Shibdas Bhattacharjee
‘‘I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al-Qaida in Pakistan and Afghanistan and to prevent their return to either country in the future. That’s the goal that must be achieved. That is a cause that could not be more just. And to the terrorists who oppose us, my message is the same: We will defeat you.”
This was the view expressed by the new US President while unveiling the US policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan that came to be known as the ‘‘AfPak policy’’ of the new US administration to bring back peace, stability and normalcy in these trouble-torn nations. But the new US strategy for this region has little new to say on some of the key problems that have jeopardized the Western effort in bringing peace there despite the two conceptual departures from the traditional US policy.
The American leadership has begun to speak for the first time of starting a UN Contact Group on Afghanistan and Pakistan, an important step at the level of thought. Since the ouster of the Taliban from Kabul in the late 2001, the latter have invariably been seen as an Afghan issue in which Pakistan was involved only to the extent that Islamabad’s assistance was thought necessary in dealing with the Taliban and Al Qaeda. This myth stands dissolved and it was predicted that the problem should be seen from a wider perspective, as inclusion of the Pakistan-based jihadi outfits in the so-called action plan has been trying to assure. The second conceptual break is with regard to involving regional countries in helping to solve the terrorism problem that has come to threaten regional and international security. This was a recognition that the broad track so far the US has adopted has not delivered the desired results as far as the question of peace and security of this region is concerned. Thus President Barack Obama’s AfPak policy is considered an effort to produce a rift in the Taliban resulting in those not ideologically wedded to the extremist group to break rank and join hands with the government in Kabul.
In fact, behind President Obama’s new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan is an attempt to keep the reformulated approach tied to clear and attainable measures of progress. The emphasis on pragmatism appears to be, to some degree, away from the earlier Bush administration efforts, which set a broad and very challenging ambition to foster an enduring Afghan democracy. The new policy places an elevated priority on supporting the Afghan government’s fledgling civilian capabilities to deliver public services and establish its authority throughout the country. The Obama team is also intent on getting deeper international support, in the form of either additional troops or money.
In Obama’s new policy, Iran is seen as an important regional player in Afghanistan’s future, a reality that the administration has decided to recognize explicitly. Still, multilateral deliberations over Afghan security are not being viewed as a forum in which any broader strategic dialogue with Tehran could emerge. The Obama policy, notes an official, is tantamount to an endorsement of a Congressional funding plan, known as the Kerry-Lugar legislation, that links long-term US security assistance to Islamabad to that government’s effort at curbing Taliban activity along the frontier areas of western Pakistan that border Afghanistan. The administration believes that maintaining the new relationship envisioned between Islamabad and Washington depends on a convergence of views on how to counter the Taliban-driven security challenges in Pakistan.
But the present situation in Afghanistan is quite alarming. Resources are insufficient, attacks are up from the jihadis, and the Taliban are in greater control. While civilian opinion is mixed, they expect coming years to be more difficult with the increase of US forces, which will logically bring increased casualties, and will lead to increase in violence in general. It is now an irony that the US and its allies attacked Afghanistan in the name of bringing human rights, democracy and freedom to the war-torn country. The Taliban regime fell and Hamid Karzai’s puppet regime took over in the name of a fake democracy. However, today the deceitful policies of Karzai and his Western guardians have brought Afghanistan to a very critical situation in which disaster is ticking like a time bomb that can explode any time. Trickery has effectively been used in the name of democracy and freedom during these years, and the human rights situation in Afghanistan is a product of the painful deception of the government. As an outcome, Afghanistan ranks as the fifth most corrupt nation in the world, and second as a failed state.
The reality is quite shocking not only for the US but also for the whole international community, as the United States is not fighting the Taliban alone in Afghanistan. It is fighting the entire Pashtun community, some 30 million people, two-thirds of whom live across the border in Pakistan. That border has never really existed for the Pashtuns, who move freely across it in peace and in war. The Taliban are entirely Pashtun in membership, and always were. The US invasion effectively drove out not just the Taliban but the Pashtuns in general from power, in a country that Pashtuns have dominated for several centuries. To minimize US casualties, the Americans made an alliance with all the non-Pashtun ethnic groups of Afghanistan (the “Northern Alliance”) in 2001. There really was no American land invasion; it was the Northern Alliance that defeated the Taliban, with considerable assistance from the Americans. It was a clever strategy, but it perpetuated what was effectively an Afghan civil war between the Pashtuns and all other ethnic groups — Tajik, Hazara and Uzbek. Thus the name “Taliban” has been misused by Americans. All people belonging to Pashtun community are not terrorists or followers of the Taliban.
The US initiative to oust the Taliban regime for the sake of peace, democracy and stability in Afghanistan has failed. The policy of keeping out the Pashtun community from the new power structure of the country further complicated the situation. At present the harsh reality is that the Taliban are regrouping and posing a greater threat to the world. This obviously brings forth the important question as to whether there is a military solution of the Afghan problem. Presently it is the Afghan rank and file who are paying the price. After all, they are the victims of US policy crisis in Afghanistan.
