Descent Into Chaos

by Ahmed Rashid

  I had come to Kabul in the tense days before the Bonn talks began to get a sense of how the NA leaders would compromise. They were taking charge of the city as if they were already the government. Many Afghans feared that if Bonn were delayed, the Northern Alliance would never relinquish control of Kabul. However, the NA was not a monolith. I spent an emotional evening with Abdullah Abdullah as he cried, describing to me Masud’s last moments and his own sense of loss. Abdullah, who was appointed foreign minister at Bonn, spoke about how the Northern Alliance was now torn between the former warlords, whose only aim was to regain their status, and a younger generation of Panjsheri Tajik politicians with a broader vision, who wanted to unite with Pashtuns to form a national government that would have credibility and legitimacy.

  These latter NA figures included Abdullah, Younus Qanuni, the two younger brothers of Masud (Ahmad Zia Masud and Ahmad Wali Masud), and young members of the intelligence service Masud had established. None of them accepted the idea of Burhanuddin Rabbani, nominally the head of the Northern Alliance and still regarded as the president of Afghanistan, continuing as president. At Bonn there was agreement on choosing Karzai as president, but Rabbani would have to agree to step down voluntarily, as there was no other mechanism for removing him. Yet even the younger NA leaders wanted majority control over any new government because they felt they had sacrificed in resisting the Taliban and had won the war. Abdullah said Bonn should be only the first step in forming a government:

  We are fully aware that we are not the government and we don’t want to be considered the government until all Afghans have a say, but at the same time there is the problem of ensuring security in Kabul. The international community must be sensitive to our dilemma. We hope the Bonn meeting will result in a set of principles which will help us form the transitional government at the next meeting, which must be held in Kabul. If the international community wants to support the moderate wing of the Northern Alliance, then it must recognize that Rabbani has to be outflanked in his bid to become president, as Iran and Russia want Rabbani.40

  During the next few days the NA leaders met around the clock, trying to work out a plan of action. The UN deputy envoy Francesc Vendrell arrived in Kabul and told NA leaders bluntly that “territorial control or further conquest would not legitimize any faction’s right or claim to rule over Afghanistan, ” something that he had earlier told the Taliban.41 As the Bonn talks were being held, I went to see Rabbani, who was holding court in a guesthouse of the presidential palace. Since we were old friends, I asked him why he did not retire and give the new generation a chance. He would have none of it. However, after several hours of talk and a lavish lunch, he told me on the record that he would consider stepping down. “As far as my future role is concerned,” he said, “the people will determine the role of every concerned personality. I will accept the decision of the Bonn meeting and let me make it clear that I have no personal ambitions.”42 This is exactly what those at the Bonn meeting wanted to hear. As the global media picked up my story, Rabbani swiftly issued a retraction. It was a game he was to play over the next few days.

  By November 13, 2001, Brahimi had outlined a plan to the UN Security Council that called for a meeting of the Afghan factions to agree upon a two-year provisional government and the deployment of a multinational force to Kabul to guarantee security. The German government offered to host the meeting, and invitations went out to the four major Afghan groups: the Northern Alliance and the Rome, Cyprus, and Peshawar groups. The UN insisted that women be included in each delegation. The Taliban were not asked to participate.

  The conference began on November 27, in the luxurious Petersburg Hotel, perched on a Rhineland hill above Bonn, where the kitchens were told to prepare meals according to Muslim rules and, as for the timing of the serving of food, to make sure the rules of Ramadan were observed. Interpreters were flown in from the BBC to help the hotel staff. Except during mealtimes, the Afghan delegations and the foreign diplomats lodged in the hotel were kept separate. All the powerful states had a high-level diplomatic presence in the hotel during the conference. Washington sent two ambassadors, James Dobbins and Zalmay Khalilzad. Several Western intelligence agencies had reportedly wired the hotel so they could listen in on the rooms. Serious conversations took place in the corridors.

