The drone of congressional posturing over President Bush's Iraq surge proposal obscured the news of a major announcement made by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice: That a massive new $10.6 billion aid package for Afghanistan -- roughly two-thirds of all funding spent there since 2001 -- would be asked of Congress to help NATO beat back the same enemy in the same land where the first boot prints were made in the administration's "war on terror."
In the shadow of the Iraq enterprise, Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan have mounted a brazen comeback that is expected to escalate this year. They are convinced that a sustained, low-intensity campaign will eventually triumph over the wandering Western attention span. Washington has moved to compensate, promising $8.6 billion for security and another $2 billion for development. This is a significant boost, considering that Afghanistan has received less aid per capita than any other recent post-conflict state undergoing reconstruction. But lackluster U.S.-led efforts deserve only part of the blame. Today it is no secret that systemic corruption plagues the Afghan government, from top to bottom. Without serious institutional reform in Kabul, Washington's shotgun attempt to secure the country with another kind of surge may instead only fuel the popular discontent on which the Taliban trades.
With billions more American taxpayer dollars now in the pipeline: U.S. and European officials have conceded that at least half of all Western aid does not reach those who need it. Between 2002 and 2005, the U.S. Agency for International Development spent over $3.5 billion on sectors ranging from infrastructure to agriculture, but former Interior Minister Ali Jalali estimates that only 30 percent was ultimately spent on aid projects. Meanwhile, President Hamid Karzai's Anti-Corruption and Bribery Office has been operating for over two years with a staff of some 140 people, and has yet to obtain a single conviction.
One need look no further than the streets of Kabul for evidence of high-level graft, where incongruously lavish homes equipped with generators interrupt otherwise drab neighborhoods beset by rolling electrical blackouts. One Afghan minister told me off-the-record on a recent trip that everyone inside the system knows whose hands are sticky in the booming drug trade -- but to break ranks and name names poses too grave a risk.
The Afghan government's ability to siphon foreign aid money pales next to the stakes members have in the country's top export. Last year, Afghanistan boasted a record poppy harvest that accounted for 90 percent of heroin on the global market -- and at least 50 percent of gross domestic product. This increase came despite a heavy-handed eradication campaign, initiated at Washington's command, that failed to cut back production. What it did instead was push scores of farmers with no viable alternative into the arms of the Taliban. A damning new World Bank report says razing crops in one area typically precipitates growth elsewhere; and a comeback usually occurs at any rate once authorities have moved on to other pastures. Government graft has further undercut efforts to combat opium production, according to the report, allowing politically connected traffickers to profit from higher demand. So lucrative is the industry that a number of crooked officials are known to have forged alliances of convenience with anti-government elements.
Drug-related corruption is most problematic at the district level. Police chief posts in poppy-growing districts with $60 a month salary are said to have gone to bidders paying as much as $100,000. Officials then extract heavy bribes from wealthier producers to turn their backs, while poorer farmers are forced into debt once their crops are destroyed by anti-drug teams. In some cases, farmers must replant poppies to pay outstanding debts; in others, officials on the take have been known to drive out competing cartels in exchange for kickbacks. "Money put into [poppy eradication] so far has been thrown away," Robert Templer, Asia Program director for the International Crisis Group (ICG), told the Prospect. In the absence of viable alternatives, the drug trade "an enormous, almost insoluble problem, and remain absolutely corrosive to efforts to build up institutions."
As a result, the Karzai government now faces a crisis of legitimacy. According to the largest-ever opinion survey finance by the USAID, one-fifth fewer Afghans now believe the country is moving in the right direction compared to those polled after the 2004 elections. Corruption was cited as one of the top grievances against the state among those polled. The degree of mistrust is especially troublesome in the south, where NATO forces this past summer fought battalion-sized Taliban units. British Commander General David Roberts figures that up to 70 percent of the population in that region is "on the fence" over whether to support the Taliban or the government. Not surprisingly, violence was worst last year in Helmand province, home to 42 percent of the country's total poppy cultivation. Drug cartels operate with impunity in the region, giving a cut of profits to Taliban commanders in exchange for protection, which in turn allows them to pay militants about four times what Afghan national army troops earn. Farmers, already lacking government support, stand to make more than six times what they receive for crops like wheat.
