The US may find itself isolated in Afghanistan

Author: 
Kim Sengupta I The Independent
Publication Date: 
Tue, 2009-01-27 03:00

US President Barack Obama is facing warnings that the US risks repeating some of its errors in Iraq as the new administration turns its focus to Afghanistan, where NATO forces are engaged in a conflict which has already lasted longer than World War II.

Having received a briefing on his first day in office from Gen. David Petraeus, the top US commander in the region, Obama is preparing to meet his military chiefs to decide on the size and shape of the Afghanistan reinforcements he promised during his election campaign. Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said just before Dec. 25 that up to 30,000 more troops could be sent by summer, nearly doubling the size of the US force in the country. Britain, the next largest contributor in the 41-nation international force, has fewer than 9,000 troops in Afghanistan, which means American dominance of the campaign against the Taleban is set to increase.

“There are fears that this could become a US war rather than a NATO one,” said Christopher Langton, senior fellow for conflict at the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) in London. “With other NATO members already planning to scale back, the US could find itself isolated. Rather than being an international operation, it would become another ‘coalition of the willing,’ as in Iraq — though with the crucial difference that the Afghan mission has had a United Nations mandate throughout.”

Paul Smyth, head of the operational studies program at London’s Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), pointed out that several NATO countries, including Canada, Germany and France, had significantly increased their troop commitments in percentage terms during 2008. But in the past week French Defense Minister Hervé Morin said considering further reinforcements was “out of the question for now.” And Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende, another important contributor of troops, indicated that it would reduce its force by the end of next year.

Smyth said the international coalition in Afghanistan was wider and more committed than that in Iraq, but in some ways faced a tougher task. Although improved security in Iraq would benefit the Afghan mission, Iraqi insurgents had never had as much of a “safe haven” across the border in Iran as the Taleban enjoyed in the lawless frontier areas of Pakistan. “The scale is entirely different,” Smyth said.

Emphasizing that the Obama administration was not simply planning a military “surge,” one American official said: “We have to come up with fresh, innovative ideas on counter-insurgency, counter-narcotics, governance, development.” But many of the proposals are already mired in controversy and confusion, particularly the plan to form local militias on the pattern of Iraq, where Gen. Petraeus armed Sunni groups against the Al-Qaeda-linked insurgency.

In Afghanistan, where warlords were enlisted to overthrow the Taleban and still control large parts of the country, it is feared that creating yet more private armies would simply worsen chronic lawlessness. Two years ago, a similar scheme to form an “auxiliary” police force had to be shelved. As soon as they were issued a uniform and a weapon, many recruits began preying on local people. A pilot scheme in Wardak province, south of Kabul, has become bogged down in arguments over who will control the militias, who will pay them and how they should be armed. William Wood, the US ambassador, is adamant that Washington will provide training and uniforms, but not arms. The Interior Ministry suggested that the men might be issued with repaired “old and broken guns,” while Mohammed Masoom Stanekazi, vice-chairman of the country’s official disarmament organization, has argued that the militias should provide their own weapons.

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