[Senate Hearing 111-295]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office]
S. Hrg. 111-295
AFGHANISTAN'S IMPACT ON PAKISTAN
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED ELEVENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
OCTOBER 1, 2009
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Relations
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COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
JOHN F. KERRY, Massachusetts, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER J. DODD, Connecticut RICHARD G. LUGAR, Indiana
RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD, Wisconsin BOB CORKER, Tennessee
BARBARA BOXER, California JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey JAMES E. RISCH, Idaho
BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland JIM DeMINT, South Carolina
ROBERT P. CASEY, Jr., Pennsylvania JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming
JIM WEBB, Virginia ROGER F. WICKER, Mississippi
JEANNE SHAHEEN, New Hampshire JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma
EDWARD E. KAUFMAN, Delaware
KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York
David McKean, Staff Director
Kenneth A. Myers, Jr., Republican Staff Director
(ii)
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Bearden, Milt, former CIA Station Chief in Islamabad, Reston, VA. 6
Prepared statement........................................... 8
Coll, Steve, president, New America Foundation, Washington, DC... 11
Prepared statement........................................... 13
Kerry, Hon. John F., U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, opening
statement...................................................... 1
Lodhi, Hon. Maleeha, public policy scholar, Woodrow Wilson
Center, former Pakistani Ambassador to the United States,
Washington, DC................................................. 16
Prepared statement........................................... 20
Lugar, Hon. Richard G., U.S. Senator from Indiana, opening
statement...................................................... 4
(iii)
AFGHANISTAN'S IMPACT ON PAKISTAN
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THURSDAY, OCTOBER 1, 2009
U.S. Senate,
Committee on Foreign Relations,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in
room SD-419, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. John F. Kerry
(chairman of the committee) presiding.
Present: Senators Kerry, Feingold, Casey, Shaheen, Kaufman,
Lugar, Corker, Barrasso, Wicker, and Inhofe.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JOHN F. KERRY,
U.S. SENATOR FROM MASSACHUSETTS
The Chairman. The hearing will come to order.
Good morning, everybody. Thank you for taking time to be
with us. I thank our witnesses.
Next week marks the ninth anniversary of the war in
Afghanistan. A Pentagon officer said the other day that we
haven't been fighting there for 8 years; we've been fighting
for 1 year eight times in a row. That needs to change.
Some of our objectives have remained steadfast: Defeat al-
Qaeda, deny them safe havens, and ensure the stability of the
region. Others have fluctuated. And the previous
administration, both the goals and the strategy lurched in
directions that confused our troops, our allies, and our
partners. None of those partners is more affected by our
actions in Afghanistan than Pakistan. I think many people have
agreed that Pakistan is a central focus of our policy
considerations, no country in that region more vital to our
national security. Pakistan is a democracy with 170 million
people, a large nuclear arsenal, and a major challenge from
extremists within its borders.
It's no secret that the relationship between our countries
has suffered its share of strains. Many Pakistanis believe that
the United States has exploited them for strategic goals. In
fact, a recent survey by the Pew Research Center finds that two
out of three Pakistanis actually regard the United States as an
enemy. Only 1 in 10 describe us as a partner. So, at the very
least, we have a communications challenge, and the question is,
What else?
From our side, it's been difficult to build trust with
Pakistan's military and intelligence service over the years,
because our interests have not always been aligned and because
ties between ISI and Taliban remain troubling. We need to fix
this relationship. And may I say, in fairness, the current
government and many of its officials--most recently, General
Pasha of the ISI, has been here in Washington, General Kayani
and others--have made very significant progress in this effort.
It may not yet be translated down into the body politic of the
country, but there has been a very significant level of change
in the--many elements of the relationship. And, in fact, it is
the judgment of the administration--and my judgment, I hope
shared by colleagues--that many things have moved forward in
Pakistan in ways that they haven't in Afghanistan. There has
been progress in Pakistan.
In addition, the Senate took a major step in trying to
change this relationship, last week, by passing legislation
that Senator Lugar and I introduced, and which all of the
committee supported, to triple our nonmilitary assistance to
Pakistan to $1.5 billion a year for the next 5 years. And the
reason we did this is specifically to try to build a
relationship with the people of Pakistan, to point out to them
that what we want is a relationship that, in fact, meets their
interests and their needs.
The House, I'm pleased to say, passed the bill yesterday,
and the President has pledged to sign it. And we look forward
to seeing its implementation.
This is a landmark change in the relationship. It's not a
panacea, and I think both Senator Lugar and I would be quick to
emphasize that. A lot more is going to be needed--more money,
more change in policy, more investment by the governments
themselves, and by officials. It will not solve all of
Pakistan's problems, but it is a very significant
transformation in the fundamentals of the relationship. And, in
the end, only Pakistanis will define the future of that
relationship.
But, the Kerry-Lugar initiative signals our determination
to put the relationship on a new foundation, with the
aspirations of the people of Pakistan front and center. We
don't want a government-to-government centric relationship; we
want the American people and the Pakistani people both sharing
a value investment, if you will, through this initiative.
Just as we strengthen our civilian ties, we also have to
understand, our actions in Afghanistan have profound
implications for the security status across the Durand Line. We
cannot repeat the mistakes of the past when we pulled out of
Afghanistan in 1989 and left the job undone. A flood of guns,
drugs, and refugees swept over Pakistan, and its leaders
reacted by supporting the Taliban and other militant groups.
President Obama and his team are in full-fledged effort to
reevaluate and develop all of the right tweaks, if you will,
the right calibrations to our policy for our strategy for
Afghanistan, and only then can we really make the right
decisions on resources. That decision has to reflect our
commitment to the Afghan people and to the security of the
United States.
Let me be clear, no matter what strategy we adopt, it must
recognize that the actions we take in Afghanistan will have
direct repercussions in Pakistan.
So, we're here this morning to examine these potential
repercussions. We want to understand the implications and
impacts of the scenarios under discussion at the White House
and elsewhere. As we know, the Congress of the United States
has clearly defined, historical, and well-accepted
responsibilities with respect to the conduct of foreign policy
and the conduct of war. And it is important for us to fulfill
those responsibilities.
For example, we need to know what the impact on Pakistan
would be of a major troop increase in Afghanistan. Would
successful nation-building in Afghanistan, in fact, translate
into greater stability in Pakistan and elsewhere across the
region? Or, to the contrary, does a troop increase in
Afghanistan have negative consequences for our goals in
Pakistan, and might it, in fact, add to the destabilization, as
some in Pakistan in high positions of power have suggested?
The debate has to extend beyond the preoccupation with
troop numbers. We need to know beyond, How many troops do you
need? What does the manual say? What happens, here? We really
need to know, Can you build a legitimate government in
Afghanistan, particularly in the restive Pashtun belt in the
east and southeast that is of the greatest concern to Pakistan?
And we need to know how the Pakistani military and intelligence
services might react to a different strategy in Afghanistan.
We also need to understand--this is not the center focus of
this hearing today, but I think it's relevant, because of the
questions being asked publicly, and the discussion--our goal,
as stated by the President, in Afghanistan is to disrupt,
dismantle, and defeat
al-Qaeda, and prevent their ability to return to be a safe
haven and plot against the United States. That is the stated
mission. That is not a full-fledged nationwide
counterinsurgency mission, unless the latter is absolutely
essential to the accomplishment of the former. And that is
something we need to very carefully examine, and it's part of
the discussion today because of the question of, What are the
implications of that prolonged effort and additional troops to
the stability of Pakistan and to the long-term goals of the
region?
There's another goal stated by the President, and that is
the stability of the region, with a particular focus on the
stability of Pakistan.
So, this is the committee's third session that is designed
to test the underlying assumptions about the war in
Afghanistan, and really to stimulate the kind of debate that
most distinguishes this body--the United States Senate--and
that will help us, in the end, to clarify our goals, to build a
consensus.
Senator Lugar and I share the belief, and we have often
said, that American foreign policy is never stronger than when
it is bipartisan. And traditionally, when it's been at its
best, it's been bipartisan. There are great examples of that in
the course of history; and one of the greatest, with Senator
Arthur Vandenberg, in a period when the United States had
enormous responsibilities abroad. So, we want to continue the
effort to try to see if we can get politics to end at the
water's edge, and to find the policy that best serves our
troops; because, in the end, folks--and I say this from some
personal experience--the troops are best served when the people
here in Washington find a way to produce a policy that lives up
to the high sacrifice that they're called on to make. And
that's what we need to do.
Next week, we're going to hear about how to deal with the
worldwide threat from al-Qaeda. And I think that's very
important, because al-Qaeda is not just tangentially affecting
Afghanistan and centered in Pakistan, but it's in some 58 or 59
other countries, with an increased presence in Yemen and
Somalia and the Horn of Africa. And we need to think about what
the best ways to deal with that are.
We also need to clarify this approach if we're going to use
our military resources as wisely as we ought to, and obtain the
consent and cooperation of the American people. Let me
emphasize. The consent of the American people, in the end, is
the fundamental part of this equation. We know that, also, from
experience. And if we lose the consent because we haven't been
clear and we haven't asked the right questions, then we have
not only not done our jobs, but we may well have betrayed our
own interests. And so, it is important for us to do that in the
course of this deliberation.
I want to, again, emphasize that our actions in
Afghanistan, in my judgment, whatever they are, will influence
events in Pakistan, and we need to take that into account. But,
the ultimate choices, again, about the country's future, about
Pakistan's future, must be made--and will be made, in my
judgment--by the Pakistanis themselves.
The witnesses this morning are very well positioned to help
us answer these questions. And I want to thank you all for
coming.
Ambassador Maleeha Lodhi was Pakistan's top diplomat in
Washington for two tours between 1994 and 2002. Few people
better understand the complexities that bind and divide our two
countries.
Milt Bearden is a legendary former CIA case officer and a
clearheaded thinker and writer. He was the agency's station
chief in Islamabad in the 1980s, at the height of the United
States-Pakistan effort to defeat the Soviets in Afghanistan.
Steve Coll is president of the New America Foundation. He
spent years working in, and writing about, Afghanistan and
Pakistan. His Pulitzer Prizewinning masterwork, ``Ghost Wars,''
remains the seminal volume on the pre-9/11 years in those two
countries.
So, we are very, very pleased to have this expertise here
today, and I look forward to hearing Senator Lugar's comments
and then your testimony.
OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. RICHARD G. LUGAR,
U.S. SENATOR FROM INDIANA
Senator Lugar. I thank the chairman for holding this
important hearing.
As our previous hearings have demonstrated, the choices
confronting the United States and NATO in Afghanistan and
Pakistan are not simple. The threats to U.S. national security
in the region are both real and profound, but they are also
largely indirect. Meanwhile, we know that expanding United
States military involvement in Afghanistan would proceed during
a period of severe economic challenge for our own country. It
also would take place at a time of continuing strain on our
military forces and amidst questions about alliance cohesion.
Given these factors, as we review our approach to the region,
we must avoid trial and error, in favor of a comprehensive plan
that includes, not just military elements, but also makes
progress on development, governance, other facts that directly
affect the stability and welfare of these countries.
The U.S. Congress has taken an important step forward this
week, as Senator Kerry has pointed out, by passing the Enhanced
Partnership with Pakistan Act. This bill represents a long-
overdue investment in diplomacy and development in the region.
I look forward to the President's signature on the bill, and
the productive engagement with Pakistan that it is designed to
produce.
As several of our witnesses pointed out last week, the
rationale for increasing United States commitments in
Afghanistan depends heavily on our expectations of how events
there might affect stability in Pakistan. Although we should
not diminish Afghanistan's strategic, symbolic, or humanitarian
importance, it is clear that one of the most important goals of
an enlarged American commitment to Afghanistan would be the
preservation and potential enhancement of stability in
Pakistan.
Pakistan has roughly five times as many people as
Afghanistan, and possesses nuclear weapons. Its stability has
implications throughout the Middle East and South Asia. It also
is contending with an al-Qaeda sanctuary, an expanding Islamic
insurgency, political uncertainty and a shaky economy.
These circumstances are a threat to Pakistan, the region,
and the United States. With this in mind, we must ask what
impact our efforts in Afghanistan have on events in Pakistan.
Do aspects of our current military posture in Afghanistan
aggravate the situation in Pakistan? Would increasing the
intensity of our counterinsurgency activities in Afghanistan
benefit stability across the border? Would a government
collapse in Afghanistan, coupled with significant advances by
the Taliban, threaten to destabilize Pakistan?
When the President moves forward, it is essential that he
lead public discussion on Afghanistan and Pakistan, and begin
to put his own stamp on the assessments completed by his
experienced advisers. His initial statements in March served
only as guideposts. He must now clarify the best advice
Secretary Gates and Clinton, and their respective institutions,
have provided to achieve our national security goals in the
region. Many questions have arisen surrounding troop levels;
civilian force levels, contractor rules, the role development,
to name just a few. Any decisions the President makes will be
for the long term and will require significant United States
investment in diplomacy, development, and defense. His plan
will require broad support of Congress if it is to be sustained
and funded.
I believe it is possible to develop a strong consensus on
the way forward. Both Senator McCain and then-Senator Obama
campaigned in the last Presidential election on the importance
of a sustained commitment to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The
strategic imperative of this region has not diminished, even if
events in one or the other country have given us pause to
reconsider our approach.
I look forward to our continuing inquiries on this issue,
and I join the chairman in welcoming our distinguished
witnesses.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator Lugar.
We'll start with Mr. Bearden, then we'll go to Mr. Coll
and, Madam Ambassador, we'll--you'll be a cleanup hitter.
Thank you.
STATEMENT OF MILT BEARDEN, FORMER CIA STATION CHIEF IN
ISLAMABAD, RESTON, VA
Mr. Bearden. Mr. Chairman, Senator Lugar, members of the
committee, I thank you for the opportunity to appear before you
today.
The Chairman. Can you pull the mike a little closer there--
just pull the whole thing, the box.
Mr. Bearden. There we go. OK.
I thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today
to discuss the possible effects on Pakistan of our future
strategies in Afghanistan.
The Senator rightly pointed out that we're beginning our
ninth repetition of a 1-year war in Afghanistan. I would only
add that we consider that we're not beginning our 9th year,
that, in fact, we're completing our 28th year of involvement
since the December 1979 invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviet
Union, and, by President Carter's instruction to the CIA, to
provide lethal and nonlethal assistance to the people of
Afghanistan to resist that invasion.
We are, indeed, approaching 30 years in Afghanistan, and
we, indeed, have yet to get it right. I think we're at a
critical moment, where the decisions made by the government, at
this point, will affect not only Afghanistan, but the entire
region, certainly including Pakistan.
As we discuss this entire sweep of American involvement in
Afghanistan, we should remember some of the lessons we learned
from the Soviet experience, and from the British experience,
before that, and from every invader to Afghanistan since
Alexander the Great ventured in.
The Soviets spent 10 years, with an average troop strength
of 120,000. This was always enough to fuel an insurgency, but
never enough to defeat that insurgency. By the time Mikhail
Gorbachev took over as General Secretary of the Communist Party
of the Soviet Union, the fourth in as many years, the Soviet
Union had become completely bogged down in Afghanistan. Mikhail
Gorbachev gave his generals 1 year to turn it around. They
couldn't do it, and he returned to the negotiating tables in
late 1987, and, in April 1988, signed the Geneva Accords and
was out of the country 10 months later.
At that point, after 10 years of involvement with the
Government of Pakistan, the ISI, and the Pakistan military, the
United States turned its back on both Pakistan and Afghanistan
and simply walked away. I would only add that the United States
was more than preoccupied with the denouement of the Soviet
Union, which I think they managed quite expertly; but, in
Pakistan and Afghanistan, events were left to chance.
Not only did we turn our backs on Afghanistan, by 1990 we
had slapped sanctions on Pakistan, broken off military-to-
military contacts with the Pakistan Army, contacts that had
established a relationship between the two militaries over a
generation, a key relationship that was lost in the ensuing
decade without such contact.
Then came 9/11/2001. And Pakistan, with or without a real
choice, signed on with the United States. The United States and
Pakistan were allied during the 10-year occupation by the
Soviet Union, working with the peoples of Afghanistan and
welcomed by the people of Afghanistan. That role has reversed,
today. We're viewed, as is the government in Islamabad, as
enemies of the Pashtun population, a group referred to by most
of us as simply, ``Taliban.'' But in fact we're facing a
broader resistance, of one form or another. And so, this
current battle has flowed back into Pakistan, across the Durand
Line, enveloping the North West Frontier, the Pashtun areas of
Pakistan, and has reached into the settled areas, and even as
far as Lahore and Karachi and the Sindh, in the south.
Whatever we do, whatever measures we take, will affect
Pakistan as the central element in this drama. Moreover, I
think that we will be unable to come up with a policy that
makes any sense unless we step back a few meters, look at the
entire region, and try to understand what everybody in the
region is up to.
America is bogged down in a war. We're spending our blood
and borrowed treasure to fight a battle that is creating the
conditions for others to benefit. I'm not making any
accusations against any given country in the region. All of
them are looking out for their vital interests. But, India is
becoming involved in Afghanistan to an extent that the
Pakistanis consider Afghanistan as developing into an Indian
garrison. This is not hysteria. This is a real concern.
Pakistan has fought three very real wars. And, when you discuss
this thing, without emotion, with Pakistan army officers, or
ISI, as I have repeatedly, over the years, you will understand
these concerns.
You will see that China has its own interests in the
region. They have taken on a 25-percent share of a huge copper
operation in Afghanistan. They're building a major port in
Pakistan at Gwadar. Meanwhile, the Indians, working with the
Iranians, are doing the same thing across the border in Iran,
on the Arabian sea, building a major port. You have China
getting a naval anchor on the Arabian Sea in Pakistan; India
and Iran doing exactly the same thing across the border in
Iran. You have Russia, whose interest in hydrocarbons across
the arc of northern Afghanistan is clear and growing. And we
have the United States grasping for a policy.
My suggestion would be that, rather than let this thing
become a free-for-all while we're bogged down, that we at least
assume that the United States, by its involvement in the region
over the last 30 years, and in particular the last 8 years, use
its stewardship of Afghanistan to bring about some order in the
regional game that is being played. This is a resource-driven,
21st-century version of the Great Game, a recreation of a Silk
Route. But we are not, right now, able to manage that game.
So, without understanding what Iran, Russia, China,
Pakistan, and India are doing in the region, particularly in
Afghanistan, I don't think we can come up with a policy that
makes sense for Afghanistan or Pakistan.
I promised to keep my remarks to no more than 5 minutes,
and look forward to your questions.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bearden follows:]
Prepared Statement of Milton A. Bearden, Former CIA Station Chief in
Islamabad, Reston, VA
Mr. Chairman, Senator Lugar, and members of the committee, I thank
you for the opportunity to appear before you today to discuss U.S.
strategy in Afghanistan and the possible effects on Pakistan of our
future policies there.
u.s. involvement, 8th year or 30th year?
The search for a successful outcome in Afghanistan and neighboring
Pakistan requires an understanding of how we arrived at this critical
point in our Afghan undertaking, as well as new thinking on how we
might proceed.
