The failure to manage U.S. and allied military spending and aid funds has enriched and corrupted a small elite—and corrupted many more at lower levels. A decade of counternarcotics efforts has constantly shifted the areas of production but done nothing to eliminate a domestic economy based far more on narcotrafficking than a “new Silk Road,” and it has created a nation-wide structure of what have come to be called “criminal networks.”
The Afghan National Security Forces are making progress, but this progress is rushing toward goals that are far too fast, far too large, and based on spending that has to be financed from the outside at levels that cannot be sustained. There are too few properly trained U.S. and allied advisers and partners and far too high a rate of attrition and turnover in Afghan forces. The Afghan Army is making progress, but it would need at least two more years after 2014 to really be able to take over responsibility for security, and the Afghan Air Force is not supposed to be ready before 2016.
The police still suffer from massive corruption, and it is unclear than even the best elements of the local police can hold together once foreign advisers leave. There is no effective governance and justice system (sometimes, there is no system at all) in far too many high-risk and conflict areas, and no police force can be effective on its own. Moreover, it is all too clear from past insurgencies that military gains are almost meaningless if the government cannot come in immediately and hold and build.
Dealing With Reality
There are three options or strategies we can use to deal with the situation. The first is a strategy of “exit by denial.” We can go on trying to preserve as much of the past strategy as possible. We can continue setting impossible goals for transforming the Afghans and for continuing levels of U.S. and allied funding and support.
We can ignore all of the pressures building up on both sides as mistrust continues to rise, pledges are made and not kept, and outside forces and spending drops faster than planned. We can focus on empty policy statements, concepts, and conferences. We can continue to report nothing but good news or spin reality as best our public affairs officers can manage. We can waste much of the limited time left before 2014, play out a partisan debate in the United States through November 2012, and then join our allies in blundering out as best we can.
The second strategy is an “honest exit” strategy. We do not put political cosmetics and face-saving gestures first. We accept the fact that we will not sustain the level of effort needed through 2014, much less beyond. We accept what this means for peace negotiations. We don’t promise the Afghans more money and forces than they will really get.
We deal with the human consequences of these actions and ensure that those Afghans who worked with us are safe. We provide at least enough money and support so that, if there is a chance that the Afghan government and forces can survive with a far lower level of resources, they have at least that much support. We try to work with Pakistan, China, Russia, the Central Asian states, and even Iran to do as much as possible to limit the role of the Taliban and other insurgents, protect the non-Pashtun areas in the north and the large numbers of urban and other northern Pashtuns, and give Kabul a meaningful role. These efforts may well fail, but they at least offer the Afghans some chance.
The third strategy is the most challenging. It is to create a “real transition” plan with real resources through a period that is likely to last at least through 2020. This does not mean going on with the current strategy. It means a comprehensive and honest reassessment of what can be done to enable the Afghans to do things their way and largely on their own as soon as possible.
It means dealing with Afghan anger and perceptions by ending much of the criticism and calls for reform. It means accepting the fact that continued aid will have to go to the same power structure that now exists and facing the reality that most current abuses of government, policing, human rights, and the justice system will only change when Afghans are ready to change them.
It means a zero-based examination of what kind of Afghan security forces can really be created with the money and time available, as well as what level of U.S. and allied advisory and partnering presence is both needed and feasible given the security problems and tensions on both sides and real world future resource constraints. It means accepting a narco-economy, power brokers, and Afghan management of development and operating aid funds, where the most that can be done from the outside is penalize gross waste and corruption.
Unfortunately, there is no real way to know how feasible such a strategy really is. It requires a transition plan we have failed to develop, a level of interagency and international cooperation and realism that does not yet exist, and a far more honest dialogue with the Afghans than has taken place to date. It is the most responsible strategy of the three, in theory, and the one most likely to serve our longer-term strategic interests, but it is far from clear that we can go from “exit by denial” to a “real transition” plan in practice.
