A Week in the War Afghanistan, Sept. 15-21, 2010

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A Week in the War: Afghanistan, Sept. 15-21, 2010

September 21, 2010 | 1803 GMT

Parliamentary Elections

Elections for the lower house of the Afghan National Assembly, the Wolesi Jirga, were

conducted Sept. 18. Official results from the Independent Election Commission are not

expected to begin to come in until Oct. 8, but it was clear even before the election tookplace that the entire process presented more pitfalls than benefits for the U.S.-led effort

and the regime of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. As expected, fraud, voter intimidation(including kidnapping) and violence characterized the election, though the violence does

not appear to have been as intense as it was during the controversial 2009 presidentialelection in which Karzai won a second term. Some sources have reported slightly more

than 300 security incidents during the election, significantly fewer than the nearly 500reported during the 2009 vote. There are some indications that Taliban violence was

applied in such a way as to avoid too many civilian casualties, and extensivepsychologicaland information operations were used to generate fear and keep voters away.

The statistics on security incidents are likely skewed to some degree by the more extensive

closures of polling centers. More than 1,000 of the countrys 6,835 polling centers almost 15 percent were already slated to be closed during the election due to securityconcerns, and nearly 500 more were shuttered at the last minute for the same reason,

bringing the total of closed polling stations on election day to more than 20 percent.Turnout also was depressed: Afghanistans Independent Election Commission estimated

that only about 3.6 million ballots were cast (out of approximately 11.4 million eligiblevoters), compared to 6.4 million in the 2005 parliamentary elections and 4.6 million in the


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2009 presidential election. In Marjah, a farming community of 80,000 that has been a focal

point of U.S. Marine-led efforts and that had been intended to serve as aproof of conceptoperation, turnout had been expected to reach 1,000. Though numbers are not in, a report

by the New York Times indicates that the true turnout was a mere fraction of that.

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Beyond the security issues, there are also questions about what the 2,447 candidates vyingfor 249 parliamentary seats could actually achieve in Kabul. The spectrum of candidates

and their utter lack of experience with electoral and democratic political processes areproblematic, to say the least. This goes beyond what U.S. Gen. David Petraeus has come to

term Iraq-racy to describe the political turmoil in Iraq. In that case, a reasonably free andfair election was conducted in which, generally speaking, all demographics were able to

and did vote (though an equitable and acceptable governing coalition has proved elusive).

Afghanistan is at least a generational step behind Iraq in terms of a viable, democraticallyelected central government. National, centralized politics to say nothing of democratic

elections or parliamentary processes is anathema to a country distinguished by ruggedterrain and complex demography and defined by local tribal, ethnic and familial loyalties.

Even today, nine years after the initial American invasion, these loyalties and local powerbrokers continue to define political power in Afghanistan in practice, if not in name.

While elections did not go well, they certainly could have gone worse. But even if they

had gone far better, what would have been accomplished? Even officials that can claim to


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have been elected with some degree of fairness likely will lack the political connections

and wherewithal to provide meaningful representation for their electorates, much less togovern effectively. Indeed, it is not clear that a strong central government in Kabul is at all

possible without considerable regional autonomy.

Nothing in Afghanistan should be judged by Western standards. Issues with free and fairelections just like enduring issues with corruption do not necessarily equate to or

signify a lack of progress (and certainly not failure). Western standards simply are notapplicable to realities in Afghanistan, and any application of them only further skews

perceptions of an already complex and multifaceted country. But the problem is that it ishard to see progress resolving fundamental incongruities between the realities of

Afghanistan and what the U.S.-led International Security Assistance Force is attempting toachieve there.

Operations in the Southwest

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Operations in Kandahar and Helmand provinces are continuing apace, with three battalions

from the U.S. Armys 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) leading an operation focusedon the southern portion of the newly formed Zhari district (as well as portions of Panjwai

district) west of the city of Kandahar. Pushing south from Highway 1 the Ring Road

that connects the provincial capital to Helmand province the offensive will target keyvillages that are Taliban strongholds, such as Pashmul, Makuan and Singesar. Theoperations main goal is to stabilize and establish a security presence in an area that has no

meaningful Afghan government presence and has been used as a Taliban operations basefor the militants efforts in the city of Kandahar and its environs.

Meanwhile, the American commander of I Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward), Maj.

Gen. Richard Mills, continues to draw attention to the fiscal straits of the Taliban inHelmand, pointing to a financial crisis. There is every indication that this is the case,

with a drop in more expensive improvised explosive devices as well as aging small armsbeing seized.

Overall, the Taliban are being pressured in some of their core territory, and operationscontinue to expand around Kandahar. Tactical results are being achieved. But the overall

objective is to carve out space for the Afghan political process to work, for development totake place and for commerce to expand. While the Taliban remain outside this political

process, they are having some tactical terms dictated to them. But the group is alsobehaving as a guerilla force with a great deal of fight left one that is not being driven to

the negotiating table and that is proving capable of disrupting the political and economicactivity central to the counterinsurgency-focused effort aimed at altering political realities

on the ground in order to achieve strategic results. And for all the electoral and offensiveactivity in the last week, the prospects of shifts in local political and economic

circumstances and realities remain in doubt.

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A Week in the War Afghanistan, Sept. 15-21, 2010