There has been a flurry of press on the US strategy in Afghanistan, including the comical drama of flying General McCrystal to Denmark so that Obama’s failed bid for the Chicago olympics wouldn’t look pointless.
The flurry has basically been about two main options – neither of which is pretty: Option A (the “hand it over” option) means that Nato begins handing things over to the Afganis (i.e. the shoddy Afghan National Army) pretty quick. Option B is the stay option which involves loads of NATO troops over a very long time. The financial crisis and the US’s burgeoning budget deficit means the White House will eventually pull the plug. The only question is how hurried they will be. Not very pretty, right?
For Obama, we think there is a better option than this weak dichotomy of ‘should I stay or should I go.’ The middle ground between the unpopular Nato troops and the Afghan National Army is UN peacekeepers (from Muslim Nations.) We are calling this the DPKO option – slang for the UN’s Department of Peacekeeping operations.
It’s an easy argument to make. The Nato troupes are unpopular and expensive. A recent national opinion poll by several media sources found that “Afghans take an increasingly sceptical view about the presence and effectiveness of foreign troops on their soil,” and there’s an increase in the number of people who think attacks on foreign forces can be justified.
The cost of an entire UN missions, including development funds, civilian bureaucracies, and logistics, is around 55 to 80 thousand dollars a year per peace-keeper. These are taken from difficult places like Liberia and the DRC – some with challenges nearing those of Afghanistan. Susan Rice, the US Ambassador to the UN: “If the US was to act on its own – unilaterally – and deploy its own forces in many of these countries; for every dollar that the US would spend, the UN can accomplish the Mission for twelve cents.”
Afghanistan operations under the NATO umbrella, are costing the US something close to 70 billion dollars a year – no small change – and that doesn’t include commitments from the rest of the coalition. When compared to the cost of UN peacekeeping – that cost looks increasingly unjustified for a force that may cause as many problems as it solves.
The UN option is so much cheaper that the UN could nearly double the number of existing troops add 20% contingency and still come out at under ten billion USD per year – one seventh of what the US is paying now.
And the impact? The negative implications of sending Western troups to somewhere like Afghanistan can’t be understated – years of fighting various foreign powers has left its mark in Afghanistan. Muslim troops should be viewed quite differently. Recent interviews we conducted of key informants from northwestern Pakistan reveal that the people would be much more supportive of muslim troops. It’s a much better cultural fit, and it would undoubtedly weaken the recruiting position of the Taliban.
For Obama the implications are several-fold. The DPKO option would mean less cost, less American lives lost, and an unprecedented commitment (politically and budgetary) to UN peacekeeping.
Where would the peacekeepers come from? The largest providing nations to UN peacekeeping are Bangledesh and Pakistan, additional commitments from Indonesia, Malaysia, North and West Africa and the Middle East could easily round out a suitably sizable force. Many of these nations already depend on the UN’s peacekeeping pay to support their armed forces.
Before this option takes legs we need sensible data comparing the threat levels in previous peacekeeping operations with those throughout Afghanistan. We’re working on it… O&A