  A total of twenty-five delegates would take part.43 The Rome group produced the most irreverent list of delegates, none of whom had been to Afghanistan in the past two decades, and they ignored Karzai, their most famous member. The NA team was led by Younus Qanuni and made up largely of Panjsheri Tajiks, with few delegates from the other ethnic groups the Northern Alliance claimed to represent. Dostum’s Uzbeks, Ismael Khan’s Heratis, and the Hazara Shias were barely represented, which led to profound resentment among these groups. The Peshawar delegation was made up almost entirely of the family of Pir Gailani. There were no Pashtun delegates from the south or from Kandahar, raising fears among Pashtuns that Bonn would endorse a Tajik-dominated government.

  Joschka Fischer, the German foreign minister, opened the conference: “I urge you all to forge a truly historic compromise that holds out a better future for your torn country and its people.” Brahimi reminded them of past failures and warned them that failure was not an option now.44 He was aided by a large UN team as well as Ashraf Ghani and Barnett Rubin, who had been given temporary diplomatic status by the UN.

  Brahimi had no plan before arriving at Bonn. “He was going to wait and see how fast or how slowly he could go,” said Fatemeh Zia, his special assistant. “And there was even talk of having second-stage discussions in Kabul.”45 Qanuni said a new government should be composed of a leadership council of one hundred personalities and a prime minister, a post he coveted for himself. Qanuni was playing many different games. He wanted to undermine Rabbani, but he had to pretend he did not have the authority to sign an agreement. He also wanted the maximum number of cabinet seats for the Northern Alliance. From Kabul, Rabbani was trying to undermine Qanuni, receiving backing from Russia and Iran and, in his most audacious move, secretly meeting in Dubai with ISI chief Gen. Ehsan ul-Haq to gain Pakistan’s support. This move infuriated Qanuni and the NA delegates, and there was a breakdown within the Northern Alliance, stalling the Bonn talks. Qanuni asked for a ten-day break so he could confer in Kabul. Brahimi declined and now insisted that a government be formed as soon as possible.

  Over the next two days there was a blitz of phone calls to Rabbani by European leaders asking him to stand down as president and accept the decisions of Bonn. The Iranians helped the Americans, via James Dobbins, to put pressure on Rabbani and were the first to insist “that the agreement include a commitment to hold democratic elections,” said Dobbins. U.S. and Iranian diplomats met continuously night and day in the hotel.46 Finally Khalilzad telephoned Rabbani and reminded him what the Americans had done to the Taliban. The next day a rocket “accidentally” fired by a U.S. plane landed close to Rabbani’s home. Rabbani caved and said he would not insist on being president.

  After an all-night session, agreement was finally reached as dawn broke on December 6. “Nobody slept that night. Even at the eleventh hour it looked like everything may come crashing down,” said Fatemeh Zia. That morning the Bonn Agreement was signed in the presence of German chancellor Gerhard Schröder. It was a personal triumph for Brahimi and the UN, but Brahimi knew that without the participation of the Taliban, its implementation would be difficult. The Taliban had not accepted defeat, and so Bonn was never a peace agreement between victor and vanquished. The agreement made no provision for a cease-fire or the demobilization of forces. Brahimi later said, “The Taliban should have been at Bonn. This was our original sin. If we had had time and spoken to some of them and asked them to come, because they still represented something, maybe they would have come to Bonn. Even if none came, at least we would have tried.”47

  Others such as Kofi Annan held a different view: “What would have been the dynamics of Bonn if the Tal
iban had been there, how would the other parties have reacted, including the neighboring countries? The Taliban were never an all-inclusive organization, and I doubt if any Taliban would have been amenable to taking part.”48

  The Bonn Agreement called for “a broad-based, gender-sensitive, multi-ethnic and fully representative government” and the creation of a central bank, a supreme court, an independent human rights commission, and an independent commission for the convening of an emergency Loya Jirga by June 2002, which would decide on a new transitional government.49 This would be followed by presidential and then parliamentary elections. A constitutional Loya Jirga would be established to adopt a new constitution by 2003, and in the meantime the 1964 constitution would be restored. Zahir Shah was to be given the title of father of the nation.

