US troops in Afghanistan

What the US Didn’t Learn in Afghanistan, According to the Govt’s Own Inspector General

A lacerating report this week revealed the US failure to reconstruct Afghanistan over two decades. Why didn’t anyone heed the inspector general’s warnings?

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The chaotic collapse of the Afghan military in recent months made starkly clear that the $83 billion US taxpayers spent to create and fund those security forces achieved little. But a new report this week by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) also reveals the depths of failure of the United States’ entire 20-year, $145 billion effort to reconstruct (or construct, in some cases) Afghanistan’s civil society.

John Sopko, the special inspector general since 2012, has long chronicled the government’s miscalculations. In his latest lacerating assessment, he concluded that “the US government continuously struggled to develop and implement a coherent strategy for what it hoped to achieve.” The US effort was clumsy and ignorant, the report says, calling out the hubris of a superpower thinking it could reshape a country it didn’t understand by tossing gobs of money around.

The new report is a sweeping look back over America’s two decades in Afghanistan, which left 2,443 US servicemembers and more than 114,000 Afghans dead. The watchdog agency has, for 13 years, consistently and accurately pointed out consequential flaws of the many reconstruction programs at play.

ProPublica also examined some of the same issues along the way in a series called “GI Dough”. In 2015, we decided to add up the waste and did an extensive analysis of the causes behind it. Our reporting found at least $17 billion in likely wasted taxpayer dollars at the time. (And that was just out of the small percentage of total spending SIGAR had scrutinised at that point.) To help put those squandered funds into context, we created a game readers could play to see what the money could have bought at home.

The efforts to create a new government and military from scratch were overly ambitious, ProPublica found in 2015. They failed to consider the needs and abilities of Afghans. There was a disregard for learning from past mistakes. (Take for example, soybeans.) And the goals were far too “pie in the sky” for one of the world’s poorest nations, a country still racked by violence. What was happening in Afghanistan was strikingly similar to the failures endured in Iraq just a few years prior.

For its part, SIGAR has dissected a wide variety of breakdowns in its decade-plus of tracking the Afghanistan effort. These reports are not just about a $25 million building no one wanted or would ever use, a $200 million literacy program that failed to teach would-be soldiers how to read, a $335 million power plant the Afghans couldn’t afford to run or even the $486 million spent on planes that couldn’t fly and ended up as scrap metal. What the reports often really highlight is that the underlying assumptions were wrong.

The SIGAR reports form a penetrating body of real-time analysis that reveals little appetite to change course and whose warnings seem to have gone unheeded. Adequately answering the questions SIGAR raised in each report would have forced a wholesale reexamination of the US presence in the country. That never happened.

Also read: ‘Hungry, Thirsty, Tired and Scared’: An Afghan Scholar Describes His Journey From Kabul to the US

“This was not a matter of ignoring what was said as much as not wanting to come to grips with the issue, and it was a deliberate choice not to deal with the problems,” said Anthony Cordesman, a policy expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. “It wasn’t even a triumph of hope over experience; it was a triumph of political expediency over meaningful policy making.”

According to Cordesman, no one wanted to “preside over a very visible American defeat,” one that would undoubtedly leave behind a destabilised Afghanistan and potential national security disaster. There was, too, he said, a strong contingent of true believers who kept making the argument that success was almost in hand: “I think they were in a state of denial.”

Then there were the military generals and other top officials described in The Washington Post’s revelatory Afghanistan Papers in 2019, who were far more interested in spinning a tale of near victory to the public. In addition to assurances that the insurgency was on its heels, officials often trotted out statistics about lower infant mortality rates, increased life expectancy and vastly improved educational opportunities for girls. SIGAR acknowledged such “bright spots” in this week’s report, but concluded that those achievements were not worth the sizable investment and, more important, aren’t sustainable without a continued US presence. In other words: It was all temporary.

SIGAR found that there was a persistent, troubling disconnect between what US officials wanted to be true and what was actually happening. “By spending money faster than it could be accounted for, the US government ultimately achieved the opposite of what it intended: it fueled corruption, delegitimised the Afghan government, and increased insecurity,” the report says. But officials pressed on with “reckless compromises,” including unrealistic timelines for progress, and “simply found new ways to ignore conditions on the ground.”

Diplomatic agencies more suited to the task of nation building were muscled aside by the Pentagon, which was better resourced but lacked the requisite expertise. The State Department and US Agency for International Development, SIGAR reported, didn’t have enough staff to “meaningfully perform that role.”

“If the goal was to rebuild and leave behind a country that can sustain itself and pose little threat to US national security interests,” the report says, “the overall picture is bleak.”

SIGAR’s analysis of the future is equally forbidding. The US is exiting Afghanistan, but history shows we’ll likely jump into nation building again. SIGAR’s report notes that it’s the “11th lessons learned report” in the series, but the heading for the report makes it quite clear that, if the US government is the student, the message hasn’t sunk in. It’s called “What We Need to Learn: Lessons from Twenty Years of Afghanistan Reconstruction.”

Megan Rose is a reporter at ProPublica. She has investigated criminal justice and the military for ProPublica since 2013.

Biden Authorises $100 Million in Emergency Funds for Afghan Refugees

The Biden administration is preparing to begin evacuating thousands of Afghan applicants for special immigration visas who risk retaliation from Taliban insurgents because they worked for the US government.

Washington: US President Joe Biden on Friday authorised up to $100 million from an emergency fund to meet “unexpected urgent” refugee needs stemming from the situation in Afghanistan, including for Afghan special immigration visa applicants, the White House said.

Biden also authorised the release of $200 million in services and articles from the inventories of US government agencies to meet the same needs, the White House said.

The United States is preparing to begin evacuating thousands of Afghan applicants for special immigration visas (SIVs) who risk retaliation from Taliban insurgents because they worked for the US government.

The first batch of evacuees and their families is expected to be flown before the end of the month to Fort Lee, a US military base in Virginia, where they will wait for the final processing of their visa applications.

