Last week, Afghan president Hamid Karzai surprised U.S. and coalition officials by announcing the creation of a special tribunal and prosecutor to seek redress for the almost two year old Kabul Bank scandal. And earlier this month, the Afghan House of Representatives rejected the proposed federal budget in part because of the allocation of U.S. $80 million to Kabul Bank. Already, the Central Bank has poured $450 million into the beleaguered bank after it lost almost a billion dollars in the 2010 financial scandal. This money has been traced to interest-free loans given to Mahmoud Karzai, brother of President Karzai, to buy shares in the bank itself, and also to former CEO Khalil Frozi, who used bank funds to finance the President's 2009 election campaign.

Though Afghan authorities arrested Frozi and Kabul Bank founder Sherkhan Farnood approximately nine months after the crisis, it was recently reported that neither can be found in their jail cells, and both are collecting rent from tenants occupying Dubai villas bought with illegally obtained loans. A year after the debacle, only 10% of the missing money had been recovered.

Kabul Bank is more than a symbol of the pervasive corruption plaguing Afghanistan's government, it is the largest private financial institution in the country and an integral piece of infrastructure that has direct consequences for the country's security and financial stability. If Afghanistan is to have any chance at a legitimate economy and stable future, it will need an efficient and trustworthy financial system.

In particular, Kabul Bank is a conduit for government payments to Afghan soldiers, police, and teachers. The United States aims to reduce American troop presence by 2013 and shift security duties to the Afghan military and police force. Absolutely vital to a "successful" drawdown is the establishment of a reliable and transparent payment system.  The rampant corruption plaguing Kabul Bank shows that traditional banking systems may not be suitable for the Afghan economy at all. However, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is working with Afghan companies to provide an alternate solution - mobile money.

In the past year, mobile phone-based money transfers have taken off in Afghanistan. Three out of the four largest mobile network operators now offer mobile money services, two of which were launched in the last six months. Roshan, the telecommunication company that deployed the country's first mobile money product in 2008, M-Paisa ("paisa" meaning money in Dari), has grown to 1.2 million registered customers that can receive salaries, pay bills, and make domestic financial transactions over their mobile phones. Last month, the company announced a partnership with Western Union to allow these customers to receive transfers from around the world directly to their mobile phones. 

USAID has made mobile money central to Afghanistan's financial development. According to USAID, while less than five percent of Afghans have access to a bank account, more than 60 percent of the population has access to a mobile phone. To accelerate the pace of its development, USAID has allocated more than $2 million to mobile network operators as part of its Mobile Money Innovation Grant Fund, and spearheaded the forming of the Afghan Mobile Money Operators Association. Currently, there are five USAID mobile phone payment projects underway, which range from the payments of teacher stipends to police force salaries, and 14 more mobile transfer projects in planning, according to a USAID official who spoke off-the-record. With the scaling of mobile money, an estimated $60 million annually could be retrieved that had been lost to corruption and fees.

Although promising, mobile money is not entirely immune to the harsh realities on the ground. In 2009, the Afghan government worked with Roshan to pilot a mobile phone-based salary payment system to 54 officers of the Afghan National Police Force who had previously received cash from their superiors. When the policemen took their SIM cards to the local M-Paisa offices to directly collect their entire salaries, they thought they had received a 36 percent raise, while what they were really seeing was a full salary untouched by crooked officials, according to a U.S. Air Force Colonel overseeing the project. 

However, a confidential State Department cable released by Wikileaks revealed that a corrupt Afghan commander, frustrated that he was no longer able to skim off the top, fraudulently registered phones and collected his officers' salaries. In a separate incident, the same commander ordered subordinates to handover their SIM cards and attempted to retrieve the salaries himself. Though the local M-Paisa employee refused to hand over the salaries to the commander, he was forced to go into hiding for fear of retribution. Despite direct reports to the Ministry of Interior and pressure from the U.S. Government, no one has been prosecuted.

The ability to efficiently pay Afghanistan's security apparatus is critical to any post-war strategy, especially in the face of a U.S. drawdown and the ousting of private security firms. It is especially important for USAID efforts because $899 million worth of development programs they administer are in jeopardy without a functioning security force, according to a recent letter from Steven Trent, the acting Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. Though USAID says this claim is exaggerated, it still highlights the significance of dealing with the systemic corruption within Afghanistan's financial system and in particular Kabul Bank, given its central role in government payments to soldiers.

Despite the importance of anti-corruption measures to security efforts, a clear disconnect between Afghan and U.S. officials gives reason to believe that Karzai's recent announcement to prosecute those involved in the Kabul Bank crisis will not amount to much. As Afghans rushed to withdraw $800 million in deposits in the two weeks following the scandal's breaking, Mahmoud Karzai insisted the bank was stable and not in danger of collapse while simultaneously asking the U.S. Treasury for monetary help in averting a crisis. When the U.S. refused a direct injection of capital, President Karzai publicly blamed the collapse on a lack of foreign technical support rather than the illegal activities of the bank's leadership. A few months later, he banned U.S. government advisers from working with the country's central bank, as they attempted to assist Afghan officials in regulating the financial system and tracking foreign aid, both of which were conditions for releasing $1.8 billion of donor funds.

While the ideal situation for USAID is an end to corruption's hold on financial infrastructure, the reality is that they are working within a delicate political climate. According to a NYT/CBS News poll released this month, almost 70% of American respondents want an end to U.S. military efforts in Afghanistan. With this dramatic fall in American public opinion and election year politics putting the focus on a swift withdrawal of U.S. troops and transition to Afghan forces, the Obama administration is loath to engage in a battle with the Karzai government over corruption that is almost guaranteed to fail. Yet there are still ways for USAID to recognize the restraints of corruption and push forward; one of the promising solutions involves integrating mobile money to build a stronger financial system and more transparent post-transition payment system.

After all, the reality is also this: the results of development projects will have significant bearing on America's legacy in a country where it has spent over 10 years, half a trillion dollars, and countless lives. USAID's success, and ultimately that of the entire U.S. mission in Afghanistan, will depend on our ability to acknowledge that "success" is not an all or nothing proposition. Corruption exists but that doesn't mean that the development community cannot adapt to work within its confinements.

Anjana Ravi is a Research Associate with the New America Foundation's Global Assets Project, where Eric Tyler is a Program Associate.

The roots of Pakistan's inhospitality towards its minorities can be traced back over three and a half decades to the military dictatorship of Ziaul Haq - the man singlehandedly accountable for the rise of fundamentalism and retrogression in the country. Today, however, a different narrative runs through the progressive steps being taken within Pakistan's legal system - a trend exemplified by the ongoing Supreme Court case against the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) concerning missing persons, and even more so in the issue of transgendered Pakistanis.

In most parts of cosmopolitan Pakistan, something adds color to the busy traffic- and pedestrian-swarmed streets besides glossy cars and oversized billboards. Batting their mascara-drenched fake eyelashes, prancing about in gaudy Indian-soap inspired attire around every posh traffic light in Karachi, hijras - as Pakistan's transgender population is known - turn many a frown upside down after a hard day's work.

Going car window to car window ‘demanding' money, clapping their hands, flirtatiously twirling their hair while humming a popular Bollywood tune, these powerfully persuasive hijras entertain with a kind of street comedy unique only to them. But not all are entertained or amused; some are even offended by their presence.

It has never been easy being a minority in Pakistan and matters are bound to get worse if the minority is a sexual one. In a Muslim society, where patriarchal orientation reigns supreme and we are constantly battling gender discrimination, the transgendered obviously have little or no space in the social setup of things.

