Archive for November, 2010

Changes to the nuclear elements of NATO’s Strategic Concept

Posted on: November 29th, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

The new Strategic Concept certainly doesn’t cure NATO’s addiction to nuclear weapons, but there are some encouraging moves towards a 12-step program.

Evaluated from a global zero perspective, the Strategic Concept (SC) approved at the 2010 NATO Summit (in Lisbon)[i] represents classic denial – not only are nuclear weapons not acknowledged as a problem, dependence on them as the ultimate cure to security ailments is reaffirmed: “The supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies is provided by the strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance…” (para 18).

Evaluated from the perspective of where NATO has been (as reflected in the 1999 SC),[ii] the new strategy takes some early steps toward a new security approach — albeit with the substantive and difficult steps yet to be taken. Put another way, while still under the spell of demon booze, there is at least a declared intention to pursue sobriety: “We are resolved to seek a safer world for all and to create the conditions for a world without nuclear weapons in accordance with the goals of the NPT” (para 26).

Perhaps the most significant change from the 1999 to the 2010 version of the SC is in the prominent references to disarmament and arms control in 2010.[iii] In 1999, the only such references were in self-congratulatory descriptions of the advances made in the immediate post-Cold War years (para 21, 1999).  In 2010, arms control and disarmament is put forward as a means toward “enhanced international security…” (para 4, 2010).

In addition to the promised pursuit of a world without nuclear weapons, the 2010 SC affirms disarmament with the declaration that “NATO seeks its security at the lowest possible level of forces (an indirect but welcome reference to Article 26 of UN Charter), and that “arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation contribute to peace, security and stability” (para 26, 2010).

These commitments are all qualified by the insistence that disarmament must be “based on the principle of undiminished security for all.” In one sense that is obviously an appropriate objective, especially given that disarmament is acknowledged as an important contributor to security. But, of course, in another sense, that formulation can also be read as saying that if insecurities abound, then nuclear disarmament will be jettisoned – stated, again, in terms of the addiction metaphor, if things really start to look bad, we’re definitely going to be having another drink. While the 2010 SC no longer describes nuclear weapons as “essential to preserve peace,” as did the 1999 SC (para 46), it does say that “deterrence, based on an appropriate mix of nuclear and conventional capabilities, remains a core element of our overall strategy” (para 17, 2010)

Perhaps the biggest disappointment in the 2010 SC is the failure to end the presence of US nuclear weapons in Europe. But there is some modest movement in the right direction. In the 1999 SC, the nuclear forces in Europe were described as “vital to the security of Europe” (para 42). The 1999 document then went on to a fulsome defence of the continued deployment of US tactical weapons in Western Europe: “Nuclear weapons make a unique contribution in rendering the risks of aggression against the Alliance incalculable and unacceptable. Thus, they remain essential to preserve peace….The Alliance will maintain for the foreseeable future an appropriate mix of nuclear and conventional forces based in Europe” (para 46, 1999 – emphasis added).

The 2010 SC no longer insists on those European deployments. While it says the Alliance will “maintain an appropriate mix of nuclear and conventional forces,” it drops the earlier reference to such forces being based in Europe (para 19, 2010).

 In 1999, the SC insisted that for the broad nuclear deterrent to be credible in the European context, European Allies must “be involved in collective defence planning in nuclear roles” and must maintain nuclear forces on European territory. Indeed, according to the previous SC, “nuclear forces based in Europe and committed to NATO provide an essential political and military link between the European and the North American members of the Alliance. The Alliance will therefore maintain adequate nuclear forces in Europe” (para 63, 1999). In 2010 the references to nuclear forces in Europe and to them linking North America and Europe are dropped, but the reference to collective planning for nuclear roles is repeated and presented as “the broadest possible participation of Allies in collective defence planning on nuclear roles, in peacetime basing of nuclear forces, and in command, control and consultation arrangements” (para 19, 2010). But the language here is not specific (calling only for the “broadest possible participation”), and one possible implication is that NATO could accept that such participation could be confined to the UK and France and their European-based arsenals.

 The new SC links further reductions of non-strategic nuclear weapons stationed in Europe to the “disparity” (para 26) that exists between Russia’s large arsenal (which could be about 5,000) and European-based US nuclear weapons (around 200). This linkage is especially unfortunate and makes the same mistake the defenders of US nuclear weapons in Europe have frequently made – namely, ignoring the reality that Russian tactical nuclear weapons are a response to NATO’s massive conventional superiority rather than to its tactical nuclear forces.