Also read: Taliban Say They Control 85% Of Afghanistan, Humanitarian Concerns Mount

About 2,500 Afghans could be brought to the facility, about 48 km south of Richmond, the Pentagon said on Monday.

The Biden administration is reviewing other US facilities in the United States and overseas where SIV applicants and their families could be accommodated.

Special immigrant visas are available to Afghans who worked as translators or in other jobs for the US government after the 2001 US-led invasion.

On Thursday, the US House of Representatives passed legislation that would expand the number of SIVs that could granted by 8,000, which would cover all potentially eligible applications in the pipeline.

About 18,000 such applications are being processed, US officials say.

(Reuters)

What Will Happen After the US Withdraws From Afghanistan?

An agreement would be an impressive accomplishment for the Taliban – from their perspective, it would be their reward for fighting the world’s strongest military power to a stalemate.

The United States and the Taliban may be nearing an agreement to withdraw US troops from Afghanistan after more than 17 years of conflict.

In return, the Taliban would commit to refusing access to anti-American organisations such as al-Qaida on its territory.

How did we get to this point – and what will be the consequences of such an agreement?

How did we get here?

As a longtime scholar of Afghanistan’s wars and conflict dynamics, I suggest beginning with a bit of history.

The current conflict began when the Bush administration invaded Afghanistan a few weeks after 9/11.

It was on Afghan soil that Osama bin Laden hatched the plot to attack the US. The Taliban, the de facto rulers of much of Afghanistan in the wake of a bloody civil war, had given bin Laden and his supporters shelter.

Two months into the US invasion, Taliban state institutions and defensive positions crumbled and the United States formed new state institutions led by Afghans who had fought the Taliban. The US maintained a limited force to fight and capture al-Qaida and Taliban leaders but otherwise invested little in the Afghan economy or society.

It took the Taliban four years to reconstitute itself as an effective force of insurgents to fight the US and the Afghan government, and they became stronger every year after 2004. As I explain in my research, the United States and the coalition of 42 countries it formed to defeat the resurgent Taliban was poorly organised, abusive and mismanaged.

Also read: A Taliban Perspective on Recent Peace Talks for Afghanistan

Since 2001, the US-led coalition has spent US$1 trillion dollars and committed a peak of 140,000 troops and 100,000 contractors to an unsuccessful attempt to defeat the Taliban. More than 5,000 American soldiers and contractors were killed.

Today, a US force of 14,000 troops and massive US Airforce assets are helping maintain the defensive positions of an Afghan government that is widely considered as one of the most corrupt in the world.

Also read: US Plans to Exit Afghanistan in Five Years. What Does This Mean for India?

The Taliban are making territorial gains and killing hundreds of regime troops each month, and feel that they are on the cusp of victory.

Militias that recruit from the Hazara, Tajik and Uzbek minorities have rearmed in anticipation of the collapse of the regime in Kabul and fear of a coming civil war with the mostly Pushtun Taliban. Afghanistan is nearing an endgame.

What it means for the Taliban

An agreement between the Taliban and the US would be an impressive accomplishment for the Taliban. From their perspective, it would be their reward for fighting the world’s strongest military power to a stalemate.

They already were rewarded by getting to negotiate directly with the United States, as they have always requested, instead of the Afghan regime which they despise. If the negotiations are successful, they would also be getting precisely what they asked for: an American withdrawal.

In return, they are making a commitment to do something they would likely have done anyway. Al-Qaida’s attack on the US caused the Taliban to lose control of Afghanistan for years. They are not likely to risk having to pay that cost again once they regain control of Kabul, even if they don’t sign an agreement.

What it means for US

Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani meets US Vice President Mike Pence in Munich, Germany, February 16, 2019. Credit: Reuters/Michael Dalder

There is little hope for an outright US victory over the Taliban at this point.

The remaining force of 14,000 US troops is mostly meant to shore up Afghan state defenses. It is too small to reverse momentum on the battlefield. An agreement and withdrawal would therefore be attractive for those who value less military spending and stress on the military, including General John Nicholson, the previous commander of the American and NATO forces in Afghanistan.

The agreement, however, could undermine US reputation in ways big and small. The Obama and Trump administrations never reversed a 2002 Bush executive order that added the Taliban to the list of Specially Designated Global Terrorists, but they have simultaneously pleaded with them to negotiate in spite of claims that Washington does not negotiate with terrorists.

It also signals US weakness and inability to fight a dedicated force of insurgents. Militants elsewhere, including Islamic State leaders, could find this lesson instructive. I believe such an agreement may well be remembered as a turning point in America’s ability to successfully project its military power around the Muslim world.

An agreement could also signal that the US is an unreliable ally that abandons those who side with it. The United States is involved in numerous conflicts worldwide in places as diverse as Syria and Somalia, and many of its local allies would logically recalculate their own commitments after witnessing a US disengagement from Afghanistan.

What happens to the state

As I describe in my book “Organizations at War in Afghanistan,” governments tend to unravel quickly in Afghanistan when foreign support, both military and financial, ceases.

This is precisely what happened after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan and stopped their support to the Najib regime in the early 1990s. As I report in greater detail in my book, different regime militias and military units either disintegrated, joined their erstwhile Mujahideen opponents or became independent militias.

Similarly, today’s Afghan state officials at all levels have long hedged their bets by maintaining ties with the Taliban, their nominal opponents and minority militias. If history is any indication, we can expect that entire agencies and units will either fragment or collectively join any of several strongman-led ethnic militias when the rewards of working for the regime stop outweighing the risks of facing the Taliban. Some may even defect to the Taliban. This is expected behaviour in dangerous environments such as Afghanistan, where everyone is expected to have a hedging strategy for survival.

Also read: India, Others Briefed by US Envoy on ‘Progress’ in Taliban Peace Talks

Once the state gets pulled in all directions, Afghanistan will likely degenerate into a civil war very similar to the one that the United States interrupted when it invaded in late 2001. Other countries, including Russia, Iran and India will choose sides to back. I estimate that the Taliban, with their dedicated Pakistani and Arab Gulf backers will win that conflict, just like they almost did in 2001. We may very well reach a point where we see the 17-year American occupation as merely a futile, bloody and costly interruption of the Afghan civil war.

