SPY EYES

After more than thirteen years of security operations in Afghanistan by the United States and her NATO allies, the future of Afghanistan still remains uncertain – and so does the peace and security of the Central and South Asian regions

It has been over 152 months since the United States Armed Forces launched Operation Enduring Freedom in retaliation to the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. America’s NATO allies also joined in the military invasion of the landlocked country, invoking Article 5 of the Washington Treaty of the North Atlantic Alliance for the first time since the creation of the “Allied” alliance that was primarily directed to respond to an attack from the Soviet Union on the West. The Article stated that an attack on one or more of the NATO countries would constitute an attack on all NATO allies, “each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defense recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area”. Though a NATO operation in Afghanistan seemed far-fetched at the time, since the Alliance’s main theater of operations was Europe – or anywhere they (or democracy, as they were protecting) were threatened by the former Soviet Union – but NATO’s “Strategic Concept” after the collapse of the Soviet Union had already accounted for and recognized the threat of international terrorism posed by transnational groups which may or may not have state support. Such a strategic realignment of the Alliance was necessary given that their principal adversary had ceased to exist in 1991. The new Strategic Concept was finalized and approved by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Washington D.C. in April 1999. Two years later, this Strategic Concept was put to the test.

Twelve years and three months later, the United States and the NATO militaries – both collectively and individually – totaling troops from almost 50 countries have failed to achieve their targets in Afghanistan. Instead of completely decimating Al Qaeda as an operational force, they targeted the organization’s top leadership but transformed it into a global brand name under which various regional, national and local Muslim radical terror groups found refuge, support, ideological encouragement, and even financial backing and specialist recruits and/or operatives. Despite the touted achievements of restoring (or introducing) democracy in Afghanistan, the state institutions of the landlocked Central Asian nation and its political process remain fragile even after many years of existence and numerous cycles of functioning. As the Afghan Taliban melted away in the face of the awesome force and unchallengeable technological might of the U.S. military, the operations of Western forces and their treatment of the local population in a conservative Muslim society led to the “rebirth” of the insurgent movement in 2005: by this time, they had closely studied their invaders and observed how they operated and applied their technological advantages to the battlefield. The reborn Afghan Taliban developed their own new strategy for different provinces, regions, and for the whole country – in effect, they had transformed the Western forces’ technological superiority into a liability for not only the U.S. and NATO, but also for the indigenous Afghan security forces that were being trained along state-of-the-art lines.

But the U.S. and NATO were never going to stay in Afghanistan forever – the UN Security Council mandate (Resolution 1386 adopted on December 20, 2001, which followed Resolutions 1267 and 1333 adopted in earlier years) for military intervention in Afghanistan was time-bound, and by June 18, 2013, the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), comprised of the Afghan National Army (ANA) and Afghan National Police (ANP), officially took over security responsibilities throughout Afghanistan after a four-phase transfer of these responsibilities from NATO to the ANSF. Nevertheless, this is no indication that the West left – or is leaving – a sustainable military alternative in its place: The Guardian’s Emma Graham-Harrison noted that “the showpiece ceremony was more political theatre than military handover” on the very day that the transfer took place. There is an “Enduring Strategic Partnership Agreement between the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan and the United States of America” that provides the long-term framework for the relationship between Afghanistan and the U.S. after the drawdown of U.S. forces in the Afghanistan war, but its endurance is already being tested. This Agreement was signed by Afghan President Hamid Karzai and U.S. President Barack Obama on May 02, 2012 – the first anniversary of the death of Osama bin Laden, incidentally or deliberately – and as Afghanistan was designated a major non-NATO ally, negotiations for a Bilateral Security Agreement were launched in November of that year. Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on July 07, 2014 that the United States “not even imagining abandoning Afghanistan. Quite the opposite. We are building a partnership with Afghanistan that will endure far into the future”. As far as the intentions of Mrs. Clinton’s statement is concerned, it appears that the U.S. has at least learnt from its earlier mistake when it did abandon Afghanistan after “Charlie Wilson’s War”. But actions always speak louder than words.

The Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) is much like the Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) that the U.S. wished to have in place with the regime that was installed in Iraq after the ouster of Saddam Hussein: the U.S.-Iraq “SOFA” provided no cushion for any remaining U.S. troops on the ground in Iraq after their total withdrawal, and the agreement expired at midnight on December 31, 2011, even though the United States completed its final withdrawal of troops from Iraq on December 16, 2011. The SOFA was fiercely resisted by Iraqi society and legislators because it was primarily designed to provide immunity to U.S. troops operating in Iraq – pursuant negotiations over the SOFA led to some immunity for some U.S. contractors and none for others. Eventually, the SOFA met its eventual demise: after 2011, no residual combat force of the U.S. military was left or stationed in Iraq.

