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Why, you ask? Because if this is true, and if the CIA is empowering Ahmed Wali Karzai at the same time in which NATO/ISAF is saying abusive local power-brokers are a threat to mission success, then this is yet another example of NATO/ISAF carrying out one campaign in Afghanistan while the CIA carries out another -- with both campaigns operating at cross purposes to one another. I should say here that I am in no position to confirm or deny this report. I can, however, say that numerous military officials in southern Afghanistan with whom I have spoken identify AWK and his activities as the biggest problem they face -- bigger than the lack of government services or even the Taliban. And so if AWK is "the agency's guy", that leads to a huge point of friction between NATO/ISAF and the CIA. Again, I am not currently serving as an advisor to ISAF and cannot speak for Gen. McChrystal's command. But I do not have to:
“If we are going to conduct a population-centric strategy in Afghanistan, and we are perceived as backing thugs, then we are just undermining ourselves,” said Maj. Gen. Michael T. Flynn, the senior American military intelligence official in Afghanistan.
“The only way to clean up Chicago is to get rid of Capone,” General Flynn said.
Again, I am not in a position to confirm or deny that the CIA has an enduring relationship with AWK, and I am telling the truth when I tell you that all I "know" about this is what I read in the open source world. But you can be darn sure that if we think that AWK is the CIA's guy, the Afghans most certainly believe that to be the case.
Andrew,
I wouldn't be too worried about the article. It seems to take a couple of "facts," add some adjectives, and blend them into a sensational story. More than likely,
1. The Khandahar Strike Force (KSF) is a FID mission fully sanctioned by the USG, not us backing a warlord's special mission unit.
2. GEN McChrystal is well aware and maintains unity of command.
3. The KSF and others have communications and ties with Karzai and the Taliban, but they are not controlled by them. The lines of communication are a good thing.
I doubt we're going to find any saints to sponsor/partner with in A'stan. Particularly in gathering intel, we have to work with less than reputable people at times. My only gripe is the same that I've had about Iraq and A'stan for a long time--- Unity of Command. We need to have one person in charge. It's gotten better over time (Patraeus/Crocker), but the only way to achieve true accountability and responsibility is to have one MFIC. Hopefully, GEN McChrystal is getting that.
Best,
Mike
Someone should give the Karzai brothers a lesson on the fate of the Diem brothers.
Isn’t this what the CIA is supposed to do? If they want to flip some bad guy, they don’t go to the guy that’s pure as the driven snow, they find the dirtiest guy they can because he’s the guy who’ll be able to put them in touch with the bad guy. They get to roll around in the pig slop so that the State Department and the military don’t have to. They’re just not supposed to get caught. You may be too young to remember when we took down Manuel Noriega in Panama and then our press discovered that he had been on the CIA payroll for years. They, and our Congresspeople, were just absolutely shocked that the United States Government would do business with such a person, or any of the other third world thugs that we’ve done business with over the years. Well, duh!
Besides, and I’m not trying to make light of this, but isn’t this the way power works in Afghanistan? If you need something, you go to the tribal chief or the provincial governor or whatever, then you haggle for a while and end up giving him what he wants so that you can get what you want? Then he distributes the wealth in such a way as to buy support from those under him? Isn’t that what Pakistan has been doing in Waziristan, cutting deals with the Afghan Taliban so that they can go after the Mehsuds (after announcing their intentions three months in advance so they don’t actually have to fight the Mehsuds very hard)?
This is always a bone of contention between the CIA and the military. Military men (and women), thankfully, have this code of Duty, Honor, Country. Not all of them live up to it all the time, but by and large, that’s the creed that animates their service and they take that “Honor” thing pretty seriously. That’s why, I think, we see Gen. Flynn saying what he’s quoted as saying. It’s just not the way the military sees itself as doing business. The CIA guys, though, have a different creed: Whatever It Takes. If it takes getting friendly with a mass murderer (say Saddam Hussein, for example), they’ll do it because, in their judgment (through their chain of command), that’s what it takes.
The good thing about these kinds of things is that it’s reasonably easy to permanently cut the tie with the slimeball. Either you let the opposition deal with the problem — after all, they probably don’t like him any more than we do — or one of our CIA guys has a quiet word with the second most powerful guy, lets him know what he’s missing out on, and lets him take it from there.