I have been involved in the region since the mid-1980s, when I was
ordered to Pakistan by CIA director Bill Casey to manage America's
covert assistance to the Afghan resistance in their war against the
occupation forces of the Soviet Union. I have remained active in Afghan
and Pakistan matters in the intervening years, assisting in 2008, on
the negotiations on legislation concerning Reconstruction Opportunity
Zones in Pakistan and Afghanistan. More recently, I have been active in
support of the United States Government's efforts to stabilize
Afghanistan through development and business stability operations.
As we discuss future policy options, we should bear in mind that
America is not beginning its ninth year of involvement in Afghanistan;
it is, rather, closing in on 30 years of intermittent association with
a regional conflict that began with the Soviet Union's 1979, invasion
of Afghanistan. It is a history of three decades of action, neglect,
and reaction that have had profound effects on American security and on
Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the other important players in the region.
the soviet debacle
The Soviet invasion in 1979, was a gross miscalculation by the
Soviet Politburo led by the ailing General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev.
The Soviet leader concluded at the time that a limited contingent of
Soviet forces would have the ``Afghan affair'' cleared up before the
Americans might even take notice, weakened as America was, he believed,
by its retreat from Southeast Asia and preoccupied by its hostage drama
in Teheran. The initial Soviet foray was predictably and brutally
efficient. The troublesome Afghan leader, Hafizullah Amin, was
assassinated; Kabul was secured; and the Soviet's chosen ``emir,''
Babrak Karmal, was installed at the helm. But then events reverted to
the traditional Afghan rhythm, taking on a life of their own. By the
fifth year of occupation, the Soviet 40th Army had grown from its
original limited contingent to a countrywide occupation force of around
120,000. As the Soviet forces grew, so did the Afghan resistance.
Though impossible to quantify accurately, by midpoint in the Soviet war
there were probably about 250,000 full or part-time Afghan mujaheddin
fighters. Soviet forces were constrained by the harsh terrain and
infrastructural limitations to no more than about 150,000 troops before
their supply lines would fray. They settled for about 120,000 over
their 10-year occupation, a number more than adequate to fuel a full-
blown insurgency, but never enough to defeat it.
By late 1986, Soviet efforts began to falter, and the new leader in
the Kremlin, the fourth in as many years, Mikhail Gorbachev, declared
the war a ``bleeding wound.'' He gave his commanders a year to ``turn
it around.'' They couldn't; and by the end of the fighting season of
1987, diplomatic activity intensified. On April 14, 1988, the Soviets
signed the Geneva Accords ending their occupation; 10 months later,
they were out of Afghanistan.
And America turned its attention elsewhere.
In the 9 years of their Afghan adventure, Soviet losses were at
least 15,000 thousand troops killed, tens of thousands more wounded and
thousands dead from disease. The Afghan population suffered horrendous
losses--more than a million dead, about twice that number injured, and
6 million driven into internal and external exile. It is instructive to
view these numbers against those of the current American effort. While
Afghan civilian casualties caused by coalition forces today average
somewhat less than 1,000 per year, civilian casualties during the
Soviet occupation averaged around 100,000 per year.
pakistan and the pashtun question
As it turned its attention away from Afghanistan, with civil war
and chaos replacing hard fought victory, the United States would also
adjust its relationship with Pakistan. No longer able to stave off
congressionally mandated sanctions triggered by its nuclear weapons
development program, Pakistan fell out of Washington's favor. In 1990,
strict sanctions were imposed on Pakistan, and military-to-military
contacts were cut. Those measures would remain in place for more than a
decade, during which the U.S.-Pakistan alliance that dated back to the
1950s and the Baghdad Pact would change dramatically. The abrupt
reversals in the bilateral relationship created an almost
irreconcilable conviction within Pakistani military circles, and in
particular the ISI, that the United States will always leave Pakistan
in the lurch when it decides once again to retire from the region,
views that officers in the Pakistan Army and the 151 have conveyed to
me on many occasions in the past. That discussion is once again at
heated levels in Pakistan today, as it is in the United States. The
consequences, therefore, of any decision to increase or diminish the
U.S. effort in Afghanistan will have far-reaching effects in Pakistan.
Pakistan's role, led by Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) during
the 1980s had been central to the defeat of Soviet forces in
Afghanistan. Not only did Pakistan serve as the conduit for all U.S.
and international aid to the Afghan resistance and the population, but
its Pashtun North West Frontier Province provided both safe haven for
the the Afghan mujaheddin and refuge for their families. The Pashtuns
of Pakistan were also an endless source of recruits for the Afghan
resistance. These tribals straddling the Durand Line recognize the
British demarkation of their lands only when it is to their rare
advantage; otherwise ``zero line,'' as they call it, is largely
ignored. Any outside force fighting Pashtuns in Afghanistan, therefore,
will also have to deal with the Pashtuns in Pakistan.
Every foreign occupation of Afghanistan eventually ends up as a
fight with the Pashtun tribals. That was true during the 19th century
British era and the Soviet era that followed a century later. It is
true today. It is part of the Afghan playbook, as written by the
Afghans themselves, and followed by each consecutive outside power that
ventures in. The Pashtun population confronting those outside forces
who march into Afghanistan includes not only the roughly 15 million in
Afghanistan, but the 25 million or so in Pakistan, as well. Pashtuns
will always rise to the fight, but they can also quiet down once a
threat subsides, or if a proper deal is offered.
the indian question
Any oral history of Pakistan invariably begins with the line, ``in
the beginning, there was India.'' As the current phase of American
operations in Afghanistan enters its ninth year, India has become
firmly entrenched in what has always been viewed by Pakistan as it's
rear area. After the United States, India is the second largest
contributor to Afghan development projects. Working with Iran, India is
developing the Iranian port of Chabahar on the Arabian Sea coast near
the Gulf of Oman. Chabahar will provide India access to oil and gas
resources in Iran and the Central Asian states. Plans for road and rail
construction linking Afghanistan and Chabahar port by the Indian
Government are also ambitious, as are burgeoning contacts at all levels
between the Indian and Afghan Governments. Afghan President Karzai, was
educated in India, and is viewed by most Pakistanis as beholden to New
Delhi. Never, in the past 30 years, has Afghanistan appeared so
potentially hostile to Pakistan and friendly to India.
Though Pakistani concerns over Indian involvement in Afghanistan
have in the past been dismissed by American officials as overwrought,
they are nonetheless real; and it is correct that these concerns are
being taken more seriously now by the United States. Pakistan Army and
151 officers I have known over the years have been realistic in
conveying to me their deep concerns regarding India, a country with
which they have fought three costly wars. Indeed, General McChrystal,
in his Commander's Initial Assessment dated August 30, 2009, correctly
acknowledges the delicacy of Indian involvement in Afghanistan as it
impacts in Pakistan. McChrystal writes, ``Indian political and economic
influence is increasing in Afghanistan, including significant
development efforts and financial investment. In addition, the current
Afghan Government is perceived by Islamabad to be pro-Indian.''
McChrystal also points out that increasing Indian influence in
Afghanistan is likely to exacerbate regional tensions and encourage
Pakistani countermeasures in Afghanistan or India.
If there were a precipitous reduction of American force in
Afghanistan, or an outright withdrawal, we should expect the Pakistani
Government and its military, including a very capable ISI, to take
whatever measures they thought necessary counter Indian influence in
Afghanistan. Such an escalation could rapidly increase and amplify the
regional tensions, with perhaps disastrous consequences. The Pakistan
Army has had the vision of creating what it called a Strategic Regional
Consensus, a loose nexus between Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, and
Turkey as a massive and secure rear area for its 60-year confrontation
with India. Those dreams, first explained to me by the late President
Muhammad Zia ul-Haq, were never realized, and their time may have
passed; but were the United States to retire from the field in
Afghanistan, a new, and more risky jockeying between nuclear-armed
Pakistan and India would most surely ensue. This would prompt even
greater Afghan-Indian collaboration, which would only fuel Pakistani
conviction that Afghanistan is becoming an ``Indian garrison.'' The
prospects for miscalculation in such an atmosphere are grave.
the regional players
Below the noise level of military operations is the involvement of
other regional players in what is developing into a modern version of a
Central Asian Great Game. China, viewed by Pakistan as its most
reliable ally, is jockeying for position in Afghanistan, partly as a
counterweight to growing Indian influence and partly to advance its own
long-term economic goals in the region--the quest for natural
resources. China has also built a new, turnkey Pakistani port at Gwadar
on the Arabian Sea, in Pakistan's Baluchistan province, a project China
acknowledges as having strategic value matching that of the Karakoram
Highway, completed by the Chinese in 1986, and linking Pakistan with
Xinjiang. In addition to Gwadar serving as a potential Chinese naval
anchor, Beijing is also interested in turning it into an energy-
transport hub by building an oil pipeline from Gwadar into China's
Xinjiang. The planned pipeline will carry crude oil from Arab and
African sources. Inside Afghanistan, China has secured an interest in
the the huge (estimated $88 billion) copper deposits in Aynak, in Logar
Province south of Kabul. China is also interested in the massive iron
deposits in Hajigak, west of Kabul.
Hydrocarbon and mineral deposits in the arc from Herat in the west,
across northern Afghanistan are in play with Iran, China, and Russia.
In effect, the other regional players are busily setting the stage for
exploitation of Afghanistan's natural resources, while the United
States remains bogged down with the war. This should change.
the future of u.s. military operations in afghanistan
The default position on whether a foreign power should or should
not venture into Afghanistan with large-scale forces is usually a
simple, ``don't go.'' But America is eight long and troubled years
beyond any reconsideration of that default position. We're in, and we
have to see it through, if only with a greatly redirected strategy.
Though the initial American contingent that toppled the Taliban regime
and set
al-Qaeda on the run involved less than 300 American special operations
forces and CIA officers, U.S. and international forces now number
around 100,000, with a mission that seems unclear to both its critics
and its supporters. Some Afghans see the American role as simply
protecting a corrupt government and the status quo; many more Pashtuns
see the United States as the protectors of a Tajik Panjshiri-controlled
government.
The current debate seems to center on whether or not to increase
U.S. forces by as many as 40,000 additional troops. If the troop
increases are intended to advance a new strategy designed to allow a
modicum of security and justice to develop, perhaps guided by the
Afghans themselves, and to create an economic stake that would become
available to more Afghans, such increases could be a good idea. If,
however, the increases are considered a ``surge'' to feed greater
levels of kinetic operations, such a strategy will likely fail as the
war escalates. Thoughtful Soviet post-war assessments of their Afghan
debacle have concluded that with anything less than half a million
troops on the ground, no outside force could expect to ``pacify''
Afghanistan. In reaching that conclusion, Soviet analysts were also
aware of the sheer impossibility of supporting a force of that size,
even with Afghanistan being contiguous to the U.S.S.R. That analysis,
and the constraints included in it, apply to the American intervention
today. A marginal surge in support of a military solution will
accomplish little, absent a new, broader strategy.
a way forward
In addition to creating the conditions for greater security and
justice for the Afghan people, the United States might use its
stewardship in Afghanistan to work toward an orderly marshaling of the
regional players in developing that country's natural resources,
deriving, in the process, the maximum possible benefit to the Afghan
people themselves. Instead of a free for all race for Afghanistan's
resources, the United States could provide the leadership to ensure
that the regional players contribute to Afghan stability as they pursue
their own valid and vital economic interests, rather than revive the
zero sum game that has characterized competition in Afghanistan over
the last 8 years. Any outside investment in Afghanistan should have the
positive effect of providing alternatives to endless conflict for
Afghans, most of whom would make the right choices if offered security,
justice, and a stake in an economy. Only the United States can make
that happen.
Indeed, rather than contemplate withdrawing from Afghanistan, the
United States will have little choice but to redirect its forces to
provide greater security in selected regions, and make a virtue of
necessity by taking the lead in working with the regional players in
the major investment and development schemes already underway.
Once again, thank you for this opportunity to appear before this
committee. I look forward to your questions.
The Chairman. Well, thank you. That's a very cogent,
thoughtful oversight, and I'm sure it will prompt a number of
questions, and we really appreciate the thinking.
Mr. Coll.
STATEMENT OF STEVE COLL, PRESIDENT, NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION,
WASHINGTON, DC
Mr. Coll. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Senator Lugar. Thank
you, members of this committee, for this chance to testify
about the effects of United States policy in Afghanistan on the
stability and political evolution of Pakistan.
I thought both of the opening statements framed the
questions very, very well, and I'll just briefly add a
perspective looking at the regional security context.
I'll start with a statement of American interests in this
conflict. You know, obviously the success of Pakistan, by which
I mean its emergence as a stable, modernizing, prosperous,
pluralistic, country at peace with its neighbors and with its
own borders and integrated economically into South and Central
Asia, is obviously an important and even vital interest, not
only of the United States, but of the entire international
community.
Over the years--over the last 20 years, the history that
Milt described, one obstacle--not the only obstacle, but one
obstacle--to the emergence of such a Pakistan has been the
persistent view, within its security services and elsewhere in
its elites, that the United States will--certainly since 9/11,
the view that the United States will abandon the region once it
has defeated and disabled al-Qaeda. That has been our pattern
of behavior, in their view, and Milton described the episode
that gave rise to that perception. It is based in fact.
Pakistani generals correctly fear, today, that a
precipitous American withdrawal from Afghanistan would be
destabilizing; that it would strengthen Islamist radical
networks including but not limited to the Taliban, who are
today destabilizing Pakistan as well as the wider region.
Where it gets complicated is that I think, alternatively or
concurrently depending on the individual, there are sections of
the Pakistani military, and even the civilian elite, who also
fear that the United States may be, today, collaborating with
India, naively or deliberately, to weaken Pakistan by
supporting governments in Kabul that are, at best, hostile to
Pakistani interests and, at worst, facilitating what some
imagine to be Indian efforts to destabilize, disarm, or even
destroy the Pakistani state.
The Pakistan military's tolerance of the Taliban--
historically and, I think, currently--and similar groups, is
routed in the belief that Pakistan requires unconventional
forces, in addition to a nuclear deterrent, to offset India's
conventional military and industrial superiority. This self-
defeating logic--as I see it, anyway--of existential insecurity
has informed Pakistan's policies in Afghanistan because
Pakistani security services and their leaders have seen an
Indian hand in Kabul, since the days of the invasion.
And I'm not suggesting that it's entirely illusory. As Milt
described, India continues to invest deeply in Afghanistan
today. These Pakistani commanders tend to interpret India's
goals in Afghanistan as a strategy of encirclement of Pakistan,
punctuated by the tactic of promoting instability among
Pakistan's own Pashtun, Baluch, and Sindhi populations.
Pakistan has countered this perceived Indian strategy over
the years by developing Islamist militias, such as the
predominantly Pashtun Taliban and the Punjab-based--type as
proxies for Pakistan in regional conflicts and as a means to
destabilize India, or at least hold it off-balance.
As for the United States role, Pakistani generals have
tended to see it as inconstant and unreliable, based on the
pattern of here-and-gone United States engagement in the past
and the narrow definition of United States interests in
Pakistan, and they've also tended to believe that the United
States, as I say, is today lashing itself to an Indian-based
strategy in South Asia.
So, what does this imply, as you asked, for United States
policy in Afghanistan today? There's quite a lot to chew on
there, but let me just mention a few things, in broad strokes.
If the United States signals to the Pakistan military
command now that it intends to abandon efforts to stabilize
Afghanistan, or that it has set a short clock running on the
project of Afghan stability, or that it intends to undertake
its regional policy primarily through a strategic partnership
with India, then it will only reinforce the beliefs of those in
the Pakistani security establishment who argue that nursing the
Taliban is in the country's national interests. This, in turn,
in my view, will exacerbate instability in Pakistan itself,
which is the opposite of United States goals.
At the same time, if the United States undertakes a heavily
militarized, provocative, increasingly unilateral policy in
Afghanistan, without also adopting an aggressive--or, rather
than adopting an aggressive political reconciliation in
regional diplomatic strategy that more effectively incorporates
Pakistan into efforts to stabilize Afghanistan, then it will
also reinforce the beliefs of those in the Pakistani security
services that they need the Taliban as a hedge.
Between withdrawal signals and militarization, there is a
more sustainable strategy, one that I hope that the Obama
administration is in the process of defining. It would make
clear that the Taliban will never be permitted to take power by
force in Kabul or major cities; it would seek an enforced
stability in Afghan population centers, but emphasize politics
over combat, urban stability over rural patrolling, Afghan
solutions over Western ones; and it would incorporate Pakistan
more directly into creative and persistent diplomatic efforts
to stabilize Afghanistan and the region.
Such a sustained policy, combined with heavy new
investments in Pakistan's success, even beyond--and I was
encouraged to hear the chairman say--even beyond the
extraordinarily important achievements of the Kerry-Lugar
legislation that has to be a beginning, this is the path to
provide the best chance that Pakistan's Army will, over time,
continue to share power and accept strategic advice from
civilians, and eventually conclude that it is in its own
interests, the national interests of Pakistan, to cast out the
Taliban and similar groups as a mechanism to defend the country
against India. And that, in turn--that decision is ultimately
the best path to a modernizing, politically plural,
economically integrated and successful South Asia.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Coll follows:]
Prepared Statement of Steve Coll, President, New America Foundation,
Washington, DC
Thank you for this opportunity to testify about the effects of U.S.
policy in Afghanistan on the stability and political evolution of
Pakistan.
It seems useful to begin with an assessment of where U.S. interests
in Pakistan are located. The success of Pakistan--that is, its
emergence as a stable, modernizing, prosperous, pluralistic country, at
peace with its neighbors and within its borders, and integrated
economically in South and Central Asia--is important, even vital, not
only to the United States but to the broader international community.
The nuclear danger in South Asia alone argues for risk-taking
investments in Pakistan's success. In addition, any durable American
``exit strategy'' from Afghanistan will depend upon the emergence of a
stable Pakistan that is moving toward normalization with India and the
reduction of extremism within its borders.
For nearly four decades, Pakistan's struggle to achieve its
constitutional and founding ideals of democracy, pluralism, and a
culture rooted in a modernizing Islam have been impeded in part by the
spillover effects of continual warfare in Afghanistan. These spillover
effects have influenced the militarization of Pakistanis politics,
encouraged the development of a ``paranoid style'' in Pakistani
security doctrines, and more recently, helped to radicalize sections of
the country's population.
The United States today is a catalyzing power in this same,
continual Afghan warfare. U.S. actions in Afghanistan since 2001 have
amplified the debilitating spillover effects of the Afghan war on
Pakistan. To name a few examples: The lightly resourced, complacent
U.S. approach to Afghanistan following the ouster of the Taliban in
late 2001 effectively chased Islamist insurgents into Pakistan,
contributing to its destabilization. Dormant, often directionless U.S.
diplomacy in the region failed to bridge the deepening mistrust among
the Kabul, Islamabad, and New Delhi governments after 2001, or to
challenge successfully the Pakistani military's tolerance of Islamist
extremist groups, including the Afghan Taliban. In Pakistan itself, the
United States relied for too long and too exclusively on former
President Pervez Musharraf and failed to challenge his marginalization
of political opponents or his coddling of Islamist extremists. During
these years, narrowly conceived, transparently self-interested U.S.
policies caused many Pakistanis to conclude, to some extent correctly,
that the American presence in their region was narrowly conceived,
self-interested, and ultimately unreliable.
