Pakistanis went to the polls on May 11^th to participate in landmark national and provincial elections. Violent attacks by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) insurgency disproportionately targeted vocal opponents of the TTP prior to the vote, and clashes between rival candidates continued on election day itself. But despite the threats and disputed results in some constituencies - particularly the country's largest city of Karachi - this appears to have been the freest and fairest election in Pakistan since the country's first democratic national election in 1970. Its legitimacy was enhanced by being one of the most widely contested elections in Pakistan's history, with all major national and regional political parties taking part in what appears to have been a genuinely competitive contest.

During the campaign period, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan in particular seized media headlines and public attention with calls for change and efforts to mobilize the country's large youth vote. But given the PTI's disappointing electoral performance relative to expectations, credit for the high levels of participation - currently projected by the Election Commission at around 60% nationwide, considerably more than the 44% reported in 2008 - must also be shared more broadly. Beyond the party campaigns, a diverse and vibrant array of media coverage and social media participation, a caretaker government and Election Commission administration of the polls that were broadly accepted as neutral, and public commitments by the military establishment not to intervene all appear to have contributed to voters' determination to take part in the elections - despite Taliban threats and calls for a boycott.

Table 1: Preliminary Pakistan National Assembly 2013 Election Results

Source: Election Commission of Pakistan, Party Position (National Assembly), as of Wednesday, May 15, available at http://www.ecp.gov.pk/overallpartyposition05152013412.pdf

Note: Results are for 272 directly contested national assembly seats, and do not include 60 seats for women and 10 for minorities that are allocated proportionally to parties based on election performance. Candidates are allowed to contest multiple seats, requiring special elections in the event that they win in more than one constituency, meaning final results will be subject to further change.

Although the final results have yet to be certified, Table 1 illustrates that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) led by former two-time prime minister Nawaz Sharif, has emerged as the clear victor. The party was able to nearly double the number of National Assembly seats it won from 68 in 2008 to at least 124 in 2013. Most pre-poll analysis predicted that the PML-N would emerge as the single largest party, but the general expectation was that the elections would produce a hung parliament requiring Nawaz Sharif to cobble together a weak coalition government. The PML-N's decisive victory, however, will enable it to reach out to potential coalition partners from a position of strength, increasing its freedom of action to use its newfound political capital. Whether this tremendous advantage will be seized or squandered remains to be seen, but expectations are already being raised - possibly unrealistically so - that Nawaz Sharif will now be in a position to tackle a range of issues from Pakistan's acute energy shortages to helping normalize relations with India.

While Imran Khan's PTI supporters may be the most disappointed voters after coming in second place across most of Punjab, the biggest loser in 2013 was the Pakistan Peoples' Party (PPP), which had led Pakistan's coalition government from 2008-2013. Whereas the PML-N nearly doubled its seat numbers, the PPP was reduced from 89 seats in 2008 to 31 in 2013. While the scale of the PPP's defeat surprised many, the fact that it lost seats reflects a consistent feature in Pakistani electoral politics, which is the disadvantage of incumbency. No political party has won back-to-back elections in Pakistan since the PPP's victory in 1977 in an election widely acknowledged to have been massively rigged. The shortage of resources available to meet patronage demands often leaves the majority of voters unhappy with incumbents, who are then punished the next time elections are held.

This tendency was further exacerbated by the deep discontent of most voters with the direction in which Pakistan was heading (91% according to a recent Pew poll), and the perception that the PPP-led government from 2008-2013 was corrupt and inefficient, doing little to tackle some of the major issues confronting Pakistan, such as the country's serious energy crisis. The most disturbing aspect of the PPP's dismal performance is that it has now essentially been reduced to a party of rural Sindh, whereas historically it has been the only national party able to consistently win seats in all four provinces. It remains to be seen whether this devastating defeat, especially in the largest province of Punjab where it won only one seat, will serve as a wake-up call and force a substantial shakeup within the party, or whether it will continue its downward spiral into yet another ethnically defined party.

Another impact of the 2013 election result is that the role of the Pakistani presidency is likely to diminish further after the PML-N assumes office. Although the 18^th Amendment to Pakistan's constitution in April 2010 formally transferred many powers of office that had accrued to the president under General Pervez Musharraf's tenure to the prime minister, President Asif Ali Zardari's leadership of the PPP allowed him to retain effective control over its activities in parliament - though a verdict from the Lahore High Court forced him to relinquish his party title prior to the start of the campaign season. Zardari's term in office expires later this fall, and he now appears unlikely to secure reelection by the electoral college comprised of the national and provincial assemblies and the upper senate house. For the first time since Nawaz Sharif's ouster in a 1999 military coup, civilian power in the Pakistani political system will be re-centering in the office of the prime minister rather than a powerful president.

This represents a shift from the past five years, which had seen a general diffusion of power within the country. The PPP tenure was marked by significant compromises on power-sharing with the opposition and between the central and provincial governments. But the difficulties of managing a fractious coalition and fending off challenges to the government's authority from the judiciary and Pakistan's powerful security services ultimately consumed much of the PPP leadership's attentions. The result was a slow consensus-based policymaking process that, while necessarily more inclusive of the interests of the country's diverse centers of powers, stalled out before resolving many of the critical concerns facing Pakistan - particularly on economic reforms needed to address chronic energy shortages, fiscal deficits and tax revenue collection shortfalls, and Pakistan's integration through trade with its neighbors.

Table 1: Preliminary Pakistan Provincial Assembly 2013 Election Results

Source: Election Commission of Pakistan, Party Position (Provincial Assemblies), as of Wednesday, May 15, available at http://www.ecp.gov.pk/overallpartypositionPA05152013412.pdf

Although the largest parties managed to achieve small footholds in the other provinces, the overall election result has reinforced the regionalization and localization of political party organizations in Pakistan. Despite its wins, the PML-N made few gains outside of Punjab itself. The PPP retained its hold over the Sindh assembly, but lost its position elsewhere in the country. Although it failed to make major hoped-for gains in Punjab, the PTI secured approximately a third of the seats in the Khyber-Paktunkhwa provincial assembly, echoing the decisive ouster in 2008 of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal coalition of religious parties by the Awami National Party, which has now itself failed to gain reelection to any more than a handful of provincial assembly seats. Balochistan, which faces an active separatist insurgency and saw the lowest levels of participation, experienced the most fragmented electoral outcomes, with ethnic nationalist parties, religious parties, and independents dividing the provincial assembly and delegation to parliament.

The PPP retains a plurality in the upper senate house, and administrative devolution processes mandated by the 18^th and 19^th amendments to the Pakistani constitution have strengthened the autonomy and responsibilities of provincial governments, as well as locking in larger shares of national tax revenues for the provinces. The PML-N supported many of these reforms during its time in opposition, benefiting through its management of the Punjab government. It is possible the PPP and PTI opposition parties' control over provincial governments will ensure their stake in the system and provide for a negotiated balance of power with the PML-N at the center. But given the history of conflict in Pakistan over issues of federalism and provincial autonomy, relations between the new Punjab-based government in the center and the rest of the country have the potential to be a significant source of political tension going forward.

Beyond questions of divided center-provincial relations, the new PML-N government must also balance its relations with Pakistan's unelected centers of power - namely the military and the increasingly assertive judiciary. Speculation is already mounting as to whether Nawaz Sharif, who when previously in office confronted and was overthrown in a military coup by General Musharraf, will again try to increase the role of civilian authorities in security and foreign policymaking - traditionally the domain of Pakistan's military. Both the military and the judiciary are facing transitions of their own later this year, as Chief of Army Staff General Ashaq Kayani and Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry approach the end of their respective terms. These two institutions have effectively self-selecting control over their membership and leadership appointments, and are likely to continue to check parliament's freedom of action, potentially setting up deeper institutional clashes if a Sharif government chooses a course of more direct confrontation than its predecessor.

The new PML-N government takes office with many major challenges to resolve, including the ailing economy, tense relations with its neighbors to the east and west, and the continuing threat of domestic militancy. The PML-N, which played a patient waiting game in opposition throughout the PPP's tenure, can now credibly claim a mandate for action on many of these issues. But even with a stronger base of support in its home province of Punjab and in the national parliament, it will still face limits to its ability to push through new policies. Nonetheless, the transition from the PPP-led government at the end of its full term in office to a popularly elected successor is an important institutionalization of the democratic process as a means of resolving political disputes, and a hopeful sign for Pakistan's future political stability.

Andrew Wilder is the Director of Afghanistan and Pakistan Programs at the United States Institute of Peace, where Colin Cookman is a researcher. The views reflected here are their own.

Pakistan's election hopefuls have expressed strong and vocal opposition to U.S. drone strikes within the country.

Pakistan People's Party chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, who participated in a government that visibly failed to do much to prevent drone strikes for five years, recently insisted that such strikes are "counter-productive."

Nawaz Sharif, leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and two-time former prime minister, similarly lambasted the U.S. policy saying that "Drone attacks are against the national sovereignty and a challenge for the country's autonomy and independence. Therefore, we won't tolerate these attacks in our territorial jurisdictions."

And no one has been more vocal and stringent in his opposition to drones than the chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf party, Imran Khan, the increasingly popular and charismatic contender for prime minister. Khan has even gone so far as to promise that, if elected, his government will shoot down any drone that crosses into Pakistan after May 11.

Yet, despite all the heavy pre-election posturing and rhetoric, the million rupee question remains: is Pakistan legally entitled to shoot down U.S. drones that enter its territory?

The short answer is yes. Unless it has consented to the use of drones in its territory, Pakistan most certainly can shoot them down as a matter of international law.

The United Nations Charter-a treaty which virtually all states in the world have agreed to follow and one that is sometimes touted as the "constitution of the international community"-forbids states from using force in another state unless it is used 1) in self-defense to repel an "armed attack"; 2) with the approval of the U.N. Security Council; or 3) because the state in which force is being used has consented to it.

That is, the U.S. drone war must fall within one of these exceptions to be legal.

We know the U.N. Security Council has never authorized the use of U.S. drones in Pakistan. And neither has Pakistan ever engaged in an "armed attack" against the United States, nor has the United States claimed as much. That leaves consent as the only legal justification for the program.

While, as I have previously written, claims of a denial of consent by the Pakistani government should be viewed with some skepticism-especially in light of former president Pervez Musharraf's admission that he allowed a ‘few' drone strikes to take place-publicly and for all official purposes, the Pakistani government vehemently denies that it has ever consented to U.S. drones being operated in its territory. In fact, in 2011, Pakistan shut down a CIA base which was being used to launch drones.

Further, Ben Emmerson QC, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Counter-Terrorism and Human Rights, has certainly been persuaded by Pakistan's narrative that there is no "tacit consent by Pakistan to the use of drones on its territory". In a recent news article, he categorically stated that drone strikes were a "violation of Pakistan's sovereignty".

Assuming then that consent has not been given by Pakistan, the use of drones in its territory would prima facie be an illegal use of force against a sovereign nation. Pakistan would thus be well within its rights, under international law, to destroy any drone that crosses into its airspace.

Now, here's where things do get slightly complicated. Sometimes when military force is used abroad in countries which have not really attacked the "defending state," new theories can be innovated to justify such force; and the drone war in Pakistan is no exception.

Some U.S. lawyers, including Eric Holder, John Brennan, and John Bellinger have argued that drone strikes in Pakistan are a legal form of "self-defense" because Pakistan is "unwilling or unable" to prevent threats to the United States.

This is also one of the main messages of the Department of Justice memo which essentially argues that the United States has a right, under international law, to kill persons in other countries-via drones or other means-that it determines are "associated" with al-Qaeda and who pose an "imminent threat" to the United States if the country where such individuals are allegedly based is "unwilling or unable" to do so itself. Consent is desirable but not necessary.  