I consider a US-Taliban agreement to be no more than a face-saving measure to conclude a failed and costly American military intervention. If there is a useful lesson to be learned from this misadventure, it is that leaders of even the world’s mightiest military power need to reconsider the merits of a militarised foreign policy in the Muslim world. US military interventions are stoking resentment and inflaming a perpetual transnational insurgency across Muslim countries. If it doesn’t change its course, the US may very well suffer more defeats such as the one in Afghanistan and will cause even more hurt and damage in other countries along the way.

Abdulkader Sinno, Associate Professor of Political Science and Middle Eastern Studies, Indiana University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

US Plans to Exit Afghanistan in Five Years. What Does This Mean for India?

New Delhi stands to lose not just political but also economic influence in Afghanistan.

According to a new Pentagon plan offered in the peace negotiations with the Taliban, all US troops will withdraw from Afghanistan in the next three to five years, the New York Times reported.

The new report is in line with President Donald Trump’s earlier call for the withdrawal of American troops from Afghanistan. On December 20, 2018, just a few hours after the resignation of Trump’s defence secretary Jim Mattis over the withdrawal of 2000 US troops from Syria, various news outlets reported that the US also plans to pull out 7,000 US troops from Afghanistan. On December 28, 2018, a White House spokesperson for the National Security Council denied these reports in Bloomberg News.

Nevertheless, a few days after, at a press appearance after 2019’s first cabinet meeting, President Trump once again defended his push for the US to invest less in countries overseas, particularly Afghanistan. Trump also urged local actors to do more in the region.

“Why isn’t Russia there? Why isn’t India there? Why isn’t Pakistan there?” he asked at the press conference. “Why are we there? We are 6,000 miles away.”

Also read: Why We Shouldn’t Denounce Trump’s Decision to Withdraw from Syria

The US invaded Afghanistan in 2001 as a part of its ‘war on terror’ after the September 11 terrorist attacks on American soil. Since then, the US has been fighting the longest war in its history in Afghanistan. Presently, there are 14,000 US troops in Afghanistan as part of NATO’s Resolute Support Mission. The bare-thin US and NATO troops are there to advise and assist the Afghan Security Forces.

Pentagon’s plan will cut the US troops presently stationed in Afghanistan by half in the next few months and shift their mission from training the Afghan military to counterterrorism strikes, added the Times, based on its interviews with more than half a dozen current and former American and European officials.

Implications of US withdrawal on India

The current peace negotiations between Zalmay Khalilzad, the US Special Representative for Afghanistan Reconciliation, and Taliban come amidst heightened violence in Afghanistan. A 2019 UN report found that more civilians were killed in 2018 in Afghanistan than any other year since 2009. The single largest cause of their death – suicide bombings and related attacks by insurgents.

Earlier withdrawal of US and NATO combat troops by the end of 2014 saw a resurgence of Taliban, intent on capturing large swaths of the conflict-ridden country. Presently, the Afghan government controls just 56% of the countries’ districts, according to a 2018 report by the US special inspector general for Afghanistan reconstruction. Taliban and other militia, including al-Qaeda and a newly-emerged ISIL, are fighting for dominance in the remaining regions.

Zalmay Khalilzad. Credit: Reuters

If the US abruptly withdraws from Afghanistan, the worst case scenario is that Taliban, bolstered by the withdrawal, along with several other old militias rearm themselves in anticipation; local actors like Pakistan and Russia support their proxies as they did in the early 1990s and a new and bloodier civil war breaks out in Afghanistan.

Also watch: Has India’s Afghanistan Policy Served Us Well?

India’s worst-case scenario

The fight in its neighbourhood pilfers into India’s turbulent domestic region, particularly the Kashmir Valley, through the subcontinent’s porous borders aided by proxy terrorists and militia groups, some of whom Pakistan has supported and provided a safe haven for throughout the years.

New Delhi recognises that few countries have more at stake in Kabul than India.

“No troop in Afghanistan” is a course of action that the BJP-government, like the ones before it, have candidly proclaimed despite multiple calls by the US president to “do more” in Afghanistan. By not committing troops in Afghanistan, New Delhi has continued to reiterate its strategic autonomy, not alienate its relationship with China or Russia and bolstered its soft-power credentials in Afghanistan.

In the past, the US has also discouraged Indian boots on the ground, given the US’s strategic ties with Pakistan. Islamabad fears Indian security presence in Afghanistan could lead to a Kabul-New Delhi “strategic encirclement” – a hostile India on its East and a hostile Afghanistan on its West.

Representational image. Members of Taliban delegation take their seats during the multilateral peace talks on Afghanistan in Moscow last December. Credit: Reuters

India has largely followed development diplomacy. It is the largest regional donor and the fifth-largest donor to Afghanistan. New Delhi has committed up to $3 billion in development aid since the defeat of the Taliban in 2001. Afghanistan has been the second-largest recipient of Indian foreign aid in the past five years.

It is India’s state-building role along with its refusal to send in troops that have earned New Delhi immense goodwill in Afghanistan. But this could all change soon as American policy oscillates away from Kabul.

Also read: A Taliban Perspective on Recent Peace Talks for Afghanistan

Indian domestic security and the Taliban connection

India has been a vocal opponent of the Taliban, which continues to maintain a close relationship with Pakistan’s Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam. Pakistan’s Afghanistan strategy has always been to prop up the Taliban as a legitimate political actor in the area. Before coming into power, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan had campaigned for the US to engage with Taliban, earning him the moniker “Taliban Khan” from his critics for his soft stance against the militant group. Given these ties, the Indian domestic security threat is bound to increase were Taliban to return to power in Kabul.

It will also motivate local insurgent actors in Kashmir.

