World cannot afford to fail

Feb.1, 2008

World cannot afford to fail

TWO years after a gathering in London chalked out a plan for billions of dollars in international assistance to Afghanistan and agreed to implement it, the situation has turned all the more worse, according to reports drawn up by experts.
The reports acknowledge that tens of billions of dollars have been spent in Afghanistan but for the wrong purposes. An immediate example is Washington's announced plans involving about $10.6 billion to spent on security and development in the country in the next two years. The bulk of the money — $8.6 billion — will be spent on training Afghan security forces -- meaning a chunk of it being channelled to US equipment and US contractors.The rest will be spent for reconstruction, again meaning contracts for US companies or firms allied with US companies. The US has already spent some $14 billion in aid to Afghanistan since the 2001 invasion which toppled the Taleban. Apart from that the US is spending about $100 million a month in Afghanistan in the fight against the Taliban and Al Qaeda.
The international community has spent an equal amount in Afghanistan.
With so much of money flowing into the country, one would expect the people of Afghanistan to be far better than their counterparts in other developing countries.
The ground reality is in dark contrast to the expectation. The ordinary people of Afghanistan have yet to feel any difference in their daily life.
Crops are poor, and unemployment is as high as 50 per cent in most of the country. Militant groups like the Taliban and Al Qaeda find fertile ground for recruitment among the unemployed in Afghanistan. Many Afghans have turned to growing poppy despite efforts to stamp out the practice.
These are only cursory reviews of the situation in the country.
The Atlantic Council says that the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) is not winning in Afghanistan and the British charity Oxfam has warned that the country faces a humanitarian disaster. It points out that millions of dollars of development aid is being wasted and says that the international approach towards Afghanistan is lacking in direction and is "incoherent and uncoordinated."
Effectively, the reports have underlined the pressing need for a new approach to prevent Afghanistan becoming a "failed or failing state."
The warning by the US Atlantic Council is ominous:
"If Afghanistan fails, the possible strategic consequences will worsen regional instability, do great harm to the fight against jihadist and religious extremism, and put in grave jeopardy Nato's future as a credible, cohesive and relevant military alliance."
The American Afghanistan Study Group says that "resurgent violence, weakening international resolve, too few military forces and insufficient economic aid" were all contributing to the country's woes.
The international community, which professes keen interest in prevening states to fail, and the US, which leads the "war against terror" that it launched with the Afghan war in 2001, have to take these warning seriously and rethink strategies. If they fail to do so, then the world would have in its hands one of the worst disasters it ever faced.