Afghanistan

  The potential exists for “insurgency creep,” reflecting political dissatisfaction, cultural opposition, and lack of economic opportunity even in areas where there has not been insurgent action in the past. There is widespread disaffection in the north and west over the preponderance of aid flowing to the Pushtun south and east, which are also the two regions where violence is the worst. Mark Ward, a UNAMA official working on aid issues, said: “If you look at the security map, it does not stay the same. The bad guys are going where we are not. We cannot afford another front.”542 The challenge is to allocate enough resources to create a stable enough civil infrastructure throughout all Afghanistan so that the “bad guys” are not able to move into areas where they had not previously operated and undo the progress that the coalition and Afghans have worked to achieve.

  The Afghan Security Forces

  By 2002, the Taliban and Al Qaeda fighting forces had fled across the border to Pakistan, and the future of Afghanistan’s armed forces became an issue. The Northern Alliance initially envisioned their forces, the nominal army of the Islamic State of Afghanistan, transforming into the actual army of the new post-Bonn Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. But when all the armed forces of the anti-Taliban Afghan forces were added together—designated the Afghan Military Forces (AMF)—they proved too large, too unwieldy, and totally unreformed. They retained their basic characteristics of either retaining loyalty to one of the three major groups of the Northern Alliance—Tajiks, Uzbeks, and Hazaras—and their limited number of pre-2001 ethnic Pusthnun allies, or were anti-Taliban Pushtun militias that had been improvised in the south and east. In addition, the defense ministry, then under the former Northern Alliance battlefield commander Mohammed Qassam Fahim, along with the interior ministry, had only nominal control over a number of provincial and district level militia and police forces. In Pushtun areas, this control was even more minimal. As part of the AMF, these forces were meant to be designated as military units and their commanders commissioned as formal officers. The fighting men were to receive military salaries, small as they were. These men were mainly recruited by local warlords or strongmen to whom they remained loyal. In addition, separate from these, there were other Afghan militia forces, organized and led by coalition troops in many cases.543 Using the Northern Alliance as the cadre for the new Afghan army proved unacceptable to other Afghan groups, especially among Kabulis and returning exiles, all of whom lacked comparable forces and were concerned that this would give the Northern Alliance’s strength of arms effective sway over the national government, regardless of the results of the constitutional and electoral processes.

  In 2002–03 there were already extensive problems with the AMF. Fahim had established 40 divisions that were concentrated in—but by no means limited to—the south, even though many had only a few hundred fighting men. There were so many “ghost” soldiers, kept on the rolls so their commanders could pocket their pay, that no one knew the size of the AMF. Many of the AMF unit commanders in the south were Pushtuns who had turned against the Taliban in 2001. However, they were still often identified with repression under pre-Taliban regimes or else shared the Taliban’s loss of legitimacy. Conflicts involving local AMF units resulted when factions of nominally pro-Kabul Pushtuns clashed in Kandahar, Paktia, Khost, and Nangarhar provinces in 2002–04. In addition to the tension caused by the coalition supporting AMF commanders who effectively were local Pushtun warlords, many Pushtuns resented the Kabul-based control of the AMF by non-Pushtuns, especially Panjsheris.

  Since 2003, the US had decided not to invest resources in reforming the AMF and those militia forces that were under US or coalition control. Instead, they focused on demobilizing them and instead forming two new organizations, the ANA and ANP. The ANA was first created in 2002, with the goal of giving the Kabul government a politically reliable force as a counterweight to the AMF with its links to the Northern Alliance. But these old forces were disbanded before the ANA and ANP were ready to take their place, giving the insurgency a chance to re-emerge. This was especially notable in areas such as Khost, where the local 25th Division of the AMF and militias together had worked with the provincial governor and the local population. When they were disbanded, the insurgent activity in the Khost area increased rapidly. Fahim was replaced as minister of defense in December 2004 by Rahim Wardak, a US-trained professional solider and returning exile who had served as military chairman of one of the Peshawar parties in the anti-Soviet conflict and as chief of staff of the ISA’s army in 1992. The Northern Alliance leaders saw this as a move to deny them participation in the post-Taliban government. This marked the transition to the emphasis on the new ANA rather than continuing the forces that had fought the Taliban in 2001. Because the aid donors were providing the resources, they directed the process and set priorities. This included setting age limits for enlistment that kept many veterans of the anti-Soviet war out of the ANA enlisted ranks, making them available for service with the insurgents or narcotics traffickers.

