Brian M Downing
The US went into Afghanistan in 2001 with the lofty goals of democratizing and modernizing it. Today, neither has been approximated and the goals seem naive or foolhardy. The effort has failed, though no one in Washington wants to admit it. The political system is hopelessly corrupt, incompetent, and unstable. Ethnic and tribal mistrust is higher than ever.
Afghanistan has never been a unified nation-state. Wars have made the country less unified, the politics less stable, and foreign involvement more vexing – and more like as well. Over the last forty years Afghanistan has endured a Russian and American war. Both conflicts contributed to the country’s loss of political equilibrium and fragmentation. Russia has left, the US is leaving, and China will inherit a broken, violent country.
Political equilibrium
A viable central government is critical to stability and development. A reasonably strong central government is usually important. That’s what political science tells us – liberal, Marxist, conservative, what have you. But few Afghans want a strong central state. It simply isn’t part of their experience. When it rears its head, they fight it – ferociously and relentlessly.
The Afghan leaders that governed best – and remain respected today – were those who strategically disbursed money from foreign subsidies to tribal and ethnic groups in the localities – Pashtun, Tajik, Uzbek, Hazara, Turkmen, and others. Those groups in turn used the money in their localities as they saw fit, with little if any direction from Kabul. Outmoded and quaint from the western view of political development, but it’s what worked for Afghanistan.
Amid the Great Game with Russia, and after two wars, the British gained the upper hand and subsidized the king in Kabul. He then parleyed with tribes and peoples and kept Afghanistan out of Romanov hands, which prevailed just to the north in the ‘Stans. Foreign money and political equilibrium between Kabul and local groups worked.
The Soviet Union gained the upper hand decades later and judiciously continued the time-honored proactive of subsidizing Kabul. Party bosses replaced kings, rubles replaced pounds. The formula of foreign money and political equilibrium continued and Afghanistan stayed relatively peaceful.
When in the late seventies communist leaders in Kabul wanted to modernize the country with land and education reforms, they broke the equilibrium – perhaps permanently. Soviet leaders in Moscow cautioned against rapid modernization but the Afghan leaders reminded them of how much Comrade Stalin had achieved in the thirties. Kabul pressed ahead. It led to widespread rebellion and foreign intervention from all sides.
The Russian war
The US, reeling from the Iranian revolution, saw opportunity. Initially, the US and Pakistan encouraged the turmoil, often by encouraging local mullahs, who previously had little respect. Discontent became rebellion and the subsequent Soviet invasion led to a vicious, protracted war against disparate mujahideen forces.
Several countries sent money and arms to oppositional groups. The US, Saudis, and other Islamic countries funded Pashtun guerrillas in the south just across the Durand Line from Pakistan. Iran, though hostile to the US and holding US embassy hostages till early ‘81, supported Tajik and Hazara fighters in the west and north. China trained guerrillas in its Muslim province Xinjiang.
Unsurprisingly, given the nature of Afghan society and disparate foreign support, there was no unity in the opposition. Many groups fought each other as much as they did the Soviets and the national army. Nonetheless, they wore down the Soviets and forced a withdrawal in 1988.
With victory, many fighters deserted their leaders and went home. No longer funded from abroad, many bands seized gem mines, crossroads, poppy fields – anything that could generate money for them.
Kabul tried to reestablish the equilibrium by offering Soviet money to war-weary local notables. This met with some success but when the Soviet Union collapsed in ’91, the subsidies ended – as dod hopes for a reestablished equilibrium between Kabul and the localities. Hobbes had come to Central Asia but there was an iron-fisted sovereign rising in the south.
The Taliban, a successor to the Hisb-i-Islami Khames band, played upon popular weariness of turmoil and through conquest and parley, established control over most of Afghanistan, save the northern Panshir area. A harsh sovereign had arrived but it never ruled the entire land and it blundered into hosting al Qaeda.
© 2020 Brian M Downing
Brian M Downing is a national security analyst who’s written for outlets across the political spectrum. He studied at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs. Thanks as ever to Susan Ganosellis.