Henry Kissinger on the Future of Afghanistan

Henry Kissinger wrote an Opinion piece in the Washington Post on June 6th on the future of Afghanistan. As usual, Kissinger nailed the topic, giving the best advice I’ve read about how to proceed to bring stability to the region.

Kissinger said the end of the American Afghan war is similar to other American wars since the end of World War II, that is, there was a large consensus about starting the wars and then disillusionment followed by an equally large consensus (today 70% of Americans vis-à-vis Afghanistan) about getting out without real victory.

His analysis: “We entered Afghanistan to punish the Taliban for harboring al-Qaeda, which, under Osama bin Laden’s leadership, had carried out the Sept. 11 attacks. After a rapid victory, U.S. forces remained to assist the construction of a post-Taliban state. But nation-building ran up against the irony that the Afghan nation comes into being primarily in opposition to occupying forces. When foreign forces are withdrawn, Afghan politics revert to a contest over territory and population by various essentially tribal groups.”

The Obama administration then decided to use in Afghanistan the surge technique used by President Bush in Iraq - one might add the General Petraeus surge because he developed it.

The allied effort in Afghanistan is set to wind down by 2014, with the security of the country being turned over gradually to the Afghans.

Kissinger reports what I had read earlier, that negotiations are already underway between the Taliban, headed by Mullah Omar, and the United States, using Germany as the sponsor, to find an alternative solution to securing Afghanistan after the allies withdraw.

Kissinger says his concern is that the solution may lay “the groundwork for a wider conflict.” There must be, he says, “a cease-fire; withdrawal of all or most American and allied forces; the creation of a coalition government or division of territories among the contending parties (or both); and an enforcement mechanism.”

Kissinger sees enforcement as the difficulty. He expects the Taliban to overrun any regional partners as soon as the Americans and allies leave. So, the negotiation must include not only the Taliban but also others, to negotiate an enforcement mechanism, such as “a residual American force, some international guarantee or presence, or — best — a combination of both. [Because] Total withdrawal is likely to be final; there should be no illusion of re-intervention.”

Kissinger hammers home the idea that the outcome in Afghanistan is an international political problem. He sees the creation of a perception that America and its allies were driven out as “an impetus to global and regional jihadism” that would engulf Pakistan, Kashmir and the rest of northern India. “The end of such a process is likely to be a proxy war along ethnic fault lines in Afghanistan and elsewhere, especially between nuclear-armed India and Pakistan.”

He notes that if the Taliban assume total power in Afghanistan, and behave as before, “Every neighbor would be threatened: Russia in its partly Muslim south, China in Xinjiang, Shiite Iran by fundamentalist Sunni trends. In turn, Iran would be tempted by the vacuum to arm sectarian militias, a strategy it has honed in Lebanon and Iraq.”

Kissinger says that America must find at least some common ground with Pakistan and Iran in order to make any solution workable. “Without a sustainable agreement defining Afghanistan’s regional security role, each major neighbor will support rival factions across ancient ethnic and sectarian lines — and be obliged to respond to inevitable crises under the pressure of events. That is a prescription for wider conflict. Afghanistan could then play the role of the Balkans prior to World War I.”

Kissinger states that any exit strategy and long-term solution should be undertaken in the form of a regional conference, that it will take 18 months to 2 years and that the major part of American troop withdrawals should be planned for the end of this period to prevent unilateral action by the Taliban.

You can read Henry Kissinger’s Opinion piece in the on-line edition of the Washington Post of 6 June 2011. It is well worth your time.

I also refer readers to my blogs of 21 November 2010, “Getting Out of Afghanistan,” and 20 February 2011, “Massoud, Karzai and the War in Afghanistan.”