Afghanistan: New Strategy or Old Wine in New Bottle?

“We will defeat you (Al Qaeda),” President of the United States, Barack Obama, said recently, as he unveiled the US Administration’s ‘new’ intervention strategy in India’s western neighbourhood, the Af-Pak policy.

The comprehensive, Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy announced by President Obama on 27 March has several elements. The US purpose in Afghanistan, however largely remains the same as outlined by the Bush Administration, which was characterised by targetting the Al Qaeda and the Taliban with massive force. The new policy links Afghanistan to Pakistan, their border being the “most dangerous place in the world”, as Obama said at the White House while announcing the Af-Pak policy. In Obama’s words, as a part of a “stronger, smarter and comprehensive strategy”, the “military, governance and economic capacity” of Afghanistan and Pakistan has to be simultaneously enhanced through international support

In his address while announcing the strategy, President Obama sent a clear message on terrorism to the Pakistan establishment, saying that “the single greatest threat to (the) future comes from Al -Qaeda and their extremist allies, and that is why we must stand together”. This forms the backdrop of the US$1.5 billion aid promised to Pakistan each year for the next five years. Creating “opportunity zones in the border region to develop the economy and bring hope to places plagued by violence” is a part of the same strategy.  The President said that the US would engage in “constructive diplomacy” with both India and Pakistan to reduce tensions.

The President advocates a two-pronged strategy to put pressure on the Taliban. On one hand an additional 17,000 US troops will be deployed in Afghanistan to “take the fight to the Taliban in the south and east”, while on the other measures to strengthen the Afghan Security Forces will be taken. The US will “shift the emphasis” of their mission to “training and increasing the size of the Afghan security forces, so that they can eventually take the lead in securing their country”. Towards this initiative, approximately 4,000 US troops will be deployed. The Afghan army is thus being expanded to 134,000 and police force to 82,000 by 2011.

This troop surge will be supplemented by a “civilian effort” by providing, “agricultural specialists and educators, engineers and lawyers” to develop the Afghan economy. A new Contact Group for Afghanistan and Pakistan which will include Central Asian states, the Gulf nations and Iran; Russia, India and China is also being created. 

The Afghanistan-Pakistan policy thus provides a clear and focused approach to resolve the instability that bedevils this region by identifying key objectives, earmarking resources and denoting an integrated strategy to achieve the same. However, Obama’s measures largely remain connected to the Bush policy, apart from the focus on three issues – closely linking Afghanistan and Pakistan in a single continuum, creation of a Contact Group of interested regional players and the important “civilian effort”.

What is clearly missing is the much needed “Afghan-approach” to the whole conundrum. The problems in Afghanistan need an indigenous rather than an imposed approach. As President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan has said many a time and most recently, “Afghanistan ... will never be a puppet state.” He has been particularly sceptical of the movement in international circles to dilute the authority of the central government in Afghanistan saying, “That is not their job. The issue of governance and the creation of (a mechanism for) good governance is the work of the Afghan people.” Thus, imposing an American or a Western model may prove to be disastrous.

While the policy will lead to stabilisation in the short term, the goals seem to be restricted to taking out the Al Qaeda leadership and the Taliban and then exiting the trouble-torn region. Afghanistan, on the other hand, requires sustained international and regional support in rebuilding modern governance structures integrating with the traditional ones.

Ironically, the Taliban has also been undertaking a parallel review of its policy and organisation of militancy. Mullah Mohammed Omar has given a call to the Pakistani militant groups to join the battle to “liberate Afghanistan from the occupation forces”. In first signs of integration, three key Pakistan-based Taliban groups led by Behtullah Mehsud, Mullah Nazir and Gul Bahadur have come together to form the Shura Ittihad-ul-Mujahideen. They are also willing to send their fighters into Afghanistan to combat the surge of the US and NATO forces. Thus the areas astride the Durand Line, Southern and Eastern Afghanistan will see increased militant activity in the months ahead.

In the context of holding talks with a moderate Taliban, it is at first necessary to address who these, “moderate” Taliban are, what is their loyalty and whether they would stick to promises made, and for how long? There is support in Afghanistan for talks with the Taliban and therefore this factor may play an increasingly important role in the days ahead. However the core Taliban around Mullah Omar are not expected to compromise, therefore a soft and a hard strategy to bring down the level of violence by physically reducing the number of militants in the mainstream will have to be adopted.

The diffusion of tensions between India and Pakistan seems to be have been identified as an aim of the new US administration, but it can also be read as a tactic to assuage Islamabad. What has been clearly missed out is the sustained support that Pakistan has been providing to terrorist groups operating not just in Afghanistan but also in India. A clear message to Pakistan to clamp down on the same would have sent the right signals. India has possibly failed to insist on this term of reference while having succeeded in avoiding a direct reference to Kashmir.

There is no doubt that Indian interests are best served by supporting the international effort in Afghanistan. India will be able to provide whatever assistance is required be it political, economic or even military training, which the United States and other regional players such as Pakistan are comfortable with.

Indian assistance in aid, development of trade linkages, agriculture and other areas where there is a congruence in interests would be ideal keeping in view the regional dynamics of antagonism that a closer interaction would draw from Pakistan, something that Washington may not want. India’s Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon has indicated that India and United States have similar goals in the region and has suggested an integrated approach encompassing development, security and governance. Thus the way ahead for New Delhi seems to be to support the economic and trade effort in Afghanistan.

In the final analysis the success for the United States and NATO in Afghanistan will lie in their willingness to support the Afghans in restoration of order rather than remote social, political, economic and military engineering from Washington and Brussels.

 (Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the views either of the Editorial Committee or the Centre for Land Warfare)