For the past six decades, hijras in Pakistan have been isolated and denied any form of identity, along with basic human rights such as education, employment, and healthcare. Disowned by their families and mocked and ridiculed by the rest, hijras find shelter among their kind under gurus - leaders of small scattered transgender communities - who give them food and wage in return for their service and contribution to the group. With not many open doors in sight, they beg, dance and engage in prostitution as their only means of livelihood, becoming soft targets for harassment, violence, abuse and rape, mostly in the hands of the local police.

Their story is, or one could easily say ‘was,' painful until the summer of 2009. Today, despite all of Pakistan's supposed intolerance, its long-oppressed transgender minority not only has an identity under which they are recognized as lawful and respectful citizens of the state, but they also have civil rights, the most groundbreaking being the right to vote - unthinkable just a few years ago, especially in a country like Pakistan. The landmark move has not only paved the way for hijras to vote in the upcoming general elections, but also to nominate their own candidates for parliament. In its wake, popular hijra leader and a prominent member of the Pakistan She-male Association, Shahana Abbas Shani, has announced that in the upcoming general elections, she will run as an independent candidate for the Muzaffargarh constituency of the provincial assembly in southwestern Punjab. Topmost on her agenda is the demand for reserved seats for hijras in the Pakistan National Assembly. And why not? For now, more than ever, it is very much possible.

Very few could have fathomed that Dr. Muhammad Aslam Khaki - an attorney specializing in Islamic law and probably the most unlikely defender of hijra rights in Pakistan - would turn out to be the man behind it all. Stirred into action in 2009 after an atrocious incident in Taxila, near Islamabad, where local police reportedly attacked and raped a group of transgender wedding dancers, Khaki filed a private case in the Pakistan Supreme Court. He persuaded the court to officially recognize hijras as a third gender under the Pakistani Constitution, a major step towards giving them their due stature and respect in society.

In 2009, Khaki estimated the transgender population in Pakistan to be around 80,000. However, a Reuters report in December the same year put the figure at around 300,000. The conflicting numbers further reinforced the Supreme Court's orders to the government, given in June that year, to set up a commission to conduct a census of hijras, so that a more precise figure could be obtained.

The Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry - a "hero" of the transgender minority - took this unlikely revolution forward. Following his orders, the Supreme Court for the first time in the history of Pakistan, granted the transgender community their own gender category under Pakistan's National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA). This means that hijras can now, per their own will, have male transgender, female transgender or intersex written on their national identification cards - a landmark headline coming out of retrogressive, conservative Muslim Pakistan.

The Chief Justice's decision spurred a series of successful follow-up rulings by the Supreme Court. Various judicial, law-making and enforcing committees were formed, and orders were released to both national and provincial authorities to safeguard the hijras' newfound rights in matters of inheritance, employment and election registration. The police, all the way down to the district level, were especially warned to cease harassment and intimidation or be subject to serious prosecution.

Bearing in mind that having its own gender label will not solve all of the hijra community's problems, the Supreme Court made further recommendations, the most revolutionary being in the professional field. Per official orders, if qualified, hijras were now to be given preference for civil service jobs for affirmative-action reasons. According to the ruling, a transgender applicant with a 10th-grade education was now deemed to have the same qualifications for government work as a non-transgender person with a bachelor's degree.

But that wasn't all. In 2010, hijras were also appointed as tax collectors to utilize their "special" persuasion skills. They now knock on the doors of people who haven't paid their taxes and ask them to pay up. To deal with those who aren't willing, they make what they are infamous for making - a scene, which works like a charm every time. The experiment has been judged something of a success by the local authorities, too, with several teams collecting hefty amounts of unpaid dues.

Monitoring the progress of Khaki's case through periodic hearings -- about 20 of which have been held so far -- both the Pakistan Supreme Court and Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry still have a cumbersome task at hand -- acceptance, implementation and rehabilitation. The challenges of eliminating stereotypes from the minds of common Pakistanis, providing equal opportunities to everyone in all professions and in all spheres of life, is much easier said than done. This series of landmark rulings undoubtedly constitutes the first step in the right direction, but there still remains a long list of problems that cannot be resolved by legislation; problems like stigma. The recent surge of positive activity means there's definitely hope beyond the traffic light for the beleaguered hijra community in Pakistan.

But the fight has only just begun. Khaki and those working alongside him have received death threats from various Pakistani fundamentalist Islamist groups including Shabab-e-Milli - a branch of the youth wing of Pakistan's main religious political party, Jamaat-e-Islami - for promoting homosexuality in the Islamic state. The Supreme Court decision has undeniably come both as a shock and a blow to all such elements promoting intolerance and violence in the country. But nothing seems to be holding this group back.

"The chief justice says we are God's creation," says Almas Bobby, President of the Pakistan She-male Association and one of the key frontrunners of Khaki's case. God sure helps those who help themselves.

Rabail Baig is a Pakistani journalist based in Boston.

In recent days, details have emerged about the Pakistani government's pursuit of Internet filtering technologies that would enable it to block up to 50 million websites. This news comes just weeks after a parliamentary committee proposed a ban on "anti-Pakistan" programming on private television stations.

Pakistan's media may be feisty (the country's private television channels are often stridently anti-government in tone), but feisty does not necessarily mean free. In its 2011-12 Press Freedom Index, Reporters Without Borders ranks Pakistan 151^st out of 179 nations. The country's culture of violence toward the media is the main reason for this low ranking, but state policies threaten media freedoms as well. Because the rapid and relatively recent expansion of the Pakistani press has not been accompanied by checks on its excesses, media-muzzling measures have effectively become proxies for regulation.

It wasn't always this way. For years, Pakistan's television media environment was dominated by the staid, state-run Pakistan Television. Not until the early 2000s did the nation experience a sudden and explosive proliferation of private cable and satellite TV outlets-the result of a liberalization regime initiated by then-President Pervez Musharraf, who, according to some observers, sought alternatives to the Indian satellite television channels watched by many Pakistanis at the time. Today, Pakistan boasts about 90 private television channels and more than 100 radio stations, but only one media oversight entity: the Pakistan Media Regulatory Authority, which falls under the information minister's purview and is widely regarded as ineffective.

What has this pell-mell transition wrought? First, it has produced a vibrant media environment that strengthens Pakistani democracy. It has also promoted civic activism; Pakistani television networks helped catalyze the anti-government fervor that erupted following Musharraf's firing of the country's chief justice in 2007.

Yet it has also unleashed a torrent of ugly content. This ranges from sloppy reporting (The News' coverage of the Congressional hearings on Balochistan earlier this year misidentified a witness, M. Hossein Bor, as a Congressman) to unethical practices (newspaper articles frequently print names, phone numbers, and even addresses of vulnerable citizens such as human rights activists and rape victims, and print journalists are often accused of plagiarism).

Then there is sensationalism. The recent exploits of Maya Khan and Shamoon Abbasi-TV personalities who, with cameras rolling, sought to expose dating couples frolicking in parks and lovers engaged in homosexual activities-have attracted considerable attention. Yet there is also popular TV personality Meher Bokhari, who berated and bullied the late Punjab Province governor Salman Taseer in a 2010 interview. One observer concluded that the interview whipped up such hatred that it contributed indirectly to Taseer's assassination just weeks later. Oftentimes, however, politicians drive the sensationalism. A senior leader from Imran Khan's party once hurled a glass at a fellow guest during a Business TV talk show. And just last month, an official from Musharraf's party appearing on Express News issued a death threat to a co-panelist-with no intervention from the host or producer.   