  The disbandment of the AMF meant that Disarmament, Demobilization and Reintegration (DDR) of its forces became a coalition priority. Former interior minister Ali Jalali stressed the importance of disarming and demobilizing both the AMF and local armed groups and relying on the uniformed forces of the ANA and ANP to keep the peace: “In DDR, we had to demobilize militias to create a safe environment. To fill the vacuum, we had to create the ANA.”544

  The Japanese-funded UNAMA Disarmament, Demobilization and Rehabilitation (DDR) program started with good intentions, but ended up being perceived by non-Pushtuns as a way of disarming them while building up the forces of a new Pushtun-dominated government in Kabul. To these Afghans, the DDR program was seen as being intent on preventing any future self-defense against foreign invasion while leaving the Pakistan-based insurgency, where most of the conflict originated, unaffected. Historically, especially against the British and Soviets in past centuries, the defense of Afghanistan against foreign invaders has relied on the local people of Afghanistan in arms rather than the uniformed Afghan military. Saleh Registani, member of parliament from Panjshir province, said that the re-emergence of the Taliban was encouraged by “Disarmament of the United Front/Northern Alliance and the mujahideen in general, the only groups that were capable of fighting the Taliban and the groups that would never accept the Taliban’s ideology.”545 The desire, especially by the coalition and the Kabul government, to see Afghanistan rely on the ANA and ANP, which they controlled, for defense against the insurgents has had to be compromised with the reality that effective counter-insurgency warfare includes armed villagers acting in self-defense. Yet the potential for armed groups of Afghans fighting their own private conflicts was very real. Reconciling these two requirements in a country where there are lots of weapons and a tradition of individuals being armed even in peacetime has been a challenge that the formation of the ANA and ANP has not yet resolved.

  The Afghan National Army

  Today, the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) comprises the Afghan National Army (ANA), which includes the Air Corps and the Afghan National Police (ANP).546 The ANA was created by the coalition, who guided it throughout its formation and now its operations. The ANA is intended to be the national army of Afghanistan, with ethnic quotas being applied to both the force structure as a whole and to individual kandaks (battalions) to ensure that it accurately reflects the demographic makeup of the country as a whole.547 The ANA has emerged far ahead of any other Afghan government institution in terms of capability, competence, minimized corruption, and its ability to operate with ethnolinguistically diverse personnel. Since its organization, the ANA has not been defeated in action by insurgents and has not been in any battle where it has not prevailed. It has become something for Afghans to take pride in as well as a successful example of what can be accomplished for other Afghan governmental institutions through a complete overhaul. Only in the most heavily insurgent-controlled areas of the south are the ANA considered an outside, fore
ign, and therefore hostile force. “It is the most respected institution in the country. That it went from zero to that in five to six years is significant,” said MG Mark Milley, US Army, deputy commander of Regional Command-East in 2008.548 While the ANA’s progress has been great, further challenges remain, especially as the coalition pushes for it to quickly expand and take over the burden of ground combat operations.

  In the initial years of its existence, ANA infrastructure was limited. Many of their barracks even lacked running water. A rapid buildup was not a priority; rather, the overall approach was aimed at minimizing US aid expenditure. By not anticipating that there would be another insurgency coming about any time soon, the US and its coalition partners “wasted so many years,” in the words of Rahim Wardak, Afghanistan’s defense minister.549 It was only in 2007 that the US provided greater funding for a faster buildup of the ANA. The decision to disband the Afghan Military Forces and recreate the ANA from scratch meant that there was no opportunity to build on an existing foundation, making the buildup process even lengthier. But such a clean slate was seen by the coalition and Kabul government alike as required to break down the links with pre-2001 forces, limit ethnolinguistic divisions, and weed out corruption.