As I wrote in a recent journal article, this argument is very controversial and has little legal traction. Pakistan could, if it wanted to, easily challenge this doctrine as being of dubious and weak legal pedigree.

First, international law does not allow a state to unilaterally attack targets within another state to eliminate potential "threats." An armed attack must have occurred or at least be imminent against the self-defending state for an argument of self-defense to have any legal grounding.

Second, while Pakistan is legally obliged to use "best efforts" to prevent individuals on its territory from launching armed attacks against other states, unless it can be proven that Pakistan has in fact supported these individuals by, for example, supplying them with weapons or other forms of assistance, Pakistani territory cannot be attacked simply because Pakistan is allegedly "unwilling or unable" to suppress such individuals.  

To be sure, Pakistan may still be liable for reparations or other measures for failing to prevent an attack against another state, but this failure does not translate into a right for another state to conduct lethal drone attacks in its territory as a unilateral "self-help" measure.

Third, prominent American legal scholars, including Mary Ellen O'Connell and Eric Posner, have rejected the international legality of the "unwilling or unable" doctrine. In fact, apart from the United States, only three countries-Israel, Russia, and Turkey-have explicitly invoked some variant of this theory in the past fifty years or more. But even these countries, on the rare occasion when they have done so, have never justified their actions as motivated by a legal obligation.

And most importantly, the International Court of Justice-the principal judicial organ of the United Nations and popularly known as the "World Court"-agrees. It has on two recent occasions-one concerning Uganda and the other Israel-passed judgment that weak states cannot be attacked and invaded because they failed to prevent individuals in their territory from launching attacks abroad.  

And for good reason too. A theory that permits the use of force in a state such as Pakistan because it is "unwilling or unable" to do something opens up far too many loopholes for aggression and makes the prohibition against the use of force contained in the U.N. Charter somewhat redundant.

To put it succinctly, if the new Pakistani government were to argue that the use of drones within its territory are illegal and were indeed bold enough to take the unprecedented step of shooting one down, it would have a strong case under international law that it was acting in "self-defense," provided it has not consented to drone strikes.

Of course, just because an action is legally sound does not mean that it is politically feasible. The Wall Street Journal previously reported that "Pakistan has considered shooting down a drone to reassert control over the country's airspace but shelved the idea as needlessly provocative." And one can see why.

Unfortunately, that is one limitation that smaller states sometimes face when they try to assert their international legal rights against a far more powerful state.

Nevertheless, as far as international law goes, yes Mr. Khan, absent consent, you are free to shoot down any drones that enter into Pakistani territory.

Dawood I. Ahmed is a lawyer and a doctoral candidate in international law at the University of Chicago. He is the author of the forthcoming article "Defending Weak States Against the ‘Unwilling or Unable' Doctrine of Self-Defense," which can be found online here

When Amb. James Dobbins arrives at the ground-floor offices of the State Department's Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan he will find a depleted staff, a moribund peace process and a mandate riddled with colossal diplomatic challenges. Secretary of State John Kerry called today's state of affairs a "pivotal moment" for the two nations. But it is also a critical moment for U.S. involvement in ending the conflict President Barack Obama once called the war "that we have to win" and now wants only to "responsibly" wind down.

Dobbins is a veteran of uphill assignments.  He oversaw the return of the American flag over a newly reopened U.S. Embassy in Kabul in 2001.  In addition to Afghanistan, he has served in Kosovo, Bosnia, Haiti, and Somalia.  Not exactly a list of luxe diplomatic posts.

As Dobbins prepares to assume his post on 23^rd St, a series of open questions await his attention. Three of the biggest are below.

1)    Troops: Just how many U.S. troops will remain in Afghanistan after 2014?  That question remains unanswered as the United States continues to negotiate an agreement with Afghanistan on the shape of the U.S. military presence post-2014. Gen. James Mattis, who most recently served as the commander of U.S. Central Command, is on the record pushing for more than 13,000 troops. Most numbers out of the Pentagon and the White House come in at less than that.  The State Department's Robert Blake noted recently that "we are still in the process of thinking through what our final military presence will be in Afghanistan after the end of the transition at the end of 2014." Exactly when that will be and what shape it will take remains to be seen.

Also an open question: how many Afghan troops will be needed? And how many will be funded? Those two numbers may well end up being different. And the latter should be known sooner rather than later.

2)    Peace process: Right now there is not one of substance to speak of. What shape might one take? The window for action is rapidly closing as frustration between Pakistan and Afghanistan remains very much alive, with Afghanistan arguing that Pakistan looks favorably on Afghan instability. Will Afghanistan and Pakistan agree to agree on conditions for talks?  And what role will the Americans take? Sec. Kerry met last month in Belgium with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistani General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and vowed to "under-promise but deliver" as the sides "continue a very specific dialogue on both the political track as well as the security track." What, if anything, the dialed-down dialog yields will be watched carefully as nearly all sides agree that a diplomatic solution - one in which human rights are not made the price of peace - is the lone shot at a lasting and durable peace.

3)    Transition: whither and at what pace will security, political and economic transitions continue? So far, the economic transition has been bolstered by GDP numbers that have been better than expected.  As the World Bank noted, "rapid economic growth" has been accompanied by "relatively low inflation."  But the government is overwhelmingly dependent on foreign coffers for its funding -- civilian aid alone is "estimated at more than US$6 billion a year, or nearly 40 percent of GDP" - and as those dollars dry up, the questions of stability and security arise immediately.  A recent IMF report mentioned by the New York Times notes that tax evasion, corruption and declining growth all mean that the government will find it tough to pay even half of its bills this year. Stories of graft and CIA-filled slush funds do not lead to greater confidence in the Afghan government from either the American public paying for it or the Afghan people who will pay the price of chaos and a political power vacuum.

These are only the most pressing of a rash of questions sure to occupy Amb. Dobbins on Day One.  Fortunately for both Sec. Kerry and Amb. Dobbins, the SRAP position does not require Senate confirmation, so they can get down to work quickly - as they must. The U.S. is speeding toward the end of the NATO combat mission, and both diplomats will soon be hard-pressed to find answers.

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon is fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of The Dressmaker of Khair Khana.

The looming drawdown of U.S. and NATO troops from Afghanistan in 2014 has raised a multitude of concerns, among them fear that the al-Qaeda organization in Pakistan [hereafter AQC] will return to set up camp. This is overwrought. Any residual U.S. force should contain a heavy concentration of Special Forces operators whose top priority will be hunting al-Qaeda remnants who move back across the border into Afghanistan. AQC may be able to carve out small pieces of territory, but even a small number of U.S. troops in tandem with unmanned aerial vehicles should ensure it enjoys little more freedom of movement than at present in Pakistan's Tribal Areas.

Pakistani militants are likely to receive less attention. This is understandable. Yet their access to territory in Afghanistan, alongside the sanctuaries they already enjoy in Pakistan, is cause for significant concern, as it may amplify the threats they pose to India, to Pakistan, and to U.S. interests in the region. Moreover, as Secretary of State John Kerry seeks to jumpstart stalled peace negotiations, it is worth noting that their presence in Afghanistan further complicates the already tortuous search for a settlement.

Home Away from Home

Most of the major Pakistani militant groups and a host of minor ones are active in Afghanistan. They fight alongside the Afghan Taliban and Haqqani Network, both of which enjoy sanctuary in and support from Pakistan. Some Pakistani organizations are also engaged in a revolutionary jihad against their own government, with the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan leading that charge. Organizationally, whether to wage war against the state is the greatest dividing line among militant groups endogenous to and based in Pakistan. Operationally, it does not preclude collaboration on either side of the Durand Line.

Anti-state militants displaced by Pakistani military incursions into FATA and the Swat Valley in 2009-2010 have regrouped across the border in Afghanistan. From there, they launch cross-border raids into Pakistan. The two countries have been waging a low-level border war since the late 2000s, fueling suspicions in Pakistan that Afghan forces are providing sanctuary and support to these militants. Even if true, such assistance would pale in comparison to Pakistan's well-documented support for insurgents fighting in Afghanistan.

Militants fighting against the Pakistani state are sometimes co-located in Northeastern Afghanistan with those from Pakistan's proxy organizations, most notably members of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) who have been active there since the mid-2000s. Though still small in number, LeT's presence in Afghanistan has grown since 2010. This likely owes to an increased need for a safety release valve following pressure on the group to reduce its India-centric activities after the 2008 Mumbai attacks, as well as the appeal of the Afghan front for those motivated to fight America or simply to join the biggest jihad in town. Pakistan's intelligence services also may have endorsed this expansion as a means of gathering information about those anti-state militants pushed across the border. The past several years have witnessed attempts by LeT to solidify its presence in the Salafi-strongholds of northern Afghanistan where the group has longstanding roots.

In short, though militants overwhelmingly remain based across the border in Pakistan, Northeastern Afghanistan has become a sanctuary not only for Pakistani militants arrayed against the state, but also those aligned with it.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

No one knows with certainty how the conflict in Afghanistan will evolve once U.S. and NATO troops draw down or what the cascading impacts will be on Pakistan, India or the region. But several broad pathways are easy to envision. The worst-case scenario is a conflagration that draws in regional actors, most notably India. The more likely outcome is an ongoing insurgency that does not lead to the overthrow of the state, but also does not escalate into a full-blown proxy war involving countries other than Afghanistan and Pakistan. Hopes for a political settlement between the Afghan government and the insurgents don't look good at present, but even this best-case result wouldn't come without challenges. In all cases, the drawdown of U.S. and NATO forces brings with it the opportunity for Pakistani militants - pro- and anti-state - to take greater advantage of cross-border sanctuaries in Afghanistan.

In the absence of a negotiated settlement and amidst an ongoing insurgency, relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan could deteriorate further, leading Kabul to provide the TTP and associated anti-Pakistan militants the type of support Islamabad already suspects they are receiving. As a result, Pakistan could face not only a domestic jihadist insurgency, but also the sort of durable threat of cross-border jihadist violence that it has long supported against its neighbors. Moreover, an escalating proxy war could create conditions for a greater instability along both sides of the border. A conflict that draws in regional actors, particularly India, would exacerbate this dynamic. But even increased bilateral tensions, fueling and fueled by a cross-border proxy war, would have a destabilizing impact. For U.S. officials, this would further complicate an already labyrinthine regional environment and could impact the operations of any residual force.

Regardless of the outcome in Afghanistan, LeT is likely to keep a small presence in the Northeast where its members have worked to carve out territory. The group is also likely to agitate for regenerating the jihad directly against India, both in the form of terrorist attacks against the mainland and increased activity in Kashmir. The latter has been torpid since the late 2000s. Several incidents there this year may augur the rumblings of renewed jihadist activity, though it is too early to know whether they will amount to much. Important here is that access to safe haven in Afghanistan for LeT and other Pakistani proxy groups conceivably reduces ISI situational awareness of what their members there are doing. This would increase plausible deniability for militant leaders under some form of Pakistani state control and, thus, for the Pakistani state itself. Each could conceivably claim they did not sanction plots orchestrated from across the border, with the result being to heighten the likelihood of such attacks occurring. This is of most concern to New Delhi. Given LeT's past readiness to include Westerners in its target set for attacks in India, this rightly concerns U.S. policymakers and practitioners too.

