STATE BUILDING IN THE FACE OF INSURGENT ISLAM

SWP Papers S 30 (english version), 2004

After impressive initial successes in dealing with the humanitarian crisis and toppling the Taliban, the dual strategy of building peace while fighting terrorism is facing failure. For the foreseeable future Afghanistan’s government will not possess the capacity to control violence that is the precondition for establishing a legitimate monopoly on the use of force. There is an immediate danger that the voluntary disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration of the approximately 50,000 Afghan mujahedin will fail. The country is on the brink of becoming a “narco-state.” Consequently the government will be unable to develop its own extractive capacity for levying the taxes and duties required to provide at least a minimum of welfare services independent of external funding. Individual and community-based welfare continues to be tied to the illegal economy as the primary motor of development. Nor is a law-making capacity that would put the state in a position to guarantee a legitimate and democratic legal system in sight either. Multiple state, community, and religious legal systems currently exist side by side in Afghanistan. The new Afghan constitution is unlikely to bring about any significant statification or homogenization of the legal systems. The failure to meaningfully include the neighboring states in the Bonn process and the lack so far of initiatives to develop a regional security regime have left Afghanistan without effective external relations capacity, leaving the country exposed to continuing destabilizing influences that undermine the consolidation of its statehood. This critical interim verdict has room for a more optimistic outlook on the future. If we concentrate on disarming, demobilizing, and reintegrating the fighters, and consolidating the core institutions of the central state, while at the same time tapping local knowledge and strengthening the regional dimension by involving neighboring states and regional powers, a stronger Afghanistan could emerge from the present crisis. Retrospectively the civil war might even, as in other cases, turn out to be a state-building war. The precondition for this would be power-political realism not only in dealings with actors in Afghanistan itself, but also in the region, where neighboring states have their own legitimate (and illegitimate) security interests. If the states involved in Afghanistan ignore these realities, there is a real risk of gradual fragmentation and disintegration toward the centripetal force fields to the west, north, and south. The symptoms are all to clear.

With the approaching drawdown of U.S. forces from Af-ghanistan by 2014, Central Asian countries seem worried that Taliban will use this as momentum to launch a new offensive, threatening to re-destabilize the country and make it a safe haven for terrorism and extremism. It has repeatedly been stated by Central Asian leaders that re-destabilization of Afghanistan could bring about serious security implications for the region including spillover of violence, spread of extremism and increases in drug trafficking. The mobilization of extremist groups with links to Afghanistan and increase in trafficking is already being observed in Central Asia, and the situation will likely be exacerbated if Afghanistan collapses into anarchy and violence. The internal weaknesses of Central Asian countries make them increasingly vulnerable to the negative impacts of the situation in Afghanistan. The combined effects of the rise of violence in Afghanistan and internal weaknesses of Central Asian countries has the potential to leave the whole region extremely insecure vis-à-vis the possible deterioration of stability in Afghani-stan after 2014.

Global Policy, 2017

After the US invasion of Afghanistan, while there were some successes in fighting international terrorists in the region, Western attempts at state-building in Afghanistan remain a dismal failure. After years of Western military involvement, the Taliban insurgency today shows no signs of operational decay or a possible defeat. This article argues that Western engagement in Afghanistan only prolongs civil strife and makes room for more radical elements such as the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) to gain a robust foothold in Afghanistan. Domestic conflicts, with the past involvement of the former Soviet Union and the ongoing Western intervention, have bruised and traumatized Afghan society. What the country now needs is a different form of political process that makes peace and reconciliation a top priority. A transition to a peace process will face multiple hurdles, but given their military and economic sacrifices in Afghanistan, the US and its allies should not flinch, but rather face the challenges boldly

After the US invasion of Afghanistan, while there were some successes in fighting international terrorists in the region, Western attempts at state-building in Afghanistan remain a dismal failure. After years of Western military involvement, the Taliban insurgency today shows no signs of operational decay or a possible defeat. This article argues that Western engagement in Afghanistan only prolongs civil strife and makes room for more radical elements such as the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) to gain a robust foothold in Afghanistan. Domestic conflicts, with the past involvement of the former Soviet Union and the ongoing Western intervention, have bruised and traumatized Afghan society. What the country now needs is a different form of political process that makes peace and reconciliation a top priority. A transition to a peace process will face multiple hurdles, but given their military and economic sacrifices in Afghanistan, the US and its allies should not flinch, but rather face the challenges boldly

