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institutional memory, as well as the question of how well “quick-impact projects” fit into the framework of the Afghan National Development Strategy of 2006 and the broader Millennium Developments Goals. The ongoing insurgency in southern Afghanistan has taxed the will of a number of NATO members. This is especially the case in parliamentary systems where force deployments may enjoy the support of, at best, a fickle and fragile majority. Some of this opposition amounts to no more than knee-jerk anti- Americanism, but in other cases it reflects a genuine conviction that military force cannot resolve the problems of Afghanistan. Others believe that the war is unwinnable because Afghan nationalism will always lead to successful popular mobilization against foreign forces. These convictions may be ill-grounded, but they are nonetheless part of the political environment with which the U.S. and its NATO allies must deal. The conflict in Iraq has complicated this problem. Deeply unpopular with European publics, it has the potential to drain support from the Afghan theater of operations, as well. In July 2007, White House Homeland Security Adviser Frances F. Townsend described the struggles in Iraq and Afghanistan as “clearly a single conflict by a single determined enemy who is looking for safe haven.” To European publics this is not a claim calculated to boost support for operations in Afghanistan; the most recent Transatlantic Trends survey, conducted by the German Marshall Fund of the United States in 2007, found that only 30 percent of European respondents supported combat operations against the Taliban in Afghanistan. A delinking of the two situations would help to make the case for sustaining the commitment more marketable. In a Feb. 8 interview, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates offered a nuanced defence of involvement in Afghanistan, noting that lingering anger in Europe over the U.S. invasion of Iraq explained why some allies were reluctant to heed U.S. calls for more combat troops in Afghanistan. It remains, however, to be seen how much the allies will deliver in response to the call for greater assistance to Afghanistan that was contained in the declaration of NATO members at the April 2008 Bucharest Summit. 38 FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL/JULY-AUGUST 2008 F OCUS The ongoing insurgency in southern Afghanistan has taxed the will of a number of NATO members. Through Afghans’ Eyes NATO’s involvement is controversial not only in Europe, but in Afghanistan as well. Civilian casualties are one key problem. The arrival of international forces was celebrated in Afghanistan, where the Taliban remain deeply unloved. But any foreign force can outstay its welcome if it loses sight of the local population and its needs. Here, the problem of “collateral damage” is extremely serious. Every civilian casualty has the potential to create new enemies, and great care needs to be taken to avoid them if at all possible. Another weighty problem relates to the cultivation of opium poppies, an industry in which over two million Afghans are now entangled, many as poor wage-laborers. For the wider world, the temptation to deal with this problem through simple eradication may be considerable. But fear that this will happen is becoming a major recruiting tool for the Taliban, probably of greater significance to their insurgency than the cash that they may be able to derive from the drug trade. The issue of eradication has also become a point of friction between various NATO members and the government of Afghanistan. To some, the opium poppy is a curse which helps fund Taliban operations and should be eliminated with maximum expedition. To the Kabul government, this is profoundly naïve, given the number of poor Afghans who are dependent on some income from opium in order to eke out a meager living, and for whom “alternative livelihoods policies” remain a remote chimera. What has been largely lost in the dust surrounding this dispute is the complexity of the narcotics problem in Afghanistan, which is underpinned by diverse incentive structures, has multiple local variants, and is also significantly transnational in character. Dwarfing these issues, however, is the threat posed by the Taliban’s external sanctuaries. As a threat to Afghanistan’s stability, this is vastly more serious than the occasional cache of arms of Iranian origin. In August 2007, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf made a very candid statement about this problem while addressing a so-called “Peace Jirga” in Kabul: “There is no doubt Afghan militants are supported from Pakistani soil. The problem that you have in your region is
ecause support is provided from our side.” Much speculation has surrounded the question of whether Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence directorate has directly orchestrated or passively tolerated such militant activity. But in a real sense this misses the point. As a sovereign state Pakistan has rights, but it also has responsibilities, and one of these duties is to prevent its territory from being used in this way. Closing the border with Afghanistan is not an effective means to this end, but moving vigorously against key Afghan Taliban cells inside Pakistan would be. Few observers with any knowledge of Pakistan doubt Islamabad’s ability to deal with this problem — if presented in a serious and sustained fashion with the right incentives to do so. The key sanctuaries for the Afghan Taliban leaders are in the city of Quetta rather than the remote and inaccessible tribal areas; and the “Red F OCUS Here, the problem of “collateral damage” is extremely serious. Mosque” crisis in Islamabad in July 2007 demonstrated that the Pakistan military can effectively concentrate its fire on such targets if it chooses to do so. As long as NATO states seem unwilling to take a strong stand in the light of Pres. Musharraf’s admission, a shadow will hover over the seriousness of their commitment to Afghanistan. The Reality Test NATO’s battle in Afghanistan is not just a struggle against gangs of Taliban fighters. It is a battle for the confidence of the Afghan people. And the blunt reality is that Afghans’ experience of the wider world in recent decades has not been encouraging. After the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan in February 1989 interest in the Afghans and their problems dwindled substantially in the West, facilitating the JULY-AUGUST 2008/FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL 39
Page 1: A TIRELESS “AFSA-CATE” ■ HONO
Page 6 and 7: CONTENTS AFSA NEWS DISSENTERS HONOR
Page 8 and 9: Getting History Wrong I was astonis
Page 10 and 11: Forgetting History The April Cybern
Page 12 and 13: National Security Infrastructure: D
Page 14 and 15: Saharan Africa, where the number of
Page 16 and 17: Association for Diplomatic Studies
Page 18 and 19: udget of $3.5 million, and a profes
Page 20 and 21: Pinochet to form a political party
Page 22 and 23: aircraft was an American flag carri
Page 24 and 25: of State’s attention to managemen
Page 26 and 27: In recent months, the growing secur
Page 28 and 29: Commission and the Judicial Reform
Page 30 and 31: of government — notwithstanding t
Page 32 and 33: setup, relying on elected provincia
Page 34 and 35: order is a barrier to change, educa
Page 36 and 37: development and governance prioriti
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Page 42 and 43: ise of the Taliban. This has been b
Page 44 and 45: Durand Line broke the region’s do
Page 46 and 47: Center, that the TTP is bound to re
Page 48 and 49: On Sept. 7, 1948, Secretary of Stat
Page 50 and 51: ecame increasingly chaotic, with cr
Page 52 and 53: What I want to get at is a problem
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Page 56 and 57: in turn, the enthusiastic applause
Page 58 and 59: authority and against the advice of
Page 61 and 62: AFSANEWS American Foreign Service A
Page 63 and 64: V.P. VOICE: STATE ■ BY STEVE KASH
Page 65 and 66: 2008 AFSA CONSTRUCTIVE DISSENT AWAR
Page 67 and 68: 2008 AFSA CONSTRUCTIVE DISSENT AWAR
Page 69 and 70: 2008 AFSA OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE A
Page 71 and 72: AUSTIN TRACY Scholarship Winners Ho
Page 73 and 74: AFSA Issue Brief Foreign Service Re
Page 75 and 76: CLASSIFIEDS JULY-AUGUST 2008/FOREIG
Page 77 and 78: Cultural Diplomacy’s Finest Hour
Page 80 and 81: Lucius Durham Battle, 89, a retired
Page 82 and 83: ing French and Spanish literature a
Page 84 and 85: Comforts, that specialized in anima
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Leasing and Management of Exception
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90 FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL/JULY-AUG
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Seven months ago, I was living in a
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F OCUS - American Foreign Service Association

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