Afghanistan: You Can't Buy Love

In an op-ed in today's New York Times entitled "Getting Obama Right" (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/12/opinion/12brooks.html?ref=opinion), David Brooks writes:

"To the consternation of many on the left, Obama has continued about 80 percent of the policies of the second Bush term. Obama conducted a long review of the Afghan policy and was genuinely moved by the evidence. He has emerged as a liberal hawk, pursuing victory in Iraq and adopting an Afghan surge that has already utterly transformed the momentum in that war. The Taliban is now in retreat and its leaders are being assassinated or captured at a steady rate."

Anyone reading the Brooks' op-ed would be led to understand that Obama is succeeding in his Afghan war. Remember Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now?: "It smells like . . . victory." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bPXVGQnJm0w). At least so it seems to Brooks viewing the world from a New York high-rise.

Meanwhile, however, from Afghanistan a different picture emerges. Alissa J. Rubin, also writing today for The Times from Jalalabad, informs us in an item entitled "Afghan Tribal Rivalries Bedevil a U.S. Plan":

"Six weeks ago, elders of the Shinwari tribe, which dominates a large area in southeastern Afghanistan, pledged that they would set aside internal differences to focus on fighting the Taliban. This week, that commitment seemed less important as two Shinwari subtribes took up arms to fight each other over an ancient land dispute, leaving at least 13 people dead, according to local officials.

. . . .

In return for the tribe’s pledge [to fight the Taliban], the Americans are offering cash-for-work programs to employ large numbers of young people from the tribe as well as small-scale development projects, according to Maj. T. J. Taylor, a public affairs officer.

The one initial worry was that the Taliban might try to drive a wedge between different factions within the tribe, which includes about 400,000 people. The land dispute may have done that work for the insurgents.

. . . .

'We promised to work with the government to fight the Taliban,' said Hajji Gul Nazar, an elder from the Mohmand branch of the Shinwari tribe. He added, 'Well, the government officials should have taken care of this argument among us before the shooting started.' 'We are the same tribe, and we are not happy killing each other,' he said. 'The provincial police chief and the governor should have taken care of this issue.'

. . . .

Elders from the Khogyani, another local tribe, met with 100 elders from each of the feuding subtribes to participate in a peace shura to defuse tensions.

'I don’t think the shura will work,' said Hajji Gul Nazar, a Mohmand elder who was not able to attend the shura. 'The Alisher have lost people and have so many wounded, and lots of their tents were burned by our people, and motorcycles were burned, and cars. They must be waiting to take revenge on us.'”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/12/world/asia/12afghan.html?hp

So now the U.S. has taken to buying the loyalty of Afghan tribesmen. The U.S. also sought to recruit the Degar (Montagnard) of the Central Highlands of Vietnam, but the tactic changed nothing. You can't eliminate tribalism overnight and buy love and loyalty; tribalism has its own own agenda.

Does the U.S. intend to continue to pay Afghans to undertake menial jobs after American troops withdraw in just over a year? How long can the U.S. maintain their loyalty? Any decision by Afghans to lay down their lives in the fight against the Taliban must stem from a higher motivation than money.

By the way, the "shura" mentioned in Ms. Rubin's article? Much akin to the ancient tribal dispute resolution system known as "sulha" (from the Arabic word for "peace making"), which predates Mohammed, and which is practiced throughout the Muslim Middle East. Both the shura and the sulha are intended to provide a mechanism to terminate feuds, taking into account local notions of honor and shame.