I agree with MikeF, at least to the extent that it would nice of everyone were operating with the same operational objectives. I believe, though, that the concept of plausible deniability still has a place in the operational arena, so I’d suggest unity of effort instead of unity of command. MikeF’s assumption is that if there were unity of command, it would be the military guy who would be in charge. That might not happen all the time, though. Sometimes, especially in special ops, it might be the CIA. Sometimes it could even be the State Department. Isn’t that an awful thought? Better to just sing off the same sheet music, I think.
Agree with Mike I think this is not as troubling as it first seems, a Lot of unnamed sources sounding off. Not that unnamed sources haven't brought us fruits in the past.
The Strike force does seem legit. In the early stages a US National Guard SF unit was stationed there doing snatch and grabs with an Afghan unit, 3rd Commando. They used the same compound mentioned in the article.
That being said its still good governance that will win the day, a administration in both Kabul and Kandahar that is trusted by both the ISAF and the Afghans themselves. And some ducks are suspicious.
Remember that paranioa is the feeling that somewhere, out there a duck is watching you. If those ducks are involved in the drug trade, conspire with the Taliban and seek to destabilize the country for fun or profit then removing them form power is something for the to do list.
Back at the start of the Afghan ice-capades, my lovely first wife, who hailed from behind the orange curtain, saw President Karzai on television. She started giggling, "Omigod, they're going to trust a guy who wears a rat on his head?".
"Besides, and I’m not trying to make light of this, but isn’t this the way power works in Afghanistan? If you need something, you go to the tribal chief or the provincial governor or whatever, then you haggle for a while and end up giving him what he wants so that you can get what you want?"
Except we're not getting what we want from him. Kandahar is friggin out of control and there are Taliban everywhere in the city. It'd be one thing if he'd created his own little fief where Taliban feared to tread. Instead he plays the CIA by feeding them bad actors of one sort while cutting deals with others, enriching his own little kitty, and ensuring any decent Afghan official in the south can't succeed against his network of officials/drug dealers.
Murdering the police chief of Kandahar doesn't really sound like he's interested in playing in his own little corner.
Well, its a surefire way to give the Taleban more propaganda material. Pure Warriors of God vs evil druglords with deathrobots al la terminator, claiming to be pure and good yet in secret deeply involved in the opiuum traficking and the suport of deathsquads. As if Pakistan and other muslim countries were not paranoid enbough. It seems to me yet another example of cross-purpose strategies, the military trying to win hearts and minds while the CIA finances torturing corrupt thugs that alienates hearts and minds.
To Mike and Paul: It seems the CIA has yet to discover this here thing called the interwebs, wherteby information is no longer under control. Shit like this gets out. Its about something so basic as doing what you are saying. Not just pretending to run the good fight while in reality paying off the biggest corrupt bastards int he hope they will torture enough folks to get actionable intel.
this story was leaked for a reason.
imho the reason is quite simple: mccrystal, mullen, obama, power and company have realized that it is no longer sufficient to merely talk to the talk. if we want to be perceived as the good guys, then it doesn't matter how good your strategic information campaign is - you have to actually *be* the good guys.
the squirrelies, on the other hand, have gotten used to an entirely different MO - one based on the assumption that the afghan people won't know what they're doing, so there will be no blowback from their actions. given that that assumption clearly doesn't hold, i sincerely hope they're preparing to change their ways on this one...
mikef, paul - why do you assume that mccrystal has a handle on AWK or KSF? we know KSF killed the provincial police chief in a shootout - do you think that was part of a USG-approved FID mission? sometimes assets go rogue and other times they always were rogue, and it looks to me like a case of the latter. if this is "whatever it takes", it has clearly backfired in damn near the most spectacular way possible.
for years now, i've been saying that only actual justice will do. those who trade justice for a little temporary stability deserve and will end up with neither. we can no longer afford to back the diems, musharrafs, shahs, pinochets, and karzais of the world. we have proven quite unable to manage the blowback - but more fundamentally, why would we want to? where are our priorities here?
let's be honest with ourselves: if we believe that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, and that the resulting honest democratic governance is the best defense against extremism and totalitarianism in the world, then let's try practicing what we preach! it's clear that hypocrisy has failed miserably. it's clear that backing goons in the name of "whatever works" doesn't work. it's also clear that our ideals have massive cross-cultural appeal and are one of the biggest things we've got going for us... so let's try living up to them.
