At the London conference on Afghanistan yesterday Gordon Brown and Hamid Karzai presented the way forward for Afghanistan. Apart from the intent to talk to the Taliban, much of the strategy remains as before, albeit with an added urgency to deliver. Some of the measures outlined have been tried before in one shape or the other and for the most part failed. It is difficult to assess the chances for success of the new phase without knowing the finer details. Nonetheless, taken at face value experience does suggest that many of the measures will struggle to achieve their aims unless lessons of the past have been learned.
Overall the priority is to improve governance, strengthen security, fight corruption, advance economic development, enhance regional partnerships and attempt to bring the Taliban back into Afghan society. As part of the new phase outlined, several measures were announced:
• Expansion of the Afghan security forces with the gradual transfer of responsibility for security to Afghans to begin this year
• A Trust Fund to reconcile and reintegrate Taliban fighters into Afghan society
• Appointment of an independent high (anti-corruption) office with investigative powers and an international monitoring group of experts
• Provision of support to national and subnational civil servants as part of the civilian surge
• Increase the share of foreign aid that is delivered through the Afghan national budget to 50 per cent and expand aid for agricultural programmes
Nation-building is in principle about political development or transformation that requires as a prerequisite a functional government administration. Gaining the trust and confidence of the people in new governance structures is also crucial. Ultimately, to succeed, the realisation of equitable social and economic development is of paramount importance.
In Afghanistan the progress on the governance and social and economic agenda has been both inadequate and inequitable, enabling the insurgency to grow and spread instability. Together with the endemic corruption in the country, and recent diluting of democracy at the presidential elections, many of the achievements since 2001 have been overshadowed.
Expansion of Afghan army and police
The aim to expand and empower the Afghan army and police will play a key role in ensuring a stable and secure future for the Afghan people and is an integral part of the strategy. As well as increasing the number of soldiers and fast tracking training, the international community must ensure the Afghan troops are paid a livable wage and are sufficiently equipped. For the last several years, the troops were paid little more than $100 a month, woefully inadequate to provide for their families. At the same time, the Taliban were enticing recruits by paying $200-$300 a month. This inequity gap must be closed and Afghan troops as well our troops should be paid far more.
The Re-integration Trust Fund
The new Trust Fund aims to reintegrate Taliban fighters into Afghan society but will be extremely difficult to effectively implement in Afghanistan. Many projects and interventions in Afghanistan end up with skewed outcomes (with the wrong people benefiting) as a result of inadequate governing structures and blatant nepotism.
In addition to being operationally difficult, the new Trust Fund also sends out the wrong signals to the ordinary Afghan people, as it basically rewards ‘bad behaviour’. In the past farmers were paid not to grow poppy, which backfired as it encouraged others not growing poppy to begin its cultivation just so they could also benefit from the handouts. The message being sent out once again to ordinary Afghans is that if you grow poppy or are a Taliban fighter you are entitled to receive money, a job, and possibly a house. Yet if you are a poor law-abiding Afghan you will not benefit from the new phase.
The focus should be on delivering more development and reconstruction aid and funding economic development projects for the ordinary and poorer Afghan people.
Delivering aid
In terms of development aid for Afghanistan, the international community should have done more and done it much better. Afghanistan has fared far worse than other post-conflict areas. In the two years following international intervention, Afghanistan received $57 per capita in aid, whilst Bosnia and East Timor received $679 and $233 per capita respectively.
To put things in perspective, the US military is spending nearly $100 million a day in Afghanistan, yet the average volume of international aid provided by all donors since 2001 is little more than $7 million per day. To win hearts and minds, a shift in this equation is necessary.
The new phase of the strategy to increase aid to Afghanistan is welcome. The expansion of agricultural programme and projects designed to counter the narco-economy is a step in the right direction, though there still does not seem to be a coherent ‘drugs’ strategy in place.
However a key problem that persists in Afghanistan is the extremely low level of disbursement of funds by donors and poor capacity of the ministry of finance and government to deliver programmes and projects. Even today, to make a financial disbursement for a programme or project via the Afghan national budget requires over 20 signatures which can take an eternity to obtain – all the while the funds sit in the bank account and Afghans sit deprived of projects. The capacity to handle more funds through the Afghan government does not exist.
Unless there are some serious structural reforms which increase capacity and transparency, the international community should not be looking to pour 50 per cent of its aid funds through the Afghan system. The pressing aim is to ensure timely delivery of programmes and projects to the Afghan people. The anticipated civilian surge should facilitate further institutional reforms across the governing structures to ensure there is sufficient capacity to manage aid in a timely, accountable and transparent fashion and ability to deliver public services.