Recently, the suicide bomb attack that killed over 40 Indian paramilitary police in Pulwama was claimed by the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad terrorist group. The suicide bomber was reportedly inspired by Taliban’s “victory” in Afghanistan from foreign occupiers through jihad, reported the Times of India. The bomber had recorded two videos before the attacks, explaining his “martyrdom” that soon began circulating in the Indian media post-Pulwama.

Security forces in Pulwama. Credit: PTI

Former General of Police K. Rajendra Kumar had earlier cautioned about this increased threat as the American troops pull-out. “It has its implications in Kashmir. It is a matter of time that we will be feeling its implications in the Valley. After the US withdrawal, the terrorist organisations would feel pumped up, emboldened,” Kumar said to NDTV News in December 2018.

On February 21, 2019, as tensions began escalating between India and Pakistan post the Pulwama attack, Pakistan’s ambassador to Afghanistan, Zahid Nasrullah, warned that the peace talks between the US and Taliban would be affected if India retaliates with violence. While Nasrullah was criticised for his statement and handed the diplomatic demarche by the Afghan government, the fear of a spillover from the Indian-Pakistan conflict to the Taliban negotiations and vice-versa cannot be ignored.

Also read: The Elusive Afghan Peace and India’s Way Forward

Despite being the largest regional donor to Afghanistan, India’s role in the ongoing peace talks has been largely minimal. New Delhi is right to be wary of Islamabad’s increasingly important role in the peace talks as a facilitator between the US and the Taliban. As the US relents to dialogue with the insurgent group, the tide is shifting in Islamabad’s favour. It will undoubtedly put a wrench in India’s plans to isolate Pakistan globally.

While official Indian policy has always been to push for an “Afghan-led, Afghan-owned and Afghan-controlled” peace process with active participation from the Afghan government, there has been a noticeable shift in recent months in New Delhi’s previously hostile position towards the Taliban.

With key players like the US, China, Russia and Iran directly engaging with the Taliban, while Indian allies in the Kabul government are struggling to retain power, New Delhi has little option but to change tack. India has shifted from having no engagement at all with Taliban to non-official participation at the Moscow format talks in Russia on November 9 with Taliban and other regional actors.

India stands to lose not just political but also economic influence in Afghanistan. For the rapidly growing and energy-starved India, Afghanistan is an important gateway to the resource-rich Central Asia states. For instance, an unstable Afghanistan could endanger the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) natural gas pipeline project. The TAPI project plans to help abate both India and Pakistan’s energy demands, providing 42% energy to each and the remaining to Afghanistan along with transit revenue.

Bansari Kamdar is a freelance journalist from India. She specialises in South Asian political economy, gender and security issues.

Taliban Appoints New Political Leader to Join US-Taliban Peace Talks

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar was released from a prison in Pakistan in October last year has been authorised to lead the political team and take decisions.

Kabul/Peshawar: A co-founder of the Taliban was appointed as the leader of its political office in Qatar on Thursday to strengthen its hand in peace talks with the US as they try to establish a mechanism to end the 17-year Afghan war.

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar was released from a prison in Pakistan in October last year has been authorised to lead the political team and take decisions, two Taliban sources in Afghanistan said.

The Taliban issued a statement to announce Baradar’s appointment and a reshuffle in their team to put senior leaders into key positions as the talks with US officials gain momentum.

“This step has been taken to strengthen and properly handle the ongoing negotiations process with the US,” the Taliban said in statement.

US special peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad’s meeting with the Taliban representatives, which was originally due to run over two days, entered its fourth day on Thursday.

It was not clear whether the talks were to continue on Friday, or how soon Baradar could join the talks.

“Baradar will soon fly to Qatar. He has been given the new position because the US wanted senior Taliban leadership to participate in peace talks,” a senior Taliban official said.

Also Read: What Talking to the Taliban Means

Baradar, who coordinated the insurgent group’s military operations in southern Afghanistan, was arrested in 2010 by a team from Pakistan’s military-controlled intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence, and the US Central Intelligence Agency.

His release, according to security experts, was part of high-level negotiations led by Khalilzad with the Taliban.

Diplomatic efforts to end the US’s longest running conflict intensified last year after the appointment of the Afghan-born Khalilzad to lead direct talks with the Taliban.

He has held at least four meetings with the Taliban representatives. But there has been no let up in the violence.

And abiding fears about how Afghan government forces would withstand the Taliban threat without US military support have been heightened by reports that US President Donald Trump wants to bring home almost half of the 14,000 troops deployed in Afghanistan.

US soldiers in Afghanistan. Credit: Reuters

Positive progress

But the unexpected extension of peace talks was a positive sign, according to two senior Taliban leaders in Afghanistan who have been kept informed of the progress made in Qatar.

During the first two days, the talks focussed on a roadmap for the withdrawal of the foreign forces and a guarantee that Afghanistan would not be used for hostile acts against the US and its allies, according to one of Taliban leaders.

“The mechanism for a ceasefire and ways to enter into an intra-Afghan dialogue were the two other big topics that were supposed to be discussed on Thursday,” he told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity.

A third source based in the Gulf, who has close ties to the Taliban representatives, said the decision to extend the meeting in the Qatari capital Doha came after “positive progress” during the first two days.

Members of Afghanistan’s High Peace Council (AHPC), a body which oversees peace efforts but does not represent the government said they were hoping for positive news.

“When talks take a long time it means the discussion is in a sensitive and important stage, and the participants are getting close to a positive result,” said Sayed Ehsan Taheri, the spokesman for AHPC in Kabul.

The Taliban who are fighting to oust foreign troops have repeatedly rejected the offer to hold direct talks with President Ashraf Ghani’s government, which they consider an illegitimate foreign-imposed regime.

The US and regional powers insist that the peace process should be “Afghan-led and Afghan-owned”.

Newly appointed Baradar will also hold the additional post of third deputy of Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, the leader of Taliban and work with Sher Mohammad Abbas Stanekzai, a veteran Taliban official who has been running the group’s political office in Qatar since 2015 and has participated in the latest rounds of peace talks.

“Stanekzai was given the responsibility but he was not powerful to make all decisions,” said a second Taliban official on conditions of anonymity.