(The writer is a freelancer based in Halakura, Dhubri) THE SENTINEL
‘‘I want the American people to understand that we have a clear and focused goal: to disrupt, dismantle and defeat al-Qaida in Pakistan and Afghanistan and to prevent their return to either country in the future. That’s the goal that must be achieved. That is a cause that could not be more just. And to the terrorists who oppose us, my message is the same: We will defeat you.”
This was the view expressed by the new US President while unveiling the US policy in Afghanistan and Pakistan that came to be known as the ‘‘AfPak policy’’ of the new US administration to bring back peace, stability and normalcy in these trouble-torn nations. But the new US strategy for this region has little new to say on some of the key problems that have jeopardized the Western effort in bringing peace there despite the two conceptual departures from the traditional US policy.
The American leadership has begun to speak for the first time of starting a UN Contact Group on Afghanistan and Pakistan, an important step at the level of thought. Since the ouster of the Taliban from Kabul in the late 2001, the latter have invariably been seen as an Afghan issue in which Pakistan was involved only to the extent that Islamabad’s assistance was thought necessary in dealing with the Taliban and Al Qaeda. This myth stands dissolved and it was predicted that the problem should be seen from a wider perspective, as inclusion of the Pakistan-based jihadi outfits in the so-called action plan has been trying to assure. The second conceptual break is with regard to involving regional countries in helping to solve the terrorism problem that has come to threaten regional and international security. This was a recognition that the broad track so far the US has adopted has not delivered the desired results as far as the question of peace and security of this region is concerned. Thus President Barack Obama’s AfPak policy is considered an effort to produce a rift in the Taliban resulting in those not ideologically wedded to the extremist group to break rank and join hands with the government in Kabul.
In fact, behind President Obama’s new strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan is an attempt to keep the reformulated approach tied to clear and attainable measures of progress. The emphasis on pragmatism appears to be, to some degree, away from the earlier Bush administration efforts, which set a broad and very challenging ambition to foster an enduring Afghan democracy. The new policy places an elevated priority on supporting the Afghan government’s fledgling civilian capabilities to deliver public services and establish its authority throughout the country. The Obama team is also intent on getting deeper international support, in the form of either additional troops or money.
In Obama’s new policy, Iran is seen as an important regional player in Afghanistan’s future, a reality that the administration has decided to recognize explicitly. Still, multilateral deliberations over Afghan security are not being viewed as a forum in which any broader strategic dialogue with Tehran could emerge. The Obama policy, notes an official, is tantamount to an endorsement of a Congressional funding plan, known as the Kerry-Lugar legislation, that links long-term US security assistance to Islamabad to that government’s effort at curbing Taliban activity along the frontier areas of western Pakistan that border Afghanistan. The administration believes that maintaining the new relationship envisioned between Islamabad and Washington depends on a convergence of views on how to counter the Taliban-driven security challenges in Pakistan.
But the present situation in Afghanistan is quite alarming. Resources are insufficient, attacks are up from the jihadis, and the Taliban are in greater control. While civilian opinion is mixed, they expect coming years to be more difficult with the increase of US forces, which will logically bring increased casualties, and will lead to increase in violence in general. It is now an irony that the US and its allies attacked Afghanistan in the name of bringing human rights, democracy and freedom to the war-torn country. The Taliban regime fell and Hamid Karzai’s puppet regime took over in the name of a fake democracy. However, today the deceitful policies of Karzai and his Western guardians have brought Afghanistan to a very critical situation in which disaster is ticking like a time bomb that can explode any time. Trickery has effectively been used in the name of democracy and freedom during these years, and the human rights situation in Afghanistan is a product of the painful deception of the government. As an outcome, Afghanistan ranks as the fifth most corrupt nation in the world, and second as a failed state.
The reality is quite shocking not only for the US but also for the whole international community, as the United States is not fighting the Taliban alone in Afghanistan. It is fighting the entire Pashtun community, some 30 million people, two-thirds of whom live across the border in Pakistan. That border has never really existed for the Pashtuns, who move freely across it in peace and in war. The Taliban are entirely Pashtun in membership, and always were. The US invasion effectively drove out not just the Taliban but the Pashtuns in general from power, in a country that Pashtuns have dominated for several centuries. To minimize US casualties, the Americans made an alliance with all the non-Pashtun ethnic groups of Afghanistan (the “Northern Alliance”) in 2001. There really was no American land invasion; it was the Northern Alliance that defeated the Taliban, with considerable assistance from the Americans. It was a clever strategy, but it perpetuated what was effectively an Afghan civil war between the Pashtuns and all other ethnic groups — Tajik, Hazara and Uzbek. Thus the name “Taliban” has been misused by Americans. All people belonging to Pashtun community are not terrorists or followers of the Taliban.
The US initiative to oust the Taliban regime for the sake of peace, democracy and stability in Afghanistan has failed. The policy of keeping out the Pashtun community from the new power structure of the country further complicated the situation. At present the harsh reality is that the Taliban are regrouping and posing a greater threat to the world. This obviously brings forth the important question as to whether there is a military solution of the Afghan problem. Presently it is the Afghan rank and file who are paying the price. After all, they are the victims of US policy crisis in Afghanistan.
(The writer is a freelancer based in Halakura, Dhubri) THE SENTINEL
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