International coordination & communication
In order for the measures and strategy to have any chance of being successful, better coordination is needed between international actors on state building and development agenda. The largest donor to Afghanistan, the US, maintains its ‘inability’ to share information on its development aid and project interventions in Afghanistan, greatly undermining coordination and cooperation efforts. The situation has slightly improved since the election of the Obama but it is still an intransigent problem.
The London conference provided the opportunity to obtain understanding among the 70 or so foreign ministers who attended, and some of the public, of the coherence and clarity of the plan and hopefully better coordination mechanisms, though the jury is still out on this.
Linked to the need for effective coordination is the need for better communication. The international community must ensure it has a strong relationship and dialogue with the people of Afghanistan. It must do a better job of explaining the new phase not only to the Afghan people but people back home. In addition, regular feedback on progress or otherwise must be provided and there must be more honesty about failures.
Fighting corruption
An independent monitoring panel with international members is a step in right direction. Fighting endemic corruption must be tackled head on. To be effective the international community must better support the international advisers working in Afghanistan. Too often in the past advisers (who uncover corrupt behaviour) were simply removed by the donors who did not want to upset Afghan ministers. This only fuels further corruption and has allowed people get away with it.
Nation-building in Afghanistan will only be successful when the apparatus of government, working in partnership with the international community can amply demonstrate the delivery of an inclusive political, economic, social, and secure ‘order’, which effectively meets the aspirations of the people. To achieve this, both the Afghan government and international community need to raise their game and make good on the promises of the past.
The new phase outlined in London yesterday is not without major risks and obstacles. Given there is no Plan B, the strategy must be made to work.
Very informative thank you. Highlights the complexity of the situation.
Excellent article. Very well written. Clearly shows that its important to have experience on the ground to understand the situation better. Maybe we should be looking for a Plan B. Just in case.
Thanks Del.
I think your good article, focused on development policies, avoided to spell the words in everybody’s minds:exit strategy.
The benchmarks of the new Compact are vague; time horizon unclear.
Human rights are not on the agenda.
A trust fund to reconcile and reintegrate taliban fighters is disputable, both for its ethics and its effectiveness, in the Afghan scenario. No attention is given to the victims.
While we all welcome the future Afghan ownnership of the security, Americans are likely to take over from the Germans in Kunduz, and the Canadians in Kandahar.
Many in Kabul are disputing the usefullness of the Conference itself, while one third of the Cabinet is not in place. A Government with 24 Ministers, 50 Deputy Ministers, another 60 Advisors to the President. Transparency? Legitimacy? And what is the health of democracy in Afghanistan?
Oh, finally, everybody, from McChrystal to Eide, is repeating the ominous sentence: things will get worse before getting better. With a constant increase of NATO troops, training of Afghan armed forces, drones attacks on both sides of the Af-Pak border, Pakistani offensive against Talib sanctuaries, after 9 years from the fall of the Taliban, things still get worse before getting better?
Given there is bo plan B, things must work. Nice. And what if plan A doesn’t really work, the way it didn’t work in the past 9 years? London won’t tell us what happens if the Afghan armed forced are not trained well. Probably, the West will be still dragged into this low-intensity war for another 5, 10 years.
What happens if the Government will continue being not transparent and efficient enough to manage through its budget the aid effort? Bilateral aid will continue, in armored vehicles and difficult security conditions. Corruption will triumph, along with poppy production, human rights violations, criminality, insurgency, and “allergy to the foregner”.
In London we trashed a number of goals set for this country, such as a just, decent reconciliation mechanism. We royally inaugurated the lowering of our expectations, given our incapability to reach not even half the objectives agreed upon in previous international Conferences. Since we were not able, in the end, to conquer hearts and minds with wise and effective development strategy, a political negotiation must be the way forward.
This urgency to get out of the country cannot pass unnoticed among the insurgents and the Taliban. Shouldn’t they continue their wait and see strategy? Should ideologic, fanatic, radical fighters give up for good on their aims for the promise of money and land? and what if the promises go unfullfilled, due to the greed and corruption of Afghan officials? would the insurgency restart? Would the tribal warfare reignite?
Don’t worry: foreign troops will be no longer in the country: no valuable western lives will be at stake.
your friend
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great article, that’s very well written and provides clear explanations and analysis.
Dharmender,
Your article is refreshingly written in that it avoids the two easy options of taking the official government line and attacking the official government line,
One question I have though regards the expansion of the Afghan army and police – what guarantees are there that the army and police won’t be used in the same way they are in the West Bank under American supervision and with British funding – i.e. to suppress alternative political views, to stop protest and to generally undermine democracy?