In the event of a settlement that enabled the Afghan Taliban and Haqqani Network to migrate back across the border into Afghanistan, it is possible that elements from among them would provide at least a modicum of assistance to India-centric groups with factions operating there. More troubling, it is far from certain that all Afghan-centric militants would buy into any settlement. Questions exist regarding how much control the Quetta Shura (leaders of the Afghan Taliban currently or previously based in Quetta, Balochistan) has over its own foot soldiers, much less those operating under the banner of the Haqqani Network or the Pakistani Taliban. Some could be expected to fight on and, depending on the posture of the Pakistani state, to assist the TTP in launching cross-border attacks as well. Once again, the result could be a durable threat of cross-border jihadist violence. As a result, accounting for Islamabad's compulsions vis-à-vis those militant groups straddling the Durand Line and waging a domestic insurgency against Pakistan also adds another wrinkle to any peace negotiations.

One Factor Among Many

Multiple variables including host nation preferences, domestic political and budgetary constraints and broader U.S. defense policy objects will (and should) determine the size, composition, and focus of any residual U.S. force in Afghanistan post-2014. It is unrealistic to imagine that the main focus of any residual force will not remain on supporting the Afghan National Army and targeting al-Qaeda along with other actors that have the intent and capabilities to launch transnational attacks. However, the presence of anti-Pakistan militants and possibility for escalating cross-border jihadist violence means U.S. and NATO officials will need to contend with whether to target them too.

Doing so could help serve a political purpose, reducing the threat to Pakistan's internal stability and in so doing possibly helping to defuse regional tensions. However, there is no guarantee such a payoff would accrue. More tangibly, it might provide a means for transactional targeting, i.e. the U.S. removes anti-Pakistani militants from the Afghan battlefield in exchange for assistance capturing, killing or otherwise curtailing militants of significant concern in Pakistan. Yet even this would mean sparing sparse resources and require buy-in from a host government in Kabul that has very different priorities.

Hunting India-centric militants hiding in Afghanistan, though likely to engender less animosity in Kabul, would come with its own set of hurdles. To begin with, debates persist about the costs and benefits of aggressively pursuing the small number of LeT militants in Afghanistan if the group is not actively targeting the U.S. homeland. The direct threat consists primarily in the form of terrorist attacks against India that could include Western interests. Indirectly, of course, are concerns another Indo-Pak crisis might eventuate. Either way, it is unclear what role, if any, the small number of LeT militants in Afghanistan would play in generating such attacks. As already noted, the more relevant issue is one of plausible deniability. This suggests the need to realign intelligence officers and analysts whose expertise will be essential for identifying emerging and evolving jihadist threats in the region, thus making it more difficult for militants to carry forward plots or plausibly claim no involvement in them.

The U.S. invaded Afghanistan and re-forged its relationship with Pakistan in order to destroy al-Qaeda Central. Finishing that job is important. However, with the drawdown looming and AQC's capability to strike the homeland severely degraded, Washington must begin reorienting its South Asian counterterrorism architecture in line with the decreasing threat from al-Qaeda and growing potential for regional attacks against U.S. interests and regional instability post-2014. Although it is but one component among many, the availability of sanctuary for Pakistani militants in Afghanistan should inform this process. It also must factor in broader U.S. foreign and defense policy planning for South Asia, including any strategy designed to reach a negotiated settlement in Afghanistan.

Stephen Tankel is an assistant professor at American University and a non-resident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. His next book, provisionally titled Peripheral Jihads, explores how jihadist groups in S. Asia, the Middle East and N. Africa adapted to the post-9/11 environment and will be published by Columbia University Press in 2014.

Diego Cordovez and Selig S. Harrison, Out of Afghanistan: The Inside Story of the Soviet Withdrawal (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995)

Roderic Braithwaite, Afgantsy: The Russians in Afghanistan 1979-89 (London: Profile Books, 2011)

Artemy M. Kalinovsky, A Long Goodbye: The Soviet Withdrawal from Afghanistan (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2011)

The idea that history offers lessons for the present is uncontroversial and common to the point of cliché.  Yet, American foreign policy decisions often proceed with barely a look to the past.  And so we were informed in 2009 by then-Undersecretary of Defense for Policy Michèle Flournoy, likely to return as a fixture in future Democratic administrations, "[T]here's absolutely no valid comparison between the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan" and the U.S.-led campaign to enable the Afghan people to "reclaim their country."  Is that so? 

In her award-winning book about the Vietnam War, Fire in the Lake, Frances FitzGerald states:

Americans ignore history, for them everything has always seemed new under the sun....Americans see history as a straight line and themselves standing at the cutting edge of it as representatives for all mankind.  They believe in the future as if it were a religion; they believe that there is nothing they cannot accomplish, that solutions wait somewhere for all problems like brides.

Just as history's lessons were dismissed as advisers begat brigades in the jungles of Southeast Asia, the Soviet experience in Afghanistan has been discarded as irrelevant to our own war by American policymakers, commanders, and commentators.  This has left us, in the words of Lord Butler of Brockwell, "like a driver who commits to some manoeuvre in the road without looking into the rear mirror."  Indeed, American leaders believe we are on a different road entirely.  While there are significant differences between the two interventions, the road winds through the same mountains.

Two books released as the latest incarnation of foreign intervention winds down - one by Rodric Braithwaite and the other by Artemy Kalinovsky - tell the troubled tale of the Soviet intervention and withdrawal.  In doing so, they shatter mischaracterizations that prevent the West from looking to this decade as a source of lessons.   The only major flaws of these books, Afgantsy and The Long Goodbye, is that they were published years too late to serve as rejoinders to Undersecretary Flournoy and others who came before her who insisted that Afghanistan, in the words of former Secretary of State Colin Powell, stood "at the dawn of a new day." 

Yet, while Braithwaite and especially Kalinovksy draw on previously unpublished Soviet records and interviews, they were not the first to strike at the myths of the Soviet intervention rooted in the Cold War.  Almost twenty years ago, Diego Cordovez, the U.N.'s point man on Afghanistan in the 1980s, and journalist Selig S. Harrison produced the insightful Out of Afghanistan: The Inside Story of the Soviet Withdrawal.  These three books demand to be read and revisited in combination.   They very much complement each other.  Braithwaite's Afgantsy provides a vivid, novelistic account of the war in its entirety.  Kalinovsky's more scholarly text provides the oft-missing Soviet perspective based on Politburo records, now housed at the Wilson Center thanks to Kalinovsky himself.  Cordovez and Harrison give us the ultimate insider's account, bringing readers along for the ride as the U.N. emissary shuttles back and forth between Moscow, Washington, Kabul, and Islamabad, furiously working to get deadly foes to sit down at a table and talk.

The common Western narrative holds that once Soviet forces crossed their southern border into Afghanistan in December 1979, they were modern-day Cossacks waging a war of unmitigated brutality.  With U.S. support, the noble mujahideen prevailed.  This narrative, rooted in the hostile spirit of the Cold War, tells us we have nothing to learn from the Soviets in Afghanistan because our mission is so different in its purpose, aims and methods.   Our very nature is so different that comparisons are useless.   Or so we tell ourselves, and in doing so ignore the nuances of history. 

The Soviets also had trouble reconciling their mission with Afghan history.  In one memorable exchange captured by Kalinovsky, Soviet Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister Mikhail Kapista cited the British experience in Afghanistan in the 19^th Century.  Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko responded, "Do you mean to compare our internationalist troops with imperialist troops?"  Kapitsa retorted, "No, our troops are different - but the mountains are the same!"

There are many aspects of the Soviet experience relevant to the current U.S.-led campaign, but none are more relevant to the present day than the Soviet efforts to achieve a negotiated settlement and withdraw their military forces.  On these aspects of the war before the war, these three books have a great deal to say, primarily by way of three key lessons:  Even a "reconciliation" that promises substantial government concessions may not succeed. Timing is everything. Pakistan is not to be trusted.  

Reconciliation

By the time Mikhail Gorbachev ascended to power in 1985, the view that the Soviet war in Afghanistan was a quagmire was commonly held in the Politburo and in the military. Frustration with Afghan partners - particularly General Secretary Babrak Karmal - was at an all-time high, leading to his replacement with Mohammad Najibullah in 1986.  Gorbachev came to accept that the Soviets would not leave a socialist government in their wake, but he was not ready to abandon their client regime entirely. He pushed a second, internal track on Najibullah: the policy of "National Reconciliation," which was far reaching in its concessions to the mujahideen.

The reconciliation program sought to reach out to biddable elements in the armed opposition, as well as non-Communist political and religious leaders not involved in the rebellion. In doing so, they sought to strengthen the position of the Afghan armed forces.  Through a re-tooled aid package, more emphasis on outreach to tribes, efforts to make Afghan officials more independent, and dialogue with insurgent commanders, the Soviets hoped to set the conditions for a durable state as they planned to withdraw. Attempts to make the Afghan government more representative, rather than dominated by the ruling People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), were key.  The new policy was announced in December 1986. That same month, Gorbachev called Najibullah to Moscow and informed him that a military withdrawal from Afghanistan was now official Soviet policy. The government, with Soviet advisers over their shoulders, drew up a new constitution that established "an Islamic legal system run by an independent judiciary, greater freedom of speech, and the election of a president by a loya jirga assembly consisting of parliament and tribal and religious leaders."

While sensible, the National Reconciliation program arrived too late.  All sides were too entrenched.  The Khalq and Parcham factions of the PDPA were still at loggerheads.  The "Peshawar Seven" and "Tehran Eight" mujahideen parties were strong and confident in the countryside and the mountains, dripping with a desire for revenge and a hatred of the Kabul-based government.  The Pakistanis and the Americans doubted the Soviets and the Afghan government were serious about a negotiated settlement.  And they understood that, regardless of Soviet intentions, a compromise on their parts was not necessary.  One independent-minded Soviet colonel wrote in a letter: "[O]ne has to keep in mind that the counter-revolution is aware of the strategic decision of the Soviet leadership to withdraw the Soviet troops from the DRA [Democratic Republic of Afghanistan] ...The counter-revolution will not be satisfied with partial power today, knowing that tomorrow it can have it all."

Timing

Gorbachev also fumbled the timing of announcing troop withdrawals. In February 1988, against the advice of the Soviet negotiating team in Geneva, Gorbachev announced a full withdrawal would begin on May 15, assuming an agreement was reached in Geneva.  He hoped that his announcement and the signing of the accords would induce the United States and Pakistan to cease arming the mujahideen.  According to Harrison, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze had warned Gorbachev that "a formal commitment to a specific target date would give the impression of an urgent need to withdraw." Gorbachev was wrong and Shevardnadze was right.  The withdrawal timeline was one of the few cards the Soviets had left in their deck and Gorbachev gave it away.   Subsequent Soviet efforts to negotiate directly with the Peshawar Seven and Tehran Eight were futile.

In response to Gorbachev's announcement, U.S. Secretary of State George P. Schultz demanded that the the two superpowers take a symmetrical approach to the withdrawal of military aid to their respective proxies. In other words, American aid to the mujahideen and Soviet aid to the government would be withdrawn simultaneously. Early drafts of the accords had not envisioned symmetry. Gorbachev was apoplectic, but it was too late.  

Moscow had greater concerns linked to a successful withdrawal from Afghanistan - namely negotiations over American nuclear-tipped missiles in Europe. Success in these negotiations depended on improving relations with the United States.  And so, on April 14, 1988, the Geneva Accords were signed.  They committed the Soviets to execute a "front-loaded" withdrawal within nine months. The United States and the USSR agreed to "positive symmetry," meaning that aid continued to the mujahideen and the Afghan government alike, rather than negative symmetry, which would have withdrawn aid to both.  Besides, the Soviet leadership believed that the Accords, which prohibited Pakistani interference and intervention in Afghan affairs, would mitigate the problem of aid to the mujahideen. At any rate, Gorbachev assured Najibullah that, "Even in the harshest, most difficult circumstances, even under conditions of strict control - in any situation, we will provide you with arms."  Like the rest of the world, neither of them anticipated the dissolution of the Soviet Union less than four years later.

