Travels With Nick # 3
The road from Kabul to Jalalabad is as spectacular a drive as you can find. Toyota Corollas and jingle trucks snake along a river that cuts through dramatic mountains, along the edge of spectacular gorges, and across lush river valleys. As we made the trip, scores of Kuchi nomads walked the road, shooing their livestock off the road as we pass. The drive also gave me reason to ponder the example of Nangarhar province, often cited as the success story of the East. The drive is relatively safe because Nangarhar is relatively safe — and increasingly prosperous thanks to its fertile land and its trade route to Pakistan.
Many attribute Nang’s success to its legendary and controversial warlord governor, Gul Agha Sherzai. Sherzai is practically a caricature of the Afghan warlord: a former Muj against the Russians, he combines ruthlessness with Machiavellian political skills and a convenient comfort with corruption or worse. He would be easy to dislike if not for the fact that he keeps Nangarhar safe and increasingly prosperous while staunchly pro-American. The visible focused police presence I saw in downtown Jalalabad is indicative of how Sherzai has tamed the province and increased capacity along many dimensions. Fertile lands and an increasing role as a regional economic hub have spurred ideas of what reliable power, further irrigation, and an airport could yield in turning Jalalabad’s agricultural wealth into a valuable export.
My hosts in Jalabad were the fine soldiers of the 3rd Brigade, 1st Infantry division at FOB Fenty. I am indebted to these guys for their invitation and taking the time to talk with me about our handbooks and training projects. Long gone, however, is the cushy life of the Burz Al Arab or Kabul Serena. My Fenty quarters were a plywood prison cell right next to a busy helo pad. The 3-1 has really faced some extraordinary challenges — reforming as an entirely new unit only months before deployment to RC East — a treacherous and challenging counterinsurgency mission. It is a great credit to COL John Spiszer and his team that they have sustained modest progress in the Northeast even as the situation in the South has deteriorated. The 3-1 has an extraordinary, if perhaps overly stovepiped, group of support units for the engagement and reconstruction of Nangarhar. You have a PRT, HTT, ADT, MTT, not to mention vairous partners in a collection of NGOs and IOs. WTF! Leaving aside (for now) the organizational wisdom of this alphabet soup, Nangarhar is potentially a worthy example of success in the East. Or is it?
Is Sherzai’s strongman approach one we would want to duplicate elsewhere? Does the Provincial government have a self-sustaining income stream to function? There is little taxation collected in the province except for the tariff at Torkham Gate — the primary trade route with Pakistan. The Afghan Torkham profits go directly to a fund controlled by Sherzai, allegedly used for “reconstruction” in an account he controls. Real development is almost entirely funded by outsiders such as the US PRT and various USAID programs. A small budgetary allotment from Kabul just about pays for existing salaries, with none for development, construction, or even much maintenance. Thus, much of the governance and economic growth may be unsustainable servicing of the US grant-making and logistics appetite.
One can think of stabilization as a sequence from engagement to ceasefire to managed peace to self-sustaining peace to long term development and (perhaps) democratization. Nangarhar is ready for a stronger emphasis on sustainable development and governance capacity building that can withstand the inevitable departures of Sherzai and most US assistance. This is not to dismiss the contribution made by Sherzai. He is a good example that working with nasty characters can be a necessary and effective part of small wars.
Nick Dowling is a small wars policy wonk with experience in OSD, the NSC Staff, NDU, and the contracting sector. He has worked on stability operations for 16 years, most prominently on Bosnia and Kosovo as a Clinton Administration appointee and Iraq and Afghanistan as a DoD contractor. He is currently President of IDS International, a leader in interagency and soft power” types of support to the US military. He is a graduate of Harvard, got his masters at Georgetown, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Although a veteran of print and television media interviews and publications, this is his first foray into SWJ.