  The ANA is now committed to a program of rapid expansion. In November 2008 the ANA was 79,000 strong (plus five thousand absent without leave personnel) with 78 infantry and five commando kandaks.550 By January 2009, 56 of these kandaks were assessed by ISAF as being capable of battalion-level operations. A specialist counter-narcotics infantry kandak is also being formed. In January-April 2009, an average of 83 ANA deliberate operations per week were being mounted, compared with 37 the year before.551 Five corps headquarters provided the ANA’s operational leadership: the 201st Corps in Kabul, 203rd Corps in Gardez, 205th Corps in Kandahar, 207th Corps in Herat, and 209th Corps in Mazar-e-Sharif. By 2009, there were plans to expand the ANA to over 134,000 in October 2010 and eventually 216,000 in 2014, as well as for the acquisition of additional helicopters and transport aircraft. New equipment is being provided; artillery and armored vehicles will be delivered though US and other coalition security assistance programs. The ANA’s Kalashnikov rifles are being replaced by US-designed M16 series weapons, and Soviet-era tanks will be replaced by US-designed wheeled armored vehicles. The ANA will retain some of its Soviet-designed equipment, including its helicopters.

  By 2009, the deteriorating security situation in Afghanistan led to further initiatives to expand the ANA and ANP. A total end-strength of 400,000 ANSF personnel was being considered in Washington. GEN Petraeus said: “I’m not going to get into numbers, but there is a pretty general assessment that number is in the ballpark, whatever you do, in facing an industrial-strength insurgency in Afghanistan.”552 He added “there are limits to how fast you can accelerate growth, especially the development of officer and non-commissioned officer leaders. . . . The ANA has gone up from under 20,000 in 2005 to over 85,000 in 2008. We need a lot more, now 90 battalions or so. . . . They will fight but have a long way to go before they can take over security responsibility in any systematic fashion.” By the time even the 134,000 force level is reached, the ANA would have 20 brigade headquarters throughout the nation, plus a division headquarters in Kabul, alongside artillery, engineer, and Quick Reaction Force (QRF) assets. Because of the limited pool of trained and competent Afghan military leaders, this expansion remains problematic. “I don’t know how we are going to get there,” said COL Jeff Haynes, USMC, former chief advisor to the 201st Corps.553 The expansion of the ANSF is likely to have to be throttled back to meet Afghan realities rather than coalition political goals. New leaders will have to be identified among those that have proven themselves in combat without weakening those units already in the force structure.

  Even developed countries have found that the rapid expansion of armed forces is difficult to accomplish, even given practically unlimited resources. For the Afghans, with too few literates willing to fight and with the ANSF dependent on foreign security assistance for training, equipment, and funding, they may have to look again at other measures, such as militia or self-defense groups. Conscription may have to be considered as an alternative to the current all-volunteer forces, although this would potentially have negative political and stability impacts if Pushtuns were conscripted to fight fellow Pushtuns or educated Afghans were unwilling to serve in uniform.

  ANA expansion plans to date do not include forces, weapons, or capabilities that would be able to take on Pakistan’s army. Under current plans, Afghanistan will not receive weapons such as surface-to-air missiles or anti-tank weapons from the US or any other source. This expansion has also stretched available training resources, which were strained to begin with. While ANA expansion is a coalition-wide effort, ISAF forces have often failed to provide required resources. As of November 2008, they had provided only 42 out of 103 ISAF OMLTs (operational mentor and liaison teams) that, along with the comparable 12–20 man US Embedded Training Teams (ETTs), are integral to ANA units, training them in garrison and operating as part of them in the field. Many OMLTs are limited by national caveats and so cannot accompany ANA units on some missions, while the smaller armed forces providing OMLTs lack the US military’s depth of resources. There has also been a long-standing shortage of Afghanistan-trained advisors and trainers that can operate in the field alongside ANA officers. The Combined Security Training Command-Afghanistan (CSTC-A) has an ANSF-wide training function, and in November 2009 this was consolidated as part of the NATO Training Mission-Afghanistan (NTM-A). This action was intended to encourage other coalition members to increase their participation in the training mission.554 Yet the shortage of advisors and trainers remains. One of the reasons why US GEN McChrystal requested US and coalition reinforcements in 2009 was to provide additional advisors and trainers to enable the ANSF to expand and be able to take over a greater burden of combat operations in the future.

