An interesting article in the news about Afghanistan today illustrated (to me) the dire straits we now face. A senior USAID officer gave a mildly negative critique of the USAID reconstruction efforts. The story represents a total lack of situational awareness as 2008 draws close.
When you have lived in a poorly understood, distant country like Afghanistan, as long as I have lived here, it is easy to find mistakes in the international press. I am not nitpicking mainstream news reports because they report as fact things I know to be completely untrue. You get that a lot from the media these days.
The article was written by Mark Ward, a senior Foreign Service Officer with US AID, who had just completed an impressively long tour in Afghanistan. Here is the opening paragraph:
“Nearly every observer of Afghanistan, from the most senior U.S. military officers to Washington think tank analysts and everyone in between, agrees that stability in that country demands a multipronged approach involving the military, diplomatic efforts and economic assistance. Having spent nearly the past five years as the senior career officer responsible for U.S. economic assistance to Afghanistan, I agree with those in the military who have said that 80 percent of the struggle for Afghanistan is about reconstruction and sustainable economic development and only 20 percent about military operations. In the face of a heightened Taliban insurgency, the U.S. military has changed its tactics. But if civilian U.S. agencies do not change the ways they deliver economic assistance, they jeopardize their chances for success and risk alienating the Afghan people.”
He is spot on with this assessment. I would judge that he is around six years late, but better late than never. He then goes on to discuss the ramifications to the morale of the American people if, given relaxed security standards, Foreign Service Officers get killed in the line of duty. What??? The American public doesn’t even know what a Foreign Service Officer is, and they couldn’t give a hoot if a few buy the farm in Afghanistan. You have already lost men in Iraq, and that caused no detectable disturbance in the body politic. My friend, FSO Steve Sullivan, was killed by a VBIED in Mosul along with three Blackwater contractors. State Department and contractor casualties are not the same as military casualties because the mainstream media doesn’t treat them the same. You won’t see our names in memorials on Sunday talk shows or PBS, or our numbers included in the national dialogue.
A new administration is also taking office, which will change the tone and tenor of media coverage 180 degrees for reasons that are too obvious to mention. I do not believe for a second that the concern about FSO casualties will in any way affect (or even register with) the will of the American people to continue our efforts in Afghanistan.
Mr. Ward concludes his article with this paragraph:
“The new team at the State Department and USAID should engage a team of outside experts to conduct an objective assessment of the security rules and their impact on our economic assistance program in Afghanistan. The review should give due weight to the importance of interacting with the Afghan people to hear their ideas, get to know them and gain their trust. It should rigorously test the theories about what would happen if an increasing number of Foreign Service officers were killed and injured as a result. And it should look at other donor countries’ approach to security in Afghanistan. Some have the balance between security and access about right, particularly in parts of the country where security is more permissive.”
We do not need expensive DC-based contractors to conduct a review of security procedures or conduct an assessment of the consequences of increased Foreign Service officer casualties. There is a seven-year track record in Afghanistan from governmental and nongovernmental organizations operating precisely as Mr. Ward advocates. The government of Japan has over 100 “Foreign Service officers” (the Japanese do not use that term) spread out from Mazar-e-Sharif to Jalalabad, working every day in Afghan ministries and offices, mentoring their Afghan colleagues. They do this on a security budget that is less than the cost of providing bottled water to the US Embassy compound in Kabul. The Japan International Cooperation Agency uses the same security guidelines as every other international organization in Afghanistan (except for the US AID contractors who use DS guidelines), and that is the UN minimum occupational safety standards (UN MOSS.)
The UN MOSS standards are not applicable in contested provinces (Helmand, Zabul, Kandahar, etc). In those provinces, the best solution would be to turn over all reconstruction monies to our military, which has repeatedly demonstrated that they are better at delivering reconstruction aid anyway. For the rest of the country, the US could start sending its FSOs out into the provinces immediately and be reasonably sure that any casualties they take would come from motor vehicle accidents, one of the bigger threats faced by internationals living outside the wire. There have been IGO and NGO casualties in Afghanistan, but they are rare and disproportionately suffered by those who choose not to use armed security. By that I mean those organizations that place stickers on their vehicles of an AK 47 with a red circle and a line drawn through it. Nothing says “I am important and unarmed” like a new SUV with “no weapons on board” stickers. This is not a country where it is wise to advertise that you are both essential and unarmed. It is a dangerous place, but the risks are manageable and reasonable, which has been proven by JICA and the hundreds of other organizations currently operating outside the wire in Afghanistan.
