Putting peace talks on pause

By Omar Samad

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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The 9/11 Wars

By Daniel Byman

The ten-year anniversary of the 9/11 attacks has led tostock-taking of the attacks and their legacy. Even after ten years, debates remain fierce about the scope of thethreat, and the proper nature of any response.

Making sense of the aftermath of 9/11, the subject of JasonBurke's The 9/11 Wars, is amonumental task -- but Burke is up to the job. The 9/11 Wars is insightful, thorough, and at times fascinating. Burkebrings the reader from villages in Afghanistan and Iraq to slums in London andFrance, offering individual portraits of combatants and those overrun by warwhile also weaving in government policies and scholarly research to portray thebroader context. The resulting tapestry leaves the reader more informed, thoughoften appalled by policymakers' ignorance and furious when well-intentionedpolicies backfire.

Burke himself is well-qualified for his ambitious task. Aveteran reporter for The Guardian andThe Observer, he has writtenextensively on al-Qaeda, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan. The 9/11 Wars draws on a wide range of sources and, in contrast tothe works of many journalists, is meticulously documented.

Burke's work is a book big in scope and, weighing in at a hefty752 pages, in substance. Such size is understandable. As he points out, theconflicts associated with 9/11's aftermath are not one but many, and each onehas its own intricacies. Burke is at hisbest giving ground truth to the war on terrorism. He claims his book is aboutpeople, not politicians, and for the most part he stays true to his promise.

The United States and al-Qaeda, Burke contends, repeatedlymisunderstood the complexity of the societies in which they waged their wars. Whetherit was trying to impose Western concepts of women's rights on villages inAfghanistan or viewing the Kurdistan-based terrorist group Ansar al-Islam asfriendly to Saddam Hussein's regime (when it was in fact hostile to the former),the United States frequently was its own worst enemy. Nor do U.S. allies farebetter. Indeed, after the July 2005terrorist attacks in the United Kingdom, the discourse in Europe on terrorism becameparticularly absurd. Muslimorganizations had embraced a crude anti-Americanism and made claims that they werereceiving Nazi-like treatment from European governments, while nativistscaricatured Muslims as brutal rapists.

Al-Qaeda, however, fares even worse in Burke's telling. It wasoften disorganized and fractious, held together by personal links rather thanfirm institutional ties. Attacks oncivilians turned locals against al-Qaeda in places like Jordan and Indonesia,squandering the goodwill its fighters had gained from their battles againstU.S. soldiers. Striking at Americans inIraq was seen as heroic, Burke points out, "But when the violence came home itprovoked a very different reaction. Thesight of blood on one's own streets, the dismembered bodies of one's owncompatriots, the grieving parents who could have been one's own ... turnedentire populations away from violence." As they lost popularity, the terroristsrelied more on coercion -- and in so doing made themselves even lesspopular.

Burke's fundamental argument is a simple one: the local isthe enemy of the global. For the United States, this meant that grandiosemissions to transform the Arab world into a mirror image of Western democracyled to insurgency and scorn. For al-Qaeda, attempts to impose an Islamic stateran into stiff opposition from nationalists, practitioners of more traditionalforms of Islam, tribal leaders, and others with a stake in their long-establishedways of life. In the battle against al-Qaeda, "Bloody-minded localparticularism" is America's greatest ally.

Burke at times offers guarded praise for U.S. and alliedpolicies after 2006. The new U.S. counter-insurgency manual, for example,stresses cultural sensitivities and local concerns as a way to win the war,while Burke describes how deradicalization programs in Europe and the MiddleEast offer a softer, but in his view often more effective, form ofcounter-terrorism.

Al-Qaeda, in contrast, remains under siege. To secure aplace to hide its leaders, the group often must avoid training, planning, andrecruiting on a large scale. Conditions forwould-be fighters hiding out in the tribal parts of Pakistan are much worsethan they were before 9/11 under the Taliban in Afghanistan. Burke relates howone Belgian recruit who got malaria was "left in the corner" and "given a jabevery few days by a kid who was the little brother of the local doctor." Even al-Qaeda'smany affiliates, which offer some bench strength to the group, often do notheed the central leadership, or frequently they lack popularity themselves. Asa result, the much-vaunted "network of networks," he argues, is "battered anddisjointed."

