An intellectual quagmire

With all eyes on South Waziristan, Afghanistan - for a short while, one presumes – has become almost a side-show, even more so the machinations of that sad little tribal leader Hamid Karzai and his bid to stay on the gravy train.

However, the Karzai situation is coming to a head, with diverse reports recording that the UN-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) has pulled the plug on his vote-rigging supporters. It has downgraded his share of the vote from 55 to 48 percent, upping the share of his main competitor, Dr Abdullah, from 28 to 32 percent.

This means, according to the rules, there must be a run-off but, as might have been predicted, Karzai is digging his heels in and refusing to accept the result. Even though a run-off is the last thing his Western paymasters actually want, such is the fantasy land in which he and his supporters dwell that Mohammad Moin Marastyal, an Afghan MP and leading Karzai supporter, claims the commission has "twisted the facts" in a deliberate attempt to trigger a run-off vote.

This is not yet the last stage of this current drama though. Procedurally, the ECC delivers its report to the Independent Election Commission (IEC), a body notionally appointed Karzai as a sop to the idea that as president, he actually exercises sovereignty on behalf of the Afghan people.

In theory, it is the final arbiter of the election results and must declare a result. But the ECC has "ordered" the IEC "to invalidate a certain percentage of each candidates votes in six separate categories". The IEC is expected "to implement those orders with haste and move swiftly to issue the final certified results or the need for a run-off as required by Afghan electoral law," says Aleem Siddique, a spokesman for the UN in Kabul.

Where we go from here is anyone's guess but, whatever the final outcome – which looks a long way off – the whole electoral process is irrevocably tainted, and Karzai is holed below the waterline. Even in the unlikely event that he could rally the nation behind him, he has lost the trust of the "international community", whose money, troops and bodyguards have kept him in power.

Already, the shock waves are beginning to be felt in Kabul with White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel warning that president Obama is minded to delay a decision on committing up to 40,000 extra American troops to the conflict. He prefers to wait until the election crisis pans out and it becomes clear whether there is "an Afghan partner" worth fighting for.

Even if this does play into the hands of a president who is fast becoming known for his indecision, Obama does have a point. The whole concept of a counter-insurgency campaign rest on the fiction – honoured more in the breach than the observance – that the military is acting in support of the civil power.

With a tarnished and weakened figurehead, even the fiction is hard to sustain, framing the coalition military activities in their true light – a multi-national occupation force, bolstering a puppet government for its own ends. That is something the Taleban and the so-called "anti-Afghan forces" will be – and have been – quick to exploit.

How precisely we got ourselves into this mess is relatively easy to see – albeit that hindsight affords a certain clarity. Unwittingly, the Independent's Kim Sengupta puts his finger on it, writing in his "analysis" that the elections held in Afghanistan in August "were meant to show how democracy has taken root in the country since the overthrow of the Taliban."

The essential flaw was (and is) the delusion that "democracy" in any shape of form had taken root in Afghanistan, and thus the belief that this second presidential election could or would be a continuation and a strengthening of the process imposed by the international community when Karzai was first elected president in 2004.

Although the structures of a western democracy were imposed, giving Karzai the superficial appearance of a democratically elected president, he retained the mindset and mores of the man he had become, a tribal chief in what is essentially a pre-feudal society. And, in the traditional manner of such, he did what any tribal chief would do in power – he used the resources and apparatus of the state to strengthen his power base, rewarding his allies and forging new alliances.

Sengupta remarks of the current election round – apparently with some surprise – that "instead" (of following the model of a western election), "the polls became mired in massive fraud". Rather than the word "instead", however, he should have used the word "inevitably", as no tribal chief was ever going to give up power voluntarily or take the chance of losing it.

For our brave reporter then to suggest that "this reopened historic, ethnic and political divisions", is almost laughable for its naivety. Those divisions were never "closed" – they are there and have always been there, and are driving the political process, as they have been throughout Karzai's administration. To complete his fog of incomprehension, though, Sengupta observes that this has "led to questions about why Western troops are being sent to fight and die for a seemingly corrupt and cynical government."

Therein lies the core delusion. Karzai's government, in its own terms, is neither "corrupt" nor "cynical". As its president, Karzai has simply been following traditional precepts, acting in accordance with the mores and norms of his tribal society. And if he was to be "democratically" replaced tomorrow, his successor would behave in exactly the same way.

It is into this "quagmire", of course, that British and other coalition troops have been pitched, but what we are beginning to see is that the true "quagmire" is the intellectual swamp. It is that which has trapped the western powers into their current impasse. And, as we can see, their increasingly desperate thrashing is doing no more than suck them deeper into the cloying mud.

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UN-comfortable

One of the preconditions being set by the British government before it will commit to sending more troops to Afghanistan is "a new Afghan government being in place" ready to seize the initiative on corruption, and ready to send more Afghan troops to be trained and partnered by our troops.

Unspecified but nevertheless implied is that the new Afghan government should be stable, holding power legitimately with the support of the majority of the electorate. Yet, weeks down the line from the presidential election, there is no sign that this happy state of affairs is any closer – in fact, quite the reverse.

Such is the turmoil that yesterday saw the unprecedented sacking of Peter Galbraith (pictured), the deputy head of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) after he had written a scathing letter accusing his boss of concealing election fraud that benefited Hamid Karzai.

The head of the mission, Norwegian Kai Eide, denies any wrongdoing, but Galbraith's charge is seen as confirming that the presidential election was hopelessly undermined by fraud.

"For a long time after the elections, Kai denied that significant fraud had taken place, even going to the extreme of ordering UN staff not to discuss the matter," Galbraith wrote. "And, at critical stages in the process," he added, "he blocked me and other UNAMA. professional staff from taking effective action that might have limited the fraud or enabled the Afghan electoral institutions to address it more effectively."