After the end of the war on terror in Afghanistan a comprehensive peacebuilding approach has been taken. As a post war strategy, to avoid further emergence of terrorist and relapse of conflict, USA decided to dismantle local security structures and build a relatively strong, democratic, Afghan central government. However, Afghanistan is currently experiencing a disturbing recurrence of insurgent activities. The regroup of insurgent groups can be attributed to the failure of the Afghan government and the international community to establish a legitimate state in Afghanistan, a state capable of fulfilling its most basic functions and requirements. The aim of this paper is to assess the present condition of state building effort; as well as seek to answer the questions: • How successful is the state-building policy to establish sustainable peace in Afghanistan? • Is there any possibility to relapse of conflict both internal and regional perspective? • What are the potential threats and obstacles? With this regard this paper will shade light on the theoretical approach of conflict prevention as an instrument to prevent the relapse of conflict, accordingly state building as the central elements of conflict prevention.

2014

In Central Asia the regimes link Islamists with terrorism and violence, thus framing them as a security challenge (securitisation of Islamism), often with (wrongly) alleged roots in Afghanistan. To these regimes, state security actually denotes security for the regime rather than for the people. This exacerbates the already low identification between society and state, a key feature of weak statehood in Central Asia. The lack of agreed codes and rules for competition and coexistence in the public debate result in a fragmented public discourse with little continuity. Instead, multiple centres of power seek to improve own security and influence at others’ expense. Doctrinal documents reveal big differences in how the regimes see the Islamist challenge. Is it primarily a political or a military threat? Is this threat primarily external or internal? In sum, Islamism is primarily a challenge to the regimes in the region and is unlikely to abate. Little underpins regional action and regimes’ mainly individual responses will not change.

This article examines the dynamics of inducing stability in Afghanistan. There are two competing groups of nations in this process, nations like Russia, India, Iran and CARs who want Afghanistan to stabilise as a modernist and inclusive State and the other grouping of Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and China, who want the Taliban reinstalled to maximise their geo-political gains. The US has now espoused modest, achievable objectives to ensure the face saving exist from Afghanistan. Americans have argued that State-building and nation-building is not the task of the US army, its sole task is to fight and win war and not build the nation-State. Pakistan is the most significant regional actor and major spoiler. Pakistan treats Islamic extremists as its strategic asset. Strangely, there is complete convergence between the Iran-India-US interests in Afghanistan. All three want destruction of Al Qaeda and Taliban; want to prevent the return of Taliban to power; Western and Iranian interests converge on the issue of drug trafficking emanating from Afghanistan. The Central Asian Republics want stable and strong government in Afghanistan, which can check the radicalisation of the region. The writer contends that there is no such thing as good or soft Taliban. They are by nature hardened criminals and so their integration is fraught with dangers.

2021

Through the 1990s, the failed state problem, evaluated earlier as essentially a humanitarian or human rights issue (Fukuyama, 2005: 126), was gradually associated with international insecurity and the idea of non-traditional security threats (Newman, 2009: 424). Failed states discourse gained greater urgency after the 9/11 attacks, because territories of failed states were evaluated as safe havens for terrorist groups. The term ‘state failure’ indicates a condition where the central government has a poor or no capacity to control public order within its territory, to deliver vital public goods, to maintain the rule of law, and to sustain economic and social development (Newman, 2009: 422). Such states and territories were viewed to be threats against the security and foreign policies of Western states, so they had to be reformed by extraordinary measures. External interventions to failed states, as extraordinary measures, have been justified as a corrective to ‘the horrendous costs ...

Resurgence of the Islamic State and Challenges to the Peace Deal in Afghanistan, 2020

The Islamic State (IS) had ambitions of controlling Pakistan, Central Asia, and Afghanistan which is also known as the Khorasan region. After its success in Syria and Iraq, the IS wanted to establish its foothold in Khorasan as they anticipated support from the local militant organizations. On the contrary, the IS had to face the US airstrikes and anti-terrorist operation Zarb-e-Azb launched by Pakistan. The Taliban could be a reliable ally of IS in the region, but clashes between the two have diminished the chances of former’s success in the region. This paper gives a brief background of the current security situation in the Khorasan region. As the Afghan peace deal is reached, this paper aims to examine the role of the Afghan peace deal on the rejuvenation of the long-held aspirations of IS in the region. Once American troops leave Afghanistan, the prospects of peace will become precarious. This resurgence of terrorist activities by the IS will have implications for the peace and stability of the region.