The last time I was at the Kabul International Airport I saw a group of embassy workers being escorted from the VIP parking lot adjacent to the terminal to the front door by four Blackwater contractors with weapons and complete kit. I would submit that having armed men escort your diplomats the entire 100 yards from the parking lots to the front door is not only unnecessary but insulting to the host nation. The men Blackwater places on the embassy contract are highly trained operatives who must maintain rigorous weapons proficiency standards and top-secret security clearances. They would be of much greater use out in the provinces and undoubtedly be much happier roaming around the countryside where their skill set is used. Parading around the Kabul airport with rifles at the ready is silly.
I applaud Mr. Ward for highlighting this issue in Washington, D.C.. Still, I must stress that we must adopt a sense of urgency regarding the rapidly deteriorating situation in Afghanistan. We do not have the time or money to study what to do; it is time to do. The way forward had been marked by the thousands of internationals operating inside Afghanistan daily, using the UN MOSS security guidelines. The American Embassy and US AID already have dozens of highly trained security contractors in Kabul. It is time to put them to better use.
I would have to agree with you on the importance of getting outside the wire and focusing on reconstruction projects. I think the big problem — at least from what I have read over the years is security and corruption. I disagree with your assessment that deaths of FSOs would go unnoticed by the American public. If FSO casulties were a regular occurance, I think it would be picked up by the MSM and would probably cause an uproar of people demanding we get out of Afghanistan. Americans are very casualty adverse. I’m sure this thought has crossed the minds of DoS powers and that may explain the level of security and their inability to be out and about. I’m betting most of those FSOs would like to be out and about working with the people.
That said, there was an interesting article yesterday or over the weekend about how none of the major news networks has a full time correspondent in Iraq – – and haven’t had full-time correspondents in Afghanistan for years. An NBC executive said that the media and the American public have grown weary of the war. Granted, they expect things to shift toward Afghanistan in the Obama administration. But who knows.
It will be very interesting what the impact of having Hilary Clinton as the Sec of State will be.
Regarding the CIA and Viagra – – culturally, I see your point – – it could be insulting. And maybe whoever they are courting is educated and does know what Viagra is. Viagra is expensive – – isn’t it like $60 – $100 a pill? Why pay for it when you could get it free — and maybe the contact doesn’t plan on using it himself but selling it? Silly or not that story in the Wash Post probably doesn’t surprise most Americans.
great post tim ! I hope your get your GATR back online soon brother !
I especially was rolling on the floor this morning on the clown comments – Hang in there..
Much love to the Taj for 2009!
Given that many “journalists” aspire to write the next great novel, I can’t understand why their penchant for writing fiction surprises you. Many a night in Farah I entertained myself by surfing the net looking for articles on our contacts with the hostiles in the neighborhood. I found the small number of articles actually published in the western media were wildly inaccurate. I was a hoot to read our contact reports and set them beside the news pieces.
As usual, and excellent piece. Happy New Year
Ron
Another great post. While your Afghan storytelling is good stuff, where you point out the disconnect between what we need to achieve and our methods that are incompatible is what needs to be read at the highest levels. FOB-bound is not what we need. We need to get out in the thick of things, where you do risk the chance of being engaged by the ACM; but that’s where the Afghan people live. It’s good to see that the Japanese aren’t afraid to go out and do their jobs.
For those of us who have functioned outside the wire for lengthy periods in Afghanistan, it’s demystified. Yes, there is a certain amount of danger, but while it may seem safe on the FOBs, that is the surest way to lose. What security do you gain for the United States if force protection always wins over what effects you have in the field? In the end, you bring home tens of thousands of people who have never left the wire and lose the greater struggle. If you truly want to see a robust and healthy Al Qaeda, let the Taliban win in Afghanistan. Then how secure will our families be in the States?
I know that you see this, and your frustration is evident. Don’t get tired of tossing the bullshit flag, Tim. The only thing I regret is that this posting isn’t being read word for word on each major network. Now THAT would be news!
Have a great New Year!
Blue
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the blog post From the Front: 12/31/2008 News and Personal dispatches from the front and the home front.
This entire war on terror is, for me, a rehash of Vietnam. Same old quack, new set of feathers. Little was learned from that fiasco as we now know.
Upon reading the headline that the arrogance, J. Paul Breemer 111 esquire, etc., was firing the Iraqi army, way back when, I realised that people who gravitate to Washington DC for work, are likely to be incompetent.