Perhaps the most troubling consequence of Pakistan's unregulated press is the erosion of the line separating fact and fiction. In late 2010, the Express Tribune published a horrifying story about Shamsul Anwar, a soldier-turned-taxi driver. Anwar claimed that two of his sons were kidnapped by militants, with one killed and the other released-only to be diagnosed with cancer, which Anwar had no money to treat. About a year later, The News published an update: not only was the son still in need of medical care, but Anwar reported that his daughter had now been abducted as well.

In January 2012, Anwar admitted that his story was a hoax-concocted, he said, to swindle money from sympathetic readers. Sehrish Wasif, who wrote the initial article, said she hoped the affair would be "a lesson to all journalists, including myself, to not let emotion be the guiding force of a news report." Yet the real blame lies with the anything-goes, report-everything media environment that Anwar so skillfully exploited. The murky distinction between truth and untruth also hovered over the coda to the Khan and Abbasi affairs, when both journalists claimed that their offending segments had actually been staged. And it loomed large in 2010, when several media reports insinuated (with little evidence) that a famous 2009 video of a girl getting publicly flogged in Taliban-occupied Swat was actually a fabrication orchestrated by paid actors.

Islamabad rarely responds to media shenanigans with carefully targeted interventions. Instead, it casts a wide net and resorts to outright bans. In 2010 the government temporarily outlawed Facebook and YouTube (for anti-Islamic content), while in recent months it unsuccessfully attempted to filter 1,500 words out of mobile-based text messaging-including incendiary terms such as "athlete's foot" and "finger food." 

These draconian measures are driven as much by political fears as by concerns about better-quality media. Tellingly, the announcements about Web filtering technologies and curbs on anti-Pakistan TV programming were made at a time when national coverage about Balochistan, a province rife with anti-government sentiment and separatist ambitions, has been on the rise. Rolling Stone's website has been inaccessible in Pakistan since July 2011, when it posted a story critical of the army's budgetary spending. And only in the last few days has the government overturned a four-month ban on BBC World News, which aired a documentary last November questioning Pakistan's willingness to tackle militancy.

Encouragingly, Pakistan's media and civil society have taken steps toward promoting regulation. According to Sahar Habib Ghazi of the citizen journalism portal Hosh Media, many small media outlets voluntarily follow the Society of Professional Journalists' code of conduct. The Huffington Post has spotlighted Citizens for Free and Responsible Media, comprised of Pakistanis "who regularly monitor and discuss" national media content. Other promising efforts, however, have lapsed. These include an attempt by Dawn News journalist Matiullah Jan to launch a TV show that singles out unethical behavior in the media. The show was cancelled after 12 episodes, and Jan acknowledged resistance "from the highest levels of the media industry."

This resistance to such ombudsman-like arrangements underscores a basic reality (and one not unique to Pakistan): Sensationalism sells. Criticism of questionable Pakistani media practices tends to emenate from other media professionals, and not from the general public. Media experts contend that news programming -- which produces the most outrageous content -- is more popular with Pakistani audiences than entertainment offerings.

Fortunately, there is another way to improve Pakistani media standards: Bettering the lot of the average journalist. In 2011, for the second year in a row, the Committee to Protect Journalists designated Pakistan as the most dangerous country for reporters. Yet their bravery often goes unrewarded. "It's alright to keep your employees starving while you sip champagne and devour caviar in the comfort of your many mansions," a bitter Pakistani journalist fumed last month about the country's media magnates. Even Taseer, who owned the Daily Times, was excoriated for his staff management; one critic alleged that his workers did not get paid "for months on end" or received only half their salaries. Meanwhile, according to Dawn columnist Huma Yusuf, most of Pakistan's 17,000 journalists have little relevant training; less than 1 percent of the labor force is trained in media or communication studies at the college level.

Expecting powerful media titans to take the lead in regulating their output quality may be expecting too much. A more realistic expectation is that they simply help their employees. Momentum is building for such measures; last week, the Media Commission of Pakistan, a media rights watchdog, released a report demanding that journalists be provided with health and life insurance. By offering more competitive salaries, providing training opportunities, and improving journalists' general well-being, media bigwigs can help make their staffs happier and more productive. Better compensated and trained journalists are more likely to practice their craft ethically and responsibly-thereby setting an example worthy of emulation by their bosses.

Michael Kugelman is the South Asia associate at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He can be reached by email at michael.kugelman@wilsoncenter.org and on Twitter @michaelkugelman

2011 was a catastrophic year for U.S.-Pakistan relations. Starting with CIA contractor Raymond Davis's arrest for shooting two Pakistanis dead in January, going on through the raid on Abbottabad in early May that killed Osama bin Laden, and culminating in the NATO forces lethal attack on a Pakistani border post in November 2011, a series of shocks shook this important partnership to its core. Both countries expect their future relationship to be more modest, but neither has defined this concept. As they grapple with this change, U.S. policymakers need to recognize that Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is the big issue, and to develop building blocks for a post-2014 relationship that meets the needs of both countries.

A recent visit to Pakistan provided a sobering view of where the United States now stands. Hostility toward the U.S. government among politicians, elites and the general public are a familiar problem, but two other aspects of today's problem are worth underlining. First, within the government, the biggest problem is with the Pakistan army, traditionally the privileged party when ties with Washington are robust. The army is now going out of its way to showcase an angry response to these humiliating events.  The Pakistan government's continuing refusal of visas for many U.S. official visitors, including military officers working on military procurement or aid projects is happening at the army's request (notable exceptions are visitors dealing with F-16 supply or maintenance). Almost all the senior military officers who would normally have attended ceremonial events like the U.S. July 4^th reception stayed away in 2011 - clearly on instructions.

Echoes of this resentment can be found on the U.S. side as well. Pakistanis are often quite unaware of the deep anger in the United States over Osama bin Laden's long sojourn in Pakistan. Pakistanis have complained for decades about being taken for granted by the United States; that complaint is now coming from some of the Americans closest to the relationship. Pakistanis wonder why the United States is starting to build a towering and expensive new embassy complex in Islamabad. Americans are now privately asking the same question, and noting that the major defense office in the embassy has shrunk to a third of its former size since the visa freeze.

Against this background, everyone we spoke to in Pakistan believes the broad strategic bond both countries have talked of for the past decade is dead. Few, however, have given much thought to the ingredients of downsized ties. Some, such as Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif, reject U.S. economic aid. Others see aid - civilian and in some cases military - as a key element in the future, just as it has been in the past.

The most frequently mentioned theme in our discussions of the likely new look was the need for agreement on the end game in Afghanistan. This end game will indeed drive U.S.-Pakistan relations in the short run, but the United States is likely to achieve little beyond resumption of logistical support.

The hope of a common strategy in Afghanistan is completely unrealistic. The two countries' goals diverge in ways that are too important to sweep under the rug; indeed, that is a major reason why a big strategic partnership is now out of reach. In principle, both want a stable, governable Afghanistan with no continuing ties to al-Qaeda. For Pakistan, however, this remains a secondary priority. The key objective is freezing out Indian influence in Kabul. Pakistanis do not believe President Karzai will be disposed to protect their interests - or strong enough to do so even if he wishes to.

Strategic disagreement also impedes a common U.S.-Pakistan front on negotiations with the Taliban. Pakistanis view U.S.-Taliban discussions with skepticism and cynicism, both feelings now heightened by the fallout from the Koran-burning disaster in Afghanistan and, more recently, the shooting spree of an American soldier near Kandahar. The United States wants Pakistan's cooperation in talking to the Taliban; Pakistan wants to sit in the driver's seat. Even if the talks continue after their current interruption, Pakistan will focus chiefly on maximizing its own influence in Kabul, even if that means a dominant role for Taliban elements that have been at war with the United States. In short, seeking a common strategy for the Afghan end game is likely to leave the United States feeling bruised and Pakistan unsatisfied.