A recent poll of Pakistani public opinion carried out by the Pew
Global Attitudes Project found that only 16 percent of Pakistanis have
a favorable view of the United States.\1\ That discouraging number has
been more or less consistent since 2001; the only time it spiked, to
just above 25 percent, was in 2006, after the United States pledged
$500 million in aid to Pakistan and after it played a visible and
significant role in an earthquake relief effort in Pakistani-held
Kashmir. The Senate's recent unanimous passage of the Kerry-Lugar bill,
providing $1.5 billion in aid to Pakistan for each of the next 5 years,
offers a foothold to begin shifting U.S. policy in a more rewarding
direction. However, it would be a mistake to underestimate the depth of
the resentments and sources of instability in Pakistan that now
confront the United States. A poll carried out by Gallup and Al Jazeera
in July asked a sample of Pakistanis what constituted the biggest
threat to Pakistan's security. Fifty-nine percent answered that it was
the United States, followed by 18 percent who named India and only 11
percent who named the Taliban. \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ ``Pakistani Public Opinion: Growing Concerns About Extremism,
Continuing Discontent With U.S.,'' The Pew Global Attitudes Project,
August 13, 2009.
\2\ ``Pakistan: State of the Nation,'' Al Jazeera, August 13, 2009.
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/08/2009888238994769.html.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
The measure of American policy in Pakistan, of course, is not
American popularity but Pakistan's own durable stability and peaceful
evolution. However, the dismal view of the United States held across so
many constituencies in Pakistan today--particularly the widespread view
that U.S. policy in Afghanistan and along the Pakistan-Afghan border
constitutes a grave threat to Pakistan--is a sign that U.S.
policymakers must think much more deeply, as this committee is doing,
about how the U.S.-led campaign against al-Qaeda and the Taliban will
reverberate in Pakistan during the next 5 to 10 years.
There is no unitary, homogenized Pakistan for the United States to
effect by its actions in Afghanistan. Instead, there are distinct
Pakistani constituencies, some in competition with each other, which
will be impacted in different ways by the choices the United States now
makes in Afghanistan. These include the Pakistani military and security
services; the country's civilian political leadership; its business
communities and civil society; and the Pakistani public.
Broadly, the purpose of U.S. policy in the region, including in
Afghanistan, should be to strengthen Pakistani constitutional politics
and pluralism; to invest in the Pakistani people and civil society; to
enable the Pakistani military to secure the country while preserving
and enhancing civilian rule; and most critically of all, to persuade
the Pakistani military and intelligence services that it is in
Pakistan's national interest to pursue normalization and economic
integration with India and to abandon its support for proxy Islamist
groups such as the Afghan Taliban, Lashkar-e-Taiba, and others.
This is the strategic prism through which U.S. policy choices in
Afghanistan today should be evaluated.
One obstacle to the achievement of these goals is the deeply held
view within the Pakistani security services that the United States will
abandon the region once it has defeated or disabled al-Qaeda. Pakistani
generals correctly fear that a precipitous American withdrawal from
Afghanistan would be destabilizing, and that it would strengthen
Islamist radical networks, including but not limited to the Taliban,
who are today destabilizing Pakistan as well as the wider region.
Alternatively or concurrently, sections of the Pakistani military
and civilian elite also fear that the United States may collaborate
with India, naively or deliberately, to weaken Pakistan, by supporting
governments in Kabul that at best are hostile to Pakistani interests or
at worst facilitate Indian efforts to destabilize, disarm, or even
destroy the Pakistani state.
The presence and depth of these fears among the Pakistani elites
implies that the United States should avoid taking actions in
Afghanistan that reinforce this debilitating, self-defeating belief
system within the Pakistani security services. It implies that
Washington should, on the other hand, embrace those policies that are
most likely to ameliorate or subdue such policies within Pakistan over
time.
Pakistan's historical, self-defeating support for the Taliban and
similar groups is rooted in the belief that Pakistan requires
unconventional forces, as well as a nuclear deterrent, to offset
India's conventional military and industrial might. This logic of
existential insecurity has informed Pakistan's policies in Afghanistan
because Pakistani generals have seen an Indian hand in Kabul since the
days of the Soviet invasion. They interpret India's goals in
Afghanistan as a strategy of encirclement of Pakistan, punctuated by
the tactic of promoting instability among Pakistan's restive,
independence-minded Pashtun, Baluch, and Sindhi populations.
Pakistan has countered this perceived Indian strategy by developing
Islamist militias such as the predominantly Pashtun Taliban as proxies
for Pakistan and as a means to destabilize India. As for the U.S. role,
Pakistani generals see it as inconstant and unreliable, based on the
pattern of here-and-gone U.S. engagement in the past, and they also
tend to believe that the United States is today lashing itself,
deliberately or naively, to Indian strategy in the region.
This paranoid style in Pakistani security doctrine has been
reinforced in several ways by U.S. actions in the region since 2001. As
noted above, U.S. diplomacy has made an insufficient priority, until
recently, of attempting to build constructive links between Kabul and
Islamabad and to take pragmatic steps to persuade the Pakistani
military that it has a stake in a stable Afghanistan free from the
threat of Taliban rule. U.S. policy in Afghanistan has failed to
develop a robust strategy of political negotiation, reconciliation, and
national reintegration that would provide a platform for Pakistan's
genuine security concerns. Then, too, the failure of the United States
to invest deeply and broadly in Pakistani society, but to concentrate
its aid in a narrowly based military government during the Musharraf
period, only reinforced the assumption that the United States had once
again hired out Pakistan as a regional ``sherrif'' and intended to
disengage from South and Central Asia as soon as its mission against
al-Qaeda was complete--just as the United States has done at comparable
intersections in the past, including after the Soviet withdrawal from
Afghanistan.
What does this analysis suggest about the specific policy choices
facing the Obama administration in Afghanistan today?
If the United States signals to Pakistan's military command that it
intends to abandon efforts to stabilize Afghanistan, or that it has set
a short clock running on the project of pursuing Afghan stability, or
that it intends to undertake its regional policy primarily through a
strategic partnership with India, then it will only reinforce the
beliefs of those in the Pakistani security establishment who argue that
nursing the Taliban is in the country's national interests.
To the extent that U.S. actions in Afghanistan reinforce this view
within the Pakistani security services, it will contribute to
instability in Pakistan and weaken the hand of Pakistani political
parties and civil society in their long, unfinished struggle to build a
more successful, more durable constitutional system, modeled on the
power-sharing systems, formal and informal, that prevail today in
previously coup-riddled or unstable countries such as Turkey,
Indonesia, the Philippines, Argentina, and Brazil.
If the United States undertakes a heavily militarized, increasingly
unilateral policy in Afghanistan, whether in the name of
``counterinsurgency,'' ``counterterrorism,'' or some other abstract
Western doctrine, without also adopting an aggressive political,
reconciliation, and diplomatic strategy that more effectively
incorporates Pakistan into efforts to stabilize Afghanistan, then it
will also reinforce the beliefs of those in the Pakistani security
establishment that they need the Taliban as a hedge against the United
States and India.
If the United States adopts a ``counterterrorism only'' policy in
Afghanistan and substantially withdraws from Afghanistan, it will risk
deepening instability along the Pakistan-Afghan border, and it will
reinforce the narrative of its failed, self-interested policies in
Pakistan during the Musharraf period and in earlier periods,
undermining the prospects for a Pakistan that evolves gradually toward
internal stability and a constructive regional role.
On the other hand, if the United States signals to Pakistan's
military command that it intends to pursue very long-term policies
designed to promote stability and prosperity in South Asia and Central
Asia, and that it sees a responsible Pakistan as a decades-long
strategic ally comparable to Turkey and Egypt, then it will have a
reasonable if uncertain chance to persuade the Pakistani security
establishment over time that the costs of succoring the Taliban and
like groups outweigh the benefits.
Between withdrawal signals and blind militarization there is a more
sustainable strategy; one that I hope the Obama administration is in
the process of defining. It would make clear that the Taliban will
never be permitted to take power in Kabul or major cities. It would
seek and enforce stability in Afghan population centers but emphasize
politics over combat, urban stability over rural patrolling, Afghan
solutions over Western ones, and it would incorporate Pakistan more
directly into creative and persistent diplomatic efforts to stabilize
Afghanistan and the region.
That is the only plausible path to a modernizing, prosperous South
Asia. It is a future within reach and it is a model for evolutionary
political-military success already established in other regions of the
world that recently suffered deep instability rooted in extremism,
identity politics, and fractured civil-military relations, such as
Southeast Asia and Latin America.
The Obama administration needs to make an even greater effort than
it already has to communicate publicly about its commitment to Pakistan
and to the broader long-term goal of regional stability and economic
integration. There is an emerging, bipartisan consensus within the
Congress on Pakistan policy, as evidenced by the Senate's unanimous
endorsement of the critically important Kerry-Lugar legislation. At the
Pentagon and within civilian U.S. policymaking circles there is a much
deeper understanding than previously about the centrality of Pakistan
to U.S. interests and regional strategy, and about the need to engage
with Pakistan consistently over the long run, nurturing that country's
economic growth, healthy civil-military relations, civil society,
pluralism, constitutionalism, and normalization with India. On Pakistan
policy, Washington is perhaps on the verge of proving Churchill's quip
that the United States always does the right thing after first trying
everything else.
And yet Kerry-Lugar should be seen as only a beginning. It is
essential that the U.S. national security bureaucracy find ways to act
with a greater sense of urgency, creativity, and unity on Pakistan
policy. In Iraq and Afghanistan, because we are formally at war,
American policy is often animated, appropriately, by a sense of
urgency. Too often, this is not the case when it comes to Pakistan,
even though Pakistan's stability and success is a central reason that
the United States continues to invest blood and treasure in
Afghanistan. As the Obama administration and Congress refashion and
reinvest in Afghan policy over the next weeks, there will be an
important opportunity to address this imbalance, in the way that policy
is conceived, funded, and communicated.
The Chairman. Again, also very helpful and much
appreciated.
STATEMENT OF HON. MALEEHA LODHI, PUBLIC POLICY SCHOLAR, WOODROW
WILSON CENTER, FORMER PAKISTANI AMBASSADOR TO THE UNITED
STATES, WASHINGTON, DC
Ambassador Lodhi. Senator Lugar, and members of the
committee, I'm honored to appear before you today. I speak, as
you know, as a Pakistani citizen and not as a spokesperson for
the government.
Let me get straight to the point.
The Chairman. I should mention--I don't think I did--that
you are a public policy scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center--
--
Ambassador Lodhi. Yes.
The Chairman [continuing]. And I failed to say that. But,
thank you for the----
Ambassador Lodhi. Thank you.
The Chairman [continuing]. Distinction.
Ambassador Lodhi. Thank you. So, let me get straight to the
point. The core strategic objective that the United States
seeks to achieve in Afghanistan is, Senator Kerry, as you
quoted President Obama as saying, disrupt, dismantle, and
defeat al-Qaeda. The key question is whether, to achieve this
core goal, it is also necessary to pursue other objectives,
such as fighting the Taliban, nation-building, trying to
establish a centralized state in Afghanistan. And I think the
challenge is to evolve an approach that doesn't destabilize
Pakistan.
Let me, at the outset, state that the choice for the United
States should not be between an open-ended escalating military
engagement and cut and run from Afghanistan. Both could be
disastrous--for the region, for Pakistan, and, I think, for the
United States, too. A precipitous withdrawal would repeat the
strategic mistake of the 1990s, when the United States
abandoned Afghanistan to the chaos that nurtured al-Qaeda. Nor
should the West risk being trapped in a Vietnam-style quagmire,
a war without end and with no guarantee of success.
Pakistan's stability, as I know you are already aware, has
been gravely undermined by what I call the ``twin blowback''
from Afghanistan. First, the Russian occupation--and I'm not
going to list the witch's brew of problems that Pakistan
inherited; you're well aware--2 million of the 3 million Afghan
refugees are still in Pakistan today. Second, the unintended
consequences of the 2001 United States military intervention,
which increasingly pushed the conflict into Pakistan's border
region and further fueled the forces of militancy.
The conflicts in Afghanistan and Pakistan are interlinked,
but they're also different and distinct. They are linked by the
bonds of Pashtun ethnicity, a broadly shared ideology, common
links to
al-Qaeda, and the two-way cross-border movement that does take
place. But the two insurgencies are also different in important
ways. The Afghanistan Taliban movement is older, more
entrenched, has something of a command-and-control structure, a
broader geographical presence, and a national objective, which
is the ouster of foreign forces. The Tehrik-i-Taliban in
Pakistan, as it is called, the Pakistani Taliban, is a loose
conglomeration of a dozen groups with local origins and
motives, and it is confined to part of the tribal areas which
constitutes 3 percent of Pakistan's territory and 2 percent of
Pakistan's population. It lacks command and control, especially
after the death of its core group's leader, Baitullah Mehsud.
It has been seriously disrupted by the Pakistan Army's
operations in Swat, Bajaur, and, of course, the current
military encirclement that is underway in South Waziristan.
Most importantly and strategically, the Pakistani public has
turned against the TTP, as it's called--the Pakistani Taliban.
This, to my mind, places Pakistan in a better position than
coalition forces in Afghanistan, something to which, Senator
Kerry, you just alluded, to disrupt and eventually defeat the
Pakistani Taliban. And this really reinforces a very important
principle of counterinsurgency, which is that indigenous forces
are better able to conduct such missions. But, the continuing
conflict in Afghanistan, of course, does compound the problem,
vis-a-vis Pakistan's response to the Taliban in the tribal
areas, because continuing conflict can provide a fresh impetus
to the Pakistani Taliban.
On the Afghan side, the coalition force faces much greater
challenges. And these challenges don't just come, of course,
from the fraud-stricken Presidential election in Afghanistan,
but they also come because foreign forces, as history attests--
and Mr. Bearden has recalled that history for us--foreign
forces will always find it difficult to quell an insurgency
that portrays itself as fighting for a national cause.
So, a further military escalation in Afghanistan, in my
opinion, is unlikely to succeed, for several reasons. I will
very quickly list some of these and then get on to the negative
consequences military escalation can have on Pakistan.
First, military escalation is unlikely to succeed, because
more troops will inevitably mean more intensified combat, even
if the stated aim is to protect the population. The primary
target,
al-Qaeda, can be neutralized in Afghanistan and in the border
region with Pakistan if it is rejected and ejected from the
Taliban ``sea'' in which it survives. Military escalation will
push the Taliban even closer to al-Qaeda.
Two, even enhanced troops will be insufficient, for all the
reasons that Milt Bearden has described. The Soviets, let's
remember, at the peak of the occupation, had 140,000 troops, as
well as the support of a well-organized and professional Afghan
Army, which, at its peak, was about 100,000 people. So, that's
a lot of troops that were already there. And yet, we know that
they failed to subdue the mujahideen.
Military escalation will also raise the risks of
casualties--Western casualties. It'll also increase economic
costs for the West. So, I think the question is, Can Western
forces absorb these rising costs in human lives as well as the
economic costs?
Four, something to which both my colleagues have alluded,
an escalating war will also intensify regional rivalries among
neighboring powers. Pakistan's concerns about India's growing
role in Afghanistan is well known, so I will not elaborate,
because I think we've heard sufficient elaboration. But, the
impact of a surge will have at least five negative consequences
for Pakistan.
First, it will lead to an influx of militants and al-Qaeda
fighters into Pakistan.
Second, it will enhance the vulnerability of United U.S.-
NATO ground supply routes throughout Pakistan, creating what
military strategists call the ``battle of the reverse fronts.''
In other words, NATO-U.S. forces will be confronting the
insurgents with the supply lines behind the insurgents. I'm
told by military strategists this is not a great policy to
have, because of the increased vulnerability. Pakistan's
forces, already overstretched--150,000 deployed in the border
region and undertaking counterinsurgency--will have to protect
the supply lines because supply needs will double.
Third, such a military escalation will likely produce a
spike in violent reprisals on mainland Pakistan.
Fourth, it could lead to the influx of more refugees into
Pakistan, with destabilizing effects in both the North West
Frontier province and the restive province of Balochistan.
And most importantly, and I think you would understand
this, it could endanger, erode, and unravel the key public
consensus that has been achieved in the past 1 year in Pakistan
to fight the militancy.
The alternative, as I said before, cannot be a unilateral
withdrawal by United States coalition forces from Afghanistan,
or indeed switch to the narrow counterterrorism approach, which
is simply another variation of military escalation. This will
be viewed as a strategic defeat, it will embolden the forces of
extremism across the world, and strengthen the al-Qaeda/Taliban
alliance.
May I, Mr. Chairman, propose a third path, a comprehensive
strategy that can pave the way for an indigenous Afghan
solution and create the conditions for a gradual, progressive
United States withdrawal, while leaving the region with
relative stability. There are no easy options, as we all know.
But, I think the challenge is to choose the best out of very,
very difficult options.
The question really isn't about troop levels, in my
opinion, from a Pakistani perspective. It is not about military
strategy as much as it is about having the right political
strategy, and then having the military strategy that is
consistent with such a political approach.
So, a new strategy could consist of the following elements.
I'll very quickly run through some of these. The military
component obviously will continue to play a part, but it should
encompass holding ground in a defensive military strategy,
avoiding casualties, not multiplying enemies, and negotiating
reciprocal cease-fires, wherever possible, at the local level.
Economically, I think the economic footprint does need to
be enhanced by supporting development and job creation at the
local level.
But, it is the central thrust of the strategy at the
political level which is most important. And that, I would
propose, should be aimed at seeking a political solution,
drawing into the political process in Afghanistan and
integrating within it excluded Pashtun groups, and those
Taliban elements that can be decoupled from
al-Qaeda.
Afghan leaders and military commanders from NATO, including
United States commanders, have spoken frequently about the need
for national reconciliation in Afghanistan. What has been
missing, or lacking, is a political framework within which
serious negotiations can be pursued and meaningful incentives
can be offered to the insurgents.
Talk with the insurgents will not be easy, and they may
have to be opened, initially, through intermediaries, but this
effort should aim at isolating and weakening the irreconcilable
elements of the Taliban.
What could be offered to the insurgents is to disavow al-
Qaeda, halt hostilities, support development, abide by the
constitution, participate in the political process--the
parliamentary elections in Afghanistan are due next year.
Political parties, at present, are banned, they cannot contest
those elections; I think the time has come to allow the people
of Afghanistan the right to form political parties and contest
in next year's parliamentary elections.
And I think, in exchange, U.S.-NATO forces can offer a
progressive withdrawal all foreign forces from Afghanistan. The
aim should be to establish a decentralized political order that
has existed historically in Afghanistan, and that reflects the
country's complex ethnic mosaic and of course protects the
rights of the minorities.
If this can be agreed, and a regional compact can be forged
amongst the neighboring states, then it may be possible to
contemplate and envision a U.N./OIC peacekeeping force drawn
from the Muslim countries as a transitional strategy, because
such a force can help implement such an agreement; such a force
cannot help forge such an agreement, but it can certainly help
to enforce such an agreement. As I said before, this will not
be quick, and it will not be easy. Talks may fail in the first
instance, but, I think, if there is a hearts-and-minds effect
that has to be created at the outset, this is the way to do it,
to see how many of the Taliban elements can be peeled away from
their alliance, which, by some indications, suggests that the
alliance between some Taliban elements and al-Qaeda may be
fraying. Talks is the only way to test that proposition or that
hypothesis.