(Reuters)

Peace Talks Between Afghan Taliban and US to Take Place on Wednesday

The talks will be the fourth in a series between Taliban leaders and US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad.

Peshawar: Afghan Taliban representatives will meet US officials for two days of peace talks starting on Wednesday, but they refuse to meet “puppet” Afghan government officials, senior Taliban members said. The Taliban have rejected requests from regional powers to allow Afghan officials to take part in the talks, insisting that the US is their main adversary in the 17-year war.

“This time we want to hold talks with the American officials,” said a Taliban leader based in Afghanistan, adding that the talks in Qatar would involve a US withdrawal, prisoner exchange and the lifting of a ban on movement of Taliban leaders. The insurgents, seeking to reimpose strict Islamic law after their 2001 ouster by US-led troops, called off a meeting with US officials in Saudi Arabia this week because of Riyadh’s insistence on bringing the Western-backed Afghan government to the table.

Zalmay Khalilzad, former US ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq and the UN Credit: Reuters/Jonathan Ernst/File Photo

The war in Afghanistan is America’s longest overseas military intervention. It has cost Washington nearly a trillion dollars and killed tens of thousands of people. The talks will be the fourth in a series between Taliban leaders and US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad.

“After mutual consultations, we are going to meet US officials in Doha on Wednesday. The meeting will continue for two days,” a senior member of the Taliban said on condition of anonymity. Former Afghan Interior Minister Umer Daudzai, who is senior adviser to President Ashraf Ghani, is due in Pakistan on Tuesday where he is expected to meet Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi.

Pakistani officials say Afghanistan will need foreign economic aid for years, even after any peace agreement has been signed, and have also been trying to push the Taliban to accept talks with Kabul.

Also Read: Taliban Seeks Venue Change From Saudi Arabia to Qatar for Peace Talks With US

Pakistan cooperation

A close aide to Ghani said the government was ready to meet the Taliban “anywhere and any time”.

“Every country involved in Afghanistan expects the Taliban to hold direct talks with the Afghan government, but they have not agreed to meet us,” the official said on condition of anonymity. Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) took part in the last round of talks in December.

Western diplomats based in Kabul said Pakistan’s cooperation in the peace process will be crucial to its success. Independent security analysts and diplomats said the neighbouring country’s powerful military has kept close ties with the Afghan Taliban. US officials have accused Pakistan of providing safe haven to Taliban militants in its border regions and using them as an arm of its foreign policy. Pakistan denies the claim.

Turkey has said it will host leaders of Pakistan and Afghanistan. Last week, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, met Ghani in Kabul to discuss the peace process. The meeting was held after Taliban officials met with Iranian authorities in Tehran.

The US, which sent troops to Afghanistan in the wake of September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington and at the peak of the deployment had more than 100,000 troops in the country, withdrew most of its forces in 2014. It keeps around 14,000 troops there as part of a NATO-led mission aiding Afghan security forces and hunting militants.

Reports last month about US President Donald Trump’s plans to withdraw thousands of troops from Afghanistan triggered uncertainty in Kabul which depends on the US and other foreign powers for military support and training. As peace talks gain momentum a draft agreement drawn up by the influential US think tank RAND Corporation outlining the clauses for a potential peace deal has been circulated among Afghan officials and diplomats in Kabul.

The document, reviewed by Reuters, suggests that the US and NATO withdraw their military missions in phases over an expected period of 18 months. It adds that the US may continue providing civilian assistance and seek contributions from other donors. The US Embassy in Afghanistan and Zalmay Khalilzad’s office in Washington did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

(Reuters)

Afghanistan’s Neighbours Fear Refugee Crisis if US Withdraws Troops

Alarmed by the possibility of a chaotic withdrawal, diplomats from neighbouring countries who have been in talks with US officials in Kabul said they were reassessing policies and would ramp up border preparations.

Kabul: Afghanistan‘s neighbours, caught off-guard by reports of US plans to withdraw thousands of troops, have begun preparing for the risk that a pullout could send hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing across their borders, diplomats say.

“At this point, there is no clarity about the withdrawal, but we have to keep a clear action plan ready,” said a senior Asian diplomat based in Kabul. “The situation can turn from bad to worse very quickly.”

A White House spokesman last week said US President Donald Trump had not issued orders to the Pentagon to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. But the administration has not denied reports that the US plans to pull out almost half of the 14,000-strong force currently deployed.

Also Read: A Hurried US Exit Might Do More Harm Than Good For Peace in Afghanistan

The reports come amid an intensification of moves towards peace negotiations in Afghanistan. US special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad met Taliban representatives last month and discussed issues around a future troop withdrawal as well as proposals for a ceasefire.

But even among regional powers such as Iran, Pakistan or Russia that have long been suspicious that the US wants permanent military bases in South Asia, there is no appetite for a sudden US withdrawal, say analysts.

“While the news of a potential US drawdown may be a reason for cautious optimism in the region, they don’t want an abrupt withdrawal,” said Graeme Smith, a consultant for the International Crisis Group.

“All sides recognise that a precipitous pullout could spark a new civil war that destabilises the region. The neighbours do not enjoy surprises, and the uncertain signals from Washington are causing anxiety.”

The US, which sent troops to Afghanistan in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington and at the peak of the deployment had more than 100,000 troops in the country, withdrew most of its forces in 2014, but still keeps around 14,000 troops there as part of a NATO-led mission aiding the Afghan security forces and hunting militants.

The top US general in Afghanistan said 2019 was going to be an interesting year.

An Afghan family, who were living as refugees in Pakistan, carries bundles of supplies at a humanitarian aid station in Torkham, Afghanistan, October 22, 2016. Credit: Reuters/Josh Smith

“The policy review is going on in multiple capitals, peace talks out there, regional players pressing for peace, the Taliban talking about peace, the Afghan government talking about peace,” said General Scott Miller, the US commander of Afghanistan‘s NATO-led force, at the Resolute Support mission headquarters in Kabul.