  Bonn was a victory for the Northern Alliance, which had demanded twenty seats in the cabinet until the Iranians persuaded them to drop the demand to seventeen. However, they would hold the crucial posts of ministers of defense, interior, intelligence, and foreign affairs. The Northern Alliance also received three of the five deputy president slots. The Rome group was given nine cabinet seats, the Peshawar group four, while the Cyprus group refused all posts. The ethnic division among the ministries consisted of eleven Pashtun, eight Tajik, five Hazara, and three Uzbeks. There were no Pashtuns from the south except for Karzai himself.

  The Bonn Agreement sketched out a road map for the UN and the Afghan government until the end of 2005, a period that would, it was hoped, allow for the establishment of all the structures of a modern democratic state such as a bureaucracy, an army, and a legal system. Bonn was also a compact between the international community and the Afghans in which both had to deliver certain results. Initially much would depend on whether the international community, led by the United States, would provide the money, troops, and international attention Afghanistan now needed. The critical issue of disarming the warlord militias was left vague, although the agreement called for the demilitarization of Kabul and the withdrawal of all heavy weapons from the city—something the Northern Alliance would comply with only two years later.

  On December 13, Hamid Karzai boarded a U.S. military plane in Kandahar for his journey to Kabul to take the reins of power. Musharraf had asked Karzai to travel via Islamabad, so the two could meet, offering to send a plane for him. Karzai thought about it and then declined. “I consulted with the elders and they said no,” he told me. “They did not want their new leader to go to Kabul ‘via Islamabad,’ as if I needed the stamp of ‘Made in Pakistan.’ There had been enough outside interference from Pakistan already.”

  Karzai arrived in Kabul in the evening. General Fahim, who was now defense minister, other NA leaders, and one hundred heavily armed men were on the tarmac to receive him. It was a defining moment as Karzai, the raw, inexperienced president, was received by the battle-hardened NA leaders. Karzai got off the plane with just four unarmed companions. As he and Fahim shook hands, Fahim looked bewildered. “Where are your men?” he asked, expecting a large band of Pashtun tribesmen to be protecting Karzai. In his most disarming manner, Karzai replied, “Why, General, you are my men, all of you. All of you who are Afghans are my men. We are united now—surely that is why we fought the war and signed the Bonn Agreement.” Fahim was stumped. Afghanistan’s past dictated by the barrel of a gun was meeting its future dictated by a new logic of rationality and unity, which had not been heard of in the past quarter century.

  Karzai was sworn in on December 22 in a solemn ceremony attended by some two thousand tribal chiefs, warlords, General Franks, and the world’s diplomats. The new president gave an enormously moving speech that brought tears to the eyes of many grizzled warriors. “Our country is nothing but a ruined land. Oh God! The journey is long and I am a novice. I need your help,” Karzai said. The event was mired in deep anguish for Karzai when U.S. jets attacked a convoy of fifteen vehicles in Paktia province en route to the inauguration. More than sixty people were killed, including some of Karzai’s close friends. Such mistakes—this one a result of incorrect intelligence provided to U.S. forces by Afghan warlords working out local rivalries—were already becoming widespread.

  On December 1, U.S. planes had attacked several villages near Tora Bora, killing fifty-five civilians after warlords had given the wrong village names to U.S. intelligence. Later, on December 29, fifty-two people were killed near Gardez after the United States was wrongly informed about a Taliban ammunition dump. More than two hundred Afghans were killed by U.S. bombing in December alone, but for the moment most Afghans were too relieved to be free of the Taliban to condemn the United States. However, the killing of innocent civilians was to worsen in the years to come and prove a convenient propaganda tool for the Taliban.

  PART TWO

  THE POLITICS OF THE POST-9/11 WORLD

  CHAPTER SIX

  A Nuclear State of Mind India, Pakistan, and the War of Permanent Instability

  After 9/11 the wars and rivalry between India and Pakistan that had already lasted a half century were to show no signs of abating, despite the fact that the two countries were now allied with the United States in its global war on terrorism. Both governments badly misinterpreted the consequences of 9/11, believing that the war in Afghanistan would allow them to carry on an even deadlier rivalry over Kashmir. This led to near-war between the nuclear-armed nations in 2002, while impeding Pakistan’s attempts to deal with al Qaeda along its borders.

