AP: General calls for more Afghanistan troops

[jmm99]

Not long ago, Steve (Surferbeetle) assigned me the task of looking at Astan governance and Rule of Law. As part of that task, I looked at a number of reports and assessments (most of which are pure agitprop, IMHO).

The Afghanistan Justice Sector Support Program (JSSP) issued three assessment reports on the justice systems in four fairly secure provinces in 2007:

Assessment of the Justice Sector in Kunduz Province, Oct 2007 (37 pages)

The State of Regional Justice Systems in Balkh, Herat and Nangarhar, Dec 2006 (79 pages)

Assessment of Provincial Defense Capabilities, Sept 2007 (70 pages)

The reports (which primarily focused on criminal justice - judges, prosecutors & police) were bleak. Since then, the JSSP has not updated the assessments; although it has released a number of PR "shorts".

The criminal portion of a justice system is important; but in the long term, the civil portion of the system is more important because it directly or indirectly affects far more people. Astan's 4 provinces in their formal justice system in 2007 flunked the criminal justice tests; the civil justice system seemed non-existent in any formal sense.

The ability of the two sheep barterers to resolve the "defective sheep" issue, or the issue of which rock marks the property line, is but a minor blip in the geo-political issues which are the major foci of interest. The comment by GEN McChrystal that the Taliban have set up "Shadow Governments" is not encouraging. If the Taliban can provide acceptable justice to the little sheepherders and property owners, it will go a long way to preempt the role of the national government.

So, in answer to JTF's question:

Are there comparable military and civilian leaders in Afghanistan?

Not in the four provinces studied by JSSP.

No cheers about this, but it seems to be factual.

Mike