A negotiated and progressive deescalation in Afghanistan
will be beneficial to Pakistan. Pakistan will be able to manage
its fallout. What Pakistan will find hard to manage is an open-
ended military presence in Afghanistan which shows no sign of
making the kind of progress that will help to bring about
stability.
Finally, Mr. Chairman, I do want to say that the United
States and the Western ability to isolate and eliminate al-
Qaeda and violent extremism in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the
rest of the Muslim world, depends critically not so much on
military strength and counterinsurgency strategy as on the
demonstration of the political will and capability to secure
just solutions to the conflicts and problems that plague the
Muslim world and that play on Muslim hearts and minds. It is
this concrete commitment to justice from the United States that
I believe will have a truly hearts-and-minds effect, and be a
very important weapon to fight against extremism and militancy.
Thank you Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Ambassador Lodhi follows:]
Prepared Statement of Dr. Maleeha Lodhi, Public Policy Scholar, Woodrow
Wilson Center, Former Pakistan Ambassador to the U.S. and U.K.,
Washington, DC
Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee, I am honored to appear
before you today to provide a perspective from Pakistan, not as an
official, but as someone who has had long experience both as a
practitioner and writer on these important issues. I speak before this
committee as a Pakistani citizen not as a spokesperson for the
government.
I welcome this debate and President Obama's commitment to a
comprehensive and careful reassessment of U.S. strategy in Afghanistan.
There is a famous line in Lewis Caroll's ``Alice in Wonderland''
which says: ``If you don't know where you are going, any road will take
you there.'' In addressing the dire situation in which the U.S.-led
coalition finds itself in Afghanistan, it is vital to identify the
strategic objectives and a realistic plan to achieve these.
What are the strategic objectives that the United States wants to
achieve? The core objective as President Obama stated in March 2009 is
to ``disrupt, dismantle and defeat al-Qaeda'' and protect the U.S.
homeland from terrorist attack. The question is whether to attain this
objective, pursuing other goals are also necessary: defeating the
Taliban, undertaking ``nation building'' and establishing a centralized
state in Afghanistan.
The challenge is how to prevent Afghanistan and its border areas
with Pakistan become a hub for terrorist networks that can threaten the
region and the world.
Let me at the outset state that the choice cannot be between cut
and run from Afghanistan and an open-ended military engagement. Both
will destabilize the region further: neither will succeed in realizing
Washington's strategic goals.
Any effort to pull out precipitously from Afghanistan would repeat
the epic strategic error of the 1990s when the United States abandoned
that country to the chaos that in turn nurtured al-Qaeda. But open-
ended military escalation risks trapping the West, in a Vietnam-style
quagmire: a war without end and no guarantee of success.
It is wise for this committee to consider the impact of any option
on Pakistan. I wish this had also been done in 2001 and 1989.
Pakistan's stability has been gravely undermined by three decades
of conflict and strife in Afghanistan. The twin blowback from the
Soviet invasion 30 years ago and the unintended consequences of the
2001 U.S. military intervention has created unprecedented security,
economic, and social challenges for Pakistan and contributed
significantly to its systemic crises.
Pakistan's involvement in the long war to roll back the Russian
occupation of Afghanistan bequeathed a witches brew of problems
including militancy, religious extremism, proliferation of weapons and
drugs, and a huge number of refugees, 2 million of whom remain in
Pakistan. Their camps continue to add to the challenges facing Pakistan
today.
The consequences of the 2001 intervention included fueling further
the forces of militancy in Pakistan's tribal areas and producing
ferment among the Pashtun tribes. The ramifications of installing a
government in Kabul dominated by an ethnic minority were similarly
deleterious. As the Afghan war was increasingly pushed across the
border into Pakistan and Islamabad took action in its frontier regions,
Islamic militants turned their guns on the Pakistani state and its
security forces.
It is easy to understand in this backdrop how militancy on both
sides of the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan is interconnected.
But it is also distinct in origin, goals, and magnitude.
The conflict is connected, first, by common bonds of tribe and
ethnicity; second, by the broad appeal of ideology; third, by links to
al-Qaeda; and four, by the two-way cross-border movement of insurgents
who provide each other a degree of mutual support.
It is also distinct because; one, the origin of the Afghan Taliban
is older and the movement is more entrenched with an organized command
and control structure. Two, the Taliban have geographically a much
broader presence in Afghanistan compared to the Pakistani Taliban whose
support base is confined to part of the tribal areas, which constitute
just 3 percent of the country's territory and represent 2 percent of
the population. Three, there is greater confidence among the Afghan
Taliban that they will prevail and outlast what they see as a foreign
occupation force.
In contrast to the ``national objectives'' of their Afghan
``cousins,'' the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) is a loose
conglomeration of a dozen groups that primarily have local origins,
motives, grievances, and ambitions. It lacks central command and
control. Its core group led by Baitullah Mehsud has suffered a serious
reversal by his death and the Pakistan military's aggressive actions to
blockade and contain his followers in South Waziristan.
Most importantly public sentiment in Pakistan has now turned
decisively against the TTP, leaving the organization in a position to
launch periodic suicide missions, but not expand its influence. The
Pakistani Taliban today stands discredited in the country and without
public backing are in no position to extend their sway. But the
continuing conflict in Afghanistan and the perceived obligation to help
a movement resisting an alien force provides the TTP with its main
motivation, mobilizing rationale and legitimacy among its tribal
support base.
Pakistan is in a better position than the coalition forces in
Afghanistan to disrupt, contain, and ultimately defeat its ``Taliban,''
by building on the success of the recent operation in Swat and the
tribal area of Bajaur. Within 4 months of the military action launched
against the Swat branch of the TTP in the northwestern part of the
country the Taliban have been driven out of Malakand region, their
advance into neighboring areas has been halted and the writ of the
government has been reestablished. Over 90 percent of displaced people
who were forced to evacuate ahead of the fighting have returned to
their homes, defying doomsday predictions. The Pakistan army has
demonstrated improved tactics and counterinsurgency capabilities.
This reinforces the point that Pakistan has the capacity to deal
with the threat of militancy by its own efforts, but without the
compounding complications engendered by the fighting across its border.
It is also a reminder of the most important lesson of
counterinsurgency: indigenous forces are better able to undertake
successful missions.
On the Afghan side, U.S. and coalition forces will face much
greater difficulties against the insurgency especially if the present
military and political strategies remain unchanged and also when a
fraud-stricken Presidential election in Afghanistan has denuded the
country of a legitimate government. The ongoing strategic review and
the debate that is underway are timely and critical.
One response being proposed to this dire situation is a substantial
surge of military forces. This raises the question: To what end, at
what cost and with what chances of success? Although many will see the
parallel as odious, history cannot be cast aside; the Soviet Union
deployed 140,000 troops at the peak of its occupation but failed to
defeat the resistance.
If the central objective is to disrupt and defeat al-Qaeda in
Afghanistan and Pakistan's border region can this be achieved through a
military escalation? Has the situation improved or deteriorated after
previous military surges? So far the presence of more troops has
increased militant activity and support for the Taliban. Even if the
stated aim is to protect the population, more troops will mean
intensified fighting with the Taliban.
But al-Qaeda can only be neutralized in Afghanistan and in the
border region with Pakistan if it is rejected by and ejected from the
Taliban ``sea'' in which it survives. This urges a strategy to separate
the two movements by military, political, and other means. A strategy
of military escalation will push the two closer and strengthen their
links rather than erode them.
For the purposes of the strategy review and for consideration by
the members of this committee, let me offer three possible scenarios
for what could happen in Afghanistan:
(1) Military escalation: This will inevitably be directed at the
Taliban and will likely evoke even more hostility from the country's
Pashtun-dominated areas and closer cooperation between al-Qaeda and the
Taliban thereby further impeding the core objective of eliminating al-
Qaeda. Although the Taliban do not represent all Pashtuns, they do
exploit Pashtun grievances and use the foreign presence as a
recruitment tool.
If history is a guide in this graveyard of empires, a military
solution is also unlikely to succeed for several reasons:
(i) The enhanced military forces will still be insufficient
to ``hold'' the countryside: independent estimates suggest that
the Taliban now have a permanent presence in over 70 percent of
Afghanistan. If Moscow with 140,000 troops supported by a more
professional Afghan army of 100,000 could not succeed against
the mujahideen, why should it be any different in a country
whose people have historically united against outsiders?
(ii) Escalation will inevitably lead to mounting Western/
American casualties, which will erode further public support in
both the United States and Europe. The insurgents can absorb
higher losses and fight on. Pakistan has incurred 7,500
casualties among its security personnel (dead and injured). Can
Western forces envision such heavy losses and still count on
public support for the war?
(iii) The economic cost of the war will also escalate. Will
Western Parliaments preoccupied with economic recovery and
burgeoning debt burdens agree indefinitely to defray the
growing costs of an unending Afghan war?
(iv) Escalation will likely intensify rivalries among the
neighboring powers in a region where a subterranean competition
is already in play. Pakistan's concerns about India's role in
Afghanistan are well known. Moreover if the West's
confrontation with Iran on the nuclear issue intensifies, there
will be consequences in Afghanistan (and Iraq) that will have
to be factored in.
(v) Reliance on a surge conveys the signal that the United
States is only applying a military solution and is bereft of
other nonmilitary components of strategy. This is at odds with
the comprehensive approach that President Obama promised to
implement in March 2009.
As for the impact on Pakistan, further military escalation on its
border is fraught with great risk. Far from diminishing the threat of
instability this will enhance it, for many reasons. Let me list five:
(i) It will likely lead to an influx of militants and al-
Qaeda fighters into Pakistan and an arms flow from across the
border.
(ii) Enhance the vulnerability of U.S.-NATO ground supply
routes through the country as supply needs will likely double.
This will create what military strategists call the ``battle of
reverse front'' in which U.S. forces will have their supplies
``located'' behind the insurgents. Protecting these supply
lines will also overstretch Pakistani troops, 150,000 of which
are at present engaged in border security and
counterinsurgency.
(iii) It could lead to an influx of more Afghan refugees
which can be especially destabilizing in the restive province
of Balochistan.
(iv) A surge in Afghanistan can be expected to produce a
spike in violent reprisals in mainland Pakistan.
(v) Most important, intensified fighting and its fallout,
could erode and unravel the fragile political consensus in
Pakistan to fight the TTP and counter militancy. Pakistan's
recent success against militants needs to be reinforced not
endangered.
A second scenario is a unilateral withdrawal by U.S. forces without
a political settlement. This could be accompanied by what is being
called a remote-controlled counterterrorism strategy, involving an air
war focused on al-Qaeda.
This scenario is also fraught with great danger. It will be viewed
in the region and beyond as a defeat, will embolden the forces of
violent extremism across the world and strengthen and even solidify the
al-Qaeda/Taliban alliance.
It is necessary to consider a third scenario: one that involves a
new strategy to pursue a political solution that seeks to integrate
excluded Pashtun groups and those Taliban elements into the Afghan
political process that can be de-coupled from al-Qaeda. President Hamid
Karzai and American and British military commanders have frequently
called for reconciliation efforts but what has been absent is a
political framework in which serious negotiations can be pursued and
which offers real incentives to the insurgents to abandon violence.
This will ultimately involve negotiations for a progressive
reduction of Western forces from Afghanistan in return for the
insurgents agreeing to a number of conditions. Fashioning a new
political structure, that provides a power-sharing arrangement to bring
in underrepresented Pashtuns, will help to neutralize the insurgency in
southern and eastern Afghanistan.
Even if the central leadership of the Taliban refuse to engage in
talks this will offer a concrete way to co-opt and peel away local
Taliban commanders. There are indications that the alliance between al-
Qaeda and many Taliban elements is fraying. Talks will offer
opportunities to test this.
Political engagement, even if it does not at first succeed, will
represent a meaningful ``hearts and minds'' effort that can also help
create the conditions to isolate the irreconcilable elements among the
Taliban.
A plan of action to achieve such a political solution will involve
the following elements:
A. Military
(1) Hold ground in defensible military encampments. Avoid creating
pockets of vulnerability that risk higher casualties. This will enable
the conduct of talks from a position of some strength.
(2) Restrict offensive operations except in retaliation/self-
defense.
(3) Negotiate reciprocal cease-fires at the local level with
different actors including local Taliban commanders.
(4) Restrict air strikes only to terrorist targets based on
verified intelligence; avoid civilian casualties.
B. Economic
(5) Focus on economic development and job creation at the local
level, building capacities region by region through local communities.
C. Political
(6) Launch a national reconciliation initiative to draw in more
Pashtuns into the political process. Open talks with the insurgents
initially through credible intermediaries. Set out the terms of the
dialogue by asking the various Taliban elements to disavow al-Qaeda,
halt hostilities and support development efforts and the buildup of
Afghan security forces. This will need to be accompanied by the
willingness of U.S.-NATO forces to accept a progressive withdrawal from
Afghanistan.
(7) Seek to involve as many Afghan players (political and tribal
leaders, local powerholders) as possible in the reconciliation process.
(8) Allow political parties to contest next year's parliamentary
elections (banned at present) to ensure that the reconciliation efforts
are consolidated.
(9) Ensure that the expansion of Afghan security forces is not
ethnically skewed. At the moment it is, to the disadvantage of
Pashtuns.
(10) Promote a political arrangement that once worked in
Afghanistan: a loose, decentralized political and administrative order
which strikes a balance between and reflects Afghanistan's ethnic
composition and protects the rights of all minority groups.
C. Regional
(11) Forge a regional compact between neighboring states especially
ensuring support from Pakistan, Iran, and Saudi Arabia for such a new
political order in Afghanistan.
(12) Promote a formal accord between Pakistan and Afghanistan that
includes Kabul's recognition of the Durand Line.
D. International
(13) Consider a U.N./OIC peacekeeping force drawn from Muslim
countries to implement an agreement once it is reached.
Achieving this outcome will neither be quick nor easy. But
Pakistan's stability will be helped not hurt by a progressive, orderly
deescalation in Afghanistan. Pakistan will be able to manage its
aftermath as a negotiated end to conflict in Afghanistan will be
salutary for its future stability. It will further deflate the
ideological appeal and political motivations of the TTP and other
militants.
Pakistan's long-term stability however will depend on a number of
other factors:
(1) Continuing and consolidating public support for security
operations against militants. In this context U.S. drone attacks,
tactically regarded as effective are strategically costly as they erode
public support and consensus. The lesson from the use of air power in
the Middle East should not be ignored where this has had an intensely
radicalizing effect.
(2) The capacity of the state to provide effective governance in
the post-conflict regions including Swat.
(3) Financial stabilization and economic revival. The U.S.-
supported IMF injections have led to a modicum of financial stability.
But ensuring sustainable growth, adequate job creation, social
stability and reversing militancy will require larger infrastructure
and social sector investment and trade access for Pakistani products in
the United States and European markets. Market access through a free
trade agreement can help Pakistan become a competitive producer,
attract foreign investment and serve as a base for exports to the West.
(4) In Pakistan's fragile political situation U.S. actions should
not contribute to the breakdown of the national consensus against
violent extremism by escalating demands on Pakistan. Efforts to
determine Pakistan's security paradigm and decide on its priorities
undermine that consensus.
(5) Addressing Pakistan's security concerns vis-a-vis India and
promoting a peaceful settlement of Kashmir.
(6) The ongoing public debate in Pakistan about the benchmarking of
U.S. economic assistance to Pakistan is a reminder how such
conditionalities erode much of the hearts and minds effect as they
reinforce the transactional nature of the bilateral relationship that
Pakistanis so resent and strengthens rather than breaks from the
paradigm of treating the country as hired help rather than a valued
ally.
In conclusion, it should be emphasized that the United States and
Western ability to isolate and eliminate al-Qaeda and violent extremism
in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and other Arab and Muslim countries will
depend critically, not so much on military strength and
counterinsurgency strategy, as on the demonstration of the political
will and capability to secure just solutions to the conflicts and
problems in the Islamic world: the Palestine question, Afghanistan,
Kashmir, and Iraq.
It is this concrete commitment to justice and genuine economic
cooperation in the interest of the poor and deprived in the Muslim
world that will succeed in turning the tide against extremism and
militancy.
The Chairman. Well, thank you very much, Madam Ambassador.
I repeat again, I think all three testimonies are really
enormously helpful in framing the interests here, and the
questions here. And there really are just so many questions
that leap out of each of the testimonies, so we've got a good
number of Senators here, and we want to have a chance to dig
in.
Let me frame, quickly--I want to emphasize one thing. I
think it's appropriate in your testimony to talk about the
impact of a potential total withdrawal, et cetera. But,
nobody--I want to emphasize--nobody that I know of up here is,
in fact, proposing that. And that's not the debate that I think
we're having. I think the question we're having is, Recognizing
the legitimate interests that you have defined and others have
defined, what is the method by which we best achieve them, sort
of--you know, meeting those interests, serving those interests?
And it may be that some people will have a different sense of
what those interests are, it may be that we--there are some who
want to expand them, but we all understand, there are some base
interests--basic interests that are there, and they are not
served by just, sort of, walking away. So, I don't see that as
on the table. I don't think there's anyone up here talking
about that, so I don't think we need to, kind of, go to that
part of this discussion.
The question is, sort of, What strategy works? And what are
the basic assumptions--maybe one should even use the word, in
some cases, ``truths''--what are the basic truths, that we need
to begin to accept as you think about, ``OK, here's how we
respond to that''?
Now, you've set forth five very powerful and important
notions of what happens if we put additional fighters into
Afghanistan. You've said that a surge and an escalation--and
maybe that assumes it's a certain kind of surge, too. It could
be that you put additional troops in, but they're for a very
different kind of purpose than what we've done previously, and
therefore, it maybe acceptable to accomplish something. I think
we have to examine that premise. But, assuming that a surge in
escalation, sort of, was more of the same, you say it will lead
to a further influx of militants and al-Qaeda fighters into
Pakistan. You said it would enhance the vulnerability of U.S.-
NATO ground supply routes through Pakistan, creating a battle
of the reverse front; we've seen some of that already in
caravans that have been attacked near the Khyber Pass, near
Peshawar, et cetera. You say it would produce a spike in
violent reprisals on mainland Pakistan. It could--you say it
would lead to an influx of more Afghan refugees, with further
destabilizing effects in North West Frontier provinces, in
Balochistan. And, finally, you say it could erode the present
fragile political consensus in Pakistan to fight the militancy.
And I will comment on that. I was there, in Pakistan, meeting
with the Prime Minister, when one of the efforts in the
territories went awry, and I felt and saw firsthand the level
of intensity of the hue and cry and backlash that came as a
result of it. And it was a good lesson to learn.
So, I return to both Mr. Coll and Mr. Bearden, based on
your experiences. Can you respond to the committee, based on
your experiences and judgment--Mr. Bearden starting with you--
What is your reaction to those five propositions about what
happens if additional troops go in?
And is there a legitimacy to what I said, that you might
have additional troops, but, if they're tasked in some
different way, might that mitigate, or indeed even eliminate,
some of the things that the Ambassador has suggested?
