The Return of Warlordism in Afghanistan

After a decade of involvement in Afghanistan, it appears the United States hasn't learned a critical lesson. Warlordism has been a critical component in driving the country's vicious cycle of violence. Yet as the drawdown of US and NATO troops proceeds, American policymakers are one again turning to warlord-led militias to fill security gaps.

“It is enormously short sighted to turn to these militias for stability. It all looks good on paper, but what matters is security and that's not happening,” said Rachel Reid, a researcher for Human Rights Watch and adviser on Afghanistan for the Open Society Institute. Reid and other activists participated in a recent discussion panel on human rights in Afghanistan at New York University.

The history of warlordism in Afghanistan is a long one, stretching back over thirty years to the Soviet conflict with the Mujahedin guerilla fighters. Organized in small groups, normally along ethnic or clan lines, the Mujahedin successfully overthrew the Communist government, but failed to restore stability after the conflict ended. Warlords at regional outposts promoted corruption and violence in the early 1990s, which fueled the rise of the Taliban as a force for stability. Today, with US support, disparate militia groups have once again emerged as regional power brokers and with similarly chaotic results.

“We react as if Afghan violence is something shocking and foreign when in fact we are directly responsible for the way things have unfolded,” said Matthieu Aikins, a journalist whose article on one of the most notorious Afghan militia leaders, Abdul Raziq, just appeared in the November issue of The Atlantic.

Abdul Raziq, like many of the U.S.-backed militia commanders in Afghanistan, has a record of drug trafficking and murder, but has received US support and funding for counterinsurgency operations in Kandahar Province. Since becoming involved in the U.S. fight against the Taliban in 2001, Raziq has been connected to hundreds of cases of torture and murder involving innocent civilians.

“We knew Raziq's human rights record, and this conscious decision to fund him was made. Human rights is not taken into account in Afghanistan,” he said.

Shunting justice in favor of security has become the norm in Afghanistan, but this tactic has produced neither justice nor security.

“It's been underestimated for far too long how much these abuses have actually fueled the insurgency,” explained Anand Gopal, a reporter who has written extensively about the war in Afghanistan. “US strategy is incentivizing insecurity.”

Men like Raziq have learned how to profit from US military contracts and to keep the contracts flowing in, patrols need to prove that they are still needed to maintain security. Often, innocent families wrongfully targeted as insurgents turn against the United States, and some even look to the Taliban for protection.

“Raziq represents a new generation of warlords- those who have been formed by the logic of the international contracting market,” noted Aikins, “These guys are completely new creatures, and in Southern Afghanistan, they are the ones in power.”

The return of warlordism has also stymied attempts to establish an Afghan Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The Karzai government, filled with former warlords from the Mujahedin era have put forth little effort to address the nation's bloody history since 1979. In 2007, Afghanistan's parliament even passed a law granting amnesty to those involved in conflict before 2001.

With the power vacuum growing larger, the panel's consensus delivered a bleak outlook for the future of Afghanistan, especially if the US doesn't change its strategy.

Denouncing the militia policy, Reid advocated for greater U.S. oversight of Afghanistan's top authorities.

“Don't break up the monopoly of violence through the use of militias, break up the monopoly on power. We should want the Afghan government to stop milking the opportunity for all it's worth before the money's all gone.”

Unfortunately, current United States policy appears to continue along the same trajectory. If the United States continues to fund militia warlords like Raziq, their power and the abuses they promote will only grow as U.S. troops become more scarce.

-Rachel