Pakistan, which Burke correctly identifies as the mostimportant theater in the 9/11 wars, comes off the most poorly (thoughAfghanistan is a close second). Use of jihadist proxies has long been part ofPakistan's overall strategy, and the Pakistani security establishment remainscommitted to them, even after 9/11 and subsequent violence in Pakistan showedthat the militants were off the leash. Sadly, Burke finds that in this dividedcountry there is more unity than ever on one issue: that the United States and its allies arepart of an anti-Pakistan and anti-Muslim conspiracy.

Perhaps the biggest weakness of The 9/11 Wars -- one common to many accounts of counter-terrorism-- is that it misses much of the day-to-day of intelligence gathering andpolice work against suspected jihadists around the world. The CIA is blastedfor its "extensive [program] of kidnapping suspects overseas, illegaldetention, collusion and direct participation in torture." However, thenear-constant, and largely successful, intelligence effort against al-Qaedagets little attention. In countries as far apart (politically as well asgeographically) as Sweden, Malaysia, Morocco, and Russia, security serviceshunt suspected jihadists with U.S. support and guidance. Such behind-the-scenesarrests rarely make good stories, but they put pressure on al-Qaeda and itsallies worldwide, making it far harder for the organization to communicate,plan, and conduct attacks. Indeed, the biggest threats emanate from where counter-terrorismcooperation is poor due to the host country's support for jihadists (Pakistan)or lack of governance (such as in Somalia or Yemen).

In its attempt to be comprehensive, the book at times offerstoo much detail. The story of the U.S. fiasco in Iraq has been told, and toldwell, in other books, and another detailed repetition won't offer most readerstoo much (though the additional attention on the followers of radical Shi'acleric Moqtada al-Sadr is most welcome, as their role in the Iraq conflict isoften poorly understood). While the ups and downs of terrorism andcounterterrorism in Afghanistan and Pakistan are less-known, some of thematerial could be condensed, as the reader may get bogged down in each twistand turn and lose sight of the bigger picture.

The 9/11 Wars wentto press as the Arab Spring broke out and al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden waskilled, so understandably Burke doesn't have much to add on thesetransformative events beyond the most general analysis. Such events, however,are in keeping with Burke's theme that local politics and the aspirations ofordinary people shape the battlefield, and that the most profound events areoften the least expected.

Burke ends, appropriately, on a sober and grim note: thebody counts. As he points out, there is no clear winner of the 9/11 wars, but"losers are not hard to identify." Thetens of thousands dead from the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan arelikely to be joined by tens of thousands more in the next decade. New theaters,ranging from Yemen to Nigeria, may also become enflamed. Stopping theconflagration is beyond the skill and means of even the best of leaders, but ifthey avoid the mistakes Burke identifies, they can better shield their owncitizens and avoid adding fuel to the fire.

Daniel Byman is theauthor of A High Price: The Triumphs and Failures of IsraeliCounterterrorism. He is a professor atGeorgetown University and the research director of the Saban Center atBrookings.

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Daily brief: Pakistani intel chief bashes U.S. in marathon parliamentary briefing

By Andrew Lebovich, May 16, 2011

The Rack: Bruce Hoffman, "The Leaderless Jihad's Leader," and Brynjar Lia, "Al Qaeda Without Bin Laden," both in Foreign Affairs.

Behind closed doors

In a rare and at times heated joint session of Pakistan's parliament that stretched late into the night Friday, Pakistani intelligence chief Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja Pasha and other military leaders briefed the assembled members on the May 2 U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden, defending the role Pakistan has played in dismantling al-Qaeda while also reportedly offering to resign his post if asked (NYT, ET, TIME, Post, WSJ, Geo). Pasha strongly critiqued the United States, reportedly revealing that he got into a shouting match with CIA director Leon Panetta last time he was in Washington, and telling the parliamentarians that, "At every difficult moment in our history, the U.S. has let us down... This fear that we can't live without the U.S. is wrong" (McClatchy, NYT, ET). Pasha also reportedly said that he sought a formal agreement with the CIA over intelligence sharing and other forms of cooperation (Dawn).

