History

A Nation is Born

You need only speak to an Afghan to quickly learn how passionately the attachment to their land is. This does not necessarily mean attachment to a state apparatus. The Afghan state as we know it today is the result of British geopolitical interest and the ruthless and competent ruler King Abdur Rahman, the Iron Amir (1880-1901). The northern border represents the extent to which the British were prepared to allow the Russians to expand southward, while the southern and eastern borders represent the extent to which the British Empire felt it was safe and necessary to extend itself. Abdur Rahman was able to maintain rule with the weapons and subsidies provided by the British. His gift for strong-armed tactics allowed him to unite a country composed of various ethnic groups long accustomed to fiercely independent tribal self-rule. Thus the basis for centralizing and modernizing the Afghan state was laid. (Ottaway, 2002)

Afghan Statecraft

In the European world the modern liberal state is the result of a centuries-long process of often catastrophic trial and error. In Afghanistan this process only began with the reign of Abdur Rahman. The difficulty of creating an Afghan state by mass consent has been complicated by the region's diverse and often sporadically dispersed ethnic and tribal make-up. The violent methods used by Abdur Rahman to subjugate his tribal, ethnic and religious opponents horrified and alienated his own subjects. So hated was Rahman that upon his death, his body could not be buried in the royal cemetary lest his remains be desecrated by his enemies. Much like Saddam Hussein, Abdur Rahman ruled by coercion. The state apparatus did not, however, provide much else to cultivate the loyalty of its subjects. One area that did have some measurable success was that of education: a small educated elite emerged. It would be this educated elite who would in the future struggle to assert a modernizing model in the communist coup that eventually led to the invasion by the Soviets in 1979. (Lieven, 2002)

The most recent attempt to reform and modernize the Afghan state is the Bonn Conference. A model based on that of a Western democratic state has been proposed for Afghanistan, whether this is what the tribal and religious authorities and indeed the populace at large want or not. Paramount to the new state as envisioned by Bonn are elections aimed at producing a multi-ethnic and democratic state with liberal protections for women and ethnic and religious minorities. Economic development would be managed and stimulated via the establishment of a central bank and ministry of finance and for capacity building in all economic spheres. This is a formula promoted by most NGOs and the World Bank. The missing element for this model is the presence of a strong military apparatus to assert the authority of a central government in the provinces. (Ottoway, 2002)

Fantasy or Reality?

The lack of security forces adequate to the task of promoting the authority of a strong central government and establish law and order has undermined progress toward the construction of a new and unified Afghan state. Can a country which has yet to go through the necessary changes of economic modernization sustain a liberal democracy? Can elections lead to a sustainable democracy before some measure of economic and social groundwork is laid? Is the international community willing to invest the necessary funds and military forces to forge such a national transformation in Afghanistan?

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace recommends that the international community strive for a solution somewhere between the maximilist approach in Bosnia (long-term occupation and international committment) and the minimalist approach in Somalia (neglect). (Ottaway, 2001) According to this point of view, the attempt to establish a central democratic government and bypass the local warlords and tribal leaders is a fantasy. This analysis suggests that an approach based on mediated cooperation among the various factions in Afghanistan with international aid used judiciously as an incentive will be the most realistic and successful first step toward stability in post-war Afghanistan. This middle path calls for a corps of liaison specialists to monitor and work with the regional leaders in Afghanistan on a long-term basis. Compliance with incremental changes (e.g. education for girls) would be incentivized and tied to the distribution of aid funds. (Ottaway, 2002) Using aid forcefully as an instrument of peacekeeping and incremental reform is arguably more realistic than creating an elected central government that lacks mass consensus for reform.

Although decentralized rule is de facto in today's Afghanistan, the international community's committment and vision to establish a corps of specialists to facilitate and influence governance via tribal leaders and the warlords is lacking. Kabul remains a city apart. The international community's committment to the military and financial resources needed to expand Kabul's rule and influence in the provinces is lacking. American hegemony could arguably demonstrate a firm resolve to reconconstruct Afghanistan and by doing so, galvanize the international community's committment.

American power and its influence in Afghanistan remains problematic and is perceived with ambivalence. According to Alain Joxe, French specialist in strategic affairs and contemporary wars :

Globalization is quickly turning the world into a chaos, leading to an increasing disparity between rich and poor, the rise of an international, rootless 'noble class', and an escalating number of little wars. Yet the United States refuses to conquer the world and assume the protective imperial role for the societies it subjugates. Instead, it operates on a case-by-case basis, regulating disorder, repressing the symptoms of despair instead of attacking its cause. For the first time perhaps, humanity has embarked on an ocean of disorder with no final order in sight. (Joxe, 2002)

History may well repeat itself. Afghanistan has been trapped in a cycle of unrelenting war and hardship for a quarter century. But history doesn't necessarily repeat itself in a predictable manner. Who would ever have thought that Ireland would rise from the ashes of depopulation, ignorance, poverty, and colonialism to become one of the more successful European economies? Afghanistan's greatest resource is that of its indomitable and resilient people and they may well ensure its future despite the trials to which they have been put. As for those who would scarifice Afghanistan on the altar of Empire, "My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings: Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!" (Percy Bysshe Shelley 1792-1822)