PS: asraf ghani for interim president 2009!!
Mike and David: are you mad?
Whether the story is based on real "facts" (an elusive goal in the first place), is hardly the point. It has long been an open secret that AWK is a drug warlord, which should come as no surprise since Karzai's running mate Muhammed Qazim Fahim is also a drug warlord who has used Soviet aircraft to ship heroin. Nevertheless, the question of pure accuracy hardly matters: this battle resides on the realm of ideology, and it's becoming increasingly clear that the Taliban's ideological accusations that the Karzai government is a drug-infused puppet government have a very close proximity to truth.
This is always a bone of contention between the CIA and the military. Military men (and women), thankfully, have this code of Duty, Honor, Country. Not all of them live up to it all the time, but by and large, that’s the creed that animates their service and they take that “Honor” thing pretty seriously. That’s why, I think, we see Gen. Flynn saying what he’s quoted as saying. It’s just not the way the military sees itself as doing business. The CIA guys, though, have a different creed: Whatever It Takes.
It's worth noting that this approach, on the part of the CIA, has basically never worked. Read "Legacy of Ashes" - the CIA is and has always been divided into an analyst shop, which is periodically competent, and a covert-action shop, which is never less than a grotesque and brutal counter-productive embarrassment.
Heroin, guns, paramilitary forces and money? Sounds like Ollie North never retired.
Ollie for president!
Looks like a bit of COIN theater going on here: AWK is big obstacle to reform, yet untouchable. It's one thing to be a druglord; it's another to be a CIA-owned, paramilitary-druglord. His face on Page 1 of the Times two weeks before the runoff election makes him radioactive. I say he's hiking the Appalachian Trail by this time next week.
Looking at this from any Afghan's point of view, be it the Taliban, an Afghan outside the country, Afghanistan, or inside the country, shame on CIA, don't trust those bastard Americans. To most Afghans CIA, FBI, US Military, US Administration: Republican or Democrat, they are all the same.
This is a bad piece of reporting - mixing facts, suppositions, and some plain inaccurate statements. The story is a lot more complex than painted in this article.
What I find really outrageous and despicable is that USG officials are leaking sensitive classified information in order to score points in a policy debate about counternarcotics policy. Not only does this release of information compromise intelligence operations, it also potentially puts lives at risk. I would argue that these actions of official(s) come close to treason, and that it was reckless and irresponsible on the part of the New York Times to publish this information. If fools want to destroy the CIA, then stating that as an explicit goal would be preferable to a death by a thousand cuts.
The most telling thing about this story is in the very first paragraph. CIA payments to Walid Karzai are alleged to have been going on for the past eight years.
Of course there is going to be a shortage of genuine white hats in a country like Afghanistan, but an American government in a position of genuine strength there would not need to rely so heavily on someone so obviously likely to stir up popular discontent. It wasn't long after the Taliban government was kicked out that the American mission in Iraq ceased to be in such a position. It quickly became a weak sister, starved of resources by the all-consuming preoccupation of the last administration with Iraq.
CIA needed to keep people like Walid Karzai as a paid source for eight years because we were treading water in Afghanistan. If that's all you're doing you try to ride with waves, not make new ones. I don't know why this story is coming out now, but I've got a pretty good idea why it didn't come out, say, five years ago.
This is grade-A retarded on every level humanly possible.
It's one thing to argue that you can't deal with pure-as-snow, lilly white good guys. It's another thing to endorse working with pretty much the biggest drug kingpin in Afghanistan who just happens to control large portions of the southern part of that country. It's even worse when said person is the brother of the freakin' president of the country.
No offense but this tolerance for absolute mismanagement, incompetence and corruption is why we can't get jackshit done over there.
BTW for those arguing that McChrystal is in charge (yeah right) and that it's clear he's at the top of the command structure over there, I'd strongly suggest talking to the local ANF forces let alone the KSF. No one's in command over there, and certainly not Stan the Man McChrystal. Christ, there hasn't been a general under whose watch this much has went wrong and who has, simultatenously, continued to duck responsibility for anything by continually drastically overestimating the strength of the enemy since McClellan.
It ain't like the CIA has the best track record when it comes to this sort of thing. (Nor are they above working with drug dealers, protecting them, providing aircraft to ship their product and conveniently turning their head-- otherwise known as drug running when everyone else, outside of the government, does it) Whoever compared the Karzai brothers to the Diems is sadly much closer to the mark than we'd like to think.
