The crisis in Afghanistan and international involvement



The crisis in Afghanistan and international involvement

Afghanistan has long suffered from great power rivalry and foreign military intervention, including the bitter Anglo-Afghan wars of the nineteenth century. Beginning in 1979, the country again descended into a prolonged period of devastating conflict. A Soviet military intervention (1979-1988) took a heavy toll, as US-backed Islamic militants fought a bitter conflict against the Soviet occupiers. There followed a period of civil war and warlordism 1988-mid1990s, then rule by a government organized by the Islamic Taliban, and finally in 2001 a military intervention by the United States followed by further violence, instability and civil war.

In late 2001, the Security Council authorized the United States to overthrow the Taliban government, as an offensive against the terrorist al-Qaeda organization, said to be based in the country. The Council also authorized the US and its NATO allies to set up the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) to provide military support for a newly-established pro-Western government (the United States also continued to run a separate anti-terrorist military operation). In March 2002 the Council established the United Nations Assistance Mission for Afghanistan (UNAMA) to manage all UN humanitarian, relief, recovery and reconstruction activities. Despite (or perhaps because of) these military-centered initiatives, Afghanistan has remained a "failed state." The authority of President Hamid Karzai, victor in the presidential election of October 2004, barely extends beyond Kabul's suburbs, warlords have gained back control of most of the country, and opium is now the principal agricultural crop.

The Taliban has enjoyed an upsurge of military success in 2007-2008 and several NATO countries have expressed concern about the political viability of the operation. Public support for deployments to Afghanistan in countries such as Germany and Canada has evaporated. The media have reported on US-UK air bombardment of innocent civilians as well as bold Taliban attacks against US and NATO forces, suggesting that the intervention is failing to produce the promised security, democracy and prosperity

The crisis of international terrorism emanating from Afghanistan might have been avoided had Washington heeded the now-slain leader of the Afghan anti-Taliban forces, the legendary commander Ahmad Shah Masood, who repeatedly warned that a dangerous triangular alliance between the Taliban, Osama bin Laden and Pakistan was turning Afghanistan into a major source of instability in world politics. Washington's failure to help Masood to limit the menace eventually cost both the commander and the US dearly. Masood died on 15 September 2001 of wounds inflicted on him in a suicide bombing by two Arabs, apparently organised by bin Laden, only two days before the US fell victim to the apocalyptic terrorist attacks on 11 September. Why did the US fail to act earlier over Afghanistan, and is it now capable of addressing effectively the root-causes of the present crisis? The axis of Osama bin Laden, Taliban and Pakistan (or more specifically Pakistan's Interservices Intelligence Directorate (ISI), which operated as a government within a government) was not an over-night development. It dated from mid-1994 when Pakistan orchestrated ...