Mr. Bearden. I would agree with that, Senator. I would
suggest that, if a surge involved more kinetic operations
against what we call the Taliban, it would simply foster a
symmetry in violence from the other side. There will always be
enough Pashtuns to meet our troops on the field. And one must
understand, fundamentally, that, at the end of any foreign
adventure or occupation of Afghanistan, it is a battle with the
Pashtun people.
During the Soviet period, I was repeatedly asked, by this
and other committees, how many mujahideen are fighting against
the Soviets. I said, ``I don't know.'' I said, ``I think I'll
give you a number that was around 250,000 full- or part-time
mujahideen,'' which was perfectly adequate to tie up 120,000
Soviets. The Soviets settled at about 120,000 troops, because
any surge above about 150,000 within 30 days would have
probably snapped their supply chain. They couldn't support more
than about 150,000 at any given time. And the U.S.S.R. was
contiguous with Afghanistan. Dr. Lodhi has pointed out,
certainly, the supply-line problem. We land our supplies in
Karachi, they move to Quetta or Torkham at the Khyber Pass, and
if we were to surge our troops, absolutely our supply lines
becomes part of the rear-area battle.
Now, your question, Senator, on whether or not we could
move in 40,000 troops, or up to 40,000 troops, with another
mission, to do the inkspot strategy to start providing security
so that the Afghans themselves could start reclaiming a
district at a time, or a city at a time, that might work, but
it will be a very, very serious challenge, because the other
side has the edge on the United States on the information war.
And any additional troops we put in will be characterized by
the other side as a kinetic surge. So, we'll have to deal with
that in strategic communications and in other ways, by showing
what we're doing on the ground.
In my opinion, there is no possibility for the United
States to provide enough troops in Afghanistan to ``pacify''
the situation; quotes on the word ``pacify.'' GEN Dan McNeill,
as he left ISAF, was quoted by Der Spiegel--and I understand
there was discussion of this, the accuracy of the quote----
The Chairman. It's an important quote, yet again.
Mr. Bearden [continuing]. On--that it would take 400,000-
500,000 troops to pacify Afghanistan. In researching of my book
on the Soviet War in Afghanistan, I went to Moscow and spoke
with what were my opposite numbers in the KGB and the Soviet
Army at the time, and their conclusion was that it would have
taken half a million troops to accomplish what they set out to
accomplish. I think you'll find most of our colleagues in the
Pentagon if discussing this frankly would think a half million
would be about right. That's an impossibility without a draft,
and it's an impossibility in any case.
So, what I'm saying is, a kinetic surge makes no sense. It
will fail. If you want to raise the number of the troops that
you have now to try to accomplish something else, to provide
security and perhaps justice to the Afghan people, and let them
begin to develop their own solutions, it might work.
The Chairman. Now, do you need to add to that, Mr. Coll, or
do you agree with that?
Mr. Coll. I broadly agree with it. I mean, I would just say
that it certainly does depend on what the troops do and what
vision of deployment and balance between----
The Chairman. Well, let's talk about what they might do----
Mr. Coll. Yes.
The Chairman [continuing]. In a moment here. But, I want to
come back to, sort of, some of the underlying concepts here.
You talked earlier about the 100,000 Soviet troops and their
inability to be able to accomplish the goal. And you've just
added on, sort of, these postmortem assumptions they made. Is
there a distinction in--and, Ambassador, you might want to add
in--is there a distinction between the United States presence
and our purposes there, and what we've gone in to do and
achieve, and the perception of the people of Afghanistan about
that, versus the Soviets, who just crushed in and decided,
``You know, we're going to take over'' and exert their will?
Isn't there--I mean, are we granted more latitude in our
capacity here?
Mr. Bearden. I think, indeed, we are. There is an
underlying sense of--I mean, we are not Russians. The founder
of modern Afghanistan, Abdur Rahman Khan, on his deathbed,
turned to his son and said, ``My spirit will remain in
Afghanistan, even though my soul will go to Allah. My last
words to you, my son and heir, are: `Never trust the Russians.'
'' This is part of the Afghan DNA, if there is an Afghan DNA.
And, indeed, we have not reached that point of parity with
Soviet occupation forces.
But what I would suggest, though, that there is possibly,
to use the overused phrase, a ``tipping point,'' that if you
raise ISAF and United States troops to a point--the Afghans
might come to view us as just another occupation and respond
accordingly. Most of the people we're fighting might not have
even been born when we were assisting the Afghan people resist
the Soviets. So, yes, we're not the Russians, but, that's a
distinction that I would not count on indefinitely.
The Chairman. And in your judgment, what would be the
effect if the Taliban were, in fact, to take over? I mean, you
have Pakistan, that existed for many years; you were working
with them during that period of time, and the Taliban were
there.
Mr. Bearden. Well, the Taliban--well, no, the Taliban
didn't exist until----
The Chairman. Excuse me, the Taliban came in afterward,
that's right. They came in----
Mr. Bearden. They came in the early 1990s.
The Chairman [continuing]. After that first period.
Mr. Bearden. But, I think your question implies----
The Chairman. Let me finish the question.
Mr. Bearden. Yes.
The Chairman. Describe for us, in your judgment, sort of--
and there are--you know, we hear differences about 20 percent
of the Taliban are Mullah Omar Taliban, and other Taliban are
rentable Taliban, and some are--you know, you get through this
sequencing. Can you help us--and maybe Madam Ambassador--get a
sense of that? And what would Pakistan's attitude be today?
Because, I understand the--you've described it--the Pakistanis
are very concerned about the Indian presence there. Some have
asserted they might be happier with the Taliban presence than
an Indian presence.
Mr. Bearden. Oh, of course they would, yes, Senator. The--
--
The Chairman. You say ``Of course they would.''
Mr. Bearden. I think that the Indian presence is something
that all of the Pakistani military and intelligence people find
impossible to reconcile. They see Indian construction companies
working as subcontractors on U.S. aid-financed projects, they
see that it is the largest single donor, after the United
States. And they fought three very real wars with India, and
they've almost gone to a fourth on a number of occasions. So,
that is not hysteria, that's a reality of the region.
Now, we all looked upon the Taliban, when they ended the
civil war in the mid-1990s, as, ``Well, maybe this will work
out.''
I think our problem, here in America, is that we tend to
think the Taliban all came from some secret valley, way in the
middle of Afghanistan, rather than the fact that they're almost
all the number-3 or -4 son in a Pashtun family, where you look
up and you say, ``Well, number 1 gets this, number 2 does that,
but number 3, what do we do with him?'' Well, maybe we send him
down there to the madrassa, they'll feed him. Every family has
one son like that, but the only thing is they're in charge now.
But what is it? The Taliban. It's a handful of people who
are deeply committed. It is a larger number of punks with guns.
It's criminal gangs. It's all of the above, but they all come
from a Pashtun family in that belt straddling Pakistan and
Afghanistan for the most part. It's like cognac and brandy. All
cognac is brandy but not all brandy is cognac.
All Taliban are Pashtun but not all Pashtun are Taliban. I
think we're going to have to start understanding who they are
and deal with them and, indeed, understand that where they fit
into the Pakistani view of its rear area both on the positive
side and on the negative side. Many Pakistanis would fear that
the question of Pashtunistan could raise its head again,
depending on what America does in Afghanistan.
Pashtunistan is the concept of all of the Pashtun peoples
in that belt of maybe 40 million people becoming yet another
country. And most Pakistanis know that Hamid Karzai's father
was an advocate of Pashtunistan. They also know that Hamid
Karzai got his Master's degree in India. So, I suggest that the
distrust just goes on and on and on.
The Chairman. These things matter. Madam Ambassador, do you
have a comment before Senator Lugar questions?
Ambassador Lodhi. Yes, I just want to make clear the fact
that Pakistan sees its strategic interests vis-a-vis
Afghanistan as a country that is stable, it's peaceful, and it
is nonhostile. I think that is the key, plus I think for many
Pakistanis, Pakistan is of primary importance to them.
Afghanistan is of secondary importance to them. It is of
importance, but the primary importance now lies in Pakistan's
ability to deal with many of its security, economic, social
challenges that it is negotiating with right now. So that's
one.
The other is I can't help but make a very brief comment on
how the U.S. presence is perceived in the region. I think, you
know, however well intentioned, however you may have a self-
image of being a force for good, many Pashtuns on both sides of
the border see the United States as an occupation force, no
different from the Soviet Union.
Let us not forget that the Soviet Union had also embarked
upon a modernization strategy for Afghanistan. They had also
tried to liberate women. They had tried to introduce secondary
education; all of that. Now, of course, the brutality practiced
by the Russian Army has no parallel. There's no question about
that, but I can speak from my side of the country, sort of
Pashtun belt.
I think the problem that we are confronted with in Pakistan
is that much of the rationale, the legitimacy and the
mobilizing power of the Pakistani Taliban is coming from the
sense of sympathy that many tribes have on the Pakistani side
of the Durand Line with their Afghanistan cousins as it were
within they share tribal and ethnic linkages, that they are
resisting an invader, even if the invader came in with very
good intentions and had every justification for doing what they
did; of course, 9/11. So we can't discount the sentiment. We
have to deal with this one way or the other.
The Chairman. Thank you very much.
Senator Lugar. We'll just be a little looser on the time
because there's only a few of us here. I want everybody to have
a fair extension here. So why don't we make it 10?
Senator Lugar. Dr. Lodhi's point that the Russians were
actually promoting the rights of women and secondar education
during their occupation, albeit, as you say, in a rather brutal
fashion, is certainly a new insight that I suspect we've not
heard before in this committee, or at least not as frequently
as other people thinking about this have.
I'm impressed, however, even more by the observations about
the Pashtun. Now as we try to trace our policy, we go back to
the fact that we were attacked on 9/11 and people say from
where. Well, the camps in Afghanistan.
Others would say that the camps were training people, but
in fact most of the people who attacked us on 9/11 may or may
not have come out of the camps. This was a part of the
structure and a part of the international situation, but in any
event, we asked the Taliban to let us go after the camps.
In response, the Taliban said no, they're going to protect
the camps, you can't just come in and take hold. So then we got
into a conflict with them.
Now, as I hear all three of you, you're defining different
kinds of Pashtuns. Some Pashtuns, as you say, are affiliated
with the madrassas and often become leaders of a more virulent
group that would possibly protect al-Qaeda, while there are
others who may be less inclined to do so. From our standpoint,
however, we just took them all on at this point.
Now, as you all pointed out, the Pashtuns are both in
Afghanistan and Pakistan. So, there are many Pashtuns that
exist apart from those protecting the camps for al-Qaeda.
Nevertheless the justification for the so-called just war was
to overthrow the Taliban, which was in effect made up of
Pashtuns who were harboring
al-Qaeda.
Subsequently, we've developed other ideas for Afghanistan,
such as the promotion of women's rights and encouraging parents
to put their children in schools, and now we have helped
Afghanistan hold a second countrywide election supervised by
all sorts of checks and balances, rules, and commissions that
we feel are important in different contexts whether it's Latin
America, as we went through the 1980s, or other parts of the
world, Ukraine more recently.
Now, I'm just sort of tracing what I see to be a potential
outcome of all of this where we could as a country, as you've
all suggested, try to find someone to talk to in the Pashtun
community who is prepared to make peace not only with us but,
more importantly, with the rest of their countrymen. Such an
arrangement may induce the Pashtuns to help offer a defense
against a minority of intruders to the cities that right now
cause us to assume a more defensive position in Afghanistan, as
some of you have described it.
We're not involved in a surge against people, pinning them
all down, but we are trying to provide some training to police
and to members of the army. At the same time as we're trying to
possibly include in the police and the army some of the Pashtun
we're talking about here, who have been a party to all of the
business on both sides of the Durand Line. That may or may not
work, but as I listen to all of you, it appears that this may
be a promising way to bring about some stability that we should
begin looking at.
Now, finally, our ability to leave depends upon, I suppose,
the civility of that arrangement and it's interesting because
you mentioned and we mentioned in our opening statements, our
Kerry-Lugar business now. The thing that impresses me the most
as I read the clips from the Pakistan press each day and
they've been writing about this consistently for 6 months, is
that many Pakistanis believe that the impressive thing about
the bill is not really the money but that this bill offers
assistance over a period of 5 years, the numer 5, as opposed to
a 1- or 2-year timeframe.
Five years is a long-term commitment by the United States
to Pakistan. Recently, the press has speculated that this bill
might get signed, which has led some to say that the bill is a
terrible idea due to what they perceive as all kinds of
conditions, all sorts of intrusions. They're not sure they want
all of those Americans there for 5 years, but most people still
like the idea.
In Afghanistan, it's not so clear really what the
commitment may be. There's not a comparable five on the
scoreboard over there and even if there was, some would say we
don't find President Karzai very reliable. We think there are
some real problems regarding his family, the warlords that he
deals with, and the way the election was held. How can you have
a stable Afghanistan with a government that is unreliable,
unsubstantial, and not up to our standards?
So I'm going to ask all three of you to comment about,
first of all, how do we deal with President Karzai? Also, how
do we get these talks going with the Pashtun on both sides of
the border, who may be helpful with successful negotiations
with the leadership of the country or could help with the
creation of a more reliable defensive posture around cities so
that life might go on for people without interminable battles.
Even if the Pashtun could not completely secure the areas
around the cities, could their presence at least lead to a
situation where Afghans would be fighting, most of them in the
context of police action against intruders in normal life?
Would the effect of that policy be salutary with regard to
Pakistan? Should we, as Mr. Bearden said, be considering what
the Chinese are currently thinking about this?
We've heard about the Indians. What do the Russians think?
Who are the other players? Are there people we're leaving out
of this proposition who might have reasons to try to
destabilize?
Would you start, Dr. Lodhi, with your thoughts about this?
Ambassador Lodhi. I think, Senator Lugar, you're absolutely
right. General McChrystal also mentions the crisis of
confidence amongst the Afghan people in the government. So I
think the whole debate is focused on this again.
I just want to reinforce a point I made earlier in the
context of your question which is that the debate right now is
what kind of military strategy: more troops, less troops, what
are these troops doing in Afghanistan? The real debate should
be what is the political strategy because counterinsurgency
cannot succeed at any time, unless it has a legitimate
political foundation on which it proceeds.
There is no insurgency that I can think of that has been
neutralized by military means alone. Insurgencies have to be
neutralized by a combination of political and military means.
So I think that's a question that has to be addressed by
yourselves and, of course, the U.S. administration.
It comes back to the point that we have to define and
clarify the political strategy. Now, when you say how do we
proceed with talks and with whom, I think this is a very, very
difficult question and you're right to ask it, but I would
venture to suggest that this could be done in three ways.
One, at the local level but something would have to be
offered the insurgents because I think so far, the efforts that
have been made from time to time, and these have been very
local efforts, have not survived for very long, fail largely
because not much was offered to them. So why should the other
side surrender as it were unilaterally? So what is it that's
been offered?
The second is I think initially talks would also have to be
opened through intermediaries, not just with the United States
to decide who it wishes to use as an intermediary from within
Afghanistan and from outside of Afghanistan.
Third, I think it's important to initiate an Afghan
political process as quickly as possible aimed at national
reconciliation along these lines as part of this political
strategy. I think the longer we delay that, the harder it will
become to bring in and draw in so many of the Pashtuns that may
not be supporters of the Taliban.
Let us make clear the fact that the two are not
interchangeable. There are Pashtuns, as you rightly said, Mr.
Bearden, and then there are the Taliban, but we do have a
situation and I'll finish on this point because I think it
makes the point about a military surge more effectively than
I've done so far.
The question we have to ask ourselves is what did previous
military surges do in Afghanistan? Did they lead to an
improvement in the situation or did they lead to deterioration
in the situation?
I think that question is very well answered by the fact
that independent estimates of the control of Afghanistan
suggest that the Taliban now have a permanent presence in over
70 percent of Afghanistan. Two years ago they had it in 60
percent of Afghanistan and maybe 4 years ago, they had it in
whatever it was, 30 or 40 percent.
So what is it? That's simply enhancing troops is not able
to do it and I think the answer is provided by the lack of a
political--credible political strategy being worked by the
legitimate political actors and having the support of those who
can help in this process.
Thank you.
Senator Lugar. My time is up, but I will take the liberty
of just asking you, Mr. Bearden and Mr. Coll, for at least a
few comments.
Mr. Bearden. On the question of the election and the
current political situation in Afghanistan, some things are too
hard to do all at the same time. Many Afghans, particularly the
Pashtuns, will look at the government as completely corrupt, as
you pointed out. Others will claim that U.S. forces are in the
country to support and shore up a government that is
essentially Northern alliance, Tajik Panjshiri-run. They don't
consider Hamid Karzai a genuine Pashtun. They consider him a
creature of the Tajik Panjshiri people that came into power
with American support 8 years ago.
I think Dr. Lodhi is right. We're going to have to come up
with a strategy for engaging these people. At the same time, if
we do not put resources into development projects that will
provide a possible stake for these people, then we'll get
nowhere. There aren't many options right now for the teenage
Pashtuns. Pashtun boys go from childhood to manhood. They don't
do the adolescent thing that we do with iPods and that kind of
stuff. They just go from a child to a young man with a
Kalashnikov. If we don't offer some projects that will give
them a stake in something, whether it's a road or an
agricultural project or something, where they can get $9 a day
instead of $8 a day, then we will continue to fail, as well.
The political side, let's get beyond this. A runoff. The
snows are almost ready to start filling the high mountain
passes. We want another 4 months of this? Just get on with it.
Take a deep breath and move forward. I think President Karzai
would understand that he's got a new chance now, if he's got 50
percent plus one vote, to become a statesman or to end up on
the ash heap of Afghan history.
So I don't think we have the wherewithal to control that,
but we have to start doing some things differently inside the
Pashtun belt of Afghanistan.
Senator Lugar. Mr. Coll.
Mr. Coll. Just very briefly, maybe just to sketch a little
bit of the complexity of this subject.
The Pashtuns, of course, there are more Pashtuns living in
Pakistan than in Afghanistan. There are, I think, about 10 to
15 percent of the Pakistani Officer Corps are Pashtuns. They're
a very diverse people. They're also internationalized to a
degree that I think is underappreciated in our discourse about
them.
The Pashtuns in Dubai and Abu Dubai are working on
construction sites. There are Pashtuns by the hundreds of
thousands at least in Karachi driving trucks. This is a
transnational talented people that also lives along the border
and in southern Afghanistan in considerable poverty and
deprivation, but it's a very complex subject.
The Taliban are a minority extreme movement within a
broadly based and internationalized people. So I don't think we
should reduce them in our eyesight but understand that because
of their complexity, there are opportunities to build political
coalitions that are sustainable, frankly, just as the
Government of Pakistan has done throughout its existence.
And then on the political strategy subject, in Kabul, there
are lots of opportunities, I think, to engage the Afghan
political elite in their own processes of political reform and
unification.
The Bonn Process selected the Afghan Constitution of 1964
for the absence of anything better. It was sort of ratified in
a hurried process in the early years after 2003. It's left the
country with a debate among Afghans about what would be the
best political system to address their pluralism and their
development and whether or not the Parliament should have a
greater role, whether or not Governors should be elected,
whether or not political parties should be allowed to flourish.