No offense but some of you guys have to stop drinking the Kool-Aid. The situation, from all appearances, seems to be SNAFU which everyone is somehow comfortable with.
Every knowledgable source says the problems over there, in descending importance are: 1) Corruption within the government, 2) Drugs, 3) Security and 4) working out some sort of working deal with Pashtuns fighting us and only loosely allied with the Taliban.
The CIA, somehow, considered it wise to flush 1 and 2 down the toilet for some far-fetched, tangential effort to get at 4 by working with an out-of-touch, corrupt-to-his-bone drug kingpin/semi-governmental figure who is the president's brother. How many ways can you spell dumb? And using Mullah Omar's old headquarters? No one bothered to point out this might not be the most intelligent move, from a symbolic as well as practical standpoint.
Yeah we're in some trouble over there. And if this actually struck anyone as a good idea, it's worse than we thought.
Well, Mr. Exxum, if you were confidant and adviser to Petraeus and McChrystal, I would assume they let you in on it. Perhaps doing you propaganda tour on the home front you may have been more used than trusted. CIA and drugs is a long story that mixed logistics and larceny. Now perhaps you will rethink your silly assault on Prof. Bacevich on Lehrer Newshour when all else failed you claimed that you know things he doesn't know so you are in a position to negate his logic. Now here you are pleading ignorance to the most obvious reality that everyone in the area knew is the fuel that keeps BOTH sides going. Perhaps you guys looked less at history and more with a closed mind than you should have. Perhaps a real inferiority complex about the skinny depth and the shallow breath of what you knew never sure if someone above is not using you as a "useful idiot." I do believe that advocacy makes you a responsible party for all the moms and dads that enter battle intel blind, language deaf and culture dumb killing locals in frightened defense only to end up making for orphans and widows on the home front as they return in aluminum boxes. It is a shame that youthful patriotism is so abused by the star whores as if the future mattered not. But the West Point class of 76 was certainly not a draw for the best and brightest in America, given the sense of defeat and disdain felt by a nation of draftees. We are a nation destroyed from within. As one who survived 9/11 I can assure you that I never would have imagined that the Wall Street insider could have done so much better than Osama would have ever hoped to do to wreck the American economy. Lastly, let me tell you, by 50 your conscience grabs you by the balls and your dignity screams out at you for what you were advocating and you come to feel personal blame for their sad fate and personal shame for your own survival. Then you'll have another forty years trying to live with yourself and the memories that shine in your mind like bright lights whenever the room is dark and you are hoping: tonight, dear God, please, allow me to sleep guilt free. We are a nation of tough guys, myopically tactical in our thinking and strategically blind in our morality, who mistakenly think that if we can pull the trigger today, by tomorrow we'll remember nothing… it will have been just a job done because it had to be. No sir, we are imbedded with the chip of our Judeo-Christian morality that grabs us by the balls and demands account for every bullet and its effects—not now when you’re a young hustler but later when there’s nothing you can say or do to make it right. Your generation did a lot of fire on automatic, spraying bullets, so you have a lot more to account for. You can't imagine what it will feel like when, like Iraq from where we will be kicked out per the SOFA, Afghanistan ends with the last guy out scrambling up the chopper ladder, AGAIN! Ten years from now memories will beget tears and tears will beget guilt which will beget more tears in a vicious cycle—PTSD long delayed-- all because you have a soul and assumed Petraeus and McChrystal do too. May God bring you peace, you patriotically earned it.