The negotiations – or arguments, rather – over the BSA are much similar to those about the SOFA: immunity for U.S. troops, the number and jurisdictional responsibility of the residual Western troops in Afghanistan, etc. Under the strategic partnership agreement signed by the U.S. and Afghanistan in May 2012, both countries were obliged to negotiate a bilateral security agreement within one year and these negotiations were scheduled to begin on November 15, 2012. The talks were to attempt to set conditions for U.S. forces in Afghanistan after 2014 as part of a “train, advise and assist” mission and were aimed at building a security framework, not a detailed agreement for the status of residual U.S. or NATO forces in Afghanistan beyond their own mandates (as legislated by their own countries back in the West). Besides immunity from Afghan prosecution for U.S. soldiers accused of crimes and the Afghan demand that the U.S. guarantee that it will respond to any cross-border incursion or artillery attack on Afghanistan’s territory, negotiators will also attempt to set broad outlines for air rights over Afghanistan and the use and disposition of hundreds of U.S.-built bases — especially the mega-size air bases in Bagram and Kandahar built with over billions of dollars of money funneled into Afghanistan from the U.S. and other Western countries’ defense budgets.

Plans by the US to engage in peace talks with the Taliban have resulted in suspension of bilateral security discussions between the US and Afghanistan on June 19, 2013, rendering the first blow to American plans for the Asian region post-2014. The “talk-fight” approach of the Obama administration first pursued by General McChrystal, and then by General Petraeus, did not settle well with President Karzai, who – in his twilight years as modern Afghanistan’s first head of state – discovered some unique political courage and a novel way to deal with the very powers that put and kept him in office in the first place. Talks between the United States and Afghanistan over the bilateral security agreement have faltered in recent months over the Afghan government’s insistence that the United States guarantee Afghanistan’s security and, in essence, commit to declaring Pakistan the main obstacle in the fight against militancy in the region. The guarantees sought by Afghanistan, if implemented, could possibly compel the United States to attack Taliban havens in Pakistan long after 2014, when the Obama administration has said it hoped to dial back the C.I.A.’s covert drone war there. President Karzai also wanted the Obama administration to specify the number of troops it would leave in Afghanistan after 2014, and make a multiyear financial commitment to the Afghan Army and the police. To reverse the pressure on the Karzai administration and the ANSF, the U.S. began contemplating a faster pullout from Afghanistan.

The White House announced in June 2013 that long-delayed peace talks with the Taliban would begin in Doha, Qatar, where the Taliban opened what amounted to an embassy-in-exile, complete with their old flag and a plaque with their official name, “The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.” But the highly choreographed announcement backfired, with Afghan officials saying the talks gave the insurgents undeserved legitimacy and accusing the Obama administration of negotiating behind Karzai’s back. To the surprise of American officials, President Karzai then abruptly ended the negotiations over the bilateral security agreement altogether, saying that negotiations would not resume until the Taliban met directly with representatives of the Afghan government: essentially linking the security negotiations to a faltering peace process, and making the United States responsible for persuading the Taliban to talk to the Afghan government.

By November 2013, it was announced that the U.S. and Afghanistan had reached a “final and conclusive” agreement on the final language of the BSA, but the State Department said that it was not a final agreement and that the U.S. was still reviewing it. A letter written by U.S. President Obama said U.S. forces will be “cooperating in training, advising, and assisting” Afghan forces “in a targeted, smaller, counterterrorism mission.” There was no stipulated limit on how long U.S. forces would remain in Afghanistan, and the accord also has no expiration date. The wording of agreement stated that “unless mutually agreed, United States forces shall not conduct combat operations in Afghanistan”. It stated the parties’ “intention of protecting U.S. and Afghan national interests without U.S. military counter-terrorism operations” but does not specifically prohibit such operations. Moreover, United States Special Operations forces will retain leeway to conduct antiterrorism raids on private Afghan homes. This ‘door kicking’ policy and the Drone strikes are the reason behind rampant anti US sentiment.

