Ashraf Ghani seems like a man with promise. He has got to be. He has taken over as president of Afghanistan at a time when his country seems to have lost its way. Under Hamid Karzai, it wasn’t talking to America, and was hateful towards Pakistan, Afghanistan’s critical neighbour. With a leadership that only huffed and hawed without putting in place a coherent plan of recovery for its polity, economy or society, Afghanistan seemed forever lost.
Ghani has to change all that to regain normalcy. War has fatigue; the Americans, the Taliban, the Afghans, and the Pakistanis, all have hit against that threshold having lived among ruin, blood and turmoil for decades now. And in there lies that window of opportunity that Ghani could exploit to find peace and normalcy, and the process of rebuilding.
Two developments in recent days are instructive. The first thing after the new administration (pun intended) came into power in Kabul, the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) was signed, but then in recent days there has been news that President Barack Obama has authorised the continuation of the combat role for his residual forces in Afghanistan even after the planned withdrawal of the rest continues unabated. This is significant, since for the last 18 months, the security transition had meant transferring the mission over to the Afghan forces. Therein, even the chaperoning of the Afghan forces had been discontinued, with the Americans literally restricting themselves to only counterterror missions against al Qaeda. The Taliban were for the Afghans to deal with.
Ghani, perhaps, felt the need for an active American engagement in security operations and found it appropriate to ask for it when signing the BSA. Perhaps, it was Abdullah Abdullah, his partner in power, who pushed Ghani into asking for such re-initiation of the combat role to counter a likely resurgence of the Taliban as a security threat, but in effect use the consequence as a political plank to keep the Pashtun Taliban out of any settlement while retaining eminence in the unity government. It could well have been both; the region though must be ready to deal with the consequence — the Taliban-Afghan government rapprochement may still be months, if not years, away. And that has implications.
One other development was the Pakistani army chief’s recent visit to Washington. It grew in significance as it went along. Perhaps it was there, or during his visit to Kabul before proceeding to Washington, that General Raheel Sharif learnt of the extension of the combat role of the American forces in Afghanistan. It is also possible that it was as a consequence of his discussions with the Americans and the Afghans (remember, Ghani recently was a guest of the general in Rawalpindi) that such revision of the task was instituted. It is likely that the Pakistani Army complained of the sanctuaries that the TTP enjoys in Kunar and Nuristan across the Afghan border even as it fought and dismantled the base of those groups that threatened both Pakistan and Afghanistan from North Waziristan. It is equally likely that the issue of capacities, or lack thereof, came up when discussing the inability and inaction of the Afghan forces to undertake missions to wrest control away from those holding Afghan areas as sanctuaries.
That threw up two options: Pakistan could extend its own capacity and capability to neutralise those who target Pakistani territory from Kunar and Nuristan with implicit diplomatic complexities; or importantly, the US could extend its resident capacity to do the needful. That the latter was politically more acceptable is more than obvious. Relate this to the counterterror strikes that US drones have undertaken in recent days in those areas where there are TTP sanctuaries, with reports that Fazlullah was the intended target. The dots begin to connect.
There were affiliated ramifications, too, of General Raheel’s visit. President Obama had a telephone chat with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif as the general finished his week-long visit, where the protocol extended to him was nothing short of what is extended to a visiting political head. The Americans have all to be happy for with the general. He has eliminated the Haqqani bases from Pakistan, a long-time American demand, and has hit off well with the new administration in Kabul, which can only mean better chances of finding stability in Afghanistan. Both add credibility to America’s mission as it heads out of Afghanistan. In doing so, the general in turn may have added some space for greater congruence in US-Pakistan relations.
Locally, though, it became a bit awkward. Prime Minister Sharif, on his recent visit to New York, could not elicit such interest from the Americans and his trip was a bland one. With the general, the flavour was entirely different. If he had indeed delved into some effective diplomacy and political closing of ranks with the Americans, it was perhaps appropriate that the prime minister, too, was brought in, even if nominally. Hence, the call. If statements are any indication, the government went on to exact its own price for the varying treatment:Sartaj Aziz, goofed (deliberately?) while referring to why Pakistan would not act against the Haqqanis earlier; while Defence Minister Khawaja Asif was outright critical of American policies, which in his opinion had pushed the region into such turmoil.
The prime minister made two distinct recommendations in turn: he asked the American president to help resolve the Kashmir issue with India, and two, he probably asked him to use some influence on Imran Khan to ease some pressure on his government. The American ambassador duly visited Imran Khan at his residence the next day. Whether this will be sufficient to placate some of the prime minister’s ire remains to be seen. But it has the making of some coordinated functioning among the three sides, perhaps for the first time since 2002 when America first moved into Afghanistan, bringing about a closure to a war that for the most part was fought in fragments and without unity of purpose.
Will this re-found congruence with the Americans be long term? Only time will tell. But what the extended combat role of the American forces will result in — in terms of the Taliban reflux — is a question that will need greater comfort between Afghanistan and Pakistan so that they can tend to their common problem. To meet that challenge, both countries need to hold onto the promise that Ghani exhibits.
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