If any rehabilitation of the Afghan government -- and by extension, a reversal of the deteriorating state of security -- will happen, it must start at the top. The Interior Ministry, responsible for appointing police and other administrative posts throughout the country, is an ill-reputed bastion of corrupt leadership. Under pressure, the government has set up an internal mechanism to filter appointees. Yet it will prove difficult to find and sustain decent candidates on a meager salary when they are faced with the constant temptation of easy drug profits and the threat of a gathering insurgency. Still, an overhaul of the ministry is critical, and could be part of a broader Karzai-led initiative to meet international standards of transparency as required by the Afghanistan Compact. The ICG has recommended requiring officials to declare annual assets, whereupon they are reviewed by the national assembly and made available to the public; they also suggest a monthly presidential review of efforts with the heads of anti-corruption agencies and legal action when necessary, without regard to status.
To kick off a serious reform effort, an anti-corruption drive might involve the high-profile prosecution of a few marquee offenders to send a loud statement that a new policy is in effect. This would then reshuffle district police and administrative officials that are loathed for their predatory ways. Afghanistan's highly centralized system has to date hindered integration efforts at the provincial level; in terms of vetting officials in the seat of power, this may prove to be an advantage. One concern is that some officials are ex-warlords with large followings that Karzai has reluctantly appeased with high posts to ensure the government remains intact. However, the head of the state anti-corruption department argues that making an example of the corrupt "will not undercut but strengthen, like removing the dead leaves."
Before this can take place, real judicial reform must be pursued. Frustration over corrupt courts throughout the country has led some tribal leaders to demand a return to strict Islamic law, or sharia. According to Barnett Rubin, an Afghan expert at New York University, "Enforcement by the government of the decisions of Islamic courts has always constituted a basic pillar of the state's legitimacy in Afghanistan, and the failure to do so is turning religious leaders ... against the government." Some Afghans cite the 1996-2001 Taliban reign as a harsh but effective period of justice. A new Supreme Court was sworn in last August, but it will take many years to train and staff the legal system. In the meantime, the government might try and find ways to better integrate customary judicial practices, with some sort of oversight mechanism, in order to connect influential religious leaders to the center.
The drug problem needs to be dealt with in concert with institutional reform, but not in such a way that undermines stability in the country. More should be spent on targeting drug trafficking networks that operate with impunity in lawless areas, rather than a Columbia-style counter-narcotics policy that hits desperate farmers the hardest. Eradication programs that do continue should meanwhile be focused on areas where the poor have other economic options. "Efforts to discourage farmers from planting opium poppy should be concentrated in localities where land, water, and access to markets are such that alternative livelihoods are already available," says Alastair McKechnie, World Bank Country Director for Afghanistan. To his credit, President Karzai appears to have recognized that dogged anti-drug measures are backfiring. He announced last month that this year's poppy crop -- due to be harvested in two months -- would not be chemically sprayed.
Rebuilding Afghanistan was never going to be a turn-key affair, and will demand time, patience, and lots of money. The Bush administration handicapped the project early on by going for "a quick, cheap war followed by a quick, cheap peace," the ICG reports, diverting critical resources and manpower to Iraq. Even under the recent U.S. commitment, security spending trumps development 4-to-1, when the former largely depends on the latter. But the country's fate is not a lost cause, yet. Billions in aid pledges, coupled with the appointment of an American 4-star general to head up international security forces, at least suggests the United States has made Afghanistan a long-term strategic priority; it remains to be seen if it will be long enough.
Reform is a critical first step to improve the odds. The Taliban grows stronger by the day, but counter-insurgency strategists still make the mistake of overwhelmingly focusing on ways to combat militants, at a time when what is needed is to salvage the public confidence that will ultimately decide the country's outcome. Disillusioned people in the backcountry must be won over. And this is not going to happen when the average Afghani lives on less than $200 a year, while many officials get richer at their expense. Fundamental institutional change would mean that now-skeptical foreign donors would become more likely to contribute to Afghan reconstruction in the decades ahead. More importantly, it would allow frustrated Afghanis to finally accept the rule of law enforced by a government deserving of their trust.
Jason Motlagh is a deputy foreign editor at United Press International in Washington, D.C. He has covered conflicts in Asia and Africa.
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