Well, Mr. Exxum, if you were confidant and adviser to Petraeus and McChrystal, I would assume they let you in on it. Perhaps doing you propaganda tour on the home front you may have been more used than trusted. CIA and drugs is a long story that mixed logistics and larceny. Now perhaps you will rethink your silly assault on Prof. Bacevich on Lehrer Newshour when all else failed you claimed that you know things he doesn't know so you are in a position to negate his logic. Now here you are pleading ignorance to the most obvious reality that everyone in the area knew is the fuel that keeps BOTH sides going. Perhaps you guys looked less at history and more with a closed mind than you should have. Perhaps a real inferiority complex about the skinny depth and the shallow breath of what you knew never sure if someone above is not using you as a "useful idiot." I do believe that advocacy makes you a responsible party for all the moms and dads that enter battle intel blind, language deaf and culture dumb killing locals in frightened defense only to end up making for orphans and widows on the home front as they return in aluminum boxes. It is a shame that youthful patriotism is so abused by the star whores as if the future mattered not. But the West Point class of 76 was certainly not a draw for the best and brightest in America, given the sense of defeat and disdain felt by a nation of draftees. We are a nation destroyed from within. As one who survived 9/11 I can assure you that I never would have imagined that the Wall Street insider could have done so much better than Osama would have ever hoped to do to wreck the American economy. Lastly, let me tell you, by 50 your conscience grabs you by the balls and your dignity screams out at you for what you were advocating and you come to feel personal blame for their sad fate and personal shame for your own survival. Then you'll have another forty years trying to live with yourself and the memories that shine in your mind like bright lights whenever the room is dark and you are hoping: tonight, dear God, please, allow me to sleep guilt free. We are a nation of tough guys, myopically tactical in our thinking and strategically blind in our morality, who mistakenly think that if we can pull the trigger today, by tomorrow we'll remember nothing… it will have been just a job done because it had to be. No sir, we are imbedded with the chip of our Judeo-Christian morality that grabs us by the balls and demands account for every bullet and its effects—not now when you’re a young hustler but later when there’s nothing you can say or do to make it right. Your generation did a lot of fire on automatic, spraying bullets, so you have a lot more to account for. You can't imagine what it will feel like when, like Iraq from where we will be kicked out per the SOFA, Afghanistan ends with the last guy out scrambling up the chopper ladder, AGAIN! Ten years from now memories will beget tears and tears will beget guilt which will beget more tears in a vicious cycle—PTSD long delayed-- all because you have a soul and assumed Petraeus and McChrystal do too. May God bring you peace, you patriotically earned it.
Well, Mr. Exxum, if you were confidant and adviser to Petraeus and McChrystal, I would assume they let you in on it. Perhaps doing you propaganda tour on the home front you may have been more used than trusted. CIA and drugs is a long story that mixed logistics and larceny. Now perhaps you will rethink your silly assault on Prof. Bacevich on Lehrer Newshour when all else failed you claimed that you know things he doesn't know so you are in a position to negate his logic. Now here you are pleading ignorance to the most obvious reality that everyone in the area knew is the fuel that keeps BOTH sides going. Perhaps you guys looked less at history and more with a closed mind than you should have. Perhaps a real inferiority complex about the skinny depth and the shallow breath of what you knew never sure if someone above is not using you as a "useful idiot." I do believe that advocacy makes you a responsible party for all the moms and dads that enter battle intel blind, language deaf and culture dumb killing locals in frightened defense only to end up making for orphans and widows on the home front as they return in aluminum boxes. It is a shame that youthful patriotism is so abused by the star whores as if the future mattered not. But the West Point class of 76 was certainly not a draw for the best and brightest in America, given the sense of defeat and disdain felt by a nation of draftees. We are a nation destroyed from within. As one who survived 9/11 I can assure you that I never would have imagined that the Wall Street insider could have done so much better than Osama would have ever hoped to do to wreck the American economy. Lastly, let me tell you, by 50 your conscience grabs you by the balls and your dignity screams out at you for what you were advocating and you come to feel personal blame for their sad fate and personal shame for your own survival. Then you'll have another forty years trying to live with yourself and the memories that shine in your mind like bright lights whenever the room is dark and you are hoping: tonight, dear God, please, allow me to sleep guilt free. We are a nation of tough guys, myopically tactical in our thinking and strategically blind in our morality, who mistakenly think that if we can pull the trigger today, by tomorrow we'll remember nothing… it will have been just a job done because it had to be. No sir, we are imbedded with the chip of our Judeo-Christian morality that grabs us by the balls and demands account for every bullet and its effects—not now when you’re a young hustler but later when there’s nothing you can say or do to make it right. Your generation did a lot of fire on automatic, spraying bullets, so you have a lot more to account for. You can't imagine what it will feel like when, like Iraq from where we will be kicked out per the SOFA, Afghanistan ends with the last guy out scrambling up the chopper ladder, AGAIN! Ten years from now memories will beget tears and tears will beget guilt which will beget more tears in a vicious cycle—PTSD long delayed-- all because you have a soul and assumed Petraeus and McChrystal do too. May God bring you peace, you patriotically earned it.
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