  The ANSF took over security in Kabul starting in August 2008. This shift in responsibility away from the coalition has been relatively successful. Even with the increase in insurgency-related violence, “the security services are doing better, and discover more threats,” according to Dominic Medley, UNAMA spokesman.555 The ANSF operations have not been limited to Kabul. In 2008, BG James C. McGonville, deputy commander of Regional Command-East, confirmed that: “Most operations in Regional Command-East are being lead by the ANA.”556 While Afghans are willing to watch others fight the insurgency for them, when made to take responsibility and when trustworthy Afghan commanders can be promoted and retained regardless of patronage, the ANSF can be effective.

  To facilitate coordination with coalition forces, the ANSF has established Operations Coordination Commands (OCCs), six regional (OCC-Rs) co-located with the ISAF Regional Commands and in Kabul and 34 provincial (OCC-Ps), located in each provincial capital. These are coordination rather than command centers. There is no ANSF national command post, and the separate ANA, ANP and intelligence chains of command remain intact.

  In recent years, expansion of the ANSF has been seen as the most important investment toward reversing the trends of a more powerful and widespread insurgency. While much is expected from the ANA, it still faces substantial limitations as demands for rapid expansion have stretched its limited trained cadres thin and it must rely on foreign resources to sustain a rapid buildup. Indeed, the ANA is not sustainable without foreign assistance before 2024, even given optimistic economic projections.557 In 2008–10 the ANA was still heavily dependent on foreign forces for funding, fuel, air support, casualty evacuation, and indirect fire support. Technical arms, artillery, and the ANA’s Air Corps have all lagged behind in development. Widespread absence without leave and desertion remains a problem. In some areas of Afghanistan, especially in the south, ANA units are seen as outsiders by many Pushtuns who have not embraced the army’s multiethnic composition as consistent with the Pushtun vision of the future of Afghanistan. Having an army better developed tha
n the civilian elements of government has, in other countries, most notably Pakistan, led to the military seizing power. While the ANA’s American and coalition creators have tried to mold it as a non-political force, this might not endure a reduction in the aid it depends on to function.

  The culture of corruption that affects all Afghanistan has not spared the ANA, although it is probably the least corrupt Afghan government institution. This is due in large part to its financial autonomy, being largely funded by US and other coalition donors with funds that go directly to it.558 Afghan politics and patronage relations continue to shape high-level command appointments, keeping the incompetent employed and frustrating their more-competent subordinates. Throughout the ANA’s command structure, the importance of traditional Afghan patronage relationships is often at odds with the need for a functioning chain of command that does not always line up with old loyalties. At senior levels, many ANA officers have achieved commands due to patronage rather than competence, making the entire organization at risk for continued nepotism. “It took me nine months to get an incompetent and criminal ANA brigade commander fired, and it would not have happened if I had not threatened to pull out the advisory teams,” COL Haynes recalled. The lack of willingness to accept individual accountability, encouraged by both traditional Afghan practices and lingering Soviet training, remains strong. One experienced Afghan journalist believed that, under pressure, it would dissolve and that it could fracture along ethnolinguistic lines: “It is a myth that the ANA is professional and competent.” Yet it remains that the ANA is doing better than most Afghan governmental institutions. Progress has been made, but is likely, in the future, to be as slow and frustrating as all progress is in Afghanistan. Relying on the ANSF for too much or speeding its expansion puts at risk what has been gained so far and has the potential to undercut the chance to fix its limitations.