Border security

Pakistan, which was already working to fence its 1,400 km frontier with Afghanistan and deploy a 50,000-strong paramilitary force along the border, is preparing for a fresh influx of refugees in the event of a disorder.

“Camps will be set up near the border to manage a fresh wave of Afghan refugees and illegal migrants and Afghans will not be allowed to set up illegal homes in Pakistan,” said an official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Afghanistan, which shares borders with Pakistan, Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and China, is already the world’s second-biggest source of refugees, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees.

The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) estimates that approximately 1.4 million undocumented Afghans live in Pakistan and possibly 1.2 million in Iran.

While thousands of undocumented Afghans were driven out of Iran by recent political and economic turbulence, Iranian officials in Kabul said they fear a sudden US troop withdrawal could reverse that trend.

Also Read: The Afghanistan of Today is Not Yet Ready for Peace

“We are working closely with the Afghan government to stop Afghans from entering our country. We don’t want to use violence to stop them, but a sudden US pullout will lead to a crisis,” said an Iranian official.

Afghanistan does not share a land border with Turkey, but Afghans enter Turkey from Iran to work as shepherds, farmers or in the construction sector. Many use it as a transit point to try to enter Europe.

“We have not closed our door but the number of illegal migrants is increasing on a daily basis,” said Mehmet Ozgur Sak, the second secretary at the Turkish embassy in Kabul.

In 2018, Turkish police say they intercepted 90,000 Afghans who were trying to enter the country with fake documents or with the help of traffickers, double the number in 2017.

As negotiations over the future of the country gather momentum, the Taliban have been trying to reassure Afghans that they have nothing to fear after foreign forces leave.

But there are Afghans who refuse to trust the Taliban’s new stance. Sayed Rafi Sadat, a student in western Herat province, said the Taliban would impose harsh laws to destroy democracy.

“If US troops withdraw then there is no hope for the future and we will have to leave the country,” he said.

(Reuters)

Pence Visits Afghanistan, Says US Will ‘See This Through’

In August, Trump pledged a stepped-up military campaign against Taliban insurgents and signalled the US would send more troops to fight in what is the longest war in its history.

US vice president Mike Pence arrives on stage to address troops in a hangar at Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan on December 21, 2017. Credit: Reuters/Mandel Ngan/Pool

Kabul: US vice president Mike Pence made an unannounced trip to Afghanistan to meet its leaders and underscore US commitment to the country four months after President Donald Trump agreed to an open-ended war against insurgents here.

Pence arrived on a military plane at Bagram Airfield under the cover of darkness on Thursday night after leaving Washington on Wednesday night. He then flew by helicopter to Kabul, where he met president Ashraf Ghani and chief executive Abdullah Abdullah at the presidential palace.

Pence told the leaders he hoped his presence there was tangible evidence that the US was “here to see this through”.

In a reversal of his campaign call for a swift withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan, Trump in August pledged a stepped-up military campaign against Taliban insurgents and signalled the US would send more troops to fight in what is the longest war in its history.

At the end of August, there were some 11,000 US troops in Afghanistan and more have since arrived.

Ghani expressed gratitude to the US government and said Afghanistan‘s partnership with the US was cemented in sacrifice.

Pence told reporters the strategy of increased troops on the ground and greater authorities for military leaders was paying dividends.

“The results are really beginning to become evident around the country,” he said, adding that Ghani and Abdullah had said “they’ve begun to see a sea change in the attitudes among the Taliban.” Pence said their hope was that “eventually the enemy will tire of losing” and be willing to talk peace.

Asked if more troops would be needed, Pence said that would be a decision for Trump in the days ahead.

Pence said he pressed the Afghan leaders for political reforms and Ghani assured him that an election commission was developing a framework for parliamentary elections in 2018.

Pence had originally planned to travel to Israel and Egypt this week, but he postponed that trip to remain in Washington while Congress passed legislation to overhaul US tax law.

The short visit to Afghanistan, originally part of the Middle East trip, was shrouded in secrecy for security reasons. Reporters travelling with the vice president were asked not to reveal his whereabouts until after the delegation arrived back at the air base from Kabul and Pence had addressed US troops.

Pence almost did not make it to the presidential palace. The helicopters he and others were flying in came close to turning back to Bagram because of poor visibility, but the pilots were able to find a route in the end, a White House official said.

Pence, who coordinated the process that resulted in Trump’s new Afghanistan policy, has been one of the main interlocutors between the White House and the Afghan leadership since Trump entered office in January.

He repeated his promise of US commitment to the region during remarks to troops at Bagram.

“Under President Donald Trump, the armed forces of the US will remain engaged in Afghanistan until we eliminate the terrorist threat to our homeland, our people once and for all,”Pence said.

Trump’s views of the 16-year-long Afghan conflict have shifted since he came to power.

As a presidential candidate he called for a swift withdrawal of US forces, which were bogged down through the presidencies of Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Barack Obama after a US-led coalition overthrew the Islamist Taliban government for harboring al Qaeda militants who plotted the September 11, 2001, attacks on New York and Washington.

But Trump, while acknowledging the decision went against his instincts, argued in August that a hasty withdrawal would create a vacuum for Islamic State and al Qaeda to fill.

He declined to set a timeline for withdrawal or outline benchmarks for the new strategy’s success.

Echoing Trump’s comments when he unveiled the new strategy, Pence had sharp words for neighbouring Pakistan, which he said had provided safe haven to the Taliban and other groups for too long.

“Those days are over,” Pence said. Pakistan had much to gain from partnering with the US, and much to lose by harbouring “criminals and terrorists,” he said at Bagram.

US troops are involved in training Afghan security forces and carrying out counter-terrorism operations, hoping to reverse gains by the Taliban and prod it to negotiate for peace.

Some 2,400 US forces have died in Afghanistan since the US-led invasion.

(Reuters)

US Army Sergeant Bergdahl Faces Possible Life Sentence for Endangering Troops

Bergdahl pleaded guilty to desertion and misbehaviour before the enemy, with the latter offence carrying a possible life sentence.

US Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl is pictured in this undated handout photo provided by the US Army and received by Reuters on May 31, 2014. Credit: Reuters

Fort Bragg, North Carolina: US Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl pleaded guilty on Monday to deserting his duties in Afghanistan in June 2009 and endangering the lives of fellow troops, a step toward resolving the politically charged case that could send him to prison for life.

The 31-year-old Idaho native told a judge in Fort Bragg, North Carolina, that he walked off his combat outpost in Paktika province and headed to a nearby base to report “critical problems” in his chain of command.

But he got lost after 20 minutes, was captured by the Taliban several hours later and spent the next five years suffering torture, abuse and neglect in captivity.

The dangerous search for him that ensued – and the Taliban prisoner swap that won his release in 2014 – drew wide derision from soldiers and Republicans. During last year’s presidential campaign, Republican Donald Trump called Bergdahl “a no-good traitor.”

In court on Monday, Bergdahl admitted wrongdoing but said he never intended to put anyone at risk.

“I didn’t think there’d be any reason to pull off a crucial mission to look for one guy,” he said, adding that his actions were “very inexcusable.”

Bergdahl pleaded guilty to desertion and misbehaviour before the enemy, with the latter offence carrying a possible life sentence.

His decision to enter a “naked plea” – meaning he had not reached an agreement about the sentencing terms with prosecutors – came as a surprise to some military law experts.

The sentencing proceedings will begin on October 23. Experts said the defence was betting on getting a better deal from Army Judge Colonel Jeffery Nance than it would have from a jury panel of officers.

Two law professors said they expect Bergdahl will receive a dishonourable discharge at a minimum.

“I think Colonel Nance will realise that the men who put their lives on the line looking for him are entitled to see a level of punishment that is appropriate for his misconduct,” said Geoffrey Corn, a professor at South Texas College of Law Houston and retired Army lieutenant colonel.

Army prosecutors will present evidence at sentencing of soldiers who were injured in the search for Bergdahl.

The judge can consider Bergdahl‘s time in captivity, but Jeffrey Addicott, a retired lieutenant colonel in the Army, doubts it will help the soldier much.

“He knew what the Taliban was, and he inflicted that on himself,” said Addicott, now a law professor at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas.

Bergdahl, who remains on active duty in a clerical job at a base in San Antonio, on Monday said he had tried to escape his captors up to 15 times.

The first attempt came on the day he was caught, Bergdahl said. Blindfolded, with a blanket over his head and his hands chained behind his back, he decided to run from the village where he had been taken.

But he quickly was tackled, he said, and taken to another location.

(Reuters)

In the ‘Graveyard of Empires’, the US Military Presence Is on Life Support

As a private citizen, Donald Trump advocated for full US withdrawal. As president, he has chosen to perpetuate, prolong and expand the war, at the cost to more US treasure and lives.

Members of the US military listen as US President Donald Trump announces his strategy for the war in Afghanistan during an address to the nation from Fort Myer, Virginia, US, August 21, 2017. Credit: Reuters/Joshua Roberts

Afghanistan is now Donald Trump’s war. On August 21, the president gave a major policy speech on Afghanistan at Fort Myer near Arlington National Cemetery, where 400,000 fallen American soldiers lie in peace, including 800 from Iraq and Afghanistan. After investing $1 trillion plus and 2,400 US troops killed, Trump said he wanted “an honourable and enduring outcome, worthy of the enormous price that so many have paid.”

In the speech, Trump effectively took ownership of a war from which he had previously distanced himself. To his credit, he said so: his advisers had changed his mind from his gut instincts. Why? Because “When I became president, I was given a bad and very complex hand.” This is an understatement even by British standards, let alone by Trump’s. Given the hand he had been dealt, he concluded, a precipitate withdrawal would leave a vacuum for terrorists and other enemies of the US to fill.

Prolonging the misery

Yet it is likely that Trump’s decision will only delay the inevitable, at more cost to US treasure and lives. The war is in its 17th year, easily the longest in American history. Moreover, the US entered Afghanistan as a relatively fading power. The British Empire and Soviet Union went in at the height of their powers and still failed. Not for nothing is Afghanistan known as the graveyard of empires. In the withdrawal of both Britain and the Soviet Union, the key factor was not the belief that victory had been achieved, but the loss of national will to keep sustaining casualties with no definition of victory nor any indication of the timeline for success.

On December 20, 2010, then vice president Joe Biden was firm in describing the Barack Obama administration’s exit policy: the US would be “totally out” of Afghanistan by 2014, “come hell or high water.” The Taliban response in effect was: “You have the watches, we have the time” and will wait you out. On January 11, 2013, Trump tweeted his opposition to US troops staying in Afghanistan, complaining that US soldiers were being killed by “the Afghanis we train and we waste billions there.” “Let’s get out of Afghanistan… Rebuild the USA.” Instead, as president, he has chosen to perpetuate, prolong and expand the war.

At their peak, US troops numbered around 100,000 in 2010-11. They were backed by another 40,000 coalition troops from NATO and other countries like Australia. If 140,000 of the world’s finest failed to pacify Afghanistan enduringly, there is little cause to believe that after being boosted by about 4,000 troops, fewer than 15,000 soldiers can now do the job. This has to count as a triumph of hope over experience, meeting Einstein’s definition of insanity as doing the same thing over and over again to get a different result.

Does anyone really expect the Afghan government to withstand the Taliban and other enemies once the foreigners withdraw? The central government controls approximately 60% of the territory. The Taliban are able to attack cities, including Kabul, seize control of the countryside and will look to expand northwards and westwards. Powers around Afghanistan – China, Iran, Russia, Pakistan, India – can already be seen to be positioning themselves for a new normal after the US exit in which they renew the great game.

A speech is not a strategy

The gloomy assessment of the prospects for Afghanistan underlines the truism that a speech does not make a strategy. “Staying the course” is a slogan, not a policy. Trump has effectively reversed Theodore Roosevelt’s famous aphorism – ‘Shout loudly but carry a limp twig’.