 On the overall purpose of nuclear weapons, the 2010 version of the SC is more vague, but, implicitly at least, also more limited. In the 1999 SC the purpose of nuclear weapons was to “prevent coercion and any kind of war,” and, to accomplish that, nuclear forces are given the “essential role” of “ensuring uncertainty in the mind of any aggressor about the nature of the Allies’ response to military aggression”. Ultimately, as already noted, “the supreme guarantee of the security of the Allies” is described as being “provided by the strategic nuclear forces of the Alliance, particularly those of the United States”(para 62). The “supreme guarantee,” as also noted, is maintained in 2010 (para 18), but the other broad purposes are not included. In both cases, the circumstances under which any use of nuclear weapons might be contemplated are described as “extremely remote” (para 64, 1999 and para 17, 2010).

The 2010 version of the SC retains a basic affirmation of deterrence: “as long as nuclear weapons exist, NATO will remain a nuclear alliance” (para17, preface). But that should not come as a surprise. There was no chance that NATO would reject nuclear deterrence while the world still hosts more than 20,000 nuclear weapons. Furthermore, the commitment to deterrence is simply a restatement of what President Obama said in his landmark speech in Prague on nuclear disarmament: “Make no mistake, as long as these weapons exist, the United States will maintain a safe, secure and effective arsenal to deter any adversary, and guarantee that defense to our allies.”[iv] That is really just another way of saying that nuclear disarmament must be mutual – and must be pursued to the point of making deterrence irrelevant.
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NATO’s new Strategic Concept can be taken as a genuine step toward breaking the nuclear addition and nuclear disarmament – a step that is far too modest for some of us, to be sure, but a step.

eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

Notes

[i]  Active Engagement, Modern Defence: Strategic Concept for the Defence and Security of The Members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation adopted by Heads of State and Government in Lisbon, November 19, 2010. http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_68580.htm.

[ii] The Alliance’s Strategic Concept: Approved by the Heads of State and Government participating in the meeting of the North Atlantic Council in Washington D.C. 24 Apr. 1999.

http://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_27433.htm.

[iii] The following are three early, critical, and helpful responses to the new Strategic Concept:

 Martin Butcher, “Nuclear Weapons Aspects of the Strategic Concept,” The NATO Monitor, 20 November 2010. http://natomonitor.blogspot.com/2010/11/nuclear-weapons-aspects-of-strategic.html.

“Experts Call NATO Strategic Concept ‘Missed Opportunity to Reduce Role of Obsolete Tactical Nukes from Europe’,” Arms Control Association, 19 November 2010. http://www.armscontrol.org/pressroom/NATOMissedOp.

Hans M. Kristensen, “NATO Strategic Concept: One Step Forward and a Half Step Back,” Federation of American Scientists, 19 November 2010. http://www.fas.org/blog/ssp/2010/11/nato2010.php.

[iv] Remarks by President Barack Obama, Hradcany Square, Prague, Czech Republic. 5 April 2009. http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-barack-obama-prague-delivered.

Why the international silence on New START?

Posted on: November 18th, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

The New START agreement between the US and Russia may have only two signatories, but in truth it is a global Treaty that is at the core of the struggle to stop the uncontrollable spread of nuclear weapons. Why then is the rest of the world, including Canada, so reticent to press the American Senate to ratify this nuclear arms control milestone?   

Richard Burt, who as a conservative Republican was Ronald Regan’s arms control chief, and who now campaigns energetically for nuclear disarmament, told the PBS News Hour last night that “there are only two governments in the world that wouldn’t like to see this treaty ratified, the government in Tehran and the government in North Korea.”[i]

 The Senate Republicans seem tenaciously committed to lifting spirits in Tehran and Pyongyang, but why is the rest of the world staying on the sidelines?

Preventing the expansion of nuclear arsenals in places like North Korea, and preventing their spread to places like Iran and well beyond, is inextricably linked to disarmament progress in the major powers. It’s a bilateral Treaty, but we’re all stakeholders of the first order. The point was made with particular eloquence this past weekend by Ramesh Thakur (Political Science Prof at the University of Waterloo and former Senior Vice Rector of the United Nations University and Assistant Secretary-General). In a speech to the annual meeting of the Canadian Pugwash