As Ambassador Lodhi suggested, and I agree, Afghans are
ready to have such a discourse, whether it's in the form of a
Loya Jirga or some other kind of political process and it needs
to address not only these broad questions of governance and
political power-sharing but also electoral reforms to prevent
fraud, such as occurred this time, from ever occurring and
other kinds of compacts that can stabilize the center.
This is part of what a political strategy means.
Concentrating American and international effort on the creation
and sustenance of such dialogue rather than distracting
ourselves entirely by discourse about military tactics and,
finally, there's the national reconciliation and reintegration
piece.
Not to reiterate too much of the Soviet era history, but,
you know, after the Soviets left, they left behind a client
government headed by Dr. Najibullah. He was the modernizer, an
Afghan strongman, who actually held on and controlled
Afghanistan cities until after the Soviet Union dissolved.
You could even argue that the Soviets in some technical
sense, that while they were defeated strategically in
Afghanistan, they never lost control of the Afghan state. The
Afghan state headed by Dr. Najibullah only collapsed after the
Soviet Union itself dissolved and during that period when he
held the cities against mujahideen assault after assault after
assault. There were tens of thousands of women at work in
ministries and girls in schools and high schools, but the
reason he succeeded was that he, besides being a secret police
chief and a tough man and a sort of rather strong leader, not
someone that you would admire as a political figure, but he was
very successful at a national reintegration strategy. He held
the cities, used the footprint of the cities and then reached
out and picked off tribe after tribe.
He converted his enemies into stable sources of not
necessarily his marching alliance, but he was able to settle
things down again and again by pursuing a national
reintegration strategy. If he was able to do that, despite
being discredited and despite having no resources, if the
international community pursued such a reintegration strategy
funded and adopting the best practices that have been developed
elsewhere in the world to bring young men in, give them
stipends, give them jobs, give them a future, this is part of
the political strategy that requires greater emphasis. It's
rarely discussed as part of the policy package.
Instead, we tend to always be asking what international
troops will be doing.
Senator Lugar. I thank you all for discussing it this
morning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Chairman. Thank you very much, Senator Lugar.
Senator Casey.
Senator Casey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm going to be
very brief.
First of all, I want to apologize to the witnesses. I was
in and out this morning and have to run in about half my time.
So I'll try to just be 5 minutes.
First of all, I want to thank you for your testimony. One
of the major challenges we have in the Congress, forget the
administration for a second, is to get this strategy right and
make sure we make determinations about--after a lot of analysis
and review--make determinations about what's the right strategy
before we have a full-blown debate on what the resources should
be. So you're helping us do that.
I might have time for just one question, but I wanted to
see if all three of you could comment--and I know it's hard to
do in a minute or two--but could you comment on the
relationship between or among, if any, Quetta Shura, the Quetta
Shura Taliban, the Haqqani Network and al-Qaeda. Mr. Bearden,
we could start with you and what your sense of these
relationships. A lot of the debate on this policy will center
on the nature of the threat within the region or within and
between the two countries, but also the nature of the threat as
it relates to our national security interests.
Mr. Bearden. I think that the suggestion that the al-Qaeda
Arabs can control the Taliban Pashtun or any other Pashtun
insurgents is a bit overdrawn.
Many of these people, including the father, the granddad of
the Haqqani Network, Jalaluddin Haqqani, we knew well as a
fierce anti-Soviet commander during the time and he, indeed,
got along with Arabs as many of them did, but they always felt
that after the Soviets, the Arabs were a significant irritant,
as well.
I'm not certain that we would ever see al-Qaeda come back
under any condition and take the control that we at least
attributed to it at the time of 9/11.
Now the Quetta Shura, there's a debate. The Quetta Shura
probably exists. Yes, it exists to some extent, but it's like
discussing somehow our belief that Osama bin Laden and Ayman
al-Zawahiri are in Pakistan. Nobody's seen them for 8 years.
We've repeated that claim to the point where we accept it
as true, but bin Laden could be in Yemen or Aruba or here in
Washington. I have no idea where bin Laden is and I don't think
anybody else in the government does. If they did, they would
just go get him.
But we have been locked into repetitive statements that
have become doctrine that don't get challenged anymore. I'm not
too sure that the language we have now for al-Qaeda, disrupt,
dismantle, et. cetera is even valid today.
I think someone could stand up and say that's already
happened. What has not happened is we've not had national
closure with bin Laden and that is what we're seeking.
The Afghans aren't controlled by anybody. They've never
been controlled by Pakistan, as is often suggested. Even
General Babar, who was Benezir Bhutto's adviser, said they're
``my boys.'' Well, they're not anyone's boys. I used to work
with an ISI general and would go to them and ask ``are we going
to be able to get the Afghans to do X and Y?'' And he'd be
thoughtful for a moment and say, ``You know I can usually get
the Afghans to do something they really want to do.'' That's
what happens in Afghanistan.
So I think that's a reality we're going to have to bear in
mind as we move forward. Who controls what and whether Quetta
Shura is important or not, I don't know.
Senator Casey. Thank you, Doctor. I know we have limited
time.
Ambassador Lodhi. Very quickly. I think I would agree with
Milt that there's just so much speculation around this whole
notion of Quetta Shura and I think if the wrong facts and
evidence, real-time intelligence, and it is pinpointed where
these people supposedly are, I have absolute confidence
Pakistan will respond.
But having said that, one point that I do want to bring to
your attention is the fact that Quetta has a refugee camp, one
of many that still exists in the country, which are larger than
many cities in Europe, and these refugee camps are really--
provide a haven for many who come back and forth from
Afghanistan and I think one of the points my country has made
for the last 8 years, if not more, has been to shift these
refugee camps across the border into Afghanistan. Then you can
deal with them and you can deal with whoever's hiding out in
these camps, but it becomes very hard for Pakistan which is
constantly being berated for not doing enough, for hedging, and
for all sorts of other allegations that are made certainly in
the media and yet when Pakistan says, look, we have a problem
with these camps, there's something going on.
We can't monitor all the people who come in and out of
these camps; if we tried to do that, if we tried, for example,
to do a shalita in one of the camps in Quetta, you can imagine
what the outcry would be in Pakistan, much less the
international community.
So somehow these factors don't get play in your country and
really do need to.
Mr. Coll. To quickly answer your question, I think the
Haqqani Network has a close historical collaborative
relationship with
al-Qaeda. The first al-Qaeda training camps were established in
territory that Jalaluddin had controlled and if, indeed, bin
Laden and al-Qaeda leaders came back across the border right
after Tora Bora, they would come into North Waziristan
territory that are Haqqani-controlled and there's lots of other
evidence of these networks.
That's the most likely closest collaborative relationship.
The Quetta Shura, meaning Mullah Omar and his gang, have had a
longer and more ambivalent relationship with al-Qaeda and I
think that it persists today. I don't see evidence in the
reporting that Mullah Omar's group sees the same kind of
collaborative benefit in the relationship with al-Qaeda, though
they certainly communicate and, to some extent, share goals.
Senator Casey. Thank you very much.
The Chairman. Senator Corker.
Senator Corker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the
testimony of all of you, and I appreciate the chairman and
ranking member calling this hearing today, and I think the
context you provide is very, very helpful.
I do hope at some point in the near future--I know
Secretary Gates has certainly agreed to this--it will actually
have Eikenberry and McChrystal and Anne Patterson in to do the
same kind of thing, but the context he provided us is most
helpful.
To me, where we end up in all of this is sort of a circular
discussion. You know, the President, back in March, February,
or March, talked about a narrowed mission to focus on
counterterrorism. And everybody said it's a narrowed mission.
I immediately said that that meant nation-building,
because, in fact, in a country like Afghanistan with poor
people and not much of a government, in order to win the hearts
and minds of citizens to have the counterinsurgency side, it
ends up being nation-building. Lo and behold, people are now
realizing with the metrics that have just been laid out a
couple weeks ago, in fact, what we're engaged in right now in
Afghanistan is nation-building.
So I hear the--and by the way, I'm one of the few folks on
my side of the aisle that think it's appropriate that the
President takes some time right now to think this through. I
think a prolonged length of time is very damaging. I hope we'll
come to some conclusions soon.
But I also am a little concerned. I hope that Pakistan
doesn't become a diversion. I think Pakistan's very important,
but I hope we don't come up with something that's sort of a
halfway approach, sort of a Solomon's baby, something that is
cute. And I'm afraid that we possibly are moving down that
path.
So with that context, I'm confused. Mr. Bearden, I hear
about the young men and women there who don't do the things
that our young men and women do to stay busy. It does seem to
me that regardless of whatever political reconciliation we
might incur, that there's going to be a large degree of nation-
building that has to take place for there to be a political
settlement. I would like for you all to respond to that
briefly, if you would.
Ambassador Lodhi. I think the question that you have to ask
yourself, really, the United States needs to ask itself, is
whether nation-building can ever be undertaken by those who are
foreigners to that land, because that produces its own
dynamics.
I think the mission to transform other countries' societies
are best left to the people of that country. I think they can
be helped, of course, and the United States should, in my
opinion, enhance its economic footprint in both Afghanistan and
Pakistan, but that's a different way of helping a country build
itself.
But I do think, from my long years of experience, I just
find the whole notion of nation-building by an outside force as
really well intentioned, but misconstrued, misperceived, and
therefore, resisted by large sections of that country's society
who feel that their way of life, and, in this case, the Islamic
way of life, is somehow being changed according to somebody
else's political agenda.
So I would just caution you on that, but not for a moment
say that there should not be a development surge, that
infrastructure help should not be given to Afghanistan and
indeed Pakistan. That's a different thing. But nation-building
has a completely different connotation.
Mr. Bearden. To take you back and give you a little
context, the nation-building discussion underway today is, in
fact, a delayed discussion from 1989. The end of the war for
the Afghan people, when the Soviets left on February 15, 1989,
had produced a million dead, probably 1\1/2\ million injured in
the war, and 6 million driven into internal and external exile,
3 million of which were in Pakistan, next door.
To be fair, a civil war broke out rapidly thereafter, and
you don't fight your way in with aid. But then during the
1990s, we simply walked away. Now we're going to have to do
something, I think, in the way of infrastructural development
and other attempts that will provide the Afghans a stake in
something other than the only industry they've had for the last
three decades, which is warfare.
I agree with Dr. Lodhi, to the extent that we can make a
large number of mistakes, if we go in and try to rebuild the
nation and we make it look like Oklahoma or something like
that. But I do suggest that we have a responsibility, and it is
in our vital interests to do something in the way of what
you're calling nation-building, but it should be very, very
thoughtful and unique to the circumstances.
Senator Corker. Mr. Coll.
Mr. Coll. I would just add that I think the good news is
the kind of nation-building that Dr. Lodhi's correctly anxious
about is not required in the medium run for the United States
to achieve its broader goals of regional stability and
prosperity. The real context, in my view, for this policy
dilemma the United States faces resides in competing visions in
South Asia itself between a path toward modernization, economic
integration, normalization of relations between India and
Pakistan, and a proud march toward the Asian Century
constructed by Pakistanis, Indians, Afghans.
The role of the United States is not to create and build
that future, but to enable it by ensuring that the sources of
instability, particularly the Taliban and al-Qaeda, do not
create conditions that delay or retard that effort. It's
already underway.
And so in Afghanistan, stability and the prevention of a
regionally destabilizing, disruptive war is an American
mission. We took it on after 9/11. We have our own interest
there. But the kind of nation-building that is ultimately going
to pull Afghans into a stable and prosperous future is going to
be constructed by Indians and Pakistanis themselves, in which
Afghans and other central Asians and the whole region will
eventually participate, if the failure of these fragile states
doesn't get in the way.
Senator Corker. So let me move on, and then I'm going to
come back to that in just a second. But, Dr. Lodhi, when you
talk about the grievances that plague the Muslim world, that's
obviously a sort of mid-to-longer-term issue, but could you be
specific about two or three of those that would come to your--
--
Ambassador Lodhi. Well, I think if you asked any Muslim
anywhere in the world what moves him or her, I mean, I can't
speak for everybody, but I think the first answer would be
Palestine and the need for a just settlement and the need for
the United States to put the kind of political resources to
ensure that the process doesn't trump an outcome, because we've
seen in the past that process becomes something which is an end
in itself.
So the issues that plague and play on Muslim hearts and
minds are very clear. In my part of the world, it's Kashmir. I
mean, the ``K'' word, I'm told, is not even mentioned in
Washington anymore. Why not?
I think the single most important way in which the United
States could demonstrate that it stands by justice is to play a
role in helping to bring about a Kashmir solution. It doesn't
have to get involved by mediating, but I can tell you that will
have a much greater impact on Muslim hearts and minds,
certainly from the country that I come from and its
neighborhood than probably any other issue.
So I think the issues are very clear. It's Palestine, it's
Kashmir, it's how the whole Iraq issue is ultimately resolved.
And, of course, it's Afghanistan, where people wish to see
something other than just military escalation and the
application of a military solution, because Muslims obviously
turn around and say, ``Why is it that the West does not adopt
just positions when it comes to us?'' Now, what a just position
actually amounts to is something that we can discuss in more
detail later, but they're very concrete issues.
These are the conflicts that are going on, and they need
resolutions, and they're the ones that provide the oxygen that
many terrorist groups use. These are legitimate grievances that
are leveraged and used, so we must take the oxygen away from
these people. And I think that's being smart about how to deal
with this. You're not at all conceding to them. You're being
smart about how you're dealing with all of these issues.
Senator Corker. Thank you. And, of course, those are the
same issues we have heard for decades, and I appreciate your
bringing them up. So let me get back into the issue at hand.
The President announced in February or March what his strategy
was. Obviously, there has been a gearing up toward an American-
type nation-building. That's been what's been geared up too.
So now we have a commander on the ground there that was
told to put in place whatever it took to make that happen. He's
requested 40,000 troops. Many of the things that you have
talked about are nice to talk about--no offense--in this warm
room with all of us here, but there are actual kinetic
activities that are taking place right now in Afghanistan, and
there's a conflict underway. There's an unsettled Presidential
election there that has many flaws.
So with this great context and background that you all
have, give me one, two, three steps that, if you were
President, the tangible steps you would take beginning 30 days
from now as it relates to Afghanistan.
Mr. Bearden. On the nation-building side, first----
Senator Corker. You don't have to get derailed on that, but
just----
Mr. Bearden. I'm not. I think there's an important point I
would make is that we're not talking about a U.S.-driven
Marshall Plan. There's huge money in the region and huge
interest in Afghan national resources. What I'm saying is that
America is bogged down in a war, while Chinese are buying
copper mines and looking at the huge iron ore deposits in
Hajigak to the west of Kabul, the Russians are looking at the
hydrocarbons across the North, and the Iranians that we don't
seem to ever want to mention have--there's 24-hour-a-day power
in Herat in western Afghanistan, because the Irans want it to
be there.
I think that if we were able to marshal some of those
regional forces, and there would be a huge amount of
developmental benefit, let's say, from some of their
development of natural resource operations, constructions,
creation of ports, movement of national resources out, and
large employment of Afghans, with precious little American
input, other than guidance, because we're supposed to be in
charge there.
Senator Corker. I was just in Iraq, and I agree, there's a
lot of positive activity there. But back to the question--OK.
We have a request in front of us for 40,000 troops. And so the
answer is: yes?, no?
Mr. Bearden. The answer on that one, Senator, would be that
there will not be a military solution. If you wrap up 40,000
troops, don't even think that you're going to bring anything
under control. That number will be matched by those who oppose
the troops.
But if you're going to try something else with those troops
to create pockets of stability, I could go along with that, but
I'm not a big fan of any kind of surge. You cannot have a
kinetic surge and expect to win.
Senator Corker. Of course, my understanding is with those
troops that the purpose is to protect the major population
area, so I'm confused by your response.
Mr. Bearden. Well, we don't know yet. I'm saying that if
you're surging, if it's a surge, it will be interpreted as a
kinetic surge by those who oppose us right now. I'm not too
sure what happens once 40,000 more troops get on the ground.
Forty thousand troops will beget forty thousand more enemy, and
you will end up in more dust-ups, I think.
Senator Corker. OK.
Dr. Lodhi.
Ambassador Lodhi. I think the question of how much is ever
enough is going to put you on a slippery slope. When will
enough ever be enough? Because I think without a political
strategy, you're putting the cart before the horse.
A military surge without being clear how politically you
are going to proceed in the backdrop of a fraud-stricken
Presidential election, where General McChrystal says the Afghan
people have lost confidence in their government--and he said
this prior to the Presidential election--I think is inviting
trouble, in my opinion.
You will multiply the number of enemies that you have in
Afghanistan. You will set yourself as greater targets. Because
there are that many more people, there will be that many more
targets. Casualties will go up, and the consequences for my
country, Pakistan, will be hugely destabilizing.
Senator Corker. So I think that's an interesting answer,
and I realize we've all talked about the Pashtuns and trying to
bring them at the same time. The Taliban has got 30 percent of
the country under its control today, and I would say that's
gaining, and you all are saying plus or minus. But let me just
ask you this. American sensibilities, how will we respond to a
country that has large amounts of its territory under Taliban
control, and are you thinking that through this political
strategy, that we leave those territories as are, or are you
thinking over time, that the saner-thinking Pashtuns pushed
them out? I mean, what are you thinking in that regard?
Ambassador Lodhi. Well, I'm asking the question whether, by
what you're saying, the objective of the United States then
becomes the avoidance of defeat. Is that the goal that the
United States has in Afghanistan, or is the goal to disrupt
defeat and dismantle
al-Qaeda and protect the American homeland from terrorist
attack?
I understand that as your core goal. If that is the core
goal, I think the question you have to ask yourself is whether
proceeding along the track of enhancing troop levels in
Afghanistan takes you nearer that goal, or does it take you
away from that goal? Does a policy of military escalation leave
the region with stability, or does it leave the region with
greater instability?
I think the goal is yours. We have pointed out--at least I
have, and so have my colleagues--some of the risks and the
costs. Now, I think in determining strategic goals, you have to
factor in these costs. There will be costs, and I think
assuming that somehow troops are going there to protect the
civilian population assumes that your opponent or the enemy or
the insurgent is going to accept that. The insurgent will
engage these increased combat troops in Afghanistan in
intensified fighting. What will your troops do? Respond.
Military escalation will follow.
So I think the sequence of events, regardless of the
original intentions, will lead to intensified fighting, and I
think the question then to ask is does that help take you
closer to your goal, or does it take you away from your goal?
Mr. Bearden. The Senator raises a very interesting
prospect. What would happen in some of those areas where the
Taliban are in control? An experiment might be just let happen
what will happen, and then turn the lights back on in 6 months,
and you will probably find that a bunch of bearded guys have
been replaced by a bunch of bearded guys that might be ready to
sit down and talk about something.
I'm doing that in response to your statement that we may,
in fact, have to cede large slots of territory in a new
strategy, and it might provide some very interesting
developments in itself.
Senator Corker. Mr. Coll.
Mr. Coll. I think I'd like my two fellow panelists--I don't
per se oppose the dispatch of additional troops to Afghanistan.
My question is what are the troops for, and how do they connect
to a successful, plausible, political and regional strategy?
