Opinion
Karzai's Afghanistan Steps Deeper
into Security Quagmire
by John Stanly
The attempt on President
Hamid Karzai's life in the heart of the capital city of Kabul by
suspected Taliban militants underscores the growing pessimism about
security in the country. If the April 27 attack is anything to go by,
Taliban militants are increasing their influence all across the country.
Soon after the attack, the Taliban claimed responsibility saying its aim
was to show that it could strike from the capital. The message is clear
- the Taliban has reached the capital.
It was not long ago that US President George W. Bush pledged to "smoke"
the terrorists "out of their holes" in Taliban-controlled Afghanistan.
However, almost seven years after he declared a war on terrorism,
Taliban militants, once driven out of Kabul by the US with the help of
the Northern Alliance, have shown that they can carry out a
well-coordinated attack even against the president in his turf.
Given the security situation and the incompetence of the Karzai regime,
the latest attack is unlikely to take anybody by surprise. Critics of
the US' Afghan invasion long ago warned that Washington could not win
over the Taliban with its muscle power.
Even after seven years of counter-insurgency operations with perhaps the
most sophisticated weapons, the Afghan government and its "international
allies" are still struggling to ensure security to the citizens staying
outside Kabul. Acute poverty and security threats from the Taliban have
forced the citizens, mostly in the south, to shift their loyalty to the
insurgents. The government's failure to reach out to the people and take
care of their basic needs has driven the Afghans away from Kabul, which
is largely perceived as a puppet establishment of Washington.
According to the United Nations, 78 of 376 districts in the country are
Taliban strongholds where the government's security apparatus is totally
non-functional. Government officials agree that there is a growing gap
between the government and the people that is being exploited by the
Taliban. The government is unable to even carry out reconstruction work
in the south as Taliban militants frequently attack government forces
and often kidnap aid workers.
The Kabul attack shows that the militants are no longer hiding in their
"holes" in the Tora Bora Mountains waiting for their opportunity to
strike against the foreign troops. They are out in the streets,
targeting the supporters and the top leadership of the government - the
same strategy the militants used against the Soviet troops in the 1980s.
If they succeed in creating a permanent internal security threat among
the citizens, they would have won the first part of the battle.
This poses serious doubts about the counter-insurgency strategy of the
NATO-led international troops. Last year, more than 8,000 people died in
violence related to insurgency, and there were 160 suicide attacks.
Kabul, where a large number of international troops are stationed, has
been considered relatively calm since the American invasion. However,
with the latest attack, the militants have shattered the security claims
of the government. The ability of the militants to get so close to
Karzai with weapons shows that they had inside help.
The growing concern over the failure of the Afghan strategy was visible
when Uzbekistan President Islam Karimov made it clear at the recent NATO
summit in Bucharest that NATO alone could not ensure security in
Afghanistan. According to him, apart from the NATO and the US, major
powers like China and Russia and also the Central Asian republics should
be allowed to play a larger role in Afghanistan. It however still
remains unclear whether the US would be ready for a realignment of
troops in Afghanistan. Russia, on the other side, has so far been
reluctant to get involved in Afghanistan though it has strong interests
in Central Asia.
A paradigm shift in the western governments' Afghan policy is
inevitable, as the situation gets worse day by day. It is already clear
that the puppet government in Kabul, even with the support of the
international troops, is not capable of quelling the insurgency. The
rise of Sunni Islamists in Afghanistan is in nobody's interest. To
prevent such a catastrophe, the international community should ensure
wider cooperation and consider all possible options.
(John Stanly is a research scholar with Jawaharlal Nehru University's
Department of West Asian Studies. He can be contacted at stanly.j@ians.in)
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