Afghanistan — corruption trumps violence

Corruption-tired common Afghans continue to flock towards the Taliban, viewed as “brutal but efficient and devout”

The “Afghanistan Papers” were published in The Washington Post in December 2019, detailing causes of US failures in Afghanistan. These papers were based upon the US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) interviews with some 400 — mainly insider — US, Afghan and UN officials. My two columns, “The Afghanistan Papers — Truth be Damned” published on December 17, and “Afghanistan Papers — Scapegoating Pakistan” published on December 24, 2019, analysed the US war effort and responded to Pakistan specific finger pointing. This op-ed would focus on the financial mismanagement of the invasion and the war and the scope of its implications.

The Papers note, “About halfway into the 18-year war, Afghans stopped hiding how corrupt their country had become… Dark money sloshed all around. Afghanistan’s largest bank liquefied into a cesspool of fraud. Travellers lugged suitcases loaded with $1 million, or more, on flights leaving Kabul… Mansions known as “poppy palaces” rose from the rubble to house opium kingpins.”

In damning indictment, the US stands as an accomplice in seeding corruption in the Afghan state and society, at a scale never previously known.

First, it doled out vast sums without proper oversight. Barnett Rubin, a former State Department adviser and university professor, told SIGAR, “The basic assumption was that corruption is an Afghan problem.” Even if so, he points out, it was the Americans who brought in the money.

Second, the US assistance was in total disregard to the absorption capacity of the Afghan state. The rush to spend, in order to quick-fix a state and society, US/NATO did not fully understand, had downsides. During the “nation building” under president Bush (2001-09), the US allocated more than $133 billion; flooding Afghanistan with far more aid than it could absorb. Gert Berthold, a forensic accountant in Afghanistan (2010 to 2012), who helped analyse some 3,000 Defense Department contracts worth $106 billion, concluded, “About [more than] 40% of the money ended up in the pockets of insurgents, criminal syndicates or corrupt Afghan officials.” Nobody wanted to hear about it, let alone own it and do something about it.

Third, hard cash was used in an unprecedented manner to purchase loyalties and information from warlords, parliamentarians, governors and even religious leaders. President Karzai admitted to the CIA delivering bags of cash to his office calling it “nothing unusual”. Papers cite the US military, CIA, State Department/other agencies using cash (and lucrative contracts) to win Afghan warlords in the fight against the Taliban and Al Qaeda. This short-term tactic ended up binding the US with some of the most tainted figures for years.

Fourth, the unholy trinity of warlords, drug barons and defense contractors was tolerated… being US allies. The long list includes Mohammad Qasim Fahimi (died 2014) — the Tajik commander — and later the first Afghan vice president. Fahimi was known for his “brutality and graft”; the US Ambassador Ryan C Crooker (2011-12), described him as “a totally evil person”. The other “prime beneficiary of US largesse was Abdul Rashid Dostum”, the brutal Uzbek strongman accused of rape, torture and the Sheberghan massacre — suffocating captured Taliban fighters in airtight shipping containers during November 2001. Papers cite Dostum getting a hefty $100,000 monthly from the CIA for not causing trouble. Dostum, ironically, is vying to be a “Marshall” under the present Afghan government.

Another ruthless US protégé was Sher Mohammad Akhundzada — aka SMA, the Helmand provincial governor (2001 to 2005). US Army general McNeill describes the warlord, a confirmed drug-baron, as; “SMA was dirty but he kept stability because people were afraid of him”, claiming he was not “advocating dancing with the devil”. Richard Boucher, a former assistant secretary of state (South Asia) in a nuanced view, justified corruption. “Corruption that ‘spreads the wealth’ to people who need it,” he said, was “tolerable, even necessary”.

Boucher also admired Gul Agha Sherzai aka “bulldozer”, another warlord from Nangarhar, who had “amassed a fortune by skimming taxes and contracts while serving as a provincial governor”. Boucher advocated giving money to Afghans rather than to “a bunch of expensive American experts” wasting 80 to 90% of it on overheads and profit. He declared, “I want it [the money] to disappear in Afghanistan, rather than in the Beltway.” Other government officials rubbished this approach. Nils Taxell, a Swedish anti-corruption expert called Sherazi “a benevolent asshole” who “didn’t take or keep everything for himself, he left a little for others.”

Warlords were not the only beneficiaries, the Papers report. The US government gave “nice packages” to supportive Afghan tribal delegates who were to write a new constitution in 2002 and 2003. Lawmakers were made to realise the monetary value of their vote and position on issues, tainting their view of democracy as a system “in which money was deeply embedded”.

By 2006, the Afghan government had morphed into a kleptocracy, interested only in self-sustenance and not good governance. The corruption-trail was long and never cold. Barnett Rubin, aide to Richard Holbrooke, special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan (2009 to 2010), said, “Holbrooke hated Hamid Karzai. He thought he was corrupt as hell.” After the 2009 Afghan presidential elections, a UN-backed investigation determined “Karzai had received about one million illegal votes, a quarter of all those cast”.

The aid dollar loot was siphoned through New Ansari Money Exchange, a leading Afghan financial institution to buy properties in Dubai. Somewhere in July 2010, Afghan anti-corruption officials took heart to raid the Ansari offices. Incriminating evidence recovered led to the arrest of Zia Salehi, a Karzai aide and a CIA mole. He was quickly released on Karzai’s intervention.

Later in 2010, Kabul Bank, the country’s biggest, “nearly collapsed under the weight of $1 billion in fraudulent loans” extended to the president’s brother Mahmoud Karzai, family of Fahim Khan and others. Ironically, when the US spy agencies knew of the brewing trouble, a US consultant to the bank was vouchsafing for its health to the Treasury Department. US ambassador Ryan Crooker and the military helped bury the bank investigation in political appeasement.

The Afghan National Army and police have a predatory officer corps, accused of taking cuts from soldiers’ wages and pocketing of ghost soldiers’ salaries. “Soldiers sell official property including gasoline.” The US spent about $9 billion to curb opium production during the past 18 years; only to find that in 2018 alone, Afghanistan produced 82% of the global opium.

In a bizarre manner, US and NATO forces have been paying the Taliban “rahdari” or fee for safe passage through Taliban areas. This figure alone runs into billions. No wonder the US Auditor General cannot reconcile and balance the war accounts.

The US/NATO approach has created a deep-rooted corruption-tolerant culture that Afghanistan would take generations to cast-off. The consequent loss of US/Western credibility makes the present settlement so hard. Ghani and his cabal cannot let go of their pie. Corruption-tired common Afghans, meanwhile, continue to flock towards the Taliban, viewed as “brutal but efficient and devout”.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 18^th, 2020.

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