And I think that there are--to answer your question about
what could be done in the next 30 days--markers of what a
successful political and regional strategy might look like. I'm
not suggesting this has an engineering blueprint, but for a
flavor of the kinds of things I'm talking about, linking
population security to a vision of political and regional
strategy to initiate an Afghan-led process of political and
constitutional reform that is supported by all of the
opposition, significant opposition candidates in the election,
and resourced and supported by the international community to
initiate within 30 days a program of well-resourced national
reintegration that has the prospect within 6 months of
providing an address for those local and regional Taliban
leaders who want to reengage with the constitutional system in
Afghanistan to turn up at, and to be rewarded for, their
decision.
To think about partnership with the governments in
Islamabad and New Delhi and Tehran and Moscow and Beijing, to
reinforce this strategy of stability, security, and political
emphasis. Now in that context, if the military advice from
General McChrystal, whose vision may be consistent with what
I'm describing. He hasn't actually come forward to lay all of
that out yet. If he said, ``I can get you there, but I need X
trainers, In order to put Afghan forces in the lead by 2012, I
need the following bridge period. I need the following training
vision, and I'm not going to be out knocking on--bringing young
men from Tennessee and Upstate New York into rural Pashtun
villages, knocking on doors, asking who's inside, Are you good
guys or bad guys?''
That self-defeating pattern of rural patrolling and
counterinsurgency, I asume, is not his vision, but I'm just not
clear as to what the additional troops are meant to resource by
way of that----
The Chairman. On that note, Senator, I have to interrupt.
Senator Corker. Let me just close by saying this. I think
the one thing, Mr. Chairman, that has never occurred, and that
is an understanding of what success actually means there. And I
still think, until we lay that out for the country and we lay
that out for our military and we lay that out for the civilian
operations, we're going to continue in what I think are very
circular talks.
Mr. Coll--just his last, which I appreciate--still leaves
territories where al-Qaeda ends up potentially being a safe
haven, so these things end up being sort of circular
discussions.
I thank you for the testimony, and I'm sorry to take so
long.
The Chairman. Thanks.
Senator Shaheen.
Senator Shaheen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to follow up a little bit on the line of
questioning that Senator Corker started, because I'm still
trying to understand exactly what this more sustainable
strategy is between military buildup and total withdrawal. I
understand some of the points that you've laid out. Dr. Lodhi,
I understand when you say we need to reach out to the Pashtuns
and try and bring them in and make some agreements. What I'm
not clear on is what the incentive is on their part to do that
if they don't see--if they look down the horizon and see no
further increase in U.S. troops and what, as you have pointed
out, has been an increasing presence on the part of the Taliban
over the years, based on the troop levels and the actions that
we've taken to date. So, I'm really trying to figure out how we
do this third-way strategy that you all are talking about,
because it's still not clear to me. So, I don't know if you--if
anybody wants to respond to that before I go on to the next
question.
Mr. Bearden. I would just have a--one comment is that we
sometimes presuppose that all the Pashtuns want to do is fight.
They will always rise to a fight. And there's no question about
that. They're the--it's--the ``best-friend/worst-enemy'' is
always the description of the Pashtun tribals. But, they will
also quiet down if that fight subsides and it is not brought to
them. And if there are other stakes that are created around
them that they can have a part of, they may even start making
deals.
So, I know the middle way is difficult to describe, but I
think if you continue a kinetic approach to them, they'll fight
forever.
Senator Shaheen. But, I guess, it seems to me that what
you're describing is what we've been doing for the last 8
years. I mean, we haven't--until recently, haven't increased
troops, and we have--I mean, what I've heard and--what I
heard--I was in Afghanistan in May, and we heard that, ``Well,
you know, we want to provide economic assistance.'' We've built
all these schools, but, unfortunately, we build the schools and
then the girls and the students are interrupted by the Taliban
from attending, and so, we have to provide security for those
schools. So, I'm still trying to understand how we do the
economic assistance, how we provide the resources that you
talked about, into development projects, at the same time we're
not increasing troop levels to provide that security. How does
that happen?
Mr. Bearden. Well, I think the example you used is the--
that the--you know, is nothing more of a lightning rod than--
that America is going in and building girls' school in Pashtun,
Afghanistan. I mean, it's a nice thought, but you must
understand, when you do that, that you're inviting somebody to
shut it down and then you just raise the prospect that we have
to build a girls' school and then protect it. I think that
prevents us from----
Senator Shaheen. Well, how about a boys' school?
Mr. Bearden. Little boys don't go to school, either. No,
but the point is, is that, I think, when we build those
schools--why start with schools? A well--digging a well might
be something that has a greater range.
Senator Shaheen. Heard similar stories about----
Mr. Bearden. Yes.
Senator Shaheen [continuing]. Wells. I mean, it wasn't
limited to--I chose an unfortunate example, because----
Mr. Bearden. Yes.
Senator Shaheen. What we heard was that there had been some
successes--health care was a success that was talked about in
the villages--but that whenever there was an effort to provide
some of those resources, it was very difficult to have them
secured by Afghans without the Taliban coming in and undoing
the benefits.
Mr. Bearden. I think most of those, those well-thought-out
efforts, were considered only incidental by the opposition, by
the enemies, who viewed us not as nation-builders in any way at
the time, or not providing them a stake in something, but as an
occupying force. And if that is what the debate is now in this
government of what are we going to be in the future, not what
we have been in the recent past, then maybe they will change
their attitude, as well.
I do say, again, they rise to the fight every time, but
they'll also quiet down if you don't always bring the fight to
them. But, you know, this is not easy.
Senator Shaheen. Does anybody else want to comment on that?
How do we do the things you're suggesting?
Mr. Coll. Well, Senator, I mean, I would say one thing. You
mentioned that you--two things. I don't regard our advice as
just a third way or a middle way. I think it's an attempt to
try to bring forward an emphasis on political and diplomatic
strategy. And it may be that General McChrystal and the Obama
administration have this firmly in mind. That seems to be what
the President has been saying, ``Let's get the strategy right,
and then talk about resources behind it.''
And I certainly, in my own intention--by emphasizing, in
specific ways, what political reconciliation, reintegration,
and regional diplomatic strategy looks like, I'm simply trying
to put that ahead of the resourcing question.
You said that you've worried that the status quo was, in
effect, what we've been doing all along. In fact----
Senator Shaheen. Well, that what you're suggesting is what
we've been doing all along.
Mr. Coll. Right. And, in fact, I don't think that either--
that that's the case, that the narrative of U.S. military and
political policy in Afghanistan since 2001 has been a zigzag
and has been characterized by grotesque underresourcing of a
very ambitious mission. The theory of the case early on was, we
didn't need very many troops, and yet we could transform every
nook and cranny of Afghanistan. We went in with national
ambitions that encompassed virtually every rural district, but
neither the soldiers to provide the security, nor the funds,
nor the mechanisms to deliver those results.
It was the overstretched fabric of ambition and the
resources that created the gathering crisis that now confronts
the Obama administration. And I think that, in the course of
that, there have also been attempts to undertake military
solutions to what are essentially political problems. And even
as recently as this year, thousands of marines were sent into
rural Helmand province on a mission whose strategic, sort of,
purpose I struggle to understand. They kind of went through a--
I mean, you asked a lot of brave men to take enormous risks in
what is, in my mind, a geographical kind of cul-de-sac that
didn't produce population security and didn't produce a
transformational effect on national politics.
And so, I'm hopeful that when General McChrystal--if he
appears before--that, when you ask him that same question, that
he'll have a vision that you'll find convincing. But, what I
understand from the open sources is that the basic idea is, not
only to try to put this political and reintegration and
regional strategy before the military resources, but then to
deliver those resources against a clear vision of transition to
Afghan security forces and to Afghan politics, within a time-
bound period.
And now, it may be--and the Senate has played an important
role already in raising questions about, Are there alternative
ways to get from here to 2012, rather than 40,000 American
troops? But, I think there's a shared vision, as in Iraq, that
the goal is to put Afghan security forces forward so that
United States forces can transition from direct combat to
overwatch to support, and head to the exits as Afghans take
control of their own security.
So, I think that big picture, there's a broad understanding
of. It's a question of, What are the short-term investments by
the United States, and particularly the hardest question, the
role of additional troops in achieving that vision?
Ambassador Lodhi. May I?
Senator Shaheen. Yes?
Ambassador Lodhi. I think, two or three points which emerge
from your question. The first is, you said that were--you know,
there haven't really been these military buildups, but the last
few months have seen 21,000 U.S. troops go into Afghanistan--I
mean, that's a surge, if there ever was one----
Senator Shaheen. Right.
Ambassador Lodhi [continuing]. 17,000 of which were combat
troops.
Now, the question that has to be asked is, What did that
produce? So, further military buildups, in my opinion, are
unlikely to produce an outcome different, unless you have the
connecting link, what you are looking for, which is a political
strategy. And I think there, with all the talk about ``smart
power'' and a development surge and a civilian surge that we
heard from the Obama administration in March this year, we
didn't see any of this rolled out on the ground. In fact, what
was rolled out on the ground was essentially a military
solution. Now, that may have been unintended, because you
didn't have the means to do the civilian surge; but if you
didn't have the means in March, how do you develop the means
now? So, that part of the strategy, I think, will remain open
to question.
And as for the political strategy, you know, I will just
reinforce--I think there has to be an effort to draw in as many
Afghan and the excluded Pashtun groups, and peel off as many of
the Taliban elements as possible in such a process of
reintegrating them into the Afghan political process. And, I
think, ultimately the bargain that will have to be offered to
them, in my opinion--to many of these insurgents that are
prepared to disallow al-Qaeda, so I have to keep making this
distinction----
Senator Shaheen. Sure.
Ambassador Lodhi [continuing]. And abandon violence--is
that the United States and NATO forces will ultimately be
prepared for a progressive reduction of forces over a period of
time, without reducing its economic commitment and its
responsibility to the Afghan people, after years of so much
devastation and destruction.
So, I think this is the kind of political, sort of,
solution that I see down the road. I'm not saying it's going to
happen tomorrow, or should happen tomorrow. But this is
something that has to be envisaged, because I think to rely on
the Afghan National Army, much as I'm--absolutely, I agree with
Steve that this is a very important part of any ultimate exit
strategy that the Afghans themselves are able to take
responsibility for their own security. But this doesn't take
away the most important deficit that the Afghan National Army
and police still stuff, which is they're ethically skewed in
favor of non-Pashtun groups. So, you have to ensure that it
becomes an ethnically balanced security force to start with.
And if these people are not joining the security forces,
the Pashtuns, then we have a real problem on our hands, because
how do we persuade alienated chunks of people, who are so key
to Afghanistan's future, to be recruited into the Afghan
National Army.
Because I think the exit plan ultimately will depend on
something which, frankly, has not been proceeding--even by
those who have been doing the training of these forces--
according to plan, as it were.
Senator Shaheen. My time is up, Mr. President.
The Chairman. Thank you so much, Senator, we appreciate it.
Senator Wicker.
Senator Wicker. Thank you. Very thought-provoking and
excellent hearing, Mr. Chairman. Sorry I haven't been able to
be here for all of it and to pay attention to every word.
I'm interested in the history lesson that Mr. Bearden began
with, of three decades of action, neglect, and reaction.
And so let me ask you--all three of you, if I might--just
trying to understand where the mistakes have been made. April
14, 1988, the Soviets were gone from Afghanistan.
And, according to your printed testimony, Mr. Bearden, you
say America turned its attention elsewhere--I believe in your
verbal testimony you said we turned our backs on Afghanistan.
For all three of you--what was the mistake--what should our
level of involvement have been at that point? What mistake did
we make?
Mr. Bearden. Senator, the Soviets left on February 15,
1989. America didn't just take a break and take a 3-day pass,
what happened--in May of that year--the Hungarians figured out
that the Soviet Union was finished, and they cut the barbed
wire with Austria.
In June of that year, the Poles elected the electrician
from Gdansk. All through that summer, the East Germans came
out, first in tens, then hundreds, then thousands, until the
Monday demonstrations had hundreds of thousands of people on
the street, and November 9 the Berlin Wall was breached, and
329 days later, Germany is reunited inside NATO in what I think
is one of the most masterful maneuverings of foreign policy in
this country since George Marshall was Secretary.
The Soviet Union, on Boxing Day, 1991, slid beneath the
waves. So, that's what we were doing.
Meanwhile, back in Afghanistan--in the absence of a foreign
occupier, and the only time the Soviets looked like a
superpower was leaving the country--they reverted instantly to
their unruly ways, and there was a civil war. And we blame
ourselves, because we did not do anything after that, but we
couldn't do much. U.S.A. doesn't fight its way in to assist
people, but then I think in the 1990s we just lost interest,
and that was a fateful thing for the whole decade.
Senator Wicker. So, what level of involvement should we
have had?
Mr. Bearden. I think what you have to understand--or what I
understand--is that once the Soviet Union left the scene, and
we became the sole remaining superpower, we then had a
responsibility for a new construct internationally--it was the
failed state. During the whole cold war, states didn't really
fail, because the Soviet Union would run over and throw some
money at it, and put it in their team, or we would run over and
put money on it and it would be on our team.
But when the Soviet Union retired from the field, we had a
failed state. And I don't think we took that seriously. At what
point could we have done something differently? I don't know.
Perhaps it was the change of the guard, from a Reagan
administration--who might have been credited with being
involved in bringing down the Soviet Union--or the refusal of a
subsequent administration to acknowledge that. I mean, it
becomes involved with Washington politics, as well.
But, we didn't do it, and for whatever reason, the
consequences of that became apparent in----
Senator Wicker. All right. Let me really fast-forward
before I let the other panelists respond. September 11, 2001,
the Towers go down, the Pentagon is hit. Every single member of
the House and Senate--save one--voted for us to become involved
in Afghanistan. NATO was all on board. The United Nations was
not standing in the way at all. It seemed that there was
unanimous support for what we set about to do.
Now at what point did we lose our way in the 8 years since
then?
Mr. Bearden. The initial response was understandable. We
moved in very quickly. Within weeks we had Special Operations
Forces and CIA officers on the ground.
Senator Wicker. Did we make the correct decision?
Mr. Bearden. On that, yes, that's just fine. What happened,
though, is that--if you go back and reconstruct, as Steve Coll
has done so admirably--is that we had disbursed the Taliban,
collapsed the entire Taliban structure with less than 300
Americans on the ground, supported by air. That--and they were
just CIA officers and Special Operations Forces.
A decision to turn this thing over and bring in big Army is
one point that one would have to look at. Tora Bora is a case
that is so hotly debated yet to this day, but the thought that
you're going to have Afghan--certainly non-Pashtun Afghans--go
ahead and attack the final fixed position, rather than U.S.
Army Rangers or Special Operations Forces--was probably a
mistake. Because Afghans don't usually do that--attack fixed
positions or defend them. That would have been our job, and we
might have been able to take care of something then if--you
know, would there have been a chance to get bin Laden? I think
people say there would have been.
But from that point on, when we rose above those numbers,
we changed the game for ourselves in Afghanistan, and we didn't
understand that there's one playbook for everybody that goes in
there. Whether it's Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, the
British or the Russians--there's a playbook for Afghanistan for
foreign occupying forces, but the secret is, it is written by
Afghans, and not by us.
Senator Wicker. Mr. Coll.
Mr. Coll. Let's go back to your history question and offer,
maybe, a slightly different interpretation of the period after
the Soviet withdrawal. I don't--by any means, hold Milt
responsible for this, because he was off working on the Soviet
Union at this point, which as he says, was the bigger strategic
issue of the day--but it's important, I think, the details are
important.
After the Soviets left, the United States continued to
pursue a military solution in Afghanistan. Our aid to the
mujahideen rebels--even as they collapsed into a civil war
amongst themselves--continued right through to the end of 1991.
We allowed ourselves, with the Pakistan Army, to pursue a
military campaign for the purpose of overthrowing the legacy
Soviet Government in Kabul.
At the time, Mikhail Gorbachev was desperate to engage us
and the international community in negotiations to reconstruct
stability in the region in Kabul and Afghanistan--very
difficult work, perhaps a fool's errand--but we never took it
up because we were convinced that we didn't have interests
sufficient to justify the hard and uncertain work of partnering
with regional countries to build stability in Central Asia.
And, you know, Gorbachev, I think, was justified--he had
his hands full--but he was justifiably puzzled about our
attitude. Essentially, he said, ``Look, I've got a Muslim
population across my southern rim, I don't want them to be
infected by Islamic extremists. OK, you used anti-American
Islamic extremists to defeat us, but truly you go down to the
mosques on Friday and understand that they hate you just as
much as they hate us. You've just restored a democracy in
Pakistan, don't we have a shared interest in doing the hard
work of building regional stability in trying to reconstruct a
stable center in Afghanistan?''
And we--out of distraction as much as deliberation, I think
that's absolutely correct--rejected that course and just went
on automatic pilot. We produced a deepening civil war, and then
we turned around and left after 1992, and the place just
absolutely collapsed in on itself, and the Taliban came to
power.
So, I do think that this vision of politics and regional
stability--an eye on the long term and on the fact that we have
a national interest in a stable Central and South Asia and on
modernizing Central and South Asia--is a source of continuity
between then and now.
Ambassador Lodhi. Thank you for asking this question,
because I think it will help you understand what is really
etched on the memory of a lot of people in the region--
including in my country. The memory is one of a very hasty
disengagement after the cold war was one, and the Soviet Union
collapsed and the rest of the Red Army rolled out of Kabul.
I think the haste with which the West disengaged--and when
I say disengaged, I mean in two very significant ways--one I
remember very clearly that Pakistan at that time had urged the
United States to help in establishing--what was called at that
time--an interim, transitional, provisional government in Kabul
before signing of the Geneva Accords under which the Soviet
troops withdrew.
Now, many thought this was a ploy by Pakistan, but I can't
really--I'm not here to give an interpretation of history--but
it is factually correct that Pakistan had said, ``We must have
a political arrangement that will hold, that will provide a
minimum degree of stability in our region, before you hastily
leave this region.'' But Pakistan's pleas went unheeded at that
time.
The second type of disengagement is--I wonder if you've
seen the movie, ``Charlie Wilson's War''? I think it's a very
interesting and very poignant scene where Charlie Wilson--I
don't know whether it's factually correct, but I think
substantively it's correct--in terms of whether he physically
went around the corridors of Capitol Hill asking people to help
in rebuilding Afghanistan, which had been devastated after
decades of conflict. And he said, the United States had a
responsibility to help the people rebuild their lives and
rebuild their country.
And I think the scene sort of shows people sort of turning
out and saying, ``Well, you know, we won the war, so what are
you coming to us for, now? I mean, tell us about where the
latest crisis is?'' Something like that.
So, I think this is very important and from Pakistan's
perspective, please remember another historical fact. Within
less than a year of the Red Army having been defeated and the
Soviet Union imploding, Pakistan came under wide-ranging
sanctions under the Pressler amendment, giving the Senator from
South Dakota the kind of national fame and notoriety in my
country which he doesn't have in this country, I know.
So, I think it's true. What had happened was that the
Pakistani public--and I think we are dealing with that burden
of history, even as I speak today--which is that you have a
large chunk of people in Pakistan who feel, ``Well, this is a
transaction relationship, we are seen as hired help, we are not
seen as a valued ally,'' and I'm sorry to say that much of this
remains on the public mind in Pakistan. That this is cut and
run, they come in, they use us, and then they walk away. So, I
think the Pakistan component has to be understood.