With Karzai currently tallying 54.6 percent of the vote, Afghan national elections officials are now conducting a recount and fraud review under UN oversight, but Galbraith is standing by his accusations of a "cover-up".

EU observers, who are also maintaining a watching brief, have said nearly a quarter of all votes cast could be fraudulent, including a third of those polled for Karzai. The fraud inquiry has the power to strike out rigged ballot boxes and will rule by 7 October. That will determine whether Karzai has legitimately won a second term or must face a two-man run off against his principal opponent, Abdullah Abdullah.

Whatever the result, not only is Karzai damaged, the standing of the international community - and especially the UN – has also suffered. The UN as a institution is being seen by Afghans as partially responsible for the fraud, having failed to take measures to prevent it, and now complicit in the cover-up.

This is a situation which seems hardly recoverable and can only reinforce coalition fears that a Kabul government with not even the façade of legitimacy is an unreliable partner in the prosecution of the counterinsurgency. This makes for an increasingly uncomfortable situation as General McChrystal continues to make his pitch for more resources, predicated on supporting the Kabul government in extending its writ to the rest of the country.

"Neither success nor failure in our endeavour in support of the Afghan people and government can be taken for granted," says McChrystal. On the back of deteriorating situation, however, failure looks a closer bet.

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When means now

As another two British soldiers die in Afghanistan, killed by an RPG - bringing the grand total to 210 – the coalition powers are now paying the price for grossly over-selling the Afghan presidential election.

Thus does The Times report today that "West faces losing battle over Afghan poll fraud", retailing an admission from "Western and Afghan officials" that that widespread and systematic fraud during the elections has tarnished the legitimacy of any future government and undermined the Nato campaign.

Cited also is David Kilcullen, "one of the architects of Nato's anti-insurgency campaign". He says that the failure of the Afghan Government to provide basic services in many areas was allowing the Taleban to establish its own courts, hospitals and security. "A government that is losing to a counter-insurgency isn’t being outfought, it is being outgoverned," he adds.

As to the election, one international election observer pulls no punches. He states: "The pattern is of systematic and widespread fraud, which really does call into question the legitimacy of the election. This is large scale and it is across the country." Ahmad Nader Nadery, head of the Afghan Free and Fair Election Foundation, agrees. He concedes that said the scale of the vote rigging was "serious".

Perhaps even more serious is a report from James Hider - one of the more reliable journalists – which tells us of "hundreds of angry tribal elders and local officials from southern Afghanistan" who gathered in Kabul today to protest against what they dubbed "massive electoral fraud that robbed entire districts of their votes and allocated them to the incumbent president, Hamid Karzai."

Writes Hider: "In a string of searing testimonies, community leaders told of how villages that had been too terrified to vote because of Taleban threats, of mysteriously produced full ballot boxes, and with most of the votes cast for Mr Karzai, often by his own men or tribal leaders loyal to him."

Abdulkayam Balets, "a grey-bearded and turbaned elder who had been in charge of a polling station in Shurawaq", in Kandahar province, speaks for the many. He said no ballot boxes reached his facility. They were instead sent to the district office, where they were stuffed with votes for Mr Karzai by members of his party. "We want Karzai to resign and an interim government installed, then we can have a free election that he can't manipulate by force," he says.

Sentiment that is driving increasingly voluble protest in Kabul is rippling around the world, with Michael Boyle in The Guardian accusing the US and UK of "flying blind" in Afghanistan, pouring blood and treasure into a war that looks increasingly senseless as the days go by.

He calls for a re-examination not only of our strategy but of the unconditional support we have afforded the Afghan government. The Afghan government has been the recipient of billions of dollars in aid, yet almost every ministry lacks basic capacity. It has 134,000 police and 82,000 soldiers, few of whom can operate independently of foreign forces.

Worse still, writes Boyle, the Afghan government has scored domestic political points by blasting the US and UK and ignoring their demands. We can no longer pretend we are partnering with a government when it does not govern or see itself as a partner. It is time, he concludes, to admit that unfettered support from the west may be undermining the efforts to fix the strategy in Afghanistan.

More worrying for the Obama administration is the op-ed in today's Washington Post, which declares unequivocally: "Time to Get Out of Afghanistan".

Written by George F. Will, it notes the death of two Marines, and observes that the war already is nearly 50 percent longer than the combined US involvements in two world wars, where "NATO assistance is reluctant and often risible".

Will questions the strategy of "clear, hold and build," pointing out that which has been obvious since day one, that the Taleban forces can evaporate and then return, confident that US forces will forever be too few to hold gains. Hence, he writes, nation-building would be impossible even if we knew how, and even if Afghanistan were not the second-worst place to try: The Brookings Institution ranks Somalia as the only nation with a weaker state.

US forces, Will goes on to note, are being increased by 21,000 to 68,000, bringing the coalition total to 110,000. About 9,000 are from Britain, where support for the war is waning. Counterinsurgency theory concerning the time and the ratio of forces required to protect the population indicates that, nationwide, Afghanistan would need hundreds of thousands of coalition troops, perhaps for a decade or more. That is inconceivable.

Instead, Will concludes, forces should be substantially reduced to serve a comprehensively revised policy: America should do only what can be done from offshore, using intelligence, drones, cruise missiles, airstrikes and small, potent Special Forces units, concentrating on the porous 1,500-mile border with Pakistan, a nation that actually matters (a strategy known as "offshore balancing").

To conclude, Will cites de Gaulle recalling Bismarck's decision to halt German forces short of Paris in 1870. Genius, he said, sometimes consists of knowing when to stop. Genius, says Will, is not required to recognise that in Afghanistan, when means now.

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