Stack the Odds for Peace

Now that everyone’s done oohing and aahing over Hamid Karzai’s wardrobe, it’s time to decide how many more peacekeepers will be needed to help Afghanistan’s interim prime minister maintain security so the country can be rebuilt. It won’t be easy in a land that two decades of war have left with no central government and with feuding clans and tribes happy to use the weapons stashed in virtually every household. But without security there is no nation-building: Bullying thugs hijack food before it reaches the lips of starving children, and bandits get fancy new trucks while the country lacks roads and schools.

President Bush said last week that the United States would help Afghanistan develop a national army and train its police forces, but he rejected Karzai’s request to have U.S. troops in the international peacekeeping force. It will take months to get Afghan troops and police trained. Meanwhile, at a bare minimum, four or five cities other than Kabul need help maintaining security.

NATO allies have pledged troops for the initial force, and Britain has taken the lead, supplying about 1,500 of the planned 5,000 soldiers--of which only about 3,000 are in country so far. British officials said last week that Karzai argued well in pushing to enlarge the force, but Britain does not plan to keep its troops there beyond sometime in March, when Turks will take the lead. Afghan officials have suggested increasing the peacekeepers to perhaps 20,000.

Karzai and other Afghans want a foreign presence, especially American, to show that outside nations are not about to cut and run after the defeat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda as they did after the Afghans defeated the Soviet invaders in 1989. That’s a valid concern. But U.S. and other troops need to avoid setting up long-term bases in a country known for its hatred of foreign invaders. State Department official Richard Haass said last weekend that peacekeepers might be required for as long as two years. By then Afghans should be keeping the peace, especially if men now serving in warlords’ militias are drafted into an Afghan army.

The nation’s problems are readily apparent in Gardez, where Karzai tried to appoint a governor. Troops loyal to a rival commander used heavy weapons to drive the newcomer out of town.

Karzai’s government managed to dispatch its own security force to the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif this week in an effort to get the region’s main warlords to withdraw their forces and have most of their fighters give up their AK47s and rocket-propelled grenades. But there, as in Gardez and other cities and towns nationwide, it is uncertain whether the warlords will stay out. An extra helping of international peacekeepers--10,000 does not seem excessive--would increase the odds.