Afghan policy: what is to be done?

Policymaking at the level of a state is an art. It is actually a state craft. Multiple institutions and actors play an important role in the formulation of policies but the most important role is played by the specialists that are deputed to work within the policy sub-system. If the policy is good, it ensures continuity and the resultant status quo culminates in the achievement of the desired political end and thus there is a win-win situation for the civilian leadership that formulated that policy. Yet any demand for policy change is usually attributed to a losing cause and in that context all those that played any role in formulation of such a faulty policy are generally termed losers.

Policies are generally the outcome of deep-rooted beliefs. No wonder why historically we have two categories of American Presidents — war and anti-war presidents. Any policy formulation is intrinsically related to the running belief system of the individuals, institutions as well as the state. All policy participants carry with them their core beliefs and that is why in the public policy domain it is important to know which actor is advocating what and what is the background of that actor and the background of his and her core beliefs. I would like to quote a US example before I move on to suggest why we as a state will never have a good Afghan policy if we continue with our partisan bickering.

We must give President Donald Trump the credit for concluding a deal with Taliban that finally enabled the American troops to return to their country. American Afghan policy saw many ups and downs including the American civilian leaderships protest on how the American military had hijacked the policy and saw the Afghan policy end only in the military way of winning that war. I would like to highlight the divergent views of some of the participants of America’s Afghan policymaking — US Presidents, their generals, their senate foreign relations committee, their former national security advisor and their top envoy to Afghanistan — all of them were subjects to their core beliefs or a system of institutional core beliefs and that mattered in how the American policy in Afghanistan was dragged in different directions for 18 long years.

From President Bush to President Biden, we have four American presidents now who carried divergent views on the shape and direction of Afghan policy. In the end when the policy became reconciliatory the American Senate’s foreign relation committee disagreed with it and politely suggested a reconsideration. Even Zalmay Khalilzad, the top US envoy to Afghanistan, suggested a peace summit on the lines of 2001 conference in Bonn as a prelude to the final Afghan settlement. He even asked the UN to take a lead role and call such a conference. The former US national security advisor General H R McMaster still suggests a policy review and till the last moment continued to demand of the American policymakers to build support for a continued American military presence in Afghanistan.

During the policy formulation period what we essentially have is a setting, a plot and multiple characters. The American Afghan policy had its origin under the 9/11 setting. The threat to western liberal world by Islamic terrorism was the plot and the various characters can be summarised into heroes, villains and the victims of the war. I will leave it to the reader’s imagination to pick up the heroes and the villains of this war but the people of Afghanistan and Pakistan have been the true victims — something that the policymakers in Pakistan must clearly recognise. The human impact of our Afghan policymakers has been huge. And it is because of this that Pakistan’s future Afghan policy should not be partisan but conciliatory.

Therefore, organising and holding only one meeting of Parliamentary Committee on National Security in which the DG ISI briefed selected parliamentarians is not enough. What is essentially required is a series of meetings which should be attended by parliamentarians who held important positions during PML-N and PPP governments in the past. The leadership of the opposition parties are the past participants of building and constructing the current Afghan policy and the push for a new policy must never ignore the pull of the past else it will never positively evolve.

There is an Afghan saying which translates as “if the water is muddied downstream, don’t waste your time filtering it; better to go upstream”. The muddied water of our Afghan policy has a past and the characters that were part of that policymaking are around. Even experienced people like the ex-Army chief, General (retd) Ashfaq Pervaiz Kayani should be invited to give his views to the parliamentary committee on national security on the future challenges that we may confront because of the changed Afghan policy.

Civilians are supposed to make policy and it should be broad-based and conciliatory. PM Imran Khan should even invite all important opposition leaders to attend a series of meetings to formulate our Afghan policy thus demonstrating that he is prepared to harness the leadership not only the experienced military leadership but the leadership of all political parties to meet the deadly stateless threats that we may confront in future. More importantly, the viewpoints and disagreements of the leadership of various parties should be allowed to spill over into the press for the public also to judge the righteousness of various positions. This in fact is the essence of democracy else whatever PM Imran is leading is an autocracy that can only construct and give us a partisan Afghan policy. A true conciliator is the one who like the PM is in power and true conciliation can only be initiated from a position of strength.

The current setting of Afghan policy is under the framework of US withdrawal of forces, the plot is to blame Pakistan for whatever happens in future and unless we come together as one political unit and one nation, we may again find ourselves included in not the heroes but the villains and the victims list. We must remember that the fluid situation in Afghanistan can result in anything from an absolute ceasefire, power sharing, stepping down of President Ghani, and a neutral government’s takeover to the toppling of current Afghan government at the hands of Taliban.

What is to be done? In 1902 was the title of Vladimir Lenin’s famous pamphlet in which he prescribed a strategy for what later became the Bolshevik’s successful takeover of Russia’s 1917 revolution. Maybe, we can entitle the series of meetings of the parliamentary committee on national security as “What is to be done?” and let the world know that our approach to formulation of new Afghan policy is not partisan but broad-based and conciliatory.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 11^th, 2021.

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