Global Policy Forum

By Marc Kaufman

Sixteen months after the ruling Taliban fell and Hamid Karzai took over as president, Afghanistan is still struggling to establish the basics of a working government. As Karzai and his U.S. and international supporters have found, virtually every significant system in the country is broken. The military is splintered by factionalism, the police force is untrained, the justice system is dominated by religious conservatives who have more in common with the Taliban than with Karzai, and tax collection is largely ineffective. Even driving rules are in disarray: Afghans drive on the right side of the road, but during the past chaotic decade, most of the cars brought into the country were designed for left-side driving -- a situation that leads to many accidents but is beyond the government's ability to fix.

As a result, when U.S. policymakers discuss rebuilding Afghanistan, they no longer talk exclusively about new schools, roads and services for needy people. Now they talk just as much about establishing functioning government agencies and about spreading the authority of the central government beyond Kabul. Initially opposed to the idea of "nation-building," the Bush administration has found that it is the key to Afghanistan's future.

"That opposition to nation-building is a fig leaf that dropped a while ago," said the U.S. Embassy spokesman here, Alberto Fernandez. "We're up to our ears in nation-building." A look at the pace and nature of reconstruction in Afghanistan over the past three months shows that the United States is often acting with a sense of urgency and that U.S. rebuilding efforts reach into almost every aspect of Afghan life. U.S. officials say the total budget for Afghan aid this year -- excluding the cost of maintaining 8,000 U.S. troops here -- will probably match last year's $935 million.

But the needs of the continuing U.S.-led war effort are frequently at odds with the needs of Afghan nation-building, and the nation-building often suffers as a result, a dynamic that limits the credibility of Karzai and ministers in his government, top Afghan officials and foreign officials in Kabul say. For instance, while spending millions to help train a new Afghan national army that will become the muscle for the central government, the United States is still funding local militias and warlords that its military believes it needs in the war against Muslim extremists. Those provincial leaders are often at odds with the central government and sometimes defy its orders.

U.S. troops also continue to capture and hold without charges Afghans suspected of involvement with terrorists. The practice regularly brings hundreds of aggrieved Afghans to Kabul to argue for the release of their relatives or tribesmen -- most notably in the case of Naeem Koochi, a tribal leader with a large and loyal following. Karzai has said for months that Koochi should be released, but instead he was recently moved to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Still, the United States is trying to build up the Karzai government in other ways. In addition to training and equipping much of the new army, U.S. intelligence officers are advising the Afghan National Security Directorate, a U.S. company is rebuilding the main road from Kabul to Kandahar, valuable vegetable oil from the United States is going to families that send their young daughters to school and U.S. officials helped send 26,000 Afghans on the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. U.S. funds are also helping to train Afghans to become better tax and duty collectors.

In an effort to spread assistance and security outside the capital, the U.S. military is setting up 40- to 60-member provincial reconstruction teams in several provincial capitals this year. "The Americans, and the international community, are engaged in state-building, not really nation-building," said Lakhdar Brahimi, the special U.N. envoy to Afghanistan. "That is very much of a change from the initial attitude that the American goal was running out the bad guys and, like everyone else, participating in providing some humanitarian aid in Afghanistan. . . . What they need is a state that keeps peace and order and the rule of law."

Last year the United States devoted the largest share of its Afghan spending on humanitarian aid. But this year, the United States will spend more on building up the army, which has 3,000 members but is scheduled to reach 70,000. This kind of U.S. and other international aid, in addition to the relative security being provided by U.S. and other troops, has encouraged millions of Afghan refugees to come home and has led to mini-building booms in Kabul and other cities. While many Afghans appreciate the improved security, they are increasingly critical of the reconstruction help they are receiving. They often speak harshly about the many luxury cars in Kabul that ferry United Nations and aid officials to meetings, while few visible improvements have been made in the lives of Afghans.

With that criticism in mind, the United States and other donors have acceded to Afghan requests that the Karzai government play a larger role in deciding how and where aid money is spent. "The Afghan government is taking real control of aid dollars in an unprecedented way," said William Taylor, special representative for donor assistance at the U.S. Embassy. "They are deciding what needs to be done." The process, however, remains bumpy. President Bush announced last fall, for example, that the United States would donate $80 million, and Japan and Saudi Arabia $50 million each, to rebuild the Kabul-Kandahar-Herat highway. Bush said the work would be complete by late 2004, when Afghanistan is scheduled to hold its first national election.

But the U.S. firm coordinating the U.S. part of the roadwork, the Louis Berger Group, now says $180 million is enough money to build only the part of the highway from Kabul to Kandahar. As a result, Afghan officials have demanded more control of the project, which they say they can complete much more cheaply, according to Louis Purifoy, chief engineer for Louis Berger in Kabul. "They want to do the work, but the truth is they just don't have the wherewithal to complete it to U.S. specifications," Purifoy said. "They think we're spending too much on the road, and we think they can't do what's required."

The rising cost of the road project speaks to the much-debated question in Afghanistan of whether the United States and its international allies will cut back on their reconstruction aid because of the war in Iraq. The Afghan finance minister, Ashraf Ghani, has been lobbying for increased international donations, saying that per capita aid to Afghanistan is much lower than to Bosnia, Rwanda, Kosovo and other places that have been through war.

Ghani said that with an additional $20 billion in aid over the next five years, "Afghanistan will become a prospering nation that can take care of itself entirely in 10 years." But if the international community cuts back on its commitments, "Afghanistan will become a narco-terrorist state that will be a constant problem to the world." In some ways, Afghan officials are making progress in their own nation-building efforts. Reflecting on the recently completed budget process, for instance, Ghani said that "people were sitting around a table and debating issues that have for years been settled by guns."

But there has been less progress on other important fronts. For example, there are no voter registration rolls for next year's election, a census has not been taken in decades, political parties are still not legal and the $50 million to $60 million that the United Nations says is needed for the election has not been raised. In addition, the security situation remains precarious enough that Karzai, who narrowly escaped assassination in September, seldom leaves the presidential compound, and when he does, a crew of largely American bodyguards accompanies him.

At a recent graduation outside Kabul for Afghans being trained as bodyguards for top officials, several dozen Afghan men in new suits lined up in military fashion and showed off their new skills and discipline. The men said they were eager to take over as Karzai's bodyguards. But when one of the U.S. trainers, Hank Poff, was asked if the men were ready, he demurred. "Would I want to depend on them to protect the president or other leaders now? No," he said. "They're eager, but most don't have the skills yet. It's still too early in the game."

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