The Pakistani parliament is poised to take up the terms of reference for U.S.-Pakistan relations some time after March 19. The army and the government have apparently agreed to reopen ground transport links to NATO forces in Afghanistan, subject to a higher price tag related more specifically to the amount of transshipment. This would be an important contribution to a modus vivendi on Afghanistan, though it would not prevent the governments from working at cross-purposes on Afghanistan's fundamental political problems. But the rest of the parliamentary package could add new roadblocks, especially if it includes a demand to end drone attacks. The involvement of parliament in this decision is a welcome step toward shared responsibility between civilians and the military, but comes at the price of adding an unpredictable element to decision-making in Pakistan.

This is not a good starting point for a post-2014 relationship that fosters internal stability in Pakistan and healthier regional and international relationships. And yet stability and regional peace are the most important legacy the United States hopes to secure as it winds down its involvement in Afghanistan. To do this, the U.S. needs to cultivate some other building blocks for a more normal but constructive U.S.-Pakistan relationship.

The first is a lower-key diplomatic style. For over half a century, every period of strong U.S.-Pakistan partnership has relied on lofty but ambiguous promises to create the impression of a strategic bond. The U.S. and Pakistan now need less soaring rhetoric and more understanding of their mutual expectations. Where expectations are unrealistic, they need to be pared down through serious consultations. This kind of exercise has often been castigated as a "transactional relationship." Perhaps - but that is not an insult: it is a way to avoid the "jilted lover" syndrome that has afflicted both Islamabad and Washington through over-promising and under-delivering.

This more candid and realistic diplomatic style also includes greater U.S. willingness to listen to Pakistan's articulation of its own needs, and vice versa. The United States needs to be willing to say no when Pakistan's requests are really beyond reach - and to accept no for an answer, even if Pakistan rejects U.S. assistance that Americans think would help it. Above all, hard as it may be, the United States should get out of the business of pleading and finger-wagging. Our system makes it hard to stop issuing report cards - some (like the human rights report) are legally required, others are an inevitable result of Congressional testimony and other demands - but the U.S. should minimize this.

Moving beyond style, the United States should start now to build up three tools. The first is a smaller but better targeted economic aid program. Present aid levels are more than the state of U.S.-Pakistan relations can sustain, and the U.S. administration will have its work cut out preserving even a much smaller program once U.S. forces have left Afghanistan. But both the United States and Pakistan can benefit from concentrating on activities that support the parts of the Pakistan economy that are modernizing.

The U.S. and Pakistan should work out the details in candid consultations. Our suggestions start with infrastructure: irrigation and power generation facilities. This can be done with Pakistanis in the driver's seat, and with due attention to the political dimension of these projects. Such projects have a visibility that U.S. aid programs have all too often lacked. A second suggestion is, for want of a better term, business development: helping Pakistan build up the human capacity and institutions to support a larger and more vibrant small and medium business sector. We believe these would be welcomed in Pakistan despite the rejectionist posture one hears today.

The next tool is building up real business ties between the United States and Pakistan. This should not be in the form of a gift from the U.S. government: businesses make their own investment decisions. Before they invest in Pakistan, they will require a safer environment and above all the example of Pakistani businesses putting their own money into new plants and other facilities in Pakistan. But the U.S. government can lend important support once tentative efforts start. Examples include insurance programs like those of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC) and pre-investment studies like those funded by the Trade and Development Agency (TDA). The biggest contribution would be extending preferential access to Pakistani textiles - a big stretch in today's environment but something that could be pursued if current tempers quiet down.

The third tool is more political: quiet U.S. support for more stabilizing regional relationships. Discreet encouragement for what India and Pakistan are doing on their own, including the trade opening initiative they are starting to implement, is part of this. But equally important is encouraging a broader set of regional ties. Afghan trade to and through Pakistan; energy linkages, including those involving India and countries in the Gulf; and even allowing the much discussed gas pipeline from Iran to sink or swim on its own commercial merits would all contribute to embedding Pakistan in a set of regional relationships that create greater peace and stability over time.

None of these regional efforts ought to be advertised as a U.S. initiative. It's not about us, it's about creating the infrastructure for a more peaceful and prosperous South Asian region. And none of these proposals will make longstanding U.S.-Pakistan problems vanish by magic. The reason for quietly supporting regional linkages, reinventing a better focused aid program and enhancing commercial ties, is that durable peace in the volatile region from the Persian Gulf through the Indian Ocean is at the heart of U.S. strategic interests. A dysfunctional Pakistan on terrible terms with its neighbors makes this impossible. Even in our eagerness to write the script for the end of our Afghan engagement, regional peace is an edifice worth building.

Teresita Schaffer is a non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution; Howard Schaffer teaches at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. Both are retired U.S. ambassadors with long experience in South Asia. They are co-directors of http://southasiahand.com.

On the intersection of Dr. Ziauddin Ahmed Road and Club Road -- one of the busiest traffic lights in Karachi housing two high-end five-star hotels and the head office of the biggest English newspaper in the country -- I often ran into a beggar woman who almost no one looked directly in the eyes.

My mother without looking straight at her disintegrated acid-burnt face would nod her head and recite "Astaghfirullah," Arabic for "I ask Allah forgiveness," roll down the window and place whatever change she could find in her purse on the woman's palm. Our driver, Rustam, a 20-something from Swat, would nod his head for an entirely different reason. "They bring this upon themselves for money, madam. I assure you she makes more than you do at your newspaper," he would say without a hint of empathy. But even he flinched while catching a glimpse of her deformed face.

Throwing acid on women's faces is a form of terrorism that has, with time, become accepted as part of the background noise in Pakistan -- already ranked as the third-most dangerous country for women in the world due to a barrage of threats ranging from rape and violence to dismal healthcare and honor-killings. In Pakistan, the majority of acid-attack victims are women, perpetrated against by male counterparts including husbands, fathers, sons and other male relatives for reasons as trivial as domestic disagreements to more complicated issues such as bringing "dishonor" upon the family.    

Though no concrete numbers or statistics exist, independent women's rights and welfare organizations in the country have estimated that over 200 Pakistani women fall prey to acid-attacks every year because hydrochloric and sulfuric acid is widely and easily available and is very cheap. However, organizations that have used a more active method of data collection have yielded much higher rates. The Islamabad-based Progressive Women's Association has documented over 8000 deliberate acid-attacks on women just in and around the Pakistani capital of Islamabad over the past decade. Even though these attacks left their helpless female victims mutilated and scarred for life in a matter of seconds, only two per cent of the cases were successfully prosecuted in a court of law.

This not only highlights that this atrocious act of terrorism is at an all-time high in Pakistan but also how the misogyny that creates the climate for such acts can and does bleed over into the country's judicial system, which continues to fail to provide justice for the victims of acid-crimes, as the reported assailants are usually let go with minimal punishment.  

But there's hope, hopefully. Pakistani Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker, internationally acclaimed for her 2009 film Pakistan: Children of the Taliban and the 2007 Channel 4 series Afghanistan Unveiled, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy just brought home her -- and Pakistan's -- first Academy Award. Her documentary short-film Saving Face revolves around the stories of two women - both acid-attack survivors making arduous attempts to bring their attackers to justice with the help of the groundbreaking charitable work of London-based, Pakistani-born plastic surgeon Dr. Mohammad Jawad. Through the course of the short-film, Dr. Jawad strives to help these women put their horrific pasts behind them and move on with the rest of their lives.

Going on to make Oscar history by becoming the first Pakistani to win the coveted award, Chinoy and co-director Daniel Junge's Saving Face saved the day for Pakistanis both at home and abroad. The country's prime minister has announced the highest civilian award for the filmmaker for helping Pakistan make headlines for the right reasons, for a change, and for serving as a catalyst for social progress through her work.   

