Adverse dynamics

In keeping with the desire to reduce the strategic instability emanating from the country, the US objective is to create an Afghan government that represents the aspirations of the people; maintains a balance among ethnic groups; involves various political groupings; serves as a competent partner for economic reconstruction; and respects human rights. However, the prospect of achieving this objective is rapidly receding as a result of three dynamics and the inadequate US response to them.

Firstly, the Panjshiri faction of the NA, a narrowly based group of Tajiks led by First Vice-President and Defence Minister Mohammed Fahim, wishes to monopolise power. Its grab for power began when it unilaterally seized Kabul last autumn against the express wishes of US President George W. Bush. The faction occupied all ministries and appointed senior staffs to them, while its leader, Burhannudin Rabbani, ensconced himself in the presidential palace. At the December 2001 Bonn conference, the NA exploited its dominant position on the ground to win control over the key ministries – defence, interior and foreign affairs – as well as the intelligence and security service. NA leaders have used their control over the instruments of force to coerce and intimidate political rivals.

At the Loya Jirga in June 2002, Fahim and his faction threatened to take up arms if the US did not block the candidacy for head of state of the Pushtun former king, Zahir Shah (who had the support of two-thirds of delegates). After the US caved
in to Fahim's demands, the Panjshiris increased their control over the cabinet and key ministries. Although their interior minister, Yunus Qanooni, nominally gave up control of this ministry, his replacement – the 83-year-old Taj Mohammed Wardak – was related to the Panjshiris by marriage and was too old to wrest control of the ministry from the NA-appointed senior staff. Qanooni was soon given oversight responsibilities for interior affairs. More broadly, two-thirds of the cabinet positions were allocated to individuals from groups aligned with the NA, while the Rome group, centred around the ex-king and the NA's only organised political rival, lost virtually all of its posts. Most significantly, Fahim was given the additional post of first vice-president, making him next in line to President Hamid Karzai.

Secondly, regional powers have begun to intervene in Afghanistan and the stage is being set for future proxy battles.
Fahim has secured support from Russia, both in terms of money and advisers. Uzbekistan has supported favoured ethnic Uzbek warlords. Meanwhile, Iran has played a three-level game. Officials around President Mohammed Khatami have cooperated, on the surface, with US diplomatic efforts. Meanwhile, Iranian intelligence has been providing support to its longstanding clients in the NA, both in Kabul and among the warlords. Iran has also established two Hezbollah-style clandestine networks, Sepah-e Mohammed and Sepah-e Sahaba, that can be activated to attack US and coalition targets. Pakistan appears to be preparing for a more active role once the US presence wanes. Elements of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) have reportedly been sheltering Taliban and al-Qaeda leaders in tribal areas and cities. US officials have noted that captured caches in eastern Afghanistan have contained relatively new equipment that has probably come from Pakistan.

Thirdly, the warlords in virtually every region have strengthened their positions. The US continues to fund warlords seen as useful in the hunt for the remnants of the Taliban and al-Qaeda. Others are backed by Iran, Russia or Uzbekistan. Many have developed independent means of support. For example, those who control border provinces, such as Ismail Khan in Herat, are seizing virtually all customs duties and passing little to the central government. Moreover, in ethnic Pushtun, Uzbek and other areas where Afghans are fearful of the Panjshiri-dominated government, warlords have secured allegiance by providing some protection from the perceived threat of Fahim's troops. As a result, the Karzai government has had little or no success in extending its writ beyond Kabul.

A move against Karzai?

The greatest immediate danger is that Fahim and the Panjshiris will move against Karzai. Although Karzai has consistently capitulated to the Panjshiris on personnel and policy matters, the Panjshiris are unlikely to remain content with him as head of state. Rabbani and Abdul Rasul Sayaf, the political leaders of the NA, pointedly walked out during Karzai's swearing-in ceremony. In public meetings since the Loya Jirga, Fahim has been dismissive of Karzai, telegraphing the message that Karzai rules at Fahim's pleasure.

With Fahim now 'a heartbeat away' from the presidency, his and the Panjshiris' next move could take several forms. From the inside, controlling all the instruments of force, they could execute a coup. Alternatively, they could engineer the assassination of Karzai by individuals or groups giving them plausible deniability – as many believe was the case in the killing of Haji Qadir, the ethnic Pushtun vice-president who reportedly had raised Fahim's ire by vying for control over the interior ministry. Fahim and the Panjshiris can count on support from radical Islamists, led by Rabbani and Sayaf, who have been agitating against Karzai in mosques. It was not without reason that Karzai requested that his Afghan security forces, which reported to the Panjshiris, be replaced by US Special Forces.

A secondary danger is a rebellion in the Pushtun areas. Accounting for 40–60% of the population, Pushtuns are significantly under-represented in the cabinet. The recent skirmishing in western Afghanistan between Tajik and Pushtun warlords may be a sign of renewed ethnic turbulence. If the current political imbalance in Kabul radicalises a larger segment of the Pushtuns, and if Pakistan's ISI organises and supplies an opposition movement, civil war would not be far away. If this transpired, the US and the coalition would be left supporting a narrowly based and unpopular government.

