Hi CB, this is what Washington has managed to get itself bogged down in:
stratfor.com
Afghanistan: Yesterday's Friends May Be Today's Enemies
8 August 2002
Summary
Unrest in eastern Afghanistan caused by rebel warlord Pacha Khan Zadran demonstrates Washington's precarious balancing act between tactical allies and strategic interests in the region. Tensions are becoming more acute, and the United States is caught in the middle.
Analysis
A week of demonstrations against Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government in the eastern province of Khost ended Aug. 6. Pushtun protesters there demanded that Kabul recall governors who were recently appointed to Khost and neighboring Paktia province and expressed their support for local tribal leader and rebel warlord Pacha Khan Zadran, who has twice tried to capture Paktia's capital.
The incident illustrates the limits of the central government in Afghanistan. Stability in Afghanistan is an anomaly: Ethnic and clan rivalries abound, and a loose confederation of local and regional rulers is what passes for order. Karzai's government is no exception.
The country's Loya Jirga council reaffirmed Karzai's interim government in June, after regional warlords who assisted Washington had carved out their own fiefdoms. Since then, the assassination in July of Vice President Haji Abdul Qadir, and Karzai's subsequent decision to replace his Afghan bodyguards with U.S. troops, demonstrate just how dangerous the business of politics is in Afghanistan.
Washington had no illusions about the severe factionalism in Afghanistan. That a strong central government is not quickly unfolding and internecine fighting is still the rule comes as no surprise. As far as the United States and Karzai are concerned, this is expected and even tolerable to a certain degree.
Immediately after Sept. 11, Washington needed Afghan allies that knew the terrain, had local contacts and intelligence and were willing to fight the Taliban and al Qaeda. Warlords like Ismail Khan, Abdul Rashid Dostum, Gul Agha Shirzai and Zadran were all invaluable in this sense.
In exchange for their services, it was understood that they would be allotted their share of the Afghan kingdom, and it was not unexpected that the competing warlords and local clans would fight amongst themselves to gain or protect turf. However, Washington hoped to at least manage the competing factions and prevent their hostility from interfering with operations while it conducted its war.
However, the refusal by Zadran to cease his attempts to assert power in the east and surrender to the government represents the first instance of Washington's Afghani allies coming into direct, sustained conflict. In this case, U.S. short-term tactical considerations have collided with a long-term strategy.
Zadran, a staunch supporter of the U.S. war against the Taliban and al Qaeda, so far has proven beyond Washington and Kabul's ability to handle. After Karzai's interim government appointed Zadran governor of Paktia province and head of the southern zone in January, he was prevented from taking the provincial seat by local tribal leaders who had little more than disdain for him and rejected his rule outright.
After Zadran tried to capture the provincial capital of Gardez and left scores dead in the bloodiest example of internecine fighting in Afghanistan so far, Karzai cut a deal with the local tribal leaders and replaced the problematic Pushtun leader.
Since then, Zadran and his brother Kamal -- the former governor of Khost -- have sought to take what Karzai would not give: Paktia and Khost provinces. Zadran's efforts have centered on rallying Pushtun ethnic sentiments and calling for the overthrow of Karzai's government, which he claims is overrun by the Tajik-dominated Northern Alliance.
As Afghanistan steadily slides into marginal anarchy -- competing factions cannot be separated, contained or policed by peacekeeping forces -- Zadran is fighting to take as large as piece of the pie as possible. However, Karzai cannot and will not allow a competing Pushtun leader to rise in the predominantly Pushtun-populated country, particularly in the eastern region -- the epicenter of Pushtun power.
Now the United States has been caught in the middle of clan warfare as it continues to carry out operations in the region. Within the past weeks there has been an upsurge in attacks on U.S. and Afghan government troops in eastern Afghanistan, including the ambush of U.S. troops in Khost at the end of July and the Aug. 7 attack on an army base in the Bagram district in Kabul.
Al Qaeda and Taliban forces may have perpetrated these attacks. However, human sources in Afghanistan's Defense Ministry have informed STRATFOR that they believe the guerrillas who attacked U.S. troops with missiles and machine guns Aug. 4 in Paktia in the Zawar region were Afghan Pushtuns, not foreign Mujahideens, indicating that the attack possibly was undertaken by disenfranchised Pushtuns upset with the United States and Karzai. |