But amidst the fanfare, one cannot help but think how unfortunate it is that it took such a shameful subject to bring Pakistan its first Oscar, and whether this historical win and the resulting global limelight on the subject of acid-throwing in Pakistan will help bring this heinous act to an end. One cannot be certain but one can hope, for that is something this international acclaim brings for acid-victims in Pakistan fighting injustice for very many decades.

Encouragingly, efforts to fortify women's rights in Pakistan have been afoot even prior to this award. A few months back, the parliament of Pakistan adopted harsher penalties for perpetrators involved in acid crimes as the Senate passed the historical Acid Control and Acid Crime Prevention Bill along with the long-awaited Prevention of Anti-Women Practices Bill. Both bills were introduced and carried through by female members of the National Assembly of Pakistan, which itself is quite a mean feat for the women of Pakistan.   

The acid control bill sentences perpetrators of the crime a minimum of 14 years to a lifetime of imprisonment and levies fines of up to Rs 1 million [~$11,000]. The bill also enlists major steps to control the import, production, transportation, hoarding, sale and use of acid to prevent misuse and promises acid-victims legal security.

Post-win, Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and her team are using their website to formally launch a movement to raise awareness about acid attacks to further strengthen this newly developed legislation against acid-crimes. Posting on their website, co-director Junge says the film must be "more than an expose of horrendous crimes, it must be a recipe for addressing the problem and a hope for the future."

Saving Face is set to air on American television in the first week of March, while Chinoy and Junge also plan to screen it in Pakistan, after figuring out "the best possible way to show the film while ensuring that the women in the film are safe," said Chinoy talking to a Pakistani newspaper.

The fight to eliminate acid-crime in Pakistan has only just begun. But with the Pakistani Senate passing two crucial bills before stepping into the new year and the recent Oscar win through Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy's Saving Face, there is tremendous hope for the women of Pakistan and the country itself. By showing that there is a Pakistan with great potential, different from how it is generally perceived, through a short documentary, Chinoy has pulled this nation out of a blackhole of dejection -- even if for just this little while.

Rabail Baig is a Pakistani journalist based in Boston.

Progress with the Afghan reconciliation process, still in "exploratory" mode, and involving a diverse set of actors and conflicting agendas, has been excruciatingly slow and wrapped in uncertainty. Testy exchanges, described as "hard talk" that occurred at an Afghanistan-Pakistan summit a few days ago in Islamabad, are a case in point. What is sorely needed at this stage is a slight pause, to allow for an evaluation and re-think in order to give this highly sensitive process more coherence and a chance to better define the Afghan end-state.

Islamabad's position on the peace talks was revealed when Hina Rabbani Khar, Pakistan's Foreign Minister, publicly scoffed at an Afghan request to facilitate talks between Kabul and the members of the Taliban Quetta Shura (leadership council). The Afghan side had sought clarification on the whereabouts of Afghan insurgent leaders reported to have disappeared in Pakistan. Khar said it was "preposterous" to think that her government could deliver Taliban leaders to the negotiating table, and warned Kabul against "unrealistic, almost ridiculous expectations" about peace talks.

For its part, Kabul expressed optimism for having detected "a big change among Pakistanis." Sounding enthusiastic, President Hamid Karzai's spokesman said "the atmosphere is much better... we are more optimistic than before that they will support us." Karzai himself went a step further and asked the Taliban to engage in direct talks and, once more, urged Pakistan to facilitate negotiation efforts.

A week later, in an about face, Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani urged all Afghan rebel groups to take part in peace talks. This amounted to a tacit acknowledgement that the country's civilian government was sending a message to insurgent leaders based in Pakistan, asking that they engage in talks with Kabul.

The Taliban agreed last year to establish an office in Qatar for preliminary talks between the U.S. and Quetta Shura emissaries as part of "confidence-building measures" that aim to secure the release of a handful of top leaders from U.S. custody in Guantanamo, and reduce U.N.-imposed bans on a number of blacklisted commanders in exile. It is not known what type of realistic quid pro quo, if any, is expected of the Taliban within that framework. Karzai, not too keen on the Qatar peace track, has grudgingly endorsed the Taliban office there as an "address," hoping that real talks would be held as part of a preferred separate process, whilst the Taliban insist that they will not talk to the Afghan government.  Minister Khar, during a visit to the United Kingdom last week, complained that despite her government's intentions to help the process move forward, the message from Kabul was confusing because "Karzai was still unclear whether his government really wanted to negotiate with the Taliban in Qatar."

While Pakistan is also leery of the Qatar process, and prefers to sit on the margins, it has thus far facilitated Taliban travel and engaged both the Americans and the Qataris on logistical matters. But, because of their special relationship with Saudi Arabia, Pakistanis are partial to Saudi mediation efforts and prefer to downplay the contacts underway in Qatar.

Recent reports out of Saudi Arabia say that the Kingdom has hinted that it is willing to facilitate talks if the Taliban 1) renounce al-Qaeda, 2) lay down their arms, and 3) join the Afghan political arena, or in other words, agree to a power-sharing arrangement. Karzai has also hinted at times that he feels more comfortable with the Saudi track, which partially explains his reservations about the Qatar process.

Much of Afghanistan's loyal political opposition, women's rights groups and civil society not only feel marginalized, but  are also increasingly concerned about a re-Talibanization of the country as a result of misplaced reconciliation priorities. There are calls for putting the current initiatives on hold, reforming the High Peace Council tasked to manage the reconciliation process, and reinforcing the government's negotiating baseline by getting more relevant social and political groups involved in the process.

With the unfortunate Quran burning dilemma causing deep anguish over the past week, it is too early to tell what impact it might have on the Afghan mission, at a time when the stakes for seeking a negotiated settlement are in high gear. Not only would a pause on peace negotiations during the Quran burning debacle allow all sides to engage in necessary damage control, but it would also provide a break to review strategic imperatives, consult on the way forward, and recommit. 

If true, promising new channels of communications said to have opened between local officials and Taliban mediators as part of a fresh Afghan-to-Afghan initiative, could prove useful. However, the recent gruesome beheadings of four innocent civilians in Helmand and a popular radio station owner in Paktika Province are stark reminders of the cruel side of an insurgency that is pretending to recast itself as moderate. If the Taliban do not put a stop to such carnage and duplicity, the peace process will lose the support of even larger numbers of Afghans. Frankly, trying to appease elements that have no qualms about such egregious human rights violations cannot be conducive to lasting peace.  

Given the current foray of activities, and spins and counter-spins, policy lines are being drawn by the following main actors, none of whom can be ignored or sidelined if there is to be a meaningful process:

1.      The Afghan Government: Since Karzai's political preference seems to be the so-called Saudi formula, he has been reluctant to fully embrace the Qatar track, where Pakistan also remains a peripheral actor. He is aware, though, that the Taliban are not yet ready for direct talks. Recognizing the growing internal challenges he faces, his dual approach of candid talk and friendly overtures vis-a-vis Pakistan is seen as a dangerous wager by many Afghans who are asking for more transparency, consultation and verification. Meanwhile, Karzai rightly expects the U.S. to keep him in the inner loop, and is eager to see the U.S.-Afghan strategic partnership finalized soon. How the Quaran burning disaster might impact the work in progress is still unclear. With a critical 2014 political transition ahead, Karzai may be inclined to agree to a power-sharing arrangement with the armed opposition that would not undermine his political base. This could translate into blurring established red-lines on gains made in the domains of democratic governance and constitutional rights, including gender rights. To strengthen its negotiating position, Kabul should implement reconciliation process reforms that would expand its support base through consultations and inclusivity. Afghans should agree on negotiation red-lines and stand by them. Furthermore, the next three years offer an opportunity to push for real change to improve governance, promote rule of law, especially on the judicial and prosecutorial sides, and implement electoral reforms that assure institutional independence and systemic transparency. These changes should also aim to provide the necessary space to draw the Taliban (or at least those independently inclined to do so) into a legitimate political arena, following a demobilization, disarmament and reintegration program.