Pakistan

Pakistan has three interests vis-à-vis Afghanistan that endure to the present day: blunting Pashtun nationalism, preventing strategic encirclement by India, and maintaining strategic depth against India.  Support for violent Islamist non-state actors, from the Taliban of the present to the Peshawar Seven of the 1980s, has allowed them to accomplish all three.  With Pakistan under the leadership of pro-Islamist Zia ul Haq, the idea of a socialist state and Soviet forces on Pakistan's border was intolerable.

As early as 1980, the Central Committee of the Politburo in Moscow understood Pakistan was the key, and envisioned, according to Politburo records, "a complex of bilateral agreements between Afghanistan and its neighbors, above all Pakistan, and systems of corresponding guarantees from the USSR, USA."  As such, the USSR and the Republic of Afghanistan signed the Geneva Accords, which committed Afghanistan and Pakistan to mutual relations, non-interference and non-intervention as well as to "interrelationships for the settlement of the situation." The Geneva Accords committed Pakistan to cease support for the mujahideen.  As Cordovez explains, the whole negotiations process was premised on "international disengagement" that would "allow the Afghans themselves to sort out their differences." 

Anyone hoping for Pakistani "disengagement" was disappointed.  According to Shultz, when President Reagan asked Zia how he would counter Soviet accusations that aid to the mujahideen continued, Zia responded, "We will deny that there is any aid going through our territory.  After all, that's what we have been doing for eight years."  The UN monitoring mission - the key enforcement mechanism of the Accords - was an embarrassing failure.  Before the ink on the Accords was dry, the Soviets and Afghan government began lodging legitimate complaints against Pakistani violations of the agreements.   At one point, President Zia told the Soviet ambassador to Kabul that he would support a coalition that was divided in three between the former PDPA, "moderates," and the mujahideen.  We do not know if he was serious, however, because the offer ended with the Pakistani leader's own life when his plane crashed later that summer.  What we do know is that Pakistan has always sought to be kingmaker in Afghanistan, regardless of what outside powers do. 

In the face of these treaty violations, the Soviet leadership hinted they might keep their military forces in Afghanistan beyond the withdrawal deadline if the accords were not strictly adhered to.  The bluff failed.  The Soviets continued to withdraw their forces.  The last of them crossed back into the Soviet Union on February 15, 1989.  

The Nuances of History

History has not repeated itself in Afghanistan, but it has rhymed.  There are important differences between the Soviet and U.S.-led campaigns that are worth keeping in mind.  Brutal Soviet tactics, particularly early in the war, targeted entire communities.  This had a direct effect on how the international community, Pakistan, and the mujahideen responded, particularly in terms of their recalcitrance to negotiate in good faith. The Soviet campaign was more deadly and indiscriminant in its violence, resulting in the deaths of up to a million Afghans - about 9% of the Afghan population at the time (admittedly, this figure is debatable). By the time of the Soviet withdrawal, there were millions of Afghan refugees in Iran and Pakistan.  Since the U.S.-led intervention began in 2001, most of these refugees have returned.

The scholar Louis Dupree described the Soviet strategy as "migratory genocide."  In other words, the Soviets sought, in some provinces, to depopulate the countryside, the powerbase of the rebels.  Joseph Collins, a longtime observer of Afghanistan, argued that for the Soviets, "[t]here was no talk about protecting the population; Soviet operations were all about protecting the regime and furthering Soviet control."  Later in the war, the Soviets became obsessed with connecting the government and the population - but still, the Soviet campaign stands in contrast to that waged by ISAF, which has focused on controlling key rural areas and protecting rural communities.  There has been operational success on this front.  While there is reason to doubt these gains will endure, in this respect, the West has learned from the Soviet experience.  Now, it is time for the West, and America in particular, to learn from how they negotiated their withdrawal so as not to repeat their mistakes.

In January, Afghan forces shot grenades and bullets at a remote village in Nangarhar province, in eastern Afghanistan. One civilian died, and villagers rushed six other injured residents to the hospital in Jalalabad. Nasir saw it all happen. He then had to beg $11,000 from friends and relatives to cover medical care for his injured family members.

Several days later, Nasir asked the district chief of police why Afghan forces fired on the village.  "We had an intelligence report that insurgents were in the village and we wanted to scare them, so we just started firing on the village," the police chief told him. Furious, Nasir complained to the Afghan Army Regional Corps Commander and the Provincial Governor's office to no avail. He went to the Governor's office itself to demand an investigation and financial help for the medical bills. An official there told him to rewrite his complaint letter to blame opposition forces. When Nasir refused to lie, he was turned away.

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated case.  Of the hundred or so families I interviewed with my colleagues for a report by Center for Civilians in Conflict, most say they've received nothing from their government for deaths or injuries caused by Afghan forces.

One major reason these families are ignored is that Afghan officials often refuse to acknowledge that its security forces cause civilian casualties in the first place. Over the past year, Center for Civilians in Conflict interviewed other civilians harmed by the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) whose complaints were ignored by their government. And we're not the only ones to notice. In its latest protection of civilians report, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) noted: "UNAMA is concerned by the reluctance of ANSF leadership to acknowledge civilian casualties caused by ANSF. Senior ANP [Afghan National Police] and ANA [Afghan National Army] senior officers consistently asserted that ANSF do not cause civilian casualties."

Like Nasir, some of the civilians we interviewed appealed to Afghan officials for an investigation and assistance in response to deaths and injuries caused by Afghan forces. But local Afghan officials frequently denied that harm had been done, cast blame on other warring parties, or were wholly indifferent. While Afghan government programs exist in principle to ease the suffering of all civilian victims of the conflict, in practice the government rarely investigates, holds accountable, or offers assistance to those harmed by its own security forces.

This is a disturbing trend, and eerily similar to how the United States and other international forces dealt with civilian casualties at the start of their time in Afghanistan. The civilian casualties they caused-and ignored-generated anger and harsh criticism from ordinary Afghans and President Karzai.  Commanders eventually recognized that their mission was undermined every time Afghan civilians are killed or injured by international forces.

Civilian harm caused by Afghan forces hasn't yet generated the same level of local anger, nor had the same strategic effect, for two main reasons. First, Afghans have historically been opposed to the presence of foreign forces on their soil. Civilian harm caused by international forces played into these anti-foreigner sentiments. In contrast, many Afghans I have met expressed pride in their security forces, particularly the Afghan army. Second, the ANSF have not yet caused as many civilian casualties as international forces or the Taliban, primarily because they have not been in the lead during combat operations.  As could have been predicted, ANSF-caused civilian casualties are increasing as Afghan forces assume control of their country.

Civilian deaths caused by Afghan forces are beginning to spark some protests, albeit less frequently than when international forces are responsible for such incidents. Over time, it's easy to see how Afghan forces could lose the support of their people. Three weeks ago, an elder from Nangarhar told me, "[Afghan forces] call us insurgents. That is why they kill us. Some Taliban are in our villages, but many are ordinary civilians. The Afghan army chases them and when they go to the villages [the Afghan army] shoots civilians...We are upset with both sides-the government and the Taliban. They shouldn't be killing us.  The Taliban and the ANSF are the same."

To be fair, the Taliban and other armed opposition groups are responsible for the overwhelming amount of civilian casualties. Many Afghan officials are quick to highlight this fact in an apparent strategy to deflect criticism. But, that is no excuse for the Afghan government to ignore civilians harmed by its own security forces. The population is looking to them not only for security but also to be an honest broker-capable of protecting, serving, and taking responsibility for its actions. That means Afghan forces, and the government behind them, need to avoid civilian harm and respond with integrity when civilian casualties do happen.  

Best practices can be found close to home. In 2008, international forces began noticeable efforts to better prevent and respond to civilian casualties they caused.  Instead of frequently denying responsibility for them and not offering any assistance in the aftermath, international forces started building up policies and practices that sought to avoid civilian casualties and dignify the families left behind when civilians were killed or injured.  They saw this shift as both a strategic and a humanitarian imperative.

To start, ISAF instituted a mechanism within command headquarters to track and investigate civilian harm, analyze it for lessons learned to help prevent recurrence, and respond to allegations of civilian casualties with timely information rather than denials.  Some international forces began offering monetary payments to civilians in recognition of their losses and as a culturally appropriate gesture of dignity.

These practices are by no means perfect and we still meet many civilians harmed by international forces who are not offered the assistance they deserve. But ISAF policies to track, analyze, and respond to civilian casualties have meant fewer civilians are harmed and the response to many incidents of civilian harm has improved. In 2012, UNAMA found that international military forces caused 491 civilian casualties, a marked reduction from 2009, when they were responsible for 1008 civilian deaths and injuries. For the Afghan government not to enact similar policies is a wasted opportunity to learn from past mistakes.

It's not too late. There are two ways to prove to the Afghan people that their forces are there to help, not to cause more harm.

First, Afghan forces need to own up to the harm they cause. They need a fully operational civilian casualty mitigation team-similar to what ISAF created-housed in the National Security Council. It should be staffed professionally and be responsible for tracking, investigating, and responding to civilian harm. Last summer, the Afghan President's Office began a worthwhile effort to track civilian casualties caused by Afghan forces. But the main input to this system is reporting from Afghan forces spread out in the provinces-a dispersed system that is woefully weak. The effort will certainly fail unless this reporting structure is strengthened and all data gets from the countryside to the capital.  Investigations and harm response procedures need a major overhaul, as both are inadequate to actually identify and help civilians harmed.  (Civilian harm that violates international or domestic law should be dealt with through separate legal channels.)

Second, the Afghan government should offer financial help to civilians harmed by Afghan forces.  There are already two programs in effect to assist war victims, but they don't go nearly far enough, and civilians harmed by Afghan forces are rarely offered help. One program-called the Code 99 Fund-is housed in President Karzai's office and gives payments of about $2,000 for family members killed and about $1,000 for conflict-related injuries. Another program, under the Ministry of Labor, Social Affairs, Martyrs, and Disabled, offers smaller monthly sums for conflict-related losses. In our interviews, we found that nearly all recipients of this aid were harmed by the Taliban or international forces. 

One simple reason civilians harmed by Afghan forces don't get as much help is that the forces responsible don't have a way of referring people to these assistance programs. That's an obvious fix that's needed and could be immediately rectified by creating protocols for what to do once a civilian has been harmed. When I met with the spokesperson for the Afghan Ministry of Defense several weeks ago, he agreed that such procedures should be developed for the Afghan Army.  The Ministry of Defense, Interior, as well as the National Directorate of Security-all of which oversee elements of the ANSF-should act without delay to create these channels for getting civilians through the system.

The United States and its allies shifted tactics to better avoid and respond to civilian casualties in Afghanistan, but they're not off the hook yet. They can and should do more to ensure that the security forces they leave behind are professional and accountable, including supporting the Afghan government in creating a civilian casualty mitigation team and fixing its assistance programs. The US and NATO allies currently offer $6 billion each year to pay for the ANSF, so they have plenty of leverage.  Donors should strongly encourage the Afghan government to direct a small amount of those funds towards these civilian-centered initiatives. Whether or not Afghan forces are prepared to avoid and respond appropriately to civilian harm will ultimately reflect on the U.S.-led mission in Afghanistan.

As Afghan forces take the lead, ordinary Afghans will judge their security forces by how they treat civilians. That means both their ability to avoid harm to civilians during operations, and their response when civilian casualties occur. The Afghan government has something to prove, too, as its immediate and long-term legitimacy will very much depend on whether people like Nasir and his family are cared for, not ignored.

Trevor Keck is a Kabul based field researcher with Center for Civilians in Conflict.

*Names have been changed

As the United States and other NATO member countries gradually withdraw their troops from Afghanistan, a discussion is taking place on how to support the country after 2014. But the most important voice is missing: that of the Afghan people.