Read on

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Daily brief: U.S. finds bin Laden "diary"

By Andrew Lebovich, May 12, 2011

Bin Laden in charge

U.S. counterterrorism officials said yesterday that the Navy SEALs who killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden seized his "meticulous" handwritten diary along with other documents and electronic information, showing that bin Laden was in operational control of al-Qaeda, communicating with his lieutenants, offering suggestions to diversify targets, and calculating the number of Americans that would need to die before America would depart the Middle East (AP, Independent, CNN, AFP). Bin Laden also reportedly retained a singular focus on the West, a position that caused tension with other members of al-Qaeda (Post).

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Pakistan's Persian Gulf balancing act

By Arif Rafiq, April 28, 2011

As revolutions and counterrevolutions spread across the Middle East, regional heavyweights Iran and Saudi Arabia are troubled by the potential for domestic instability and the survival prospects of their respective allies. Meanwhile, in Pakistan, along the outer perimeter of the greater Middle East, the political class and military-intelligence establishment are comfortably nestled in the verdant foothills of the Himalayas, home to the nation's capital and army headquarters. Despite the seemingly infinite troubles afflicting Pakistan, in the short-to-medium term, political change is only likely to occur within the game of musical chairs among its power elite.

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Pakistan's famous landmarks: What's in a name?

By Daud Khattak, March 17, 2011

As Libyan dictator Colonel Muammar al-Qaddafi finds himself in a pitched battle to maintain his over 40-year rule, like the final man in a cricket match, some Pakistanis are thinking about what to do with about Qaddafi Stadium, a cricket ground named after the Libyan leader in 1974.

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Al Qaeda the loser in Arab revolutions

By Peter Bergen, February 24, 2011

Osama bin Laden must be sitting in his comfortably appointed hideaway somewhere in northwest Pakistan watching the events in the Middle East unfold with a mixture of glee and despair.

Glee, because overthrowing the dictatorships and monarchies of the Middle East has long been his central goal.

Despair, because none of the Arab revolutions has anything to do with him.

There were no revolutionaries in the streets of Cairo carrying placards with pictures of bin Laden's face, nor are the protesters in Bahrain spouting al Qaeda's venomous critiques of the West. Those calling for the overthrow of Gadhafi are not graduates of bin Laden's training camps.

The Google executive and Facebook revolutionaries who launched the revolt in Egypt represent everything that bin Laden and al Qaeda hate: Secular, liberal and anti-authoritarian, they also include -- gasp -- women.

Even the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamist mass movement in Egypt, which joined the revolution as it was already in motion, is opposed by al Qaeda.

To read the rest of this article, visit CNN.com, where this was originally published.

Peter Bergen, the editor of the AfPak Channel, is a senior fellow at the New America Foundation and at New York University's Center on Law and Security, and the author of The Longest War: The Enduring Conflict Between America and Al Qaeda. He is a national security analyst for CNN.

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Why Osama bin Laden still matters

By Peter Bergen, September 28, 2010

In late January, Osama bin Laden released an audiotape praising the Nigerian who tried to blow up a Detroit-bound airliner on Christmas Day 2009. "The message delivered to you through the plane of the heroic warrior Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab was a confirmation of the previous messages sent by the heroes of [September] 11th," he said.

While the tape was proof that Al Qaeda's leader was still alive, it also raised the question of whether he's now only an irrelevant militant seeking to associate himself with even failed attacks originated by groups he doesn't control. After all, the organization behind the botched bombing was Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, headquartered in Yemen, thousands of miles from bin Laden's presumed base on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. Bin Laden's irrelevance seemed further confirmed in June, when CIA Director Leon Panetta told ABC News that Al Qaeda's presence in Afghanistan is now "relatively small...I think at most we're looking at maybe 50 to 100."

For some, these small numbers suggest that bin Laden's organization is fading away, and that the war against it is largely won. But the fact is that Al Qaeda has always been a small organization. According to the FBI, there were only 200 sworn members at the time of the 9/11 attacks, and the group has always seen itself primarily as an ideological and military vanguard seeking to influence and train other jihadist groups.

To read the rest of this article, visit Newsweek, where this was originally published.

Peter Bergen, the editor of the AfPak Channel, is a senior fellow at the New America Foundation and at New York University's Center on Law and Security, and the author of The Osama bin Laden I Know: An Oral History of al Qaeda's Leader. He is a national security analyst for CNN.

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