Ethnic divide in Afghanistan

Selig Harrison:

AS the debate intensifies within the Obama administration over how to stabilize Afghanistan, one major problem is conspicuously missing from the discussion: the growing alienation of the country’s largest ethnic group, the Pashtun tribes, who make up an estimated 42 percent of the population of 33 million. One of the basic reasons many Pashtuns support the Taliban insurgency is that their historic rivals, ethnic Tajiks, hold most of the key levers of power in the government.

Tajiks constitute only about 24 percent of the population, yet they largely control the armed forces and the intelligence and secret police agencies that loom over the daily lives of the Pashtuns. Little wonder that in the run-up to Thursday’s presidential election, much of the Taliban propaganda has focused on the fact that President Hamid Karzai’s top running mate is a hated symbol of Tajik power: the former defense minister Muhammad Fahim.

Mr. Fahim and his allies have been entrenched in Kabul since American forces overthrew the Taliban in 2001 with the help of his Tajik militia, the Northern Alliance, which was based in the Panjshir valley north of the capital. A clique of these Tajik officers, known as the Panjshiris, took control of the key security posts with American backing, and they have been there ever since. Washington pushed Mr. Karzai for the presidency to give a Pashtun face to the regime, but he has been derided from the start by his fellow Pashtuns with a play on his name, “Panjshir-zai.”

“They get the dollars, and we get the bullets,” is the common refrain among Pashtuns critical of the government. “Dollars” refers to the economic enrichment of Tajiks and allied minority ethnic groups through an inside track on aid contracts. The “bullets” are the anti-Taliban airstrikes and ground operations in Pashtun areas in the south and east of the country.

While Mr. Karzai has tried to soften the image of Tajik domination by appointing Pashtuns to nominally important positions, much of the real power continues to rest with Tajiks. For example, he appointed a Pashtun, Abdul Rahim Wardak, to replace Mr. Fahim as defense minister — but a trusted Panjshiri, Bismillah Khan, remained an army chief of staff and kept fellow Tajiks as his top corps commanders and in other vital spots, including director of military intelligence, army inspector general and director of counternarcotics forces.

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The Pashtun problem is of their own making. They backed the Taliban to begin with and in the early days of the war after 9-11, it was the Tajik Northern Alliance that liberated the country with US help. There was concern at the time that the Tajiks would exclude the Pashtun from the government, but they have given them every chance to get involved and Karzai was elevated above the Tajik leadership because he is a Pashtun.

The Pashtun tribal loyalties and their unwillingness to openly oppose the Taliban has led to misery in the Pashtun area. They have few leaders willing to aggressively go after the Taliban. They have no equivalent of the Awakening leadership of the Iraqi Sunnis. I think that an aggressive Pashtun leader would have opportunities in the Afghan government. To date most have been either too timid or too cowardly to make the move. Many are also corrupt.