US President Donald Trump announces his strategy for the war in Afghanistan during an address to the nation from Fort Myer, Virginia, US, August 21, 2017. Credit: Reuters/Joshua Roberts

According to counter-insurgency expert David Kilcullen, Trump’s speech hinted at welcome signs of good process in policy development. Kilcullen’s generous assessment highlights that the administration conducted a robust policy debate, asked tough questions, challenged assumptions and conventional wisdom, developed options and made a clear and public choice from among the competing options. After having taken ownership of the war, will Trump will stay engaged with the task for a sustained period?

However, the most important questions were not asked. Does the physical presence of American troops in Muslim-majority countries contain or fan the fires of Islamic terrorism? Do ‘we’ create more terrorists than we kill and capture? Are ‘they’ coming here in bigger numbers because we are there for a never-ending period? Has the war on terrorism since 9/11 created the very conditions that sustain and multiply terrorists?

An emerging Trump doctrine?

Scepticism about the prospects aside, are there hints of an emerging Trump foreign policy playbook regarding US objectives and the tactics to achieve them? There are many common elements across the different conflict theatres of Iraq, Syria, North Korea and Afghanistan. They clearly spring from Trump’s self-belief as a skilled negotiator and deal maker. But whether they translate well from the business setting to world politics is an open question.

Firstly, and by no quite a familiar trope, “America First” equates to a policy of “Let’s just mind our own business.”

Secondly, in all his foreign policy dealings, Trump is transactional and pragmatic, not ideological and dogmatic. His objectives are operational, not aspirational: killing terrorists, not nation-building, not constructing democracies – forget about building Afghan institutions and educating its girls.

Thirdly, don’t tip your hand to the enemy. Keep them guessing on the nature, firepower and timing of your moves. Thus, Trump has refused to give a statement on the increase in the number of US troops, even though most informed speculation puts it at around 4,000. This way, the enemy cannot anticipate US military moves and is kept off balance and nervous. Trump does not believe in entrapping himself in timelines for military operations.

Fourth, Trump has recalibrated the executive-military balance. In delegating strategy and tactics to the defence secretary and the generals, he has reversed the Obama-era centralisation of military decision-making in the White House. Despite the centralisation, Obama was remarkably disengaged from and inattentive towards Afghanistan and could not hide his impatience to get out soon as possible. Trump has given the military tactical latitude on the choice of targets, ordinance and timing not enjoyed under Obama. For example, it was the military brass who decided to use the Massive Ordnance Air Blast (MOAB or ‘Mother of All Bombs’ in the popular vernacular) in Afghanistan on April 13.

Under Trump, administration sets policy and Pentagon fights the wars

Micro-management from Washington, DC, does not win battles. They’re won in the field, drawing upon the judgment and expertise of wartime commanders and front-line soldiers, acting in real time with real authority and with a clear mission to defeat the enemy.

Fifth, call out neighbours who tolerate extremists and enable US enemies. An Afghan policy review is automatically a Pakistan policy review. But in fact, Trump has turned it into a South Asia policy review which is interesting. His speech contained some of the toughest language heard from Washington on Pakistan providing safe haven for the Afghan Taliban, Al Qaeda, Haqqani network etc. “Pakistan often gives safe haven to agents of chaos, violence and terror” said Trump, just as he had earlier called out China for enabling North Korea.

In a subsequent commentary, John Bolton argued that Trump should go further and call out China as an enabler of Pakistani nuclear weaponisation and terrorism. “Of all the external actors, China bears primary responsibility for Pakistan’s and North Korea’s possession of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles,” he wrote in the Wall Street Journal. “In both cases, China recklessly disregarded the risks of proliferation and breached its obligations under the non-proliferation treaty (NPT). China was hardly unaware that Pakistan has fostered and aided Islamic terrorists”, he said. Bolton should know whereof he speaks – he was Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security from 2001-05 and President George W. Bush’s permanent representative to the UN from 2005-06.

An Afghan man watches the TV broadcast of the US President Donald Trump’s speech, in Kabul, Afghanistan August 22, 2017. Credit: Reuters/Omar Sobhani

Will Trump succeed in reining in Pakistan where all previous US presidents have failed? For Pakistan, the Afghan Taliban are a geopolitical insurance policy for strategic depth, retaining influence in Kabul, containing Indian influence and projecting its own influence in the region. There is a good historical reason to remain sceptical that Pakistan will withdraw sanctuary and support to its proxies anytime soon.

Sixth and conversely, enlist neighbours whose goals and objectives are in sync. In the case of Afghanistan, this means India. Presidents Bush and Obama asked Pakistan’s generals on what more do they want by way of economic aid and military assistance to stop backing enemies of the US? In trying to incentivise Pakistani good behaviour by keeping India out of Afghanistan, they gave Pakistan a de facto veto over Afghanistan-India relations despite the latter two’s preferences.

Trump has subtly changed the equation: If you keep supporting our enemy, we will bring in India as our strategic partner. The problem for New Delhi is that the change of approaches with each turnover of administration in Washington does not connote consistency of purpose and strategy. India’s challenge is how to take advantage of Trump’s epiphany without leaving itself vulnerable to an American relapse into dependence on Pakistan.

Seventh and finally, let the locals lead. In a twist to Obama’s much-derided but sensible policy, Trump’s America, too, will lead from behind. In Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq, the US will concentrate mainly on training local forces to do the fighting.

What lies ahead

Having expressed scepticism about the prospects of Trump’s policy on Afghanistan, the final question is: Should Kabul fall to the Taliban, how much of a threat are they likely to pose to US security? Not much is the surprising answer. Their primary interest and focus is on internal governance. There is no evidence that Mullah Omar was aware of 9/11 plans in advance. The Taliban back in power will be brutal for Afghans, with the reimposition of extremist Islamic law and rule. It would be a setback for India, with sanctuary and support given to anti-Indian jihadists. But it is unlikely to constitute a major security threat to the US.

Ramesh Thakur is professor in the Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University.