Vietnam, but later the state of North Vietnam defeated the South in a conventional state on state war." We take ourselves and our lines far too seriously. The south went down in classic phase III Maoist insurgency as planned by Ho and Giap from the very start decades earlier.

But again, if one focuses on fixing government, these lines become far less important than when one is focused on defeating threats.

I'd love to see Crocker and Allen make a full-spectrum reconciliation and follow-on constitutional loya jirga the condition precedent to all development and any hope of ISAF leaving any presence there to help out. Unless we are willing to walk away we will remain a patsy of the Northern Alliance, filling their pockets and protecting there status at the top of the patronage heap.