Remedies required  

While these dangers require dramatic remedies, Washington is being inactive or pursuing counterproductive policies in virtually all areas:

• Rebalancing  the cabinet. The transitional administration's legitimacy was doubly undermined at the Loya Jirga when the US blocked the selection of Zahir Shah as head of state and Karzai ignored the evident demands of the delegates to reduce the power of the Panjshiris; the cabinet announced at the Loya Jirga contained no Pushtun of political significance. The US further alienated many Afghans by presenting the Loya Jirga as a great success. Since the Loya Jirga, Karzai has taken minor compensating actions, appointing one leading Pushtun from the former king's movement to a newly created vice-presidency and another to the commission to oversee the building of national armed forces. Taking stronger actions to create a better political balance would require the US to face down Fahim.

• Supporting moderate and secular political movements. In post-Taliban Afghanistan, one of the major cleavages is between radical Islamists and the moderate and traditional forces typified by the former king's movement. Washington appears not to understand that its policies are tilting the playing field toward the Islamists. Almost all of the political factions of the NA are pushing a radical Islamist agenda. Unless Washington acts with dispatch, it will be difficult to prevent the adoption of a constitution grounded in a radical interpretation of sharia. This would entrench Islamists and destroy the potential for greater respect for human rights.

• Creating national armed forces. While US policymakers have stated that Washington cannot disengage until a national military has been created, the programme to do so is progressing at a snail's pace. A factor here has been Fahim's wish to make his own militia the foundation of a new military. He has already appointed a command structure in the ministry of defence that is dominated by NA commanders and former Communist generals. US officials have recently completed training of the first 350-man brigade. At this rate, if the US intends to meet its commitment to build a 80,000-strong force, its training command will have to remain in Afghanistan indefinitely.

• Undercutting regional warlords. Instead of weakening the warlords, the US has been strengthening them. Warlords have extracted US funds by selling themselves as military proxies or as supposedly indispensable sources of intelligence.
In other cases, warlords have extorted payments by periodically threatening to break with Karzai. There is no credible strategy for bringing the warlords to heel.

• Curtailing interventions by regional powers. Afghanistan requires a strategy to limit external intervention. However, the US and the coalition have addressed this problem in an ad hoc fashion, mainly by pressuring Islamabad to remain on the sidelines, but also by undertaking a number of unsuccessful approaches to Tehran. The role of Russia in buttressing Panjshiri power has not been addressed. US policymakers appear oblivious to the fact that, if nothing is done to reduce the dominance of Iran and Russia's clients in Kabul, Islamabad will feel forced to react.

• Accelerating economic reconstruction. The cabinet assembled at the Loya Jirga augurs badly for economic reconstruction: fewer than half a dozen ministers have advanced education or relevant professional competence in the jurisdictions of their ministries. With many ministries occupied by deputies of warlords and uneducated senior staffs, the US and the coalition lack a competent partner to accelerate reconstruction. Because providing large-scale resources to a government of the present kind would be irresponsible, donors may soon conclude that serious reconstruction must be delayed for two years, when elections are to be held.

Policy problems

Few in Washington recognise the need to recalibrate the US approach. The internal policy contradictions have developed for several reasons. Early on in the war, Bush made the decision to choose the NA as the principal American proxy in Afghanistan, and the problems resulting from this choice have not yet made an impact at a high enough level to force a reconsideration. Meanwhile, the National Security Council has failed to play a strong coordinating role, so that agencies on the ground – such as the armed services
and the CIA – have been able to pursue approaches that lack integration. The military is comfortable with its arrangements with the NA and individual warlords and is loath to roil the waters. The CIA takes the view that the path to stability is to create a government bringing all warlords together.

Facing down Fahim?

Impatience with Fahim is growing, and some US voices are arguing for the need to marginalise him. However, this remains the minority view: many US policymakers believe that the risks of confronting Fahim are too great. They hope that, given time, the present course will somehow work out. Yet matters could change if Fahim moves against Karzai directly or threats to Karzai from Fahim become undeniable. This is likely to happen at some point before the elections, because the Loya Jirga showed that the Panjshiris lack the popular support to prevail in a vote.

The International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) – as well as the residual US forces in Afghanistan – are the principal restraints on Fahim and the Panjshiris, warlords who might vie for more power, and groups unhappy with their roles in the new regime. Without this military presence, open conflict would quickly break out. However, partly because of its small size (4,500 troops) and partly because its mission is defined as 'assisting' the Kabul government's security ministries, ISAF alone will not be able to create an environment free of armed intimidation – at least not in its present form. Ideally, the number of ISAF troops in Kabul would be increased substantially, creating a large enough presence to allow for demands that NA militias be withdrawn from Kabul garrisons. However, the Pentagon is deeply reluctant to expand ISAF, largely because of its aversion to peacekeeping operations and because of the danger that ISAF would become ensnared in local conflicts among warlords.

In the event that the US chooses to face down Fahim, the key lever will be US strike capability. If Washington levies major political demands, Fahim and the Panjshiris would probably back down, knowing their own forces are relatively undisciplined and having seen what happened to the Taliban on the battlefield. To date, this proposition has not been tested, because the US and the coalition have made concessions whenever the two sides have differed. As Fahim and the Panjshiris contemplate their next step, and as discontent builds among Pushtuns and other disenfranchised groups, the US risks an explosion in Afghanistan that would result in a sudden descent into a quagmire.