More On The State-ergy For Af/Pak

By Steve Hynd

I mentioned the new State Dept. "Afghanistan and Pakistan Regional Development Strategy" (PDF), in my last post and some more really should be said about it. AfPak Channel's daily brief today mentions it in passing:

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced a new strategy for civilian engagement in Afghanistan yesterday, one that involves an increased, long-term civilian presence in Afghanistan beyond the nearly 1,000 civilians already there or slated to arrive in the near future (Department of State, Reuters). The plan addresses issues from agriculture development to corruption and reconciliation efforts with Taliban fighters, though some doubt whether the ambitious strategy, developed by Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Amb. Richard Holbrooke, will receive sufficient support from Congress (AFP).

But the document is really worth reading as this is "it" for the civilian surge in the region for the forseeable future. As such, it's a grave disappointment. A mixture of impossible pipedreams and stuff that's not at all new (or working all that well right now), its a blueprint for more of the same in Af/Pak. But at least it sets benchmarks, although it calls them "milestones" - which means at least State has publicly announced metrics when the DoD still hasn't.

Occassional Newshoggers contributor Gregg Carlstrom has some thoughts on the "State-ergy" over at his usual home, The Majlis blog. He's rather more optimistic about the document than I am but wonders about execution. I'd say that's a well-placed worry.

Gregg points to one set of not-new objectives, for example.

Overhauling aid. One-third of the metrics in this section deal with reducing the overhead and waste from foreign NGOs and USAID. 40 percent of aid will be delivered through local entities by the end of 2010, for example. Better late than never, I guess?

But unfortunately this one seems like it's going to miss its due date, in Pakistan at least.

The Obama administration has reversed plans to redirect more than $200 million in aid money for Pakistan away from American contractors and nongovernmental organizations, documents obtained by ProPublica suggest. The move signals that the administration's broader plan for Pakistani assistance, which calls for relying more heavily on local organizations to run the growing U.S. aid programs there, may be harder to achieve than officials had first hoped.

...Chemonics and CARE International, two development organizations that are set to receive almost three-quarters of the funds under the Economic Growth portfolio, declined to respond to questions about the policy shift, including whether they had asked the administration to reconsider its original timeline.

CARE is a bona-fide international charity and does good work across the world. Chemiconics, on the other hand, is a for-profit contractor that makes about 90% of its money from U.S. federal contracts. It's the single biggest winner in USAid's Pakistan funding, with a $90 million deal to encourage business and entrepreneurship. It's chairman served as a senior USAID director under the first President Bush and is a long-time major contributor to the GOP. It's performance in places as far afield as Afghanistan, Poland and South Africa could be described generously as disappointing.

Then there's this objective on page 6:

Rehabilitation and expansion of key irrigation infrastructure, especially in the Helmand River Valley

Sounds good, right? But the last time the U.S. tried it, in a money-grubbing effort from the 50's through to the 70s, the contractor fouled up agriculture in the area so badly that opium poppy was one of the few cash crops left that would grow well. Holbrooke may not remember that, but I'm sure farmers in the region do.

Or how about page 16?

targeting narco-insurgency networks and shutting down drug bazaars � an approach that is already showing results

Sound great too, but only if it stops being what amounts to using the US military to pick the winners in Afghanistan's narcotics industry - and those winners all being karzai-backing but corrupt and brutal warlords.

And then there's page 28, where one of the milestones is.

U.S. disapproval ratings in Pakistan decrease, with Pakistanis� increasingly convinced that the United States is committed to a long-term partnership on an array of issues, not just counterterrorism.

I almost snarfed when I read that bit of pony planning.

Right now, it's looking to me very like much of the glad talk from State is just that, rather than a true blueprint for changing the way things are done. There's no discussion even of the options if Afghanistan and Pakistan flat refuse to do the things the U.S. wants them to. Mind you, those options are pretty narrowly defined by the administration's previous caves over issues like the Kerry-Lugar Bill or Karzai's election - all that remains is something along the lines of "well, we'd tell them again".