AIMS OF WAR

AIMS OF WAR

Let Afghans Decide Their Own Fate
For 30 years, foreign-backed governments have ravaged the country.

BY NANCY DEWOLF SMITH
Saturday, October 27, 2001 12:01 a.m.

The U.S. and Britain have been bombing Afghanistan for more than two weeks now, and in some Western circles already panic is setting in. Where's the scalp of Osama bin Laden? Why haven't the Taliban fallen yet? Did we bomb too soon, before Afghans had time to prepare a post-Taliban alternative? What happens if there's a vacuum in Kabul?
I put those questions to an Afghan friend who's in the thick of informal political talks among his countrymen, and in typical Afghan fashion he answered with a story from happier, prewar times.

It seems there was this fabric seller in a Kandahar bazaar. One day he noticed that an Indian-born merchant nearby was selling his material at cut-rate prices the Muslim couldn't match. So he took his problem to the elders of his tribe: "I'll go under if I have to compete with this new guy, so would it be OK if I reminded customers that he's a Hindu?" It didn't take the elders long to answer. "No, that's not nice," they said. "But tell them he's a Wahhabi. Then nobody will buy from him."

This story resonated with Afghans because it speaks to their deep dislike of Arabs, Wahhabi technically being the Saudi brand of Islam but also a catchall phrase used for radical foreign Muslims. My friend repeated it this week to make a broader point: If Afghans are allowed to sort out their own problems, they will not only get rid of bin Laden but gladly purge their country of all the alien influences that have fanned the flames of civil war.

That's a big "if," though. Everybody's on board for Afghan self-determination, but everybody's got a rider attached. The next government of Afghanistan must be "respected in the region" (says United Nations official Danilo Turk). The next Afghan government must "enjoy wide backing from the international community and maintain friendly ties with neighboring states" (joint statement by China and Russia). It must be "accepted by the international community" and "obviously be friendly to all of its neighbors, including Pakistan" (Secretary of State Colin Powell).
These hopes are not that unrealistic. Modern Afghanistan was most stable in its pre-1970s, nonaligned phase. The trouble is that the talk of shaping future governments is coming mostly from outside the country. The urgency felt by the Americans and Pakistanis in particular to cobble together something fast is understandable, but all such plans suffer from the same flaw.

Whether they involve the exiled Afghan King Zahir, the opposition Northern Alliance or others promoted by outsiders, they won't work, because few if any of the Afghans involved will have been chosen by their countrymen, or will enjoy respect inside the country. That's one reason why the shura, or Islamic council, of Afghan resistance groups that Pakistan hosted in 1989 failed to produce a stable postcommunist regime in Kabul. The meeting was widely seen by ordinary Afghans as a Pakistani construct. And sure enough, after the mujahedeen entered Kabul in 1992, their influence never extended beyond the capital. Answerable to no one except their foreign sponsors, most fought among themselves for two bloody years--taking some 50,000 lives in the process--until an exhausted Afghan population turned to the Taliban for relief.

So what should the U.S., Britain and willing NATO allies do now? The urgent goal must be eradicating bin Laden and other foreign terrorists and their Taliban hosts. But this must be accompanied by steps to pacify Afghanistan.
The allies can begin by taking Kabul out of the equation, ending Taliban control of the capital but also making sure no other Afghan group can claim it for the time being. This will almost certainly involve NATO ground troops, as combatants alongside Afghans or as peacekeepers. But it is critical for the long-term success of any plan for a stable Afghanistan.

Earlier this week, the U.S. reportedly started bombing frontline Taliban positions, which may allow the Northern Alliance to enter the capital. This would not be a good idea.

The conventional argument against the Northern Alliance is that it is comprised largely of Tajiks, Uzbeks and other groups that constitute a minority in Afghanistan. But the more serious defect is that the leadership of the Northern Alliance is not even representative of the country's Tajiks or Uzbeks. The Northern Alliance leaders range from anti-Western Muslim Brotherhood types, like former President Burhannudin Rabbani, to open-minded people with more patriotic credentials. If the alliance decides to storm the capital, the good elements will go in with the bad, figuring that if the pie is to be cut up, they might as well grab a slice. Once they all get in, they will not be dislodged. And we will end up with a situation like after 1992, when the city became a proxy battleground.

Fortunately, when it comes to leading a peacekeeping force for Kabul, NATO has the ideal front men in the Turks, who not only are Muslims but are generally respected throughout Afghanistan as honest brokers. Any initial NATO operation in Kabul could be put under Turkish command, while U.N. and related agencies administer relief efforts to keep the city running.

The coming of the holy month of Ramadan offers an opportunity for a second key element of any plan for peace. Especially if there is a U.S. bombing ceasefire, Afghans should be told the following: You have one month during which you must decide which side you are on. Those who had joined the Taliban can make an open declaration of allegiance to their non-Taliban tribal brothers, handing over or sharing arms as demanded by the anti-Taliban movement they are defecting to. Those Afghans who remain with the Taliban will be considered enemies and dealt with accordingly.

All Afghans who seek a chance to shape their own destiny must use this time to begin meetings among themselves to select representatives for a loya jirga, or grand council, that will eventually choose an interim government. It may be difficult in the present circumstances. But in Pashtun areas, tribes have run their affairs for centuries through meetings where all members meet as equals and decide by consensus who should represent them. Non-Pashtun areas of Afghanistan can achieve something similar starting perhaps at the level of village elders. From those smaller gatherings, representatives would emerge for a national council.

Expecting the people of Afghanistan to make political plans in the midst of war may sound unrealistic. But it's more realistic than the present approach, which seems to be that we will bomb and strafe and send in commandos until bin Laden is found--hoping that somehow Afghans will help us or at least not interfere too much with our plan. If we really want to win, and fast, we need their active support. The best way to win their help is to promise them a chance to pick their own leaders.

Everyone who has tried and failed to rule Afghanistan over the last 30 years, from the communists to the Pakistani-supported Taliban, has been imposed from outside. If people wonder why even today there has been no mass uprising against the Taliban, it is partly because many Afghans are wary of more blasts from the past. They fear either another setup dictated by Pakistan, with the U.S. again deferring to Islamabad as in the 1980s, or a replay of the post-1992 carnage, led by the Northern Alliance, backed primarily by Russia and Iran.

If Afghans see the stakes clearly, they will drive out the Wahhabis, and create an Afghanistan we can all live with.
Ms. Smith is a member of The Wall Street Journal's editorial board.


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