2.      The Taliban: Given their access to a support infrastructure, including sanctuaries inside and outside Afghanistan, the core decision-making bodies, based in Quetta and in North Waziristan, continue to hold the levers of power. However, trying to sideline the Afghan government and portray it as a puppet regime may prove to be a shallow tactic that will not find much support among ordinary Afghans. The Taliban's immediate objective is to secure the release of their top operatives from Guantanamo via the Qatar track. Thereafter, escalating the fighting as seasonal snows melt, while keeping all sides preoccupied with a tactical mix of peace overtures and psychological wearing-down ploys, may prove to be the most convenient distraction. Eventually, depending on the matrix of political progress, some fighters may favor a power-sharing arrangement, while others will invariably pursue a zero-sum game, either for ideological reasons or at the behest of foreign patrons, which will determine whether they will fracture or morph into a smaller yet more lethal opponent. Under a power-sharing arrangement, all measures need to be taken to see improvement on the security front, and prevent the fundamental weakening of the constitutional order and basic rights. The ultimate goal should be to integrate the reconcilable opponents into the political mainstream as seamlessly as possible, and let them compete for votes.

3.      The United States: Having decided to disengage from the lengthy Afghan campaign, albeit maintaining some degree of responsibility and continuity (as is envisaged in the strategic partnership), the US aims to "work itself out of a job." The question is how fast, to what degree and with what end-state in mind? What seems to escape some policy advisors and pundits, who would have us perversely believe that we are witnessing some miraculous Taliban-style perestroika and glasnost moment, is the simple fact that Afghanistan remains the epicenter of the most dangerous and most security-relevant neighborhood in the world. There are no discernible indications that the forces that want to pursue a violent adversarial confrontation have as of late had a change of heart. As the U.S. tries to avoid another blowback effect (as experienced by the neglect of the 1990s) by seeking a reasonable negotiated agreement, it should also aim to protect the accomplishments of the last decade, and help define, with Afghans and other allies the logical end-state that assures real prospects for a durable and just peace that has the backing of major segments of Afghan society. Actively engaging all sides to shift to a new regional cooperation paradigm would also need to be a cornerstone of such an end-state strategy. The timeline for agreeing and putting such initiatives into effect is now as the 2014 withdrawal dateline approaches.

4.      Pakistan: From an Afghan perspective, Pakistan (and to some extent Iran) has a strategic choice to make as a key player: use its influence to help forge a durable and just peace in Afghanistan, to help promote regional stability and economic development, pay lip service, or covertly use radicalism and duplicity to achieve its outdated militaristic objectives. The good news is that some among Pakistan's leadership now claim that they do not want a return to the chaotic Afghan conditions of the 1990s, are no longer obsessed with the "strategic depth" imperative to counter-balance India, or even a power grab by the stalwart Taliban. Pakistani leaders are now advocating "power-sharing" as a preferred option. As part of a new diplomatic offensive, visiting officials recently made an effort in Kabul to engage those Afghan political groups and personalities they usually consider adversaries. These indicators, if substantiated, need to be taken seriously as they could offer a glimpse of real change underway in Pakistani strategic calculus. However, if the crux of the matter still remains a perception that Indians are too close to Afghans, and the only way to offset this historic relationship is to impose the Taliban or other proxies into the body-politics of Afghanistan, then the reasoning is fundamentally flawed, because Indian-Afghan relations are by and large based on soft-power supply and demand dynamics, not on an anti-Pakistan predisposition. Regardless, the solution cannot be sought in continued bloodshed and promotion of proxy radicalism. The answer lies in separating the Afghan card from the Indian deck, and to have a broader and deeper understanding of a neighbor that has over the years bent backward to convey a message of peace and cooperation to Islamabad.

5.      The role of other fringe actors, i.e. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, India, China, Russia, the United Kingdom, Germany and the European Union, Japan and even Qatar, are not inconsequential. They can use their good offices to facilitate and advocate for a just and durable peace, using their diplomatic and economic clout in as coordinated and coherent a manner possible to help the process move in the right direction.

The complex, and at times frustrating, reconciliation process proposed by the Afghan government at the international London Conference in 2010 is now in its third year, with almost no tangible results in sight.  Thousands more lives have been lost on all sides, and billions of dollars later - partly to pay for a useful yet inconclusive surge - we have collectively failed to convince those who promote war that peace is the only option. Today's Afghanistan is no longer the country rescued from the clutches of terrorism in 2001. It is a very different place. The hard-earned gains (possible red-line items) in terms of education, health, gender rights, civil society and media development, income generation, infrastructure and institution building can neither be ignored nor should be traded off.

At a conference this week in Morocco, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, expressing outrage for the burning of the Qurans, clearly defined the U.S. policy objective when she said, "... the hard work of trying to build a more peaceful, prosperous and secure Afghanistan must continue." However, what worries Afghans the most is a lack of clarity about the end-state and contingency planning; what is plan B in case these efforts fail, or if Afghans find themselves in a perilous situation post 2014? These fundamental questions need to be answered now, not later, as part of a pause and re-think that are crucial to carve the right way forward.

Omar Samad is a Senior Afghanistan Expert in residence at the United States Institute of Peace in Washington. D.C. He was Afghanistan's ambassador to France (2009-2011), to Canada (2004-2009), and spokesperson for the Afghan Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2001-2004). This article reflects his personal opinion.

With the Taliban close to opening a political office in Qatar for the purpose of negotiating an end to the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan, it is unsurprising that the Taliban's primary rival insurgent network, Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin (HIG), is now clamoring for a seat at the table as well.  Yet the Taliban and HIG are quite different from each other, both in how they think and how they operate, and HIG would play a complicated but very useful role at the negotiating table with NATO and Kabul if the process gathers momentum. 

While HIG's forces are fewer than they were in the 1980s when its leader and founder, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, was America's favorite anti-Soviet mujahed, HIG has attacked NATO forces for years with a robust insurgent and criminal syndicate throughout northern and eastern Afghanistan, where I served as a civilian advisor to NATO forces in Laghman and Nuristan in 2011. Among other attacks, HIG organized an enormous 2009 siege on an American base in Kamdesh, Nuristan in which 8 U.S. soldiers were killed, and they participated in a massacre of 10 international aid workers in Badakhshan Province in 2010. 

In the last few months, Dr. Ghairat Baheer, son-in-law and long-time representative of Hekmatyar, has met with ISAF Commander General John Allen, U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Ryan Crocker, and Afghan President Hamid Karzai to discuss prospects for HIG's reconciliation and a U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan. Yet with NATO's eyes focused mainly on the southern heartland, it may be tempting for the alliance to focus on negotiating solely with the Taliban, disregarding HIG. Ultimately, however, tandem negotiations with both insurgent groups are vital for several reasons.

First, the most combustible element to the currently projected negotiations is the Taliban's reluctance to sit down with the ‘puppet' Afghan government and its insistence on dealing mainly with NATO.  That Kabul is being indirectly benched for these talks might compel Karzai to scuttle the efforts if he feels they are undermining the legitimacy of the Afghan government, no matter the fallout.  In fact, Karzai sent one such warning shot across Washington's bow by unilaterally announcing its own venue in Saudi Arabia for Kabul's negotiations with the Taliban, a claim denied by the Taliban's Quetta Shura two days later. 

