Rebirth of Freedom in Afghanistan? Not Yet
I would like very much for things to go well in Afghanistan. Our involvement there started with an invasion that was justified by the Taliban's support of al-Qaeda. For reasons understood probably only by the Bush Administration though, we've not given that country the support it deserved. I understand that it didn't get that support because our attention and resources were diverted to Iraq, but I'm not sure anybody who actually knows the reason for that will ever spill the beans.
I bring this up because today is election day in Afghanistan. You know that already, though, don't you? Our President has been crowing about this election for months, trumpeting it as a triumph of democracy and the renewal Afghani political life and self-determination and freedom. Except, well, it isn't that at all.
President (and Laura) Bush have been made an awful lot of noise about how Afghan women are better off, more free and have more choices, in Afghanistan today than before the invasion. It may be true, too. But they hardly have a degree of freedom that we in the west would recognize as meaningful. Nicholas Kristof has more. (I've linked to a NYT column, but managed to find a link to it at the "Falls Church News." NYT registration is a nuisance and as much as possible I'll try to avoid linking to their site).
As Kerry and Edwards have noted, since the overthrow of the Taliban, Afghanistan has again taken its place as the world's largest producer and exporter of opium and almost all of the country outside of Kabul is under the control of the warlords and not the central government. The lawlessness and lack of security that appear to doom Iraq's scheduled elections are just as prevalent in Afghanistan, to the point that international monitors are unlikely to have much effect on guaranteeing the legitimacy of the election.
As for the elections, many of the candidates are so put off by what they view as voting irregularities , such as this threat by tribal elders to burn down the houses of people who don't vote for Hamid Karzai, that fifteen candidates for president are boycotting the election. It doesn't help that recent statements by the US ambassador to Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, imply that the US will cooperate more with a goverment headed by Karzai than with one headed by any of his rivals.
The world, the region, and most particulary the Afghani people will benefit from an orderly and free society in Afghanistan. They don't have such a society yet, though, and it's hard to see that the policies and the actions of the Bush Administration are designed to bring them one. Kerry will have to do better. We will have to give him that chance.
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