Last, when you ask about 2001 and immediately after, you
know, the response to what had happened, the tragedy of the
United States, I think the initial decision to use the northern
alliance to go into Afghanistan actually doomed the project
from the start. Because what it did was, it immediately--in the
very initial stages--alienated the Pashtuns, given the historic
rivalry between the northern alliance and the Pashtuns, not all
represented by the Taliban, but still having very strong
misgivings about the northern alliance.
I think the moment the war was conducted in that manner,
the Pashtun areas were lost. And then it was only a matter of
time when the Taliban were able to make a comeback in some of
these areas.
Senator Feingold [presiding]. Continuing--thank you,
Senator--I'm going to continue in the chairman's brief absence,
and I want to commend the chairman for holding this hearing. I
apologize for getting here late, I was at a markup of the
Judiciary Committee on the Patriot Act--the U.S. Patriot Act--
that went right up to this time, but I--this is a terribly
important subject.
And I want to commend the chairman for holding the hearing
on what, I think, is perhaps the key question facing the United
States in Afghanistan--namely, how do we relentlessly pursue
al-Qaeda without further destabilizing Pakistan and the entire
region?
I'm deeply concerned that our massive open-ended military
presence might be contributing to the growing militancy in the
region, including in nuclear-armed Pakistan.
In appearances before this committee earlier this year, in
direct response to my questions, both Special Envoy Holbrooke
and Admiral Mullen acknowledged that our military efforts in
Afghanistan could, in fact, push militants across the border
into Pakistan. And it is far from clear to me that the
predominantly military approach that we're currently pursuing
in Afghanistan is likely to achieve its stated aims, or that it
would have any impact on our ability to eliminate al-Qaeda's
safe haven in Pakistan.
So, I've already enjoyed the brief time I've had to listen
to the witnesses, and will listen to their testimony.
But let me ask Dr. Lodhi--I've heard some argue that the
people and Government of Pakistan would interpret a decreased
United States military presence in Afghanistan as a sign of
abandonment, and an indicator of what could also happen in
Pakistan. Given that no one here has been talking about
abandoning Afghanistan, and certainly not cutting back on
civilian and development aid and counterterrorism, and given
that legislation recently passed in the Senate significantly
increased civilian aid to Pakistan--what do you think would be
the reaction in Pakistan to a reduction in United States troop
levels in Afghanistan?
Ambassador Lodhi. I think, Senator, the issue really is
what kind of a strategy will the United States have. I don't
think troop levels really indicate--except that if you enhance
the troop levels, it indicates that a military solution is
being relied upon, that that's the principal prong. And that, I
think, very few Pakistanis would welcome an enhancement of
troops in Afghanistan, because every troop surge has produced a
certain effect, which has not been to achieve your objectives.
Why should it be any different if the troop levels are
enhanced?
So, I think we come back to a more fundamental question,
which is what are those troops going to do? And I don't think
anybody in my country is yet convinced that there is some kind
of new strategy--particularly the political power of that
strategy--which is going to amount to doing anything
differently.
So, simply putting in more troops will be hugely
destabilizing for Pakistan, it could be viewed as a very
negative signal that will indicate that there's more of the
same coming, and if it's more of the same, it simply means
pushing the conflict into Pakistan's border regions, and
actually giving the militants--which Pakistan has managed to
contain to a very large extent in the last few months by very
successful operations in Swat and Bajaur--it will muddy those
waters.
It will also distract the Pakistani forces--which I was
saying before you came--that are already overstretched, 150,000
are deployed, overstretched--then we have to now protect the
ground supply lines, because supply needs will double, maybe
triple, if you're looking at 40,000 troops--even if you're
looking at 30,000 troops. The more they go up, the Pakistan
Army will be expected to protect those. We will be distracted
from our own counterinsurgency missions that are going on right
now, very effectively.
Senator Feingold. Thank you, and Doctor, thank you for your
answer.
And Mr. Coll--Dr. Lodhi apparently already alluded to this,
but I'm very concerned about corruption within the Afghanistan
security forces, particularly the police, as well as the
political implications of vastly expanding an Afghan Army that
is characterized by ethnic fissures and subject to the command
of a civilian government of questionable legitimacy.
Is there a possibility that we're creating a security
apparatus that could someday contribute to instability--to
instability within the region?
Mr. Coll. I think that's a very important question, and a
question that isn't asked often enough in this discourse about
new strategies.
Indeed, in Washington, it seems as if across all points of
view, this idea of rapidly building up the Afghan Army and the
Afghan police is a consensus view that nobody ever pokes
against.
And I think that the recent history of Afghanistan
certainly should give rise to an understanding that there are
real risks of exactly the sort that you describe.
I can think of four instances in Afghanistan over the last
several decades where political disunity in Kabul, factionalism
and unresolved ethnic and other kinds of identity politics
problems in Afghan politics have infected the security services
and the army and caused them to fall apart, or to divide, or to
dissolve altogether.
In fact, you could argue that, at least in a technical
sense, the Afghan Army fielded against insurgents, has never
been entirely defeated, but it has literally dissolved, for
lack of political glue, on a number of occasions. That's what
happened to the Soviets in the 1970s, when they were building
up Communist cells, it got so bad they had to invade, they came
in--the army dissolved again on them--they built it up until
1992 in Najibullah after the Soviet Union left, had his army
dissolve on him, as well.
And, again, in the mid-1990s when the northern alliance
forces tried to build an army in the same way, factionalism in
the round cabinet caused the army to melt away in the face of
the Taliban. The Taliban didn't really conquer Afghanistan by
military force, they took advantage of this structural flaw in
the security forces that they were defending.
So, I don't take it for granted that the American project
of rapidly building up Afghan security forces is doomed, but I
think it's a--there are serious risks in the project, and
obviously the evidence to date is that those risks are
especially acute in reference to the police. I've heard figures
of attrition and turnover and corruption that are just
appalling. And I've heard people say, as bad as you think the
project of building up a stable, noncorrupt, Afghan police is,
it's worse. The army gets better marks, but even there its
ultimate viability depends on political strategy in
Afghanistan, because it will never stand firm unless the center
is also firm.
Thank you.
Senator Feingold. Thank you.
Finally, Mr. Bearden, the stated goal of U.S. troop
increase is to ensure, of course, that the Afghan Government
has control of its territory, to the exclusion of the Taliban.
Is that an achievable objective? Has that ever been the
situation in Afghanistan? And is that the only way to prevent
al-Qaeda from establishing a safe haven in Afghanistan?
Mr. Bearden. Let me first comment, just for a second, on
the last question, as well.
Right now, the ethnic mix in the National Army is roughly
60 percent Tajik, Hazara, Uzbek, and others--non-Pashtuns.
Pashtuns are around 40 percent--they have taken note of that.
The challenge of taking a Pashtun tribal fighter--and turning
him into a national soldier, when he doesn't believe there's a
nation that represents him, is a challenge.
The other issue is that as we build forces regionally--
rather than letting them rise in a more natural way--we may be
repeating the errors of the Soviets. When I was involved in the
anti-Soviet resistance movement, they created large numbers of
militias all over the country, and armed them, and they turned
out to be a wonderful source of inexpensive weapons for our
project. I just went to their Quarter masters and paid them,
and bought all of this stuff, and saved on shipping charges.
So, we have to bear that in mind and understand how it all
worked.
Now, I don't think anybody is going to expect us to
construct a national army that regains territory. I think
they're going to have to talk it through. I don't think that
anybody is going to win that fight. I think it's an ethnic
issue. I think if the Afghans have their own strategy in doing
this, they'll be able to come up with a solution that we're not
capable of articulating. So, I don't see a military solution
for us or the Afghans.
Senator Feingold. Thank you. The committee will stand in
recess until the chairman returns.
[Recess.]
The Chairman [presiding]. I apologize--I was on the phone
in the back, there. So many things going on, trying to do
health care while I do this.
But I do have some questions that I want to follow up on if
we can, just quickly before we break up, here.
Disrupt, dismantle, defeat al-Qaeda. That's our goal in
Afghanistan. But to the best of my knowledge, al-Qaeda is not
really in Afghanistan today. Can you comment on that, Mr.
Bearden?
Mr. Bearden. I might take it even a step further, Senator.
I think that al-Qaeda has--to a large degree--been disrupted
and dismantled. Earlier, I commented that it is part of our
canonical belief that they're all in Pakistan, and I don't
think we have any firm evidence of that. I've talked to people
from the tribal areas, and they say, ``Well, yeah, he'd be
protected if he were in that valley,'' but there's not even a
whisper. And you can't even have a strange bird fly into that
valley without the cousins of the next valley knowing, and they
would start whispering about it.
So, you know, I would be heartened if that was our goal,
because I think we will discover that we've achieved it.
The Chairman. Well, that's what I want to hone in on, here.
And I want to try if I can press you, sort of, for a fast set
of answers simply because we're time-pressed a little bit,
but--therefore, I mean, that's my judgment right now. I look at
it, and I say
al-Qaeda's in a lot of different places, but it certainly isn't
any central sort of focus in Afghanistan.
And then we get to the ``prevent the return'' sort of
concept. Now, I've interpreted that as preventing them from
having a sanctuary, a training camp, plotting, because who
knows? If somebody returns one day and goes out, or whatever.
It seems to me that we have to examine that.
Is this entire counterinsurgency operation that General
McChrystal wants to engage in to create some kind of country in
Afghanistan where we feel comfortable that they can't return?
And how likely is this return, given what you just said about
the relationship between al-Qaeda and the capacity, you know,
ultimately, if the Taliban took over Afghanistan? Which we
don't like--but is it likely? Is it a certainty? Are there odds
as to what happens with al-Qaeda?
Mr. Bearden. Well, this is all opinion, but one has to
reconstruct what we were dealing with in the 1990s. You had
several things happen, you had--first, during the anti-Soviet
period, a significant number of Arabs filtered into the region,
into Pakistan and they went over and they didn't play a major
role in the combat, but it was sort of an Arab, Club Med-Jihad
thing combined.
There was a little emptying of prisons across the Arab
world, letting these guys go off into the region with the fond
hope they might step on a mine. Then they left Afghanistan when
the Soviets left, and went back home full of plans to change
things there. They found out that that wasn't going to work.
So, then the Soviet Union falls in the playgrounds that some of
them enjoyed in Eastern Europe, were closed to them, and then
the Sudanese kicked bin Laden out of Sudan.
And so it ended up as the end of the line where they all
were. And then the seething thing that followed, that created
the plotting and then the camps in Afghanistan--or in Hamburg,
for all that matter where Muhammad Atta was--happened and then
9/11 happened.
Now, I think we would also find that preventing that from
recurring in Afghanistan wouldn't be too hard. I don't see
that--all of those planets lining up, again, ever.
The Chairman. When you say--now, this is very important.
This is a very important thing to try to focus in on.
Preventing that from happening again, preventing al-Qaeda from
getting that kind of foothold, you think is much easier than
having 100,000 troops, or 67,000 troops?
Mr. Bearden. I think if we do some of the things that have
been discussed here today and that are obviously on the table
with the President's review, that much of that could--only
happened in the 1990s because we had completely left the
field--including Pakistan.
The Chairman. And, best judgments here, are there ways to
do things where you don't completely leave the field?
Mr. Bearden. Well, of course you don't completely leave the
field, but that doesn't mean you have to have 120,000 ISAF
troops in the field, either.
The Chairman. Do you agree with that, Mr. Coll?
Mr. Coll. The last part, although----
The Chairman. What do you disagree with on the first part?
Mr. Coll. Well, you seem to be asking whether we could
permit the Taliban to take control of the Afghan state.
The Chairman. I'm not. I don't want to prevent--I'm asking
what happens if they did?
Mr. Coll. If they did, whether or not the return of al-
Qaeda would be a significant risk? And I think it would be. I
think that al-Qaeda seeks a state, and if the Taliban provided
a state, they would find ways to capture it--as they did before
in Afghanistan in the 1990s.
The Chairman. Let me go to the correlating question, then.
Are there ways for us to think, as we reevaluate this policy,
about ways of preventing al-Qaeda--not al-Qaeda, excuse me--
sort of having, I think one of you mentioned this earlier--one
of your goals is, the Taliban are not going to take over.
Mr. Coll. Right.
The Chairman. And ways to prevent that that involve far
less troops and a far lesser kind of strategy.
Mr. Coll.
Mr. Coll. Yes, I think we are all three in agreement to
versions of answers to that question and that really a
question--another way to ask your question would be to say,
what is the minimum level of American troops necessary to
guarantee, credibly, that the Taliban will never take control
of the Afghan state, and to guarantee--or to invest in the
prospect--of Afghan stability, sufficient Afghan stability, to
finish the job politically, regionally, and otherwise--and to
allow the Pakistani state to find its own success, because
ultimately the ticket home--for everybody--is through Islamabad
and Delhi.
So, if you can define the question that way, then it
becomes a technical question. And I don't know what General
McChrystal's advice is about that, because I'm not entirely
certain what the additional troops are meant to achieve. If the
answer is that they're out patrolling rural districts along the
border for the sake of population security in villages, you
know, that's one thing. If the answer is, ``This is the number
that's necessary to meet the answer to that question--Taliban
can never take cities, hold cities, can't take the state and
the country will become more stable,'' then I'd be interested
in that.
The Chairman. To what degree does the narcotics trade and
Helmand play into this, in terms of our ability to achieve any
of these goals?
Mr. Coll. The Taliban have diverse sources of finance
which, narcotics is certainly one. But going after farmers in
Helmand is not the way to disrupt their access to that revenue
stream. It's also important to recognize that the Taliban's
financing comes from other sources, besides poppy growing. They
tax roads, they tax local citizens, they tax people for
providing them justice and other services that look like a
government, and they also have access to funding from the
Persian Gulf that may be an even larger part of their revenue
flows than narcomoney.
I do think that the Helmand operation demonstrates once
again that cost of putting poppy farmers on the front lines of
a counternarcotics strategy far outweigh the benefits,
especially if it's the United States that's carrying out that
kind of combat.
The Chairman. Mr. Bearden, how much footprint is necessary,
in your judgment, to be able to carry out the counterterrorism
goal with respect to al-Qaeda itself?
Mr. Bearden. Let me clarify an earlier statement, briefly.
I'm not suggesting that I would be OK with the Taliban taking
over the country, but primarily because I don't think they can,
I think that is not going to be a repeat of the 1990s, as well.
The Chairman. They can't no matter what we do, or they
can't?
Mr. Bearden. I think that Afghanistan won't go through that
particular game again. I think there could be some very nasty
events if we just walked away, and we don't want to do that----
The Chairman. Civil wars, Tajik, Hazara--?
Mr. Bearden. They'd have to be sorting things out, and
that's almost never pretty. But right now, the Pashtuns
perceive a major imbalance of what they think is the natural
way for Afghanistan--right or wrong--they view us there as
propping up a Tajik-Panjshiri government. And there are more
Tajiks in the army than there are Pashtuns in the army at this
moment, which is an imbalance, in their view.
But, do I think we would return to the point where you've
got Taliban, Pashtun-Taliban marching on Mazar? I don't know
that I see that again, nor that our troop presence there has to
prevent that.
I do think that the United States is going to have to stay
there for the long haul with a new strategy, but I do not see
that kinetics are going to be a huge part of that strategy.
The Chairman. I have that as a central comment--I mean,
that is really an important comment that you've made, and I
think it's embraced in what Mr. Coll and the Ambassador have
said, and in our own thinking. And I hope down at the White
House--I would assume, in some of their thinking--although I'm
not certain, given some of the things that I've heard.
Sitting with the Secretary General of NATO the other day, I
sort of questioned him about it, felt like, you know, we're
heading off into this grand counterinsurgency strategy. And I
think that's what the President is examining very, very
closely, right now, whether that's the way to go here.
My next question to you, in line with that, would be how do
we achieve the even newer--let's say that we adopt a different
sense of how we want this presence, and it is less kinetic,
less military, more focused on these other things. How do we do
that with a government that has proven itself to be completely
dysfunctional, even corrupt and at this point, therefore,
greatly affecting the pegs of counterinsurgency of either
security or development?
Mr. Bearden. Two points I'd make. The first is--that we
haven't mentioned up until now is--many of the numbers of
American troops increases, in reality, would reflect replacing
NATO troops that are going to be gone by the end of next year,
or the end of 2011, at any rate. So, you know, that may be
built into the thinking of General McChrystal, because we're
going to see NATO, I think--the Canadians have already passed
their legislation getting out in 2011, and others will leave.
So, it will be an American show if we're in the long haul.
Now----
The Chairman. You don't think NATO will commit to make this
a longer commitment? Because that's going to affect, greatly, I
think how the American people view this?
Mr. Bearden. Well, you are seeing some that are bearing the
brunt of--the non-American troops that are bearing the brunt of
the battle--are going to leave. I mean, the Canadians have
already made their statement, we'll watch the British.
The Chairman. But, if we're talking about a less kinetic
effort, one hopefully is looking at, then, making a greater
commitment to these other things that we're talking about that
make a difference.
Mr. Bearden. That's right.
The Chairman. Do you agree with that, Ambassador?
Ambassador Lodhi. May I--Mr. Chairman, say that I've lived
in, traveled in Europe a great deal, very recently. The war is
hugely unpopular in Europe. I don't know what NATO's Secretary
General may have said, he comes from a small country. But the
big nations that are doing counterinsurgency--and the very few
nations in NATO that are doing counterinsurgency--that's
exactly where the public support is evaporating. And I think we
have to bear that in mind.
But, if you'll allow me one quick point about al-Qaeda--I
think the assessment in Pakistan is that al-Qaeda's capacity to
mount mass casualty attacks on the West, including the American
mainland--has been very sharply curtailed; al-Qaeda has been
degraded, but it has not been eliminated. It exists, but it
exists--and I want to draw some attention to this, because I
think we've spent a lot of time on conceptualizing everything
through military terms, and then the three of us agreed that we
need a political strategy.
Al-Qaeda exists more as an idea today. What it does, is, it
has an inspirational effect across where there are Islamic
communities that are alienated or disaffected from wherever
they're living.
I think we need to also address attention, not just to how
to fight al-Qaeda militarily, but also deal with it
ideologically. I think Europe has done a great deal on this
count, the United Kingdom has--I think the United States needs
to look at ways in which we can develop counternarratives, and
we can have ideological counterresponses. Because this is the
appeal that we must seek to diminish, because the sanctuaries,
in terms of the physical sanctuaries--I think we will be able
to manage. It is the sanctuaries in people's minds that we need
to deal with.
The Chairman. Well, I want to thank all of you. I,
personally, have a lot more questions I could ask, and I'm
going to ask them of you, but just not here, now. I'd like to
ask of you to be available in these next days. I'm going to
Afghanistan and Pakistan shortly, and I would like to think
through, very carefully, the things that I ought to be making
sure I'm properly focused on when I go over there.
So, if we could continue this discussion, we would be
enormously helped by it.
And I thank you for today. This is very, very interesting,
very instructive, stimulating and challenging in a lot of ways.
And you've given us a lot of food for thought, which is what a
good hearing like this ought to do.
So, I thank you for taking part in it.
And, Mr. Bearden, thank you so much for your service. We
have great respect and admiration for it, I appreciate it.
We stand adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:45 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
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