  Since 1947, no U.S. administration has recognized how crucial the India-Pakistan dispute over Kashmir is to stability in the region. Periodic wars and breakdowns in diplomatic relations between the two countries, unwarranted expenditure on their armies, and a nuclear arms race, despite poverty and underdevelopment, have fueled new generations of Indians and Pakistanis growing up in the midst of mutual hate and a widening divide. Successive American administrations simply calculated that there were no major U.S. strategic interests at stake in the region, and the most Washington could do was to keep the temperature down by brokering temporary cessations of hostilities, rather than intervening in the core area of the Kashmir dispute. “American interests in South Asia tend to drop dramatically between periods of crisis,” wrote Shirin Tahir-Kheli, a Bush administration official. “The US attention span has been notably short-lived, triggered by crisis conditions and lasting mostly for the duration of a crisis.”1

  With the end of the cold war, South Asia had slipped off Washington’s radar, even though Indian Kashmir was suffering from its worst bout of insurgency, which was to run from 1989 to 2004. Moreover, U.S. intelligence was well aware that al Qaeda and the Taliban had taken over the training of Kashmiri militants in Afghanistan after 1997 and were promoting the jihad in Kashmir as part of its global jihad. Yet South Asia was so far from the CIA’s attention that when India tested nuclear bombs in 1998, President Clinton learned about it only from watching CNN. Thus the Bush administration was naïve in the extreme to expect that in the post-9/11 world both countries would de-escalate their rivalries in the interest of establishing a common front against al Qaeda.

  The Kashmir dispute continued to be a key factor in the intense rivalries that erupted between India and Pakistan after 9/11. Islamabad viewed its Afghan policy through the prism of denying India any advantage in Kabul. For nearly a decade, Pakistan had successfully blocked an Indian presence in Kabul through the Indian-hating Taliban. Now the ISI saw the Northern Alliance, supported by the Americans and all of Pakistan’s regional rivals—India, Iran, and Russia—as claiming victory in Kabul. For Pakistan’s military regime, this was a strategic disaster and prompted the ISI to give refuge to the escaping Taliban, while denying full support to Hamid Karzai. It was precisely because of such calculations that Musharraf had used the Americans to rescue his beleaguered assets from Kunduz in November 2001. Meanwhile, India immediately seized the advantage that came with the defeat of the Taliban. India supported Karzai, established a lavish diplomatic presence in Kabul, funded aid p
rograms, and according to Pakistani intelligence, sent Indian agents to train Baloch and Sindhi dissidents in Pakistan. Kabul had suddenly become the new Kashmir—the new battleground for the India-Pakistan rivalry. The Americans, obsessed with the hunt for bin Laden, could not understand the larger strategic picture that was changing before their eyes.

  The dispute over Kashmir is one of the bitterest legacies of the 1947 Partition, when the British left India in such haste that they did not finalize the status and loyalties of the 550 princely states existing in undivided India. The Muslim-majority population of the Kashmir Valley was ruled by a Hindu, Maharaja Hari Singh. While many Kashmiri Muslims wanted Kashmir to join Pakistan, the Hindu majority in Jammu and the Buddhist majority in Ladakh—both parts of the Kashmir princely state—were as keen to opt for India.2 Many other Kashmiris, however, wanted total independence for their state. As the maharaja vacillated on accession, some Muslim Kashmiris rose in revolt in September 1947 and were swiftly aided by Pakistan. A panicked maharaja asked New Delhi for military assistance and signed the accession document to India as Indian troops drove back the insurgents. A cease-fire was declared on January 1, 1949.

  Both sides held on to the parts of Kashmir they had acquired, with India holding two thirds of the former state. Both countries claimed the whole of Kashmir—with India basing its claim on the accession documents and Pakistan on UN Security Council resolutions drawn up in 1948, which called for a plebiscite to allow the Kashmiris to decide whether they wanted to join India or Pakistan.3 India and Pakistan fought another war over Kashmir in 1965, while the war in 1971, which led to the humiliating defeat of the Pakistan army and the loss of East Pakistan, fueled a desire for revenge by Islamabad. Thus when an insurgency by Kashmiris against Indian rule broke out in 1989 it was quickly backed by Pakistan.