'We Need to Change': America's Last Big Effort to Turn the Tide in Afghanistan

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McChrystal is responsible for turning the tide in Afghanistan. His new strategy may be the last chance to turn things around militarily in the Hindu Kush. The Dutch and Canadian governments have announced that they intend to withdraw their contingents by the year 2011. Canadian forces stationed in Kandahar have lost 128 of their soldiers. British troops stationed in Helmand province, a Taliban stronghold and center of opium poppy production, have had 212 of their men killed. The death toll appears to have brought about a significant change in the way the British view the military effort in Afghanistan. In an editorial published in July, in which it predicted the British public would soon decide the war is not worth the casualties, the Observer newspaper wrote: "Lives saved by bringing soldiers home will seem a surer benefit than the unproven hypothesis of preventing terrorism with a war thousands of miles away."

The Obama administration seems determined to expand the military effort and then to make an assessment as to whether or not progress can be made that way. NATO was informed by diplomatic sources that the United States wants to move a combat force of about 45,000 men from Iraq to Afghanistan -- in part as replacements for troops rotated out and in part as reinforcements. The same sources indicated that the Europeans would be expected to help by providing additional forces, more reconstruction assistance, and increased funding. The Obama administration wants to wait until after the general election in Germany on Sept. 27 before officially announcing its wishes.

The magic word "surge" is making the rounds in Kabul, just as it did in Iraq. However, this will involve civilian personnel for the most part. McChrystal wants to send advisers and reconstruction specialists not just to Kabul and the provincial capitals but also to remote districts and villages. They are to develop relationships with the clans and village elders and to build confidence. They are also to find out if there are any Taliban willing to engage in talks and determine if it is possible to distinguish between fundamentalists and moderates who would be willing to negotiate.

The United States was able to make progress in Iraq by taking this more patient approach. But will this be possible in Afghanistan?

There are some who say it's as good as over in Afghanistan. The confidence of the general population has been lost; too many civilians have been killed. This is the way Thomas Ruttig, a member of a group of experts known as the Afghanistan Analysts Network, sees the situation. Having served as an election observer in Paktia province, he now says that, in his view, the Afghans don't need agricultural experts from Kentucky. They need to have their fields cleared of mines, they need loans so that they can pay for irrigation systems, fertilizer, and seeds, they need functioning markets -- and more than anything else they need peace.

Missed Objectives

There are numerous things that have gone right in Afghanistan since the fall of 2001. But many major objectives have not been achieved. Osama bin Laden got away. Al-Qaida simply moved a few hundred kilometers away and set up new training camps in the lawless tribal areas of Pakistan. The political system in Afghanistan continues to be largely a farce. Court decisions can be bought. Most of the women who live in rural areas continue to have no rights. The Afghan police don't protect their citizens. More often than not they use their powers as law enforcement officers to squeeze money out of the populace. Administrative officials won't do anything unless they are paid bribes and often use their positions of power to make life hard for people.

The fraud perpetrated during Afghanistan's second presidential election was systematically organized in some parts of the country. This was seen to by the candidates' regional networks. An investigative commission is examining around 700 complaints that have been judged to be relevant.

There is the case of Delaga Bariz, district chief of Shorabak in Kandahar province, who maintains that ballot boxes were stuffed with 23,900 votes for Karzai. Allegedly the Bariz tribesmen in Shorabak had decided to vote for Abdullah Abdullah, Karzai's strongest rival. But then some of Karzai's people showed up and took the ballot boxes to Kabul, Delaga Bariz says.

The independent Afghanistan Analysts Network documented a case from the area around the town of Spin Boldak in the south. There the head of the border police had promised to monitor the election personally in six districts. The night before August 20, a large number of ballot boxes were brought to his home and members of the independent election commission are said to have been urged to fill them with votes for the incumbent president. On election day, the police chief took the filled ballot boxes to official polling stations for counting.

President Karzai's younger brother, Ahmed Wali Karzai, lives in Kandahar. As head of the provincial council, he is one of the most powerful figures in the region and organizes political support for his brother. But he claims not to have had anything to do with the election fraud.

Insubordination and Criticism

The relationship between President Karzai and Washington had cooled considerably by the end of the Bush era, as a result of weariness and disappointment on both sides. Karzai repeatedly expressed scathing public criticism of reckless bombardments by US planes in which Afghan civilians regularly died. But the Americans had expected gratitude and loyalty from him, not what they saw as insubordination and criticism.

The Obama administration immediately put even more distance between itself and the West's former favorite. Karzai had sought and formed sordid alliances with war criminals and drug barons for the purpose of preserving his power. He had also taken steps to distance himself from the West. Few people today would consider him a true democrat -- anyone who thought so was mistaken right from the start.

Now the State Department has announced that, if Karzai is declared the winner of the presidential election, his future vice president, Mohammed Fahim, will be banned from entering the United States -- because of his alleged links to the drug trade.

A Difficult Question

Just how badly the relationship between the Afghan and American governments has broken down was shown the day after the election at a luncheon given in the presidential palace for Obama's special envoy, Richard Holbrooke, an experienced diplomat with a reputation for bluntness. He and Karzai, the proud Pashtun, are like fire and water. Karzai doesn't like Holbrooke's arrogance, while for his part Holbrooke is irritated by Karzai's recalcitrance.

President Karzai was in a good mood when he received his guest in a paneled room on the ground floor of the palace. "May I ask you a difficult question?" Holbrooke asked. He felt that a runoff election between Karzai and Abdullah could increase the democratic credibility of the resultant government and reduce criticism in the West of the military operation in Afghanistan.

Karzai sensed a trap. He thought Holbrooke was looking for a last chance to force him out of office and help the preferred rival candidate, Abdullah, take over the presidency. His tone became sharp as he said this constituted an interference in Afghan affairs, adding that it was the role of the independent election commission -- not the Americans -- to decide on the need for a runoff election.

There are two versions as to how the luncheon continued from that point on. According to one version of events, they sat there silently and ate their desserts. According to the other version, Karzai immediately stood up and asked his guest to leave -- whereby things apparently got very heated.

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• Part 1: America's Last Big Effort to Turn the Tide in Afghanistan
• Part 2: The Last Chance