How to Solve Afghanistan

How to Solve Afghanistan
May 25, 2011
By Masood Aziz

Injustice and the exercise of illegitimate power are now key reasons for a disaffected and disenchanted population. This is precisely where the Taliban find the space within which they thrive and where they seek and obtain support. Closing this gap by restoring a sense of justice and legitimacy will ... make the Taliban an irrelevant entity in Afghanistan...

...How did we ever get to this? ... Beginning in 2001, an massively uncoordinated model of international intervention was followed by massive inflows of foreign aid relative to domestic sources of capital, creating a textbook case of a rentier state.

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The first step would entail the establishment of a cash transfer of natural resource revenues directly to the citizens of Afghanistan. ...

Under this structure, the distributed cash would be taxed as normal income. ...

The second pillar of this strategy is tied to the National Solidarity Program (NSP). When first established in 2003, the NSP sought to empower Afghans in rural areas and at the grassroots by establishing local governance bodies called Community Development Councils in villages across the country. Cash grants were then given directly to these elected bodies to help them carry out small-scale rural projects. ...

Civil Affairs Reset

I've always liked the much-maligned Civil Affairs - just an intuition that it was the future of war.

Civil Affairs Reset
by Greg Grimes

Civil Affairs units are uniquely suited to both the nature of fight we’ve been in for ten years and the types of engagements anticipated in the future. The near- and intermediate-operational environment of the future will likely be a continuation of the current ‘graywar’: persistent and complex conflict of variable intensity. As other agencies adjust to new budgetary realities (read: smaller budgets) and retract from a battlefield presence, Civil Affairs should emphasize its strengths when crafting its evolution. Civil Affairs units are:

Self protecting. CA units are armed and equipped to venture into nearly any environment, especially non-permissive or remote areas. No other US government organization has this capability to this extent. Civil Affairs units can engage local populations and support the mission to counter violent extremism even in challenging security environments. Civilian agency members usually are not trained to operate under fire.

Robust. There are more total Civil Affairs personnel available and skilled to sustain persistent operations than in any other agency working foreign engagement. This becomes doubly significant when considering the use of CA forces in sustained operations...

Expeditionary. CA units typically operate with a small logistical footprint; organic capabilities are adequate to support operations for extended durations. CA units arrive at the loading ramps already equipped with transportation, communication and security assets, and knowledgeable in local procurement for items they don’t have...

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Nation-building/Reconstruction. Though considered a task outside the scope of military responsibility, practical experience says the military will find itself, de facto, conducting the reconstruction mission to some extent...

Cultural Expertise. This has been a perpetual thorn in the side of US forces, despite admirable efforts at educating the forces with some sense of cultural sensitivity...

Language Expertise. Civil Affairs as a force needs to revisit the practicality of expecting CA practitioners to develop and maintain true linguistic skill. If the future reflects the past, we can expect involvement in Middle Eastern and African environments...

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COL Greg Grimes is currently assigned to the Joint Irregular Warfare Center of USJFCOM.

A Careful War

Four Corners story on a mentoring company in Afghanistan.