Karzai's gamesmanship aside, for these negotiations to get off the ground, the Afghan president needs concrete signs (not just words) indicating that Kabul will be at the center of these negotiations.  So far, no signs have been forthcoming, but there may be another way to build those signs artificially. 

Unlike the Taliban, HIG is eager to talk to the Afghan government, which means any talks with HIG will put Karzai front and center, where he belongs and prefers to be.  Rather than fabricate a story about Kabul talking with the Taliban directly, Karzai can play up his government's genuine and nurtured access to HIG. Highly publicized HIG negotiations may give Karzai enough negotiating legitimacy to make up for its supposed absence in talks with the Taliban. 

Second, while HIG and the Taliban cooperate as often as they clash, the two groups are currently competing for NATO concessions.  As the Taliban began pursuing the possibility of talks in earnest in early 2011, HIG followed shortly thereafter by meeting with then-ISAF Commander General David Petraeus in July 2011 for exploratory talks; then, when it became clear that the Taliban would likely go one step further and take the political risk of dropping its long-standing precondition to negotiations-that foreign forces withdraw before talks begin-HIG beat the Taliban to the punch and announced its policy shift in October 2011, though to little fanfare.  Four months later, the Taliban likewise officially agreed to talk without preconditions, though it is unlikely that the Taliban was influenced by HIG's announcement.  And now, with the Taliban receiving so much attention over its Qatar office, Hekmatyar has become insistent that whatever happens in Doha is sure to fail as long as it excludes the relevant parties (read: Hekmatyar).  Such competition for attention is favorable for the West and can be powerfully leveraged. 

Specifically, it is normal for parties in conflicts like these to renege on certain principles or grandstand for their respective constituencies during negotiations, and when either HIG or the Taliban indulge in such practices, NATO and Kabul will be in a position to play each insurgent group off of the other-extending or withholding concessions for one group to make a point to the other-and ultimately secure a better outcome and on a better timetable than if NATO/Kabul negotiated with one adversary alone. 

Third, while HIG and the Taliban share similar ideologies and ambitions, the emphasis of their demands is not the same because HIG has a tremendous stake in the current Afghan government.  Over the years, various HIG factions have peeled away from Hekmatyar and formed non-violent political wings that now comprise a sizeable presence in the Afghan Parliament, in Kabul's various ministries, and in provincial offices throughout the country.  The current Minister of Economy, Abdul Hadi Arghandiwal, is a member of Hezb-e Islami and has facilitated several rounds of talks between the militant wing of HIG and the Afghan government.  Granted, like the Taliban, Hekmatyar calls Kabul a ‘puppet,' but tellingly, his son-in-law is on a PR blitz indirectly demonstrating HIG's reliance on the Afghan government. 

HIG, then, is making a play to be the more moderate insurgent group in negotiations, and this contrasting platform will be equally useful in a dual track model.  If insurgents' moderate demands are given more attention and credibility, they will draw more proponents and momentum.  HIG's demand to date is the withdrawal of foreign forces (a demand NATO intends to mostly fulfill anyway), whereas the Taliban will surely want much larger concessions to include changes to the Afghan government or constitution.  Meanwhile, as the Taliban continues to see that HIG is able to negotiate directly with Kabul without sullying its own reputation, the Taliban is likely to follow suit in Qatar and elsewhere, as following a controversial trail is always easier than blazing it. 

Again, the Quetta Shura is significantly more powerful than HIG, certainly in the heavily contested south.  But parity is not required to successfully alter the negotiating calculus of the Taliban.  Spoilers are never as powerful as the parties whose plans they hope to spoil.  And given Hekmatyar's selfish streak, he would have no qualms obstructing Taliban plans if he sees a myopic gain in it for himself, as he has done at the tactical level on the battlefield for years. 

To be sure, there is nothing intrinsic to HIG that the Taliban envies or has a history of following; this strategy would actually create such a dynamic, where instead of competing merely for ISI funding, each faction would also vie for NATO/Kabul attention and concessions, thus precluding the Taliban from monopolizing the negotiations and allowing the West to drive a harder bargain.  Granted, by this logic, bringing the third and most proficient insurgent group, the Haqqani Network, to the negotiating table would be favorable as well.  Yet for various reasons (including Haqqani's particularly strong ties to the ISI and al-Qaeda), their overtures for a political settlement have been less apparent and convincing.

True, the sincerity of HIG and the Taliban is likewise highly questionable, as there is evidence to suggest that both are hungry for free concessions and are playing for time.  With that in mind, however, if negotiating a political settlement with Afghan insurgents is the U.S. policy of choice, then incorporating HIG into that framework on a near equal footing with the Taliban would serve Kabul and Washington well.  

Every negotiator has a toolbox of methods and angles for success, and while having multiple adversaries with competing agendas breeds more wildcards, it also generates more room for creative maneuvering.  Complex conflicts require complex solutions, and we should not shy away from them. 

David H. Young is a civilian advisor to the U.S. Army in Washington, DC, and recently returned from a deployment to eastern Afghanistan.  His website is www.justwars.org. The views and opinions expressed here do not represent those of the U.S. Army.    

On Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta stated that the United States would take a step back from its combat role in Afghanistan by mid-2013.  Newspapers and news shows alike are reporting that this is a major milestone towards ending our decade long war in this troubled country.

This is a significant announcement - but not for the reasons that one might think.

At the strategic level (where heads of state, Foreign Ministers and 4-star generals play), Secretary Panetta's pronouncement will shock no one.  His statement gives voice to what the International Security and Assistance Force (ISAF) is already doing, namely taking the steps needed to end their mission in Afghanistan on 31 December 2014.  To get from here to there, ISAF will transfer lead security responsibility to the Afghans at the Province and District level in a measured fashion - a process that is already underway.  In other words, NATO is already "pulling back" from combat operations.

Where this statement will have impact is - oddly - at the tactical level, where U.S. Combat Brigade Commanders will be compelled to stop taking the lead in fighting the enemy and instead support their Afghan National Security Force (ANSF) counterparts as they assume battlefield responsibility.

And this is important. It may mean the difference between winning and losing.

Left to their own devices, U.S. Army and Marine Colonels - Brigade Commanders in charge of 3,500 men and often given responsibility for one or more of Afghanistan's 34 Provinces - will relentlessly hunt down the Taliban (or Haqqani Network, etc), only nominally bringing their Afghan partners into the process. 

And why should they?  After all, their bosses usually made them responsible for security, governance, development, and rule of law - rating them on the progress that they make in their "battle space." 

To support the efforts of the ANSF instead would require a Brigade Commander to assume risk, as the ANSF:

- may not be there in great numbers;

- may be lead by corrupt or incompetent leaders;

- may not have the staff or battlefield processes to conduct full scale military, police, and civilian operations across the area of a province;

- may not be exceptionally proficient at military or police operations.

The list goes on and on.

So rather than risk failure (and soldiers hate to fail) many (not all) commanders take on the responsibility of fixing and doing everything themselves.

Don't get me wrong - the Afghans are there - but the weight of success or failure seemingly rests on the back of the U.S. commander.

The problem with this is that if the U.S. Brigade Commander succeeds, he also fails. 

Because in this counterinsurgency, the only way you ever really move towards a "win" is if you enable the Afghans in their efforts to foster security, governance, development and the rule of law in a way that makes their efforts sustainable - meaning that after we leave, the Afghans can secure their gains and hopefully make even more progress.

But to do that, you have to back away and put the ANSF and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA) in the lead. You have to let them feel the weight of the responsibility of success or failure.  You cannot do it for them.