More than a decade of Western involvement has created an enormous industry of alleged experts who claim to have studied Afghanistan from top to bottom. But their authority belies a simple truth: these experts often have a surprisingly limited understanding of this complicated country. This is because even when these experts make it to the country they are writing about, they are sequestered to secure areas with limited access to ordinary Afghans, have little opportunity to travel outside Kabul, and are rarely given the time or resources to study the local languages beyond a few words. Put another way, the majority of the experts we rely on for advice in crafting policy and spending hundreds of millions of dollars have rarely had the experience of simply walking down the street and buying a piece of bread at a local bakery.

This has created a closed conversation loop, which has driven countless millions of dollars into research and initiatives designed to help Afghanistan, but is far removed from the realities of Afghan life and the needs of the country.

This may appear counterintuitive given the reams of literature prompted by this war. Since 2001, sociologists, political scientists, anthropologists, economists, historians, and even retired civil servants have made the trek to Afghanistan in large numbers to work and write. Hundreds of books and countless reports have emerged on a myriad of topics intended to benefit reconstruction, along with reprints of every text ever written by any military that has engaged Afghanistan, going all the way back to Alexander the Great.

This research has been aided by an unlikely partner: the military. Academia and the application of violence have rarely mixed well, but in the name of applied research to support reconstruction efforts, they joined forces in Afghanistan. In striking contrast to the Iraq War, academics were flown in to inform the decisions and actions of operations personnel. Suddenly anthropologists and sociologists were thrust to the forefront of a gargantuan military effort, led for a time by an Ivy League, PhD-wielding general who encouraged them at every turn. On the civilian side, funding by USAID alone for initiatives and research related to democracy, governance and elections skyrocketed, with spending reaching more than one billion dollars between 2007 and 2011.

Yet this cadre of experts was increasingly called upon to explain a country they were rarely able to see and experience, and therefore understand. The literature that followed, published overwhelmingly only in English and consumed and discussed by peers in similarly restrictive environments or overseas, slowly began to pull away from reality. Afghans watched as unfathomable amounts of money were spent on projects intended for their benefit, but about which they had rarely been consulted.

Now, as Afghanistan moves toward its post-2014 existence with fewer resources, it is more essential than ever that rigorous research be conducted to support achievable policy objectives that will benefit Afghanistan for years to come. But for this to happen, the Afghan voice must re-enter the discussion in a meaningful way. A few steps would go long way in ensuring they are heard.

First, donor agencies and other funding bodies should consider funding for the findings of any unclassified research to be published and disseminated through various media in the languages of Afghanistan, Dari and Pashtu. This inexpensive gesture would provide a steady stream of material to the local media, which, with more than 50 TV channels and 100 radio stations, is well suited to launch any discussion about what is good for the country.

Second, letting the researchers head out into the field would have an immediate impact, grounding them by exposing them to the ways Afghans live. With this, a more honest security assessment, rather than perpetual paranoia, would do wonders.  But if we cannot let the researchers out, presumably because of security concerns, we must invite key elements of Afghan society in. Instead of listening to the Afghan diaspora who often serve as advisors but who are not intimately tied to the fate of Afghanistan, we should call on the increasingly educated and eloquent youth, whose relatively unexamined views on the future are remarkably different from the ruling elite.

Perhaps most importantly, ask Afghans what kinds of changes they would like to see in their country beyond 2014. In the hundreds of focus group and panel discussions our organization has conducted with thousands of Afghans from all walks of life over the years, we have been struck by their pragmatic interests in maintaining newly constructed infrastructure, ensuring continued access to education and health services -- even for their daughters -- and in pursuing some sort of viable peace agreement with insurgents. We sometimes do not get the answers we would like to hear: Afghanistan remains deeply traditional, patrimonial and skeptical of change. But this makes asking Afghans - and sharing what we learn - all the more important: to ensure funds are spent on programs and initiatives that Afghans have concluded are beneficial, and not wasted on projects Westerners assume they should appreciate.

With foreign forces drawing down, Afghans are preparing to once again shoulder the burden of running their country. By seriously engaging Afghan society and working with them to create policy to help them achieve their own goals, we can support the gains that have been made over the last decade and ensure that the missing Afghan voice is brought back into the debate over the direction of the country.

Dr. Saeed Parto and Matthew Trevithick work at Afghanistan Public Policy Research Organization. On Twitter at @APPROCenter.

Better late than never? We know it's already halfway through February of 2013, but we'd still like to say congratulations to the authors whose AfPak Channel articles received the most views in 2012. The results reveal that AfPak Channel readers have varied interests -- from gender issues in Pakistan to Afghanistan's uncertain future to the controversy over U.S. drone strikes. If you haven't already read these, you can get started by following the links below, which are arranged in the order of views received, starting with the most-read.

1.       Pakistan's almost suicide bombers, by Hussain Nadim

2.       10 lessons the US should learn from Afghanistan's history, by William Byrd

3.       The once and future civil war in Afghanistan, by Ryan Evans

4.       President Karzai and the secondary sex, by Rachel Reid

5.       Imran Khan's new Pakistan, by Kiran Nazish

6.       Voice of a native son: Drones may be a necessary evil, by Zmarak Yousefzai

7.       Putting the Afghans in charge, by Roger D. Carstens

8.       Dodging the drones: How militants have responded to the covert U.S. campaign, by Aaron Y. Zelin

9.       The dishonorable defense of honor, by Rabail Baig

10.   Fixing Pakistan's tanking economy, by David Walters

Big thank you to all of our contributors for their hard work, excellent analysis, and love for all things AfPak.

Jennifer Rowland and Peter Bergen, Editors of the AfPak Channel

Pakistan's war against the Taliban and al-Qaeda in the northwest is taking a tremendous toll on the local population.  The military's killing of civilians, collective punishment of locals, and continued detention of thousands has produced an unprecedented level of animosity toward the federal government and security forces.

Last month, minority Hazaras in the restive southwestern city of Quetta used a new tactic to draw attention to the systematic killing of their community members by Sunni extremists.  They took the latest victims' bodies to the center of the city and staged a sit-in, refusing to bury the bodies until the military took over security in the city. 

The tactic inspired locals in the northwestern Federally Administered Tribal Regions (FATA) to stage a similar protest in Peshawar, refusing to bury 18 of their dead until the Pakistani government looked into the latest killings by security forces.  Locals say Pakistani security forces killed the civilians during a house to house search on the night of January 15th in Bara, a district in the Khyber Agency of FATA, just south of Peshawar.  Thousands of local tribesmen held a jirga, and decided to take the bodies to Peshawar, where they sat in front of the state government building. When a member of the national parliament showed up to talk, the protesters attacked him, forcing him to flee.  The tribesmen wanted the military to admit they killed civilians, compensate families of the dead, and pull out of their areas.

The military agreed to investigate the killings and compensate the families.  But if the tribesmen wanted the military to leave the region, they would be collectively held responsible for any problems involving militants in the future.

Two days after the Bara killings, Pakistani helicopter gunships struck homes near Mir Ali, a town in North Waziristan, killing five civilians, including two women and two children.  According to locals, the Pakistani military carried out the attack in response to an IED that destroyed a tank and killed two soldiers in Miran Shah.  North Waziristan's major tribes held a jirga and decided to observe a complete three day strike, demanding reparations and an end to civilian killings, and threatening to march on Islamabad. 

Safdar Dawar, a journalist from North Waziristan and head of the Tribal Union of Journalists, says the killings of civilians in Bara and Mir Ali are not unprecedented, but the widespread, well-organized response of the tribesmen has surprised many.

While the Hazara protest in Quetta drew massive media attention and the eventual ear of the national government, the hundreds of tribesman who protested in Peshawar were dispersed with batons and tear gas, the bodies of their family members forcibly buried by security forces.  The heavy-handed approach quickly drew condemnation from opposition political parties like the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf and Pakistan Muslim League (N), who have maintained for years that the war against militants in FATA has killed too many civilians and should be abandoned.  Pakhtuns living across the country have held rallies of their own in cities like Lahore and Karachi decrying the ongoing military offensives in the Pakhtun-dominated tribal areas of Pakistan's northwest.

Nearly 700 people have been killed in Khyber Agency in 2012, making it the most violent agency in FATA.  (North Waziristan saw about 346 people killed in the same period, mostly from drones).  It has the bad luck of being a strategically important area, sitting next to Peshawar and hosting an important supply route for Afghanistan. 

Like Khyber, many parts of FATA have seen multiple military operations since 2002, when soldiers were first deployed to the region to support NATO activities across the border.  Since then, the Pakistani military has played a cat and mouse game with militants that has had a serious impact on locals.  The military often employs artillery, jets, and helicopters that pound suspected militants, but as the example of Mir Ali shows, they occasionally end up killing civilians too.  Millions of people have been forced to settle in other parts of the country, leaving many towns empty.  After carrying out its operations, the military usually announces it is safe for locals to return to their homes, but the conflict continues.  

In FATA, there is little legal recourse for civilians on the receiving end of the Pakistani military operations.  Instead of being treated as individuals, residents can legally be held accountable for the actions of others belonging to their tribe, a policy that dates back to British colonial times.  In 2011, the federal government announced a package that restricted collective punishment to males aged 16-65, and allowed for a military and civilian oversight board to review complaints of abuse, but human rights groups like Amnesty International say these measures have yet to be enacted, and would still allow the military to have the final say.  Under pressure to effectively combat militancy in the region, other legislation has given the military sweeping powers to detain individuals indefinitely.

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South Waziristan was once the primary base for militant groups in Pakistan.  After several military operations, the area is one of the quietest.  But as an Amnesty International report form 2010 explains, the peace came at a heavy price.  While launching operations to retake the area from Taliban-aligned Mehsud tribesmen in 2009, the Pakistani government issued a blanket order to arrest any Mehsud and confiscate their property.  As hundreds of thousands tried to flee towns that were being shelled by the military, witnesses recount how Mehsud refugees were turned around at military checkpoints.  According to a government report, in a single month the military destroyed more than four thousand homes belonging to Mehsud tribesmen in South Waziristan.

Tribes that support the federal government have not fared much better.

Two years ago, the government recruited 250 local tribesmen to help fight Taliban militants in a village adjacent to Peshawar, but only gave them 87 rifles.  So in late December, 2012, when hundreds of Taliban from a neighboring district carried out a sophisticated attack on checkpoints in the area, the local recruits were easily defeated.  Two recruits were killed and twenty two taken hostage.  The military issued an ultimatum to the local Taliban militants: turn over the kidnapped men or we will punish the entire village.  Tribal elders said the situation was out of their hands, and a few days later twenty one bodies turned up.  The village was embargoed and a curfew was imposed that lasted weeks.  The military carried out several raids, destroying homes and detaining scores of men.  A month later, the government finally admitted they had not adequately equipped locals to defend themselves against the Taliban, and offered financial compensation to the victims' families. 

Dawar, the journalist from North Waziristan, offers a whole list of ways the war has made life unbearable in FATA.  He says that residents of Bara have lived under a general curfew for three years.  A similar curfew has been imposed on Mehsuds in South Waziristan.  And in North Waziristan, there has been a long-running curfew every Saturday and Sunday.  Amnesty International has documented how curfews are often imposed in areas where there are ongoing military operations, making it difficult for civilians to leave the area. 

Perhaps the most egregious abuses in FATA involve extra-judicial detentions, torture, and the killing of suspected militants by security forces.  "As the state's practices have moved away from large-scale military operations to sporadic clashes with armed groups over the last three years," a December 2012 report from Amnesty International explains, "the authorities' attention has shifted to search operations resulting in thousands of arrests and detentions." 

