Instead of trying to broker a settlement between the corrupt Afghan government and the Taliban as the Americans make their way towards the exit door, they should simply leave – and bring Hamid Karzai with them.
Foreign meddling in Afghan affairs has done more damage than good over the past two centuries, especially since 1973 when King Zahir Shah was ousted in a bloodless coup due to the confluence of three external anti-nationalist phenomena: communism, pan-Islamic extremism and CIA intrigue.
Today the Afghans are trapped in a violent nexus between three other essentially non-indigenous forces: the Karzai regime, Karzai’s Western benefactors and the Taliban as other outside interlopers try to shepherd a peace process that exists in name only.
The Obama administration’s mercurial AfPak policy and misguided reconciliation strategy is obviously being driven by domestic politics. The U.S. went from killing and capturing Taliban leaders at a record clip under King David to practically begging Mullah Omar to engage in peace talks.
The U.S. has gone so far as to applaud the opening of a Taliban office in Qatar, without consulting the Afghans, which has carved a path for the Taliban to be recognized by the international community as a legitimate political entity.
Former Ambassador Peter Tomsen, who was a special envoy to the Afghan resistance in the 1980s, wrote an interesting piece last week in the L.A. Times about the perils and futility of foreign powers interfering in local Afghan politics.
Tomsen also mentions how American and German diplomats with “behind-the-scenes” Pakistani participation have been powering the Afghan peace process – a development he described as “problematic”. Tomsen elaborates:
Foreign forays into the forbidding Afghan political cauldron have invariably spawned greater disunity. They upset traditional tribal and ethnic consensus processes that Afghans informally use to resolve their differences.
Tomsen recommends that the U.S. withdraw from direct involvement in the intra-Afghan negotiations. However, the writing on the wall informs that direct, unilateral American meddling will continue, which is bound to undermine any genuine reconciliation efforts.
Meanwhile, rogue initiatives by certain U.S. politicians who have publicly supported the northern alliance could lead to political fragmentation within Afghanistan. These northern warlords are just as sadistic and have as much blood on their hands as the Taliban, not to mention a policy based on backing Panjshiri-led minority groups against the Pashtun majority is a formula for perpetual civil war.
The only argument I would make to Peter Tomsen is that the two main parties involved in the “intra-Afghan” discussions are not indigenous to Afghanistan. Hamid Karzai is seen as a Western puppet and the Taliban are nothing more than an extended expeditionary force of the Pakistani state.
Tomsen concludes, with wisdom, that the guiding principle for U.S. policy in Afghanistan going forward should be based on a statement special envoy Marc Grossman made in late January, who said: “Only Afghans can decide the future of Afghanistan.”
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