As I read the comments above, and rerad other blogs such as “Afghanistan Shrugged,” “Bill and Bob’s Excellent Afghan Adventure” etc, I am struck by the almost always exact discovery of the same points, over and over.
Now I retired from Uncle Sams Sugar corps in 2006 after four combat tours, with three adventure filled trips to Afghanistan, and what I told my bosses (and their bosses, anybody I could find actually), is the same as what you all above are discovering. It was in October of 2001 that I first told the Intel director of the USMC that the only way to pacify Afghanistan was via engineers, as the British had begun to do in the tribal areas of their then colony of India in the 1920s and 1930s (funny, Pakistan seems to have stopped that program in the 1940s). I took the time to verify my views in the field from 2003 thru 2006, frequently in civvies and sans body armor (as I liked to say, alone and very afraid).
Roads and services will always seduce a populace, giving them a claim as part or whole owners of the infrastructure that the dissatisfied ones (insurgents, terrorist, jihadis, guerrillas, freedom-fighters, criminals, dacoits, take your pick) are or will try to destroy.
Roads let services and goods (money and food most especially) in, and ambitious or poor out to better fields. Schools, medical services, electrical power, etc all flow in, maybe slowly at first, but they do. The “barbarians” get seduced and eventaully become stake-holders in reasonably settled conditions (corruption is a different beast to tackle).
I sold this line from 2001 to 2006. I sold this line based on experiences in Afghanistan, Djibouti, Yemen, Iraq, the Philippines, etc, etc. I sold this line to DoD folks, DoS folks, DoJ folks and the politician.
Seems that since you all are still discovering the same things, nobody bothered to listen.
that is what angers me…that we can see the problems but that since our (and allied) politicos see no viable reason to address these observation as it brings them no immediate domestic political gain…
Well, never mind, I can see you all feel the same way. We are doomed to repeat failure again and again, I fear. Victory is in our grasp and our leadership will snatch defeat from its jaws, again. What really upsets me is that we really can change many lives for the better as well as defuse the allure of the Islamiyun death-worshipers.
My opinion.
S/F
I agree with you 100%. There are already hundreds of military personnel such as SF, ETTs and others operating outside the wire with Afghan counterparts. A huge resource that has yet to be tapped in anyway shape or form. That they should start the cycle of learning over by them, FSOs, attempting to get outside the wire is a massive waste of time. Learn what those who are already out there know and springboard from there.
The belief that the loss of FSOs in theater will sway the American public into not supporting the war; smacks of elitism and self importance. Soldiers are dying all the time, it sounds callus to write but is an FSO more important than an American warrior? This sounds similar to the argument that FSOs shouldn’t be forced to serve in the embassy at Baghdad because they could get killed, well no DUH!
I have yet so see anyone from the Department of State, PRT, USAID or the UN in my area of operations. So how are they getting the information to make the plans to reconstruct Afghanistan? By listening to the FOB bound in Kabul??
A road into the AO would do more than 100 JDAMs and 1000 Cordon and Searches, but somebody has to fund them, so give the military the money and let us get to work. Time is always a constraint and we’re rapidly pissing it away worry about issues that have no impact at the populace level. The people in Bermel don’t care or know who the new US President is, but they will care when a road shows up that makes it faster to drive to OE than to drive to the tribal region of Pakistan.
It’s time to stop studying and start doing, no more committees, focus groups or think tank papers. Time for shovels, graders and construction. If anyone from State, USAID or any other organization wants to come down here and get outside the wire I’m not going anywhere for the next 6 months or so, come on down!
P.S. I subscribe to the idea of looking unimportant and being armed to the teeth
About the CIA & Viagra:
While Viagra is most certainly available in Afghanistan, not many Pashtun elders would be willing to admit that they needed chemical assistance to “get their freak on”. Discreetly providing a way for an elder to demonstrate his virility might just be the ticket to get a crucial bit of intelligence or cooperation when needed. I’m sure that the Washington Post chose the Viagra example because of it’s tawdry appeal to readers, but it just falls under the mundane heading of “liaison gifts”. Money, guns, livestock, medical procedures and medications, water-wells, and almost anything else you can imagine have been used to curry favor with assets.
There is an account in “Charlie Wilson’s War” where a Polish military officer agreed to help supply the CIA with Warsaw Pact weaponry destined for the Afghan Muj. His price for cooperation? A nice headstone for the grave of his father, who had died as an ex-pat in Canada.
Just another MSM-sensationalized account of a valid intelligence practice.