It is difficult to even get a good estimate for the number of detainees in FATA.  Detainees are shuffled from one security agency to another, and many seem to be held in unofficial prisons - hotels and other civilian buildings seized by security forces.  In June 2012, the Peshawar High Court ordered the release of 1,035 detainees.  According to the 2012 Amnesty report, the government has provided the names of about 1,000 people it is keeping in detention.  But 2,000 cases of missing persons are still pending in the Peshawar High Court, brought by people suspecting their relatives are in government custody.  The Amnesty report details many cases where families only learned the fate of their missing relatives once they had been released, sometimes after being severely tortured or even killed by interrogators.

--

"The tribal areas have lost their leadership," Dawar explains.  Under the laws governing FATA, tribes appoint representatives called maliks to talk to the federal government.  "Thousands of maliks have been killed or forced to leave since 2001 in South Waziristan, North Waziristan, Bajaur, all over," Dawar says.  The federal government only extended voting rights to FATA in 1997, and just last year it allowed political parties to operate in the region.  Major political parties like the Pakistan People's Party and the Awami National Party routinely see their representatives in FATA killed.  But without a constitutional amendment, future members of parliament will continue to be powerless.  Article 247 of the Pakistani constitution puts FATA entirely under the power of the President, saying "No act of Parliament shall apply to any federally administered tribal area or to any part thereof, unless the President so directs."

--

The Pakistani military continues to be the most trusted power in the region, ahead of the Pakistani government, the Taliban, or the United States.  But Dawar says tribal leaders are asking the military to leave their areas, and let them deal with the militants themselves.  When it comes to the Pakistani military, Dawar explains, "in many tribal areas, they have lost their confidence in it, and are now trying to regain it."

Tribesmen have often banded together to expel al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or other extremist groups from their land.  But they have also consistently claimed that the source of their current problems lies in Afghanistan and the U.S. invasion of 2001. 

"If you are asking about Americans," Dawar says, "100% [of the people] here are hating Americans.  They are thinking that this whole drama is from the side of America, because they came to Afghanistan.  That is why they are demanding America leave Afghanistan."

"The elders and the people recall the situation before 2001, [when] they had their own culture, unity, lashkars [militias], and peace committees," he explains, which they know were more effective than any tools from "these stakeholders in the Great Game."

Umar Farooq is an independent journalist based in the United States.  He is on twitter: @UmarFarooq_.

A growing confidence in the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) capabilities appears to be an important factor in planning for a smaller U.S. residual force as Washington charts its post-2014 security mission. But despite ANSF's extraordinary growth rate, its abilities are increasingly limited largely because it was raised with low recruitment criteria and cannot function without continued international support. Although the Afghan army and police have slowly improved their skills in combat, their capacity and reach is still inadequate. In the past couple of years, the readiness and efficiency of the ANSF had been further undermined by a rising number of casualties, higher attrition and desertion rates, Taliban infiltration, and a growing distrust from their international partners over insider attacks.

However, among the promising elements of the ANSF are the Afghan Special Operation Forces or Afghan SOF. These are the elite Afghan commandos who are advised by U.S. Special Forces teams and are more carefully vetted than other members of the Afghan security forces. Members of Afghan SOF are picked from select units within the Afghan army and the police. After an initial three-month training in reconnaissance and other skills-including advanced rifle marksmanship, mortars and convoy operations, intelligence gathering, combat communications and medical skills-Afghan SOF then embed with U.S. forces for a six-month on-the-job training deployment before stepping out on their own. These elite fighting forces are widely commended by U.S. commanders for their competence in leading independent operations and specialized missions, including their roles in replacing U.S. forces in conducting night raids that have long triggered popular anger and strained U.S.-Afghan relations. Casualties in Afghan SOF units are minimal, and they have only experienced one "insider attack," which further adds to their credibility.

However, a number of important challenges will hamper the ability and success of these nascent forces after 2014.

Prominent among them is the size of the contingent. While the ANSF overall strength presently boasts at 350,000 troops, the number of Afghan SOF is at a trifling 12,000 personnel, which has increasingly limited their reach across the country. In order to expand their grasp, the Pentagon should boost the size of Afghan commandos by at least another 15 to 20 thousand soldiers.

Raising and sustaining elite forces is unquestionably more costly than the conventional forces. However, the Pentagon must weigh the cost of sufficient defense against the cost and implications of having resource-strapped Afghan SOF units confined to their bases with a lighter U.S. military footprint on the ground. With so much at stake, U.S. commanders must recognize the value of such a force in Afghanistan - a war that has so far cost U.S. taxpayers over half a trillion dollars. And while the upkeep of each American soldier in Afghanistan alone reportedly costs the Pentagon one million dollars a year - an estimated $66 billion for the current force level-maintaining an efficient, well-trained, and somewhat high-tech Afghan security force is a low-priced insurance policy.

Additionally, the Afghan Defense Ministry is already making long-term changes to structuring its security force to ensure it is affordable. By 2017, the ANSF force level is scheduled to shrink from 350,000 troops to roughly 240,000, a nearly 30 percent reduction in personnel. Higher pay will boost retention rates for the reduced force, which may mitigate the current problems with high attrition and desertion rates within the Army, and could mean fewer soldiers to replace. In this case, the downsized conventional force should be reorganized and modernized. And the ongoing reduction of international forces in Afghanistan must come with a renewed commitment from NATO to shouldering some of the cost of boosting the size of Afghan SOF.

Given the United States' own budgetary and fiscal problems, the optics of any added financial commitment to expanding the Afghan commandos units will understandably be unappealing to Washington. However, the Obama administration's affinity for America's own Special Forces should inform the White House's understanding that it will be these burgeoning Afghan Special Forces that will not only fend Afghanistan after 2014 but also deter the many existential security challenges that may threaten U.S. national security.

Another important challenge that hinders the ability of the Afghan SOF to function effectively is the lack of enablers-air and fire support, aerial surveillance, intelligence, medevac, and other resources-that U.S. troops currently provide. Regardless of how well the Afghan Special Forces are trained, they simply cannot stay operational in combat without these important enablers. Fortunately, the Pentagon is reportedly exploring plans to train and equip the ANSF with vehicles, attack helicopters, a handful of cargo planes, unarmed tactical drones, and other necessary equipment. These capabilities will only augment the crucial role Afghan SOF units play in preserving Afghan stability, without which they will be confined mostly to their bases, ceding the countryside to insurgent elements, including the Taliban.

As the ANSF take on the operational lead in nearly ninety percent of Afghanistan and the international forces assume their number one goal to "to train, assist and advise Afghan forces" by this spring, achieving the goal of ultimately having Afghan forces lead security nationwide at the end of 2014 will depend largely on their combat skills and readiness. The ANSF readiness this year will also depend on whether they continue to benefit from U.S. air support and other enablers. The Afghan SOF program is a bright spot and a critical element in the Afghan security forces, but their reach is limited given their small number and the lack of enablers, equipment and trainers. Responsibly preparing to deter many of the threats Afghanistan will face after 2014 requires more Afghan Special Forces. However, if the United States' post-2014 mission in Afghanistan is narrowly focused on counterterrorism operations, any continuing training of Afghan forces will be severely undermined, and that will have drastic implications for the larger Afghan transition.

Javid Ahmad, a founding member of Afghan Analytica, is a Program Coordinator for Asia at the German Marshall Fund of the United States. The views reflected here are his own.

Denying al Qaeda's re-emergence in Afghanistan requires ensuring that Afghanistan can be sufficiently stable and capable of defending itself, as President Barack Obama explained during the surge announcement at West Point on Dec. 1, 2009. Al Qaeda is not present in large numbers (perhaps less than 1,000) in Afghanistan now, but Secretary Leon Panetta stated in November 2012 that "intelligence continues to indicate that they are looking for some kind of capability to be able to go into Afghanistan as well." The U.S. and NATO cannot allow war weariness and economic conditions to obscure the realities and requirements they face. The recently announced accelerated shift to a "support role" in Afghanistan could become a guise to withdraw if "support" means just a few thousand counterterrorism forces and trainers.

In the eyes of many officials, a sound counterterrorism strategy rests on the assumption that the U.S. and NATO can kill their way toward a better future, against the Taliban and the Haqqanis or against al Qaeda and its affiliates. A decade of war proves the falsehood of this assumption. Experts outside the military are better qualified to determine how best to assist Afghanistan in the areas of governance, economic development, and reconciliation, and how best to move forward in Pakistan. But my experience in accelerating the growth of the Iraqi security forces -- in size, capacity, and confidence -- during the Iraqi "surge" of 2007 to 2008 qualifies me to speak about what is necessary to help the Afghan army succeed in taking lead responsibility.

The Afghans and NATO began a program of accelerated Afghan National Army (ANA) growth in 2009, recognizing that sufficient capacity is still years away. The ANA's combat power is only partially developed. The tip of the ANA's spear, its fighting units, is more developed than its shaft, its enabler capacity. Its human intelligence ability can sense near-term threats, but its capacity to detect and anticipate threats is low. On the ground, it can maneuver well, but the ANA lacks the air and ground mobility to shift forces around the country in order to mass against the enemy. Lack of mobility and its still-developing staff capacity reduce the ANA's ability to apply timely and coordinated force. The ANA can place accurate enough direct fire against the enemy once engaged but has only limited land-based indirect fire ability. Nor does it have adequate air-delivered fires, important in the mountains and remote areas of Afghanistan. Pending medical, supply, maintenance, and transport capacity means that the ANA has limited ability to maintain momentum against the enemy once engaged. Leadership quality varies. All these shortcomings affect the ANA's confidence and combat power; none will be complete by the end of this year or next.

None of this should be a surprise. In 2009, the Afghans and NATO wisely placed primary emphasis on accelerating fighting units, with secondary emphasis on enabler capacity. While their own systems were being developed and fielded, ANA fighting units could receive the support they needed from their NATO partners. As Afghan systems emerged, NATO support could be "thinned out" and ultimately cut altogether. To do otherwise would have been to grow the ANA at the pace of its slowest element, an approach that did not match the Afghan "surge" strategy adopted in 2009. In an underdeveloped country that has suffered from over 30 years of war and has very low literacy rates, growing enabler systems -- supply, medical, transport, analytic, staff, communications, air- and land-based indirect support -- takes longer. For this reason, the ANA will need some U.S. and NATO enabler support beyond 2014.

So how should the U.S. and NATO assist the ANA in taking lead security responsibility? First, leave a combat brigade, at least through 2014, to partner with Afghan forces in the east -- a strategically important area where heavy fighting against the Haqqanis will continue. Second, in the south and southwest, embed assistance teams with every ANA battalion and higher to provide access to NATO enabling support, solidify gains already made, and deny the Taliban's return to their historical stronghold. Third, in the west and north, embed assistance teams with ANA brigades and higher -- again to provide access to NATO enabling support and solidify gains already made. Fourth, provide development teams for the ANA's major commands (recruiting, logistics, medical, areas support, and detention), the ANA's general headquarters, and the Ministry of Defense -- to continue development of the ANA's "shaft." Finally, the U.S. and NATO should leave behind "dual-purposed" enabler forces -- intelligence, airlift and medical evacuation, air and ground indirect fires, supply, maintenance, ground transport, and logistics. These forces would support both the residual NATO training teams and provide the ANA support it does not have, until its systems reach sufficient capacity. Combined, these actions will improve both ANA combat power and confidence, increasing the probability that it will be successful in assuming lead security responsibility.