And that is why Secretary Panetta's statement is important.

In the coming year, field commanders will be told that their main responsibility is not to ensure that "they" make progress in "their" province, but rather that they support their ANSF and GIRoA counterparts' progress.  U.S. units will go from being supported by the Afghan military to supporting the Afghan military. 

Nuanced? Sort of.  But to a military commander, this results in a change of mission and a change in mindset.

As an example, it will affect how a commander prepares his forces for their mission in Afghanistan. Instead of conducting pre-deployment training that focuses on unilateral or even partnered combat and counterinsurgency operations, the commander will have to get serious about training for Security Force Assistance (SFA), a mission set that involves training, advising and assisting the military and police forces of a Host Nation.

We may even start to see units arrive in Afghanistan that have been cobbled together to conduct SFA.  These units might include officers and enlisted men who speak Dari or Pashtu and are experienced in training Host Nation forces and delivering critical enablers such as air support, medical evacuation and advanced communications.  (Sadly, the spadework necessary to determine what an effective Advisory and Assistance element will look like has not yet been done.  There are some models in practice that are less than optimal; and there are some rather good ideas floating around out there; but the SFA model that will best allow the coalition to manage the transition from combat to an advisory and assistance role has yet to be solidified.  Expect added pressure to the Department of Defense to figure this out in the wake of Secretary Panetta's proclamation.)

To be sure, there are commanders out there who get it.  At the strategic level, General Allen, the Commander of ISAF, and his team certainly do.  And at the tactical level, I can point to old hands like former Task Force Yukon's commander COL Mike Howard and newer ones like Task Force Duke's COL Chris Toner (both of whom patrolled the environs of Khost Province near the Afghan/Pakistan border) who have taken the steps needed to make sure that the Afghans in their area of operations are prepared to take the lead.  But not all have changed the cognitive gears necessary to ensure ANSF and GIRoA success.

So at the end of the day, the Secretary's announcement may not seem like news to a lot of people who live and breathe Afghanistan.  But his statement is welcomed in that it requires a needed change of mindset for those Brigade Commanders who will be tasked with making strategic statements work at the tactical level.

Roger D. Carstens is a retired Special Forces officer who served in Afghanistan from 2009 - 2011 as the Senior Civilian Advisor on the COMISAF Advisory and Assistance Team.

The on-again, off-again effort by the Obama administration to begin preliminary peace talks with the Taliban is still struggling to get off the ground. The first move focuses on a statement by the Taliban against international terrorism and in support of a peace process and the opening of a Taliban office in Qatar.  For this the Taliban have called for the release of its prisoners held at Guantánamo Bay.

To garner support for this initiative, the administration's special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Marc Grossman, has been traveling in the region, including meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai, to make sure he is on board. Afghan officials have expressed concern about the possibility of a ‘secret deal' being struck between the Taliban and the U.S.

But that would be unlikely, given the administration's oft-repeated public assurance that it supports an "Afghan-led and Afghan-owned" reconciliation process.  In fact, what is more likely than a ‘secret deal' is no deal at all.

Earlier high-level efforts by the U.S. government to have ‘peace talks' with the Taliban may be instructive.  As Winston Churchill said: "The further back you look, the farther forward you can see."

The Taliban history of negotiating with its opponents reveals little reason for optimism. Striking a deal with its sworn enemies does not appear to be in the Taliban's DNA. Instead, past experience suggests it has adopted the negotiating equivalent of the "rope-a-dope' strategy in boxing -- agreeing to enter the ring, playing for time, evading and avoiding committing itself, letting the opponent wear himself out, then hitting back hard as it had intended to do all the time.

In April 1998, then U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Bill Richardson traveled to Afghanistan to meet with the Taliban and the Northern Alliance, in order to bring them to the table to discuss the possibilities for peace. He also tried to persuade the Taliban either to expel Osama bin Laden or extradite him to the U.S. for his complicity in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. 

In his memoir Between Worlds, Richardson described the outcome: "Flying back to Pakistan that night, I thought, Well, this was a good day's work. Peace talks would get started later in the month, and if they went well, we might get bin Laden after all.  But it wasn't to be. The agreement held for a while, but we quickly learned that the Taliban had no intention of making peace with the Northern Alliance. By early May, a belated spring offensive had begun and the two sides were at it again."

In February 1999 there was another attempt at direct talks with the Taliban.  After the bin Laden-directed bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, I traveled to Islamabad with the State Department's coordinator for counter-terrorism, Michael Sheehan, to meet with Mullah Abdul Jalil, a close adviser to Taliban leader Mullah Mohammed Omar (from 1997-2001 I attended some 20 meetings with Taliban officials). The U.S. government had repeatedly demanded that the Taliban stop giving safe haven to terrorists. Now we told Jalil that the U.S. would hold the Taliban itself directly responsible for bin Laden's actions, and respond accordingly.

Mullah Jalil said that bin Laden was becoming a burden on Afghanistan, but that he was under the Taliban's control and he could not possibly be operating a worldwide network as we suggested. Later efforts were made to provide the Taliban with more information about the U.S. case against bin Laden, but they never responded.

Subsequently the UN Security Council tried to persuade the Taliban to turn over bin Laden.  Two resolutions were adopted, and sanctions were imposed, but, again, the Taliban defied these calls by the international community. On a scale of one to ten on good faith negotiations, the Taliban proved to be a zero.

Are the Taliban likely to be any more accommodating today, specifically the Quetta Shura faction still led by Mullah Omar? Recent statements issued by the "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" on January 3 and January 12 suggest not. That was the name the Taliban gave Afghanistan during its rule from 1996 to 2001. The international community never recognized it. The Taliban still stick to it.

Taken together, these statements lay out the Taliban's ‘going in' position for peace talks, including the departure of all U.S. and foreign forces and a continuation of their "jihad" until that goal is accomplished. Also, the movement remains at least in rhetoric opposed to negotiations with the Karzai government (referred to as "the stooge Kabul administration") as well as acceptance of the Afghan constitution.

Administration officials say that while they are under no illusion about the chances of success in opening direct talks with the Taliban, they are convinced that a political settlement is the only solution to the war. But they also need to be convinced that the Taliban is serious about a future for Afghanistan that is not a return to the days of the "Islamic Emirate." 

In this regard, several probing questions need to be asked of Taliban representatives during what Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says is "still in the preliminary stages of testing whether [talks] can be successful":

• Do the Taliban accept a political solution to the Afghanistan conflict, and what is their vision of it?
• Do the Taliban have a political and economic plan for the future of Afghanistan?
• Will they accept the international instruments to which Afghanistan has acceded, particularly with regard to human rights?
• Will they honor and enforce the rights of women, minorities and ethnic groups?
• Will they respect the role of shuras (tribal councils): local, provincial and national?
• Are they willing to support and abide by internationally acceptable mechanisms of legitimization, like elections, referendums or tribal consensus?

During the years of repressive Taliban rule, none of these questions could have been answered in the affirmative. Can they be today? 

And, more importantly, what concrete steps can be taken by the Taliban to demonstrate that they will abide by their declarations and assurances in the future?  A good, measureable place to start for the Taliban to establish their bona fides would be an end to all suicide bombings in Afghanistan. Other confidence building measures would need to follow.

Another quote by Winston Churchill that relates to opening up direct talks with the Taliban is one of his most famous: "To jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war." It is axiomatic at this point that the conflict in Afghanistan will not end by military means alone. And the search for a political settlement must reach out to all parties -- but with eyes wide open.

Karl F. Inderfurth is a Senior Advisor at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.  He served as assistant secretary of state for South Asian affairs in the Clinton administration (1997-2001).