Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel made clear in a recent interview that the most important question was not “how many troops you send, but do you have a credible Afghan partner for this process that can provide the security and the type of services that the Afghan people need?” Senator John Kerry, who chairs the Foreign Relations Committee, raised similar concerns.
As Republicans argue that waiting to decide places the 68,000 troops already in Afghanistan in danger, the Obama team is making the right call to encourage Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai to agree to a runoff, while hanging the prospect of an increased American military presence over his head.
Historically, the U.S has been more than willing to work with local governments that were in no way ready to provide services, security, or institutional organization for the countries they represented. Most of the time, it ended in tears, like in many Latin American conflicts or for most of the Second Iraq War.
The push to create a credible government lends some measure of legitimacy to the government formed after the runoff (assuming that it goes smoothly), as it represents a success in overcoming electoral weaknesses, and can give some measure of confidence to the Afghan people about the use of Western political systems in their country. Furthermore, taking the time to form a more effective government means that hopefully a political system will be created that will be at least a little bit better than the current corrupt, narco-state in place. By attempting to provide a marginally better government, the U.S is trying to reshuffle the deck it currently plays from. A more effective political leadership will mean (optimistically) more effective security and infrastructure-building from the Afghans, and will make the U.S' current state-building job easier. With luck, it will lead to a pull-out timetable sooner rather than later.
Posted on October 20, 2009
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