The exact size of this assistance and support effort can only be determined by a proper civil-military dialogue among the NATO nations and the Afghans. But, if the United States and NATO want to increase the probability that the ANA will be successful, the number will be around 30,000 troops, and this number will be required at least for the rest of this year and next. The size and cost of this force will diminish over time and will be significantly less than then near $10 billion per month the war cost at its height. U.S. and NATO strategic objectives are not yet accomplished in Afghanistan and cannot be "outsourced" to the Afghans. Pushing the Taliban out of the south is not permanent. The counteroffensive in the east is incomplete. The Taliban and the Haqqanis have not been defeated, and al Qaeda intends to return to Afghanistan.

Killing Osama bin Laden was a hugely important success, but it was only a disruption. Al Qaeda is not "dismantled or defeated," and it remains dedicated to bleed America and the West, to depose governments it claims are apostate, to eliminate the state of Israel, and to gain control of Central Asia, North Africa, and the Greater Middle East. Al Qaeda and its affiliates remain active in Pakistan, Yemen, and Somalia. They control an area about the size of Texas in North Africa that includes parts of Mali, Mauritania, Niger, Algeria, Libya, Burkina Faso, and Chad. Despite ample sanctuary elsewhere, they want to return to Afghanistan -- for historical and symbolic reasons in addition to the complexity of the terrain, which is a nightmare for counterterrorism forces. They still recruit within the U.S. and Europe and have not given up on attacking both directly. They have not waivered with respect to their strategic objectives; neither should the U.S. or NATO.

If the United States and NATO don't finish the job now, they will leave it to another generation. Many of those fighting in Afghanistan now were 5 and 6 years old at the start of the war; we do not want the same future for the current generation of 5- and 6-year-olds. Leaving an adequate assistance and support force in Afghanistan through 2013 and beyond is in the U.S. and NATO's security interest. Certainly, the U.S. and NATO cannot afford to conduct operations as they have for the past decade. But equally certain, the U.S. and NATO cannot allow war weariness and economic conditions to obscure the realities and requirements they face. If the U.S. and NATO provide less-than-adequate support to the ANA this year and beyond, they should at least not fool themselves of the likely waste and result.

Lt. Gen. James M. Dubik (retired) is a senior fellow at the Institute for the Study of War, where Jeffrey Dressler is a senior analyst and team lead.

While Washington phases out its combat mission and withdraws troops from Afghanistan this year, the Taliban continues to increase its use of violence and refuses to negotiate with the Afghan government towards a political settlement. With no military victory over the Taliban in sight, the White House needs to make peace talks with the Taliban a centerpiece of its exit strategy in order to ensure that Afghanistan will not lapse back into civil war after most of the U.S. troops leave by 2014.

Currently, about 66,000 U.S. troops remain in Afghanistan, but the number is expected to be cut drastically this spring and into 2014 when the U.S. combat role ends and Afghanistan takes full responsibility for its security. Afghan President Hamid Karzai visited Washington this week and one of the key items on the agenda was for the two governments to discuss the various options for and potential effects of a residual U.S. military presence beyond 2014 that would train and equip the Afghan security forces and conduct counterterrorism operations along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

Numerous discussions and scenario planning occurred this week in regards to the drawdown of security forces and its implications on potential peace talks. Sending ripple effects across the policy making community, Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes said on Tuesday that President Obama is not ruling out the possibility of withdrawing all U.S. troops by the end of next year. While many in the policy community deem this as a negotiation tactic by the Obama administration, a complete troop withdrawal would undoubtedly have lasting implications for potential peace talks with the Taliban. The scenario of zero U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan would create an opportunity for the hardline elements of the Taliban to wait out the American withdrawal and subsequently emerge as an inhibiting force for peace which has no interest in a negotiated political settlement.

On Friday, escalating concerns by both the Afghan- and American policy communities were realized when in a joint statement President Obama and President Karzai agreed to speed up the handover of combat operations in Afghanistan to Afghan forces. The potentially bleak realities resulting from a hastened U.S. troop withdrawal are an increasingly likely end. The move also highlights the Obama administration's growing posture to end a nuanced and unfavorable war.

Despite the recent developments, it remains a critical security imperative for Washington that Afghanistan does not once again revert into a safe haven for terrorist activities, anarchy and civil war. A resilient Taliban insurgency, widespread corruption within the Afghan government, and the inability of the Afghan National Security Force (ANSF) to protect the Afghan nation on its own after foreign troops leave require Washington to reevaluate its strategy vis-à-vis peace talks with the Taliban. For the talks to succeed and a durable peace process to emerge, Afghans must lead the talks with the Taliban in an inclusive and transparent manner, with full support from their regional neighbors and Washington. Above all, the White House and Kabul must be on the same page and adopt a unified policy towards reconciliation. Moreover, Washington must provide strategic economic and political support for the Afghan government to lead the process and must adopt a firm stance toward Pakistan through constructive diplomacy.

Following the assassination of Professor Burhanuddin Rabbani, Head of the High Peace Council, in September 2011, the reconciliation process became dormant. The talks gained a renewed momentum after the French think tank, Foundation for Strategic Research, organized a meeting between representatives of the Taliban, Afghan political parties and civil society groups last December. Senior members of the Taliban, Hizb-e-Islami, the High Peace Council, political opposition groups, civil society and the Afghan parliament attended the two-day talks, marking the significance and increased inclusiveness of the reconciliation process. Numerous Afghan and international policy analysts believe that the seniority of the Taliban representatives attending the Paris Talks indicates they are serious about the possibility of a negotiated political settlement.

While some Afghans and foreign observers consider the Paris Talks as a positive catalyst for the overall peace process, others remain skeptical that the talks will result in a durable and inclusive peace agreement. The Taliban continue to reiterate that they would not talk with the Afghan government. Recently, the Taliban envoys at the Paris Talks restated their position that neither the Afghan constitution nor the Kabul government were legitimate and they had no plans to negotiate with the latter now or in the future. However, Taliban representatives cooperated in talks with the opposition leaders in Paris representing the Tajik, Hazara, and Uzbek ethnic groups, indicating a greater potential for movement towards increased factionalism and bringing the legitimacy and cohesiveness of the central government and the gains made during the past 11 years into jeopardy.

In May 2012, Washington and Kabul signed the Enduring Strategic Partnership Agreement in which the U.S. designated Afghanistan as a "Major Non-NATO Ally" and committed to protecting and remaining engaged into 2024 in an advisory capacity. Yet, certain regional actors still maintain the belief that the U.S. will once again abandon Afghanistan and therefore continue to support the Taliban and other extremist militant groups as a proxy to exert influence over Afghanistan's future. This scenario would not only have security implications throughout the region, but would also affect wider, global security. It would allow al-Qaeda and its affiliates to reestablish themselves in parts of Afghanistan, where they could plot against America and its allies.

The Peace Process Roadmap recently issued by the High Peace Council proposes a negotiated political settlement by 2015 with the Taliban and other insurgent groups including Hizb-e-Islami. However the roadmap fails to address key issues such as the disarmament of these groups. If there is a power-sharing deal within the government that includes the Taliban and other armed extremist groups without a provision for the disarmament of these groups and their acceptance of the legitimacy of the government, the outcome of the reconciliation could pave the way for a divided Afghanistan with a weak central government, and would compromise the gains of the past 11 years. Additionally, such a politically negotiated settlement would face considerable backlash from political opposition groups, as well as civil society.

After three decades of war, Afghans are weary of war and desire peace. However, peace must not come at the cost of human rights and democracy. In the absence of a democratic government, Afghanistan could become a hotbed for terrorism once again. Washington invested heavily in Afghanistan over the past 11 years in order to combat extremism, and the U.S. government should have a vested interest in deterring the emergence of terrorism hotbeds and ensuring a stable Afghanistan beyond 2014. A peaceful, democratic Afghanistan where human rights are protected should be a security imperative for Washington, necessitating that it put its full support behind an inclusive, transparent peace process led by Afghans and promoted by regional actors. Furthermore, any peace talks with the Taliban must not come at the cost of compromising human rights and setting back the hard won gains of the past 11 years, making it ever more an imperative that the U.S. closely reevaluate its troop withdrawal strategy.

While it remains unclear how a politically negotiated settlement will play out in the coming years and who the key stakeholders will be, it is clear that the Taliban does not wish to talk with the current Afghan government, leaving Washington to think outside the box and tap into other credible stakeholders in Afghanistan that could help lead the process. Afghan civil society leaders represent various ethnic and interest groups including religious minorities, women and youth and could be key players and stakeholders in the peace process. National consensus at all levels is critical to whatever peace process emerges in Afghanistan. Bringing in a neutral third party to broker a peace negotiation is not a bad idea, but the devil is in the details of who could serve as a neutral third party with the ever-growing list of stakeholders and spoilers to peace in Afghanistan. Without a unified reconciliation policy between Kabul and the White House and regional countries' sincere cooperation, achieving an acceptable peace agreement before the 2014 elections and troop drawdown would prove considerably more challenging and endanger the progress the country has made over the past decade. The new window of opportunity rests in the recent endorsement in the joint statement issued by President Obama and President Karzai of the establishment of a Taliban political office in Qatar in hopes of bringing insurgents to inter-Afghan talks.

Hamid Arsalan, a founding member of Afghan Analytica, is a Program Officer for the Middle East and North Africa Program at the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).
Hodei Sultan, a founding member of Afghan Analytica, is a Program Officer for the Afghanistan and Pakistan Program at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP). The views reflected here are solely those of the authors.

A version of this piece was originally published here.

As Afghan President Hamid Karzai visits Washington to discuss a bilateral strategic agreement between the United States and Afghanistan, policymakers and the public are debating the pace of troop drawdown and the residual force post-2014, when the security handover to Afghan authorities finishes. Missing from these discussions is a focus on the political and economic transitions underway in Afghanistan - areas that will serve as greater determinants of Afghan stability than whether there are zero, 4,000, or 9,000 U.S. troops. Politics ultimately drive the Afghan conflict, and its resolution will require a broader political consensus and stronger economic foundation than currently exists.

President Karzai's visit offers an opportunity for the Obama administration, members of Congress and others to drill down and express support for a number of political and economic priorities, which could assist in strengthening the legitimacy and competence of the Afghan state as the United States and NATO drawdown. The current Afghan state is deeply flawed and has alienated many Afghans due to its exclusive and predatory nature.  The constitutional system, which vests great power in the hands of the executive without real checks and balances, lends itself to abuses of authority. Officials often use formal state institutions to support their patronage networks, fueling high levels of corruption, cronyism, and nepotism on the national and local levels.  What's more, the dependency of the Afghan government and its security forces on high levels of international assistance for the foreseeable future, especially in a time of global austerity, threatens to undermine a sustainable transition.

Creating a stronger political consensus and a more solid economic foundation for the Afghan state will be required for long-term stability in Afghanistan. In their meetings with President Karzai and his team, senior U.S. officials must state their expectations about these political and economic processes, clarifying that long-term security support is contingent on Afghan progress on these efforts.  Expectations should include the following:

First, a free, fair, inclusive and transparent presidential election is required in which President Karzai transfers power to a legitimately elected successor.  President Karzai must work to ensure that the electoral bodies, including the Independent Electoral Commission and an electoral complaints mechanism are independent and credible.  The United States hopes to see parliamentary approval of the electoral laws and the implementation of a plan to ensure a successful election. 

Second, the United States supports an inclusive political reconciliation process, led by Afghans.  The United States supports outreach by President Karzai to more Afghan stakeholders, including the political opposition, women, and civil society groups, in addition to Taliban insurgents.  The United States and Afghanistan should create a bilateral mechanism to coordinate their peacemaking, public statements regarding negotiations and outreach to stakeholders, as well as to establish a venue, where representatives of the parties to the conflict can meet outside of Afghanistan or Pakistan to discuss a political settlement. 

