Wednesday, September 24, 2008, Ramazan 23, 1429    

Afghanistan under transition

Bassam Javed

Afghanistan bears a long chequered history since 654 AD wherein various invaders that raided the country failed in conditioning Afghan populace to follow their respective ideologies. At least twenty five dynasties have ruled Afghanistan all of whom tried to incorporate part or all of the country into their vast but often short lived empires. As a contrary, some of them managed to integrate and some got themselves merged with the Afghan population during the process. Afghanistan, due to its cultural diversity and its strategic location, used to be referred to with various names such as ‘Gateway of South Asia’, ‘The Heart of Asia’ etc.

Today, Afghanistan again finds itself standing at the cross-roads of history, plagued by uncertainty, confusion and a civil war. The first major event to affect the time leading to the present state of Afghanistan was the return from political exile of Muhammad Daud khan in 1973, who had earlier served as the prime minister of Afghanistan until 1963. It was during his tenure that the left wing officers of his army introduced a series of reforms including land reforms and progressive measures in relation to women and education. The reform package hurt the interests of Afghan land lords and the Mullahs and slowly destabilized the society. Then the event of soviets entry later in Afghanistan and the capture of its capital Kabul in December 1979 proved to be the last straw in the destabilization of the country.

The Americans saw this as a unique opportunity and provided billion of dollars in military aid to the Mujahideens to further their interest in the region. In the process, soviets were humiliated and withdrew from Afghanistan whereas the Mujahideens took control of Kabul. The subsequent fighting between the Northern Alliance and the Mujahideens gave rise to a new breed of fighters called Talibans.

However, it was the major event of 9/11 that formed the basis for the direct intervention of US in Afghanistan. The Americans mobilized the Northern Alliance, to oust the Talibans from Kabul. The Taliban withdrew to their areas from Kabul and dispersed to the south and the east. They were not militarily defeated neither eliminated from the system. The southern and the Eastern areas of Afghanistan remained dormant till the time NATO forces entered into Afghanistan in 2003 and the insurgency was started. The major causes that gave rise further to this insurgency comprised the natural sympathy in Pashtun dominated areas for the largely Pashtun Talibans, keeping Pashtun tribal leaders at bay through indiscriminate bombing of their areas resulting in large civilian deaths, non-inclusion of Pashtuns in main stream politics and disenchantment of local populace due to non development, massive corruption in the society and other injustices etc:

The NATO forces are contemplating an increase in the number of Afghan army to 120000 plus with a budgetary estimate of approximately 17 billion dollars over five years. This decision appears to be the outcome of two factors: the increase in allied casualties and the hope to find a way of putting an end to the fighting and then exit. As in the case of Iraq, the NATO have no clear exit strategy in Afghanistan also but hope that somehow both of these expensive conflicts, in terms of lives lost and monetary expenditures incurred, will end by themselves one day. But the history tells us that wars are ended through negotiated settlements whereby all the sides involved agree to abide by a set of terms and conditions that bring peace and stability to the area of conflict.

Now, there appears to be a growing realization amongst the NATO allies to work out the exit strategy. In this relation, a rather secret strategy paper on the ongoing mission in Afghanistan was discussed amongst the NATO leaders at their Bucharest meeting wherein for the first-time, a step by step outline has been documented for when the NATO troops can be pulled out. The authors of the secret paper seem to have been quite realistic while formulating the list of benchmarks. One of the benchmarks put in by the authors include achievement in placing on ground a well trained Afghan army with around 80000 soldiers. The other related benchmarks worked out in the same paper include levels of competencies for the Afghan soldiers as well as logistical capabilities of the Afghan army. The experts are of the view that given the various conditions to improve the Afghan army and meet the benchmarks, withdrawal of NATO forces from Afghanistan seems unlikely in a foreseeable future.

Notwithstanding the ulterior motives of US presence in Afghanistan, it needs to be understood by the US that while pursuing their long term objectives in the region, they must not forget the lesson from history, which is, Afghans have never been subjugated by the invaders / foreign forces in the past. Thus it would be in the interest of US/NATO forces to wrap up their so-called unfinished agenda and be on the roll sooner than later unless they wish to see another Vietnam like humiliation in Afghanistan.