The Case for Karzai

 
 For what has already been a chaotic week in Congressional politics, the senate Committee on Defense met today to discuss the worsening security situation in Afghanistan. Grilled by senior Democratic and Republican senators alike, secretaries Clinton and Gates were repeatedly questioned on the slow pace of reform and stabilization in the Afghan government. With midterm elections facing half of them in November, these senators were noticeably concerned with the corruption of local and federal Afghan leaders and their inability to combat the Taliban. 
 
For the two secretaries, the best explanation they could offer the senate Committee on Defense was a weary sense of mistrust and ambivalence that has characterized the Obama position toward the Karzai government.
Following the politically disastrous results of the 2009 presidential election, the Obama administration and the State Department have taken an increasingly distant and harsh stance with Karzai. In an attempt to stabilize the region and improve the security situation, Obama has intentionally separated himself from the Afghani president.
 
 This policy stance is extremely misguided. For all intents and purposes, Hamid Karzai is as "good" as it gets in Afghan leadership. This is not the right time for regime change. Rather than improving the already precarious situation in Afghanistan, removing Karzai from power would worsen stability and the recurring problems of corruption and sectarianism. Without some basis of central government in Kabul, the Afghan state will fall victim to further degeneration, American causalities will increase, and Obama will be forced to break his promise of drawing down NATO forces by July 2011.
 
The fact is that the sectarian environment in Afghanistan makes it impossible for any viable contender to emerge and compete against Karzai. Since he is a member of the country’s majority ethnic group, the Pashtuns, Karzai has been able to obtain significant electoral support and strike pragmatic alliances with a large part of the Afghan electorate. This creates a situation in which, despite decreasing public support for him recent years, Karzai will never lose the support of the majority Pashtun community to a competitor or a minority candidate. According to a February 12th 2009 article of the Economist, Karzai has maintained high approval ratings with the vital Pashtun tribes of southern and eastern Afghanistan. As long as this president can maintain this credibility in the Pashtun tribes, no other Pashtun will run against him and no other ethnic minority candidate will be able to unseat him. 
 
So there’s no chance for the United States to replace Karzai or force a power sharing agreement with his Tajik competitor, Adullah Adullah without risking a massive public outcry from the Pashtun majority. Hundreds of years of conflict and civil war have sharpened ethnic differences so much that a coalition government will not only fail to solve the problems of legitimacy but also cease to function. Just as Matthew Hoh wrote the State Department in his letter of resignation, it is time for the United States and its allies to look at the conflict in Afghanistan not as democratic versus non-democratic but as Pashtun versus non-Pashtun. Copying the lackluster policies of his predecessor, Obama has put democratization ahead of the religious and sectarian realities of the country. 
 
In this situation, there are no “good” options but rather a minimization of risk toward a faltering state that teeters on the brink of collapse. The United States must think pragmatically about ways in which they can maximize security and minimize cost that establishes an Afghan government that can stand on its own, rather than one that must be frequently chided by its foreign occupiers. Security and the lives of American soldiers must be put before the political development of Afghanistan. The precarious position of the Afghan state demonstrates that a successful democratization and security strategy cannot be treated as one goal. Instead, the Obama administration should prioritize American lives before its unrealistic goals for Karzai and the Afghan government. Afghanistan is not referred to as “the graveyard of empires” for nothing.