Third, the United States remains committed to the agreements made at the Tokyo conference in July 2012 by the Afghan government and the international community.  In addition to agreeing to provide $16 billion in civilian assistance through 2015, the international community committed to improving the effectiveness of its aid, aligning its assistance with Afghan priority programs, and providing more aid through the Afghan government's budget rather than through outside contractors.  However, the disbursements of these dollars depends on the Afghan government progressing on its own commitments, including: 

• allowing for the Afghanistan Human Rights Commission and other civil society organizations to function freely,
• the implementation of the Elimination of Violence Against Women Law and the National Action Plan for Women
• enforcement of the legal framework for combating corruption and annual asset declarations of senior public officials
• asset recovery and accountability for those responsible for the Kabul Bank crisis
• the implementation of the Public Financial Management Plan and improvement of the management of public funds
• improvement of Afghan budget execution
• the development of a provincial budgeting process

Fourth, the United States supports the development of Afghanistan's mineral sector, in a way that benefits the Afghan population and not a select few.  While Afghanistan is already a candidate member of the Extractives Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), the Karzai administration should develop an Extractive Industries Development Framework that governs Afghanistan's natural wealth through an "accountable, efficient and transparent mechanism which builds upon and surpasses international best practices", as agreed to in Tokyo.  The Ministry of Mines should continue to engage with civil society in order to increase transparency in the mining sector and to respond to the needs of communities affected by mining.   

The Obama administration must focus on political and economic priorities during President Karzai's visit.  Military aspects-troop numbers, training of the Afghan forces, and financial support to the security services-won't be enough to ensure Afghanistan's security and stability over the long term.  Leaving behind an unprepared and expensive force to battle an insurgency that NATO has struggled to contain is more likely to create instability than lasting security.  Instead, U.S. efforts must be focused on building a more sustainable Afghan state.

John Podesta is Chairman and Caroline Wadhams is a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress.

With all combat troops scheduled to be withdrawn from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, the negotiations taking place in Kabul on the presence and role of U.S. troops in Afghanistan beyond that point must include a plan for a Contingency Force as part of the troop drawdown. And the United States should take the lead in establishing this Contingency Force, either under the flag of NATO, or as a new coalition concerned with security and stability in Afghanistan in coming years.

The only alternative under discussion within the Obama administration at the moment is the possibility that some Special Forces stay behind in Afghanistan to work in an advisory or training capacity. Similarly, any U.S. residual force that will stay behind following negotiations will likely have a limited role, with additional U.S. military used primarily as force protection: protecting U.S. and international trainers instead of directly assisting ANSF if needed. The residual force options that are currently being discussed are mainly related to support for training efforts and counter-terrorism operations against transnational terrorist groups. This would not be considered a Contingency Force.

In fact, a counter-terrorism residual force, consisting of Special Forces and other troops, can be much smaller if a proper Contingency Force is in place for Afghanistan. Establishing this contingency capacity means the counter-terrorism officers would not have to deal with the emergency situations described in this article.

A too rapid drawdown?

One might argue that the current NATO troop drawdown calendar (2011-2014) was based more on domestic political agendas than on-the-ground security. The result has been an extremely tight and relatively inflexible transition calendar, which leaves few options to respond to potentially changing security dynamics or attacks by the various ‘Taliban' insurgent groups.

Domestic political pressure for a rapid drawdown inside the United States, other NATO countries, and Afghanistan has been reinforced by four key factors. In the U.S. and NATO countries there are calls for ‘an end to the war and return of the troops,' combined with a repositioning toward concerns in the Middle East (particularly Iran and Syria, but also Yemen). Simultaneously, officials in the United States and other NATO countries have become increasingly disillusioned with the Karzai government, and concerned about the deeply troubling ‘insider attacks' on NATO troops.

These political dynamics have created real pressures for a fast-paced troop withdrawal - confirmed by the U.S. Senate recently voting in favour of an accelerated withdrawal - and a neglect of a larger consideration of the security risks related to the upcoming fighting seasons.

The deliberations that existed around contingency planning during the drawdown of U.S. forces in Iraq are almost completely missing in the case of Afghanistan - and those that do surface are mainly related to safeguarding security during the upcoming presidential elections in 2014 or counter-terrorism in the region. This ignores both the possible threats of the 2013 fighting season, or other security issues that might arise in the years following.

Why do we need a Contingency Force?

Firstly, a Contingency Force would provide an additional guarantee for the safety of foreign interests, infrastructure and staff, such as the diplomats at consulates and embassies, should these come under attack. The recent attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, the coordinated attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul in September 2011 and the Indian Embassy bombings in Kabul in 2008 and 2009 are sufficient cases in point.

Secondly, the Contingency Force would offer a safety valve while Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) grow in numbers, strength and confidence in an environment that will remain uncertain and unstable for the foreseeable future.

Will ANSF be able and willing to respond to serious insurgent attacks before and after the transition end date of 2014? Despite progress in some areas, particularly in terms of handing over responsibilities to ANSF as planned, there is a risk that increased insurgent activity in the south or elsewhere in Afghanistan could lead to unmanageable situations.

The actual strengths and weaknesses of ANSF are not the essential point. What should be the focus is proper planning to respond to the possibility that ANSF could be confronted by a manner or level of insurgent attack in the South that means they cannot hold the country together. Since the build up of ANSF is such a key element of the transition plan (and exit-strategy) ‘narrative,' we see a dynamic that any public discussion of possible future failure of ANSF, and planning for that contingency, is considered ‘off-message.' This could ultimately lead to a failure of the entire transition project.

The actual current strengths and weaknesses of the insurgency are also not particularly relevant to the calculations that a Contingency Force is needed. Contingency planning does not depend on a complex debate on the current strength of the Taliban and ANSF; one need only acknowledge a possibility that the Taliban could produce a new security dynamic, which we argue would most likely be focused in southern Afghanistan.

Possible scenarios of concern could include, for example, blockading the Kandahar-Kabul road or the road between Kandahar and Lashkar Gah, a move into the suburbs of Kandahar City, taking over Lashkar Gah and blocking the bridges over the Helmand River, or gaining control of the Spin Boldak border crossing.

For an example of a new dynamic in the insurgency, look to the complex attack on Camp Bastion in September 2012 that resulted in the destruction of six AV-8B Harriers, the death of two United States Marine Corps service staff and the wounding nine others. This single assault - using 15 insurgents, explosions to enter the base, dividing attackers in three different waves, and making use of U.S. army uniforms - resulted in a four and a half hour fire fight, and caused damages of up to $200-240 million.

Clearly this type of complex, coordinated attack was not anticipated by U.S./NATO-ISAF forces at Bastion, and it illustrates unmistakably that the evolution of the insurgency must be considered in proper planning for future security threats. The more recent coordinated attack with explosives laden vehicles on Forward Operating Base Fenty in Jalalabad in December 2012 confirms that the Bastion attack is not an incident.

Geo-political consequences of losing the south

Any serious defeat of ANSF forces or a considerable loss of terrain to the insurgency - before or following the 2014 transition - would not only be a symbolic triumph for the Taliban, it could also completely reconfigure the power structure in Afghanistan and the region.

The geo-political consequences of ‘losing the south' or a similar such scenario would be significant, not the least of which would be the destabilising effect on the wider region, particularly Pakistan, where it could provide a boost for the insurgency.

Drawdown Contingency Plan: Size, location, mandate

It is important to note that having a Contingency Force on standby is not the same as continuing an international military operation in Afghanistan. It would provide Western political leaders with options if a security crisis breaks out in the country.

Size: Given the current levels of ANSF and the continuation of ANP and ANA training and capacity building efforts after 2014, a standby Contingency Force of around 5,000 foreign troops would be sufficient. The Contingency Force would be a standard brigade-size combat team of around 3,500-4,000 soldiers, plus mobility (transport helicopters, but also some attack helicopters) and other support capabilities (intelligence, logistics, medical teams, etc.).

The Contingency Force of 5,000 should be on standby from January 2013 onwards. Given the short time frame before the next fighting season, this means the Contingency Force should initially be included in the calculations of the NATO troop drawdown. Until General John Allen has officially presented his recommendations to the White House, it is not clear how many U.S. forces will be withdrawn in coming months. But at the start of 2013, the United States could start contingency planning by delaying the troop withdrawal of around 2,000 forces until the end of the fighting season of 2013 to complement the transitioning NATO-ISAF forces. These troops would not continue fighting but would convert to contingency troops. Thus, they would still be withdrawn from combat, but would move to a different base to prepare for emergency support operations.

During the six months following the 2013 fighting season, the United States could increase its share of contingency forces to 3,000, and request that its NATO and non-NATO allies contribute a total of 2,000 forces to that group before the end of 2013. This would ensure a total Contingency Force of 5,000 under the flag of NATO before the start of the 2014 fighting season.

The graph below illustrates this scenario, which is of course only one of the many possible outcomes, included here to start a constructive discussion on a contingency system.

* The average numbers of insurgency attacks are based on statistics from previous years (NATO, ISAF Violence Trends Presentation, 30 September 2011).

When deliberating strategic options for a Contingency Force, synergies should be explored - whether in terms of providing a model or in more direct ways - with the NATO Response Force (NRF), a joint force of around 13,000 troops, preparing and training together for about a year, at the disposal of the Atlantic Alliance and with the existing EU Battlegroup (EUBG) structure which has at least 1,500 European troops on standby at any time, currently headquartered in Germany.

The allocation of the 2,000 non-U.S. troops could also be based on a rotating roster, where countries commit a small number of standby forces for a specific period, for example six months to a year (similar to the NATO Response Force which recently extended rotation periods from six to twelve months, and the EU Battlegroup system that rotates every six months). After such a period, other countries will take their place, sharing the burden and making sure a nation's contingency troops are only committed in small numbers and for a limited amount of time.

Location: The foreign Contingency Force could be stationed in or close to Afghanistan. For the latter option, contingency troops stationed in, for example, one of the Central Asian Republics, Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait or the UAE, could be logistically more challenging but politically easier to ‘sell' than troops stationed in Afghanistan. Another option is to choose several locations, increasing flexibility and linking the Contingency Force to Afghanistan's main geographical areas and the ANSF units operating in these areas.

Mandate: The Contingency Force would safeguard the results of past and present efforts to ensure stability and security in Afghanistan, while guaranteeing the security transition process can be completed in a sustainable and responsible way. The Contingency Force would, in essence, have the same mandate as NATO-ISAF - particularly its current ANSF support role - but it would be subject to a very specific, predefined set of conditions with regards to when and how it could be deployed. The Rules of Engagement need to be specified as soon as possible in full coordination with the Afghan government.

The Contingency Force should remain operational in Afghanistan until at least 2024, in line with the ten-year timetable envisaged during the Chicago Summit in May 2012, unless of course the security situation changes drastically. The mere existence of the Contingency Force would boost the confidence of the ANSF.

Conclusion: the Contingency Planning window is open

The moment to act is now. With the U.S. presidential elections out of the way and only two more years in the tight calendar of the security transition process a Contingency Force should be established as part of the remaining terms of withdrawal. An operational reserve Contingency Force would provide options to western political leaders when faced with a crisis situation in Afghanistan. It also represents a politically viable compromise between the two extremes currently being talked about in Washington: leaving just a few thousand troops in Afghanistan after 2014, or leaving as many as 30,000 troops.

The fewer foreign troops there are in Afghanistan, the greater the need for proper contingency planning, especially given the essentially uncertain nature of the situation before and after transition. Security transition planning should be based on a solid assessment of possible future scenarios of instability and insecurity, rather than on political hopes or aspirations for what the future will hold.

Norine MacDonald QC is the President and Founder of the International Council on Security and Development (ICOS). Jorrit Kamminga is Director of Research at ICOS and Fellow at the Netherlands Institute of International Relations Clingendael.