The agreement text grants the United States full legal jurisdiction over U.S. troops and Defense Department civilians working in Afghanistan. On troop immunity, it says that Afghanistan agrees “that the United States shall have the exclusive right to exercise jurisdiction” over members of the force and its civilian component “in respect of any criminal or civil offenses committed in the territory of Afghanistan”, and that “Afghanistan authorizes the United States to hold [civil and criminal] trial in such cases, or take other disciplinary action, as appropriate, in the territory of Afghanistan”, but Afghan authorities can ask that anyone be taken out of the country. Afghan authorities are prohibited from detaining American troops or U.S. civilians working with them. In the event that happens “for any reason,” however, those personnel “shall be immediately handed over to United States forces authorities”. The agreement also specifies that American troops and civilians cannot be surrendered to any “international tribunal or any other entity or state” without express U.S. consent. Afghanistan, it says, retains legal jurisdiction over civilian contractors, and contractors are prohibited from wearing military uniforms and “may only carry weapons in accordance with Afghan laws and regulations”. The draft agreement says that U.S. military and Defense Department civilian personnel are exempt from visa requirements and taxation. Afghan taxes and other fees will not be imposed on the entry or exit of goods specifically for the use of U.S. forces.

The document has a clause committing the United States to consulting with the Afghan government in the event of external threats, but not the sort of NATO-style mutual defense pact the Afghans originally wanted. “The United States shall regard with grave concern any external aggression or threat of external aggression against the sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity of Afghanistan,” the proposed agreement states. U.S. President Obama added in a letter to his Afghan counterpart: “The US commitment to Afghanistan’s independence, territorial integrity, and national unity, as enshrined in our Strategic Partnership Agreement, is enduring, as is our respect for Afghan sovereignty”.

An annex to the draft lists locations where Afghanistan agrees to provide facilities for U.S. forces, including Kabul; Bagram, north of the capital, where the United States has its largest current base; Mazar-e Sharif in northern Afghanistan; Herat in the west; Kandahar in the south; Shindand in Herat province; Sharab in Helmand province; Gardez, south of Kabul; and Jalalabad, to the east. The draft document gives the U.S. the right to deploy American forces on nine bases, including the two biggest: the airfields in Bagram and Kandahar. It also allows U.S. military planes to fly in and out of Afghanistan from seven air bases, including Kabul International Airport. U.S. forces would be permitted under the document to transport supplies from five border crossings, described along with the air bases as “official points of embarkation and debarkation”. All bases in Afghanistan would revert to Afghan ownership and sovereignty after 2014, according to the draft. If approved, the BSA would allow the U.S. to deploy military advisors to train and equip Afghan security forces, along with U.S. special-operations troops for anti-terrorism missions against Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups, but President Obama will determine the size of the force.

The text of the BSA was approved by the delegates at the Loya Jirga (the Grand Assembly, composed of members of the Afghan parliament, the Elders Assembly, tribal leaders, and other important personalities of Afghan society, convened to give assent on issues of national importance) on November 24, 2013 and must now be signed by the Afghanistan president, who rejected the final recommendation of the Loya Jirga to promptly sign the BSA with the United States. The jirga even set a few conditions before expressing approval for the agreement among them a 10-year time limit on the post-2014 troop presence and reparations for damages caused by U.S. troops deployed in Afghanistan. The Mesherano Jirga (Assembly of Elders) also demanded the release of 19 Afghans from the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay and a stronger U.S. pledge to defend Afghanistan from any incursion from its neighbors, particularly Pakistan. Still, President Karzai has given no date as to when he will sign the BSA: it is his overt stance that the U.S. should wait till the Afghan legislative and presidential elections take place in April 2014, after which the BSA would be ratified by Karzai’s successor. Afghanistan’s deputy foreign minister, Ershad Ahmadi, acknowledged that the BSA becomes more vital as Afghanistan undergoes this crucial political and security transition during 2014. Even though this would give the U.S.-Afghan agreement more legitimacy, it is obvious – and many are sure – that the BSA will be signed, whether sooner or later, because of the interests and compulsions of both parties. The recommendation that the agreement be signed before the April 2014 election comes in direct opposition to a statement made by Karzai in a speech delivered on the gathering’s opening day “this pact should be signed when the election has already taken place, properly and with dignity”. Karzai’s recommendations came after he conceded that neither he nor the United States trusted one another. Washington quickly replied that it was “neither practical nor possible” to delay signing the BSA beyond the end of 2013. Analysts believe that by dillydallying on the issue of the BSA, and by extracting the maximum gains for Afghanistan from the U.S., Karzai wants to establish his legacy in Afghanistan as a positive one, even if the Taliban come to power when the U.S. leaves.

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin told President Hamid Karzai in October 2013 that the United States will “not be able” to provide any assistance to Afghanistan until the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) between the two countries is signed.

Moreover, The Afghan president said in a speech at Kabul’s Polytechnic University after the conclusion of the “consultative” Loya Jirga (Grand Assembly) that it has been made clear to him that peace in Afghanistan is “first in US hands” and second in Pakistani hands. Karzai said he had seen documentation proving as much. Alluding to the role of neighbouring Pakistan in the decades-long Afghan conflict, Karzai said “if we started the war, we can end it; if we haven’t, we can’t. This war was started by someone else”. The president went on to deliver a message to the United States, including James Cunningham, US ambassador to Afghanistan, who was seated in the audience at Kabul’s Polytechnic University. “Afghanistan has proved its friendship to you … Now, the US should prove its honesty with us”: this is an implicit signal to the U.S. that they should give more priority to Afghanistan than to Pakistan, and that if push comes to shove, the U.S. should choose Afghanistan rather than Pakistan – the wording of the BSA that the U.S. would protect Afghanistan even from a military attack by Pakistan is also a clear indication of the same.

After invoking all the caveats above, President Hamid Karzai, said that he has agreed to sign the BSA with the United States if it “brings peace to the nation” after a more than three-decade-long conflict. Speaking at the Kabul Polytechnic University, Karzai said the result of the Bilateral Strategic Agreement between Kabul and Washington must be peace. But if Karzai thinks that his legacy of a strong and nationalist Afghan leader will be cemented if he binds the U.S. to the Afghan corner with or without support from the Afghan Taliban, or even Pakistan for that matter, then it is he himself who is creating the obstacle for Afghan peace – an obstacle that will become all too visible leading up to and during the crucial April 2014 elections in Afghanistan. By doing so, President Karzai is buying himself time so that he does not have to sign off on an agreement that sells Afghanistan’s sovereignty and the average Afghan’s peace of mind and sanctity of a secure life, but he may also be giving more room for the Afghan Taliban and the U.S. to strike a deal on their own, and let the Afghan Taliban come to power in a completely new setup that starts taking shape in 2014, and crystallizes later on. However, the U.S. knows that it will not be able to control the Afghan Taliban, since it has not been able to militarily defeat them, or coerce them into staying on the negotiating table despite all efforts from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, so it needs the Karzai dispensations and the pro-U.S. warlords to have more cards to deal or play with in Asia – Central and South – during 2014 and beyond. Even as of January 17, 2014, the U.S. is urging President Karzai to “quickly” sign the Bilateral Security Agreement.

As alternate approaches to the post-2014 U.S.-Afghan (and regional) security pact are being developed, considered, and discussed at various levels, the security of the Asian region, particularly of Central and South Asia, largely depends on whether the U.S. finds a way to stay in Afghanistan during or after 2014, or whether it has to completely withdraw from Afghanistan. America may even have to decrease its presence in Pakistan, given the rousing anti-U.S. sentiment on the Pakistani street, which is physically obstructing the NATO supply routes on which the Alliance is depending so as to ensure a smooth withdrawal. If everything does not go according to plan, then the Western forces leaving Afghanistan will be going home with a mission unaccomplished and with their tails between their legs: what they will leave behind is a multidimensional monster of a problem (transnational terrorism with a radical Islamist tinge for one) that Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Iran, Central Asian states, and even China, will have to deal with for years to come. If the Afghan Taliban can encourage a Taliban movement in Pakistan – the TTP – then there will be no stopping a SIMI or Afghan Mujahideen from acquiring the same kind of power in India, and Central Asian states with Muslim populations – conservative or otherwise – will also have the same specter to face and deal with. The U.S. looked towards India’s intelligence officials for nudging President Karzai towards signing the BSA post-haste; in response, India has rejected the agreed-upon exit strategy for foreign troops stationed in Afghanistan. Defense analysts construe this as a signal of their failure to achieve a confirmation for the Indo-U.S. plans for Afghanistan and Central Asia during and after 2014, compounding a decade of India’s strategic failure in Central Asia despite piggybacking on the U.S. China is already handling – and has to a large extent, crushed – an Islamist terror movement in the Uighur-dominated areas near the Afghanistan and Pakistan borders, and will obviously prepare itself for any eventuality: if the U.S. stays and deals with Islamic terror groups, or if it leaves regional countries to its own devices and exacerbates the problem so that someone else (its perceived enemies, like Pakistan, and its accepted adversary, like China) can deal with it. Clearly a regional approach that emphasizes economic integration and cooperation is needed and all of Afghanistan’s neighbors—Pakistan, India, Iran, CAS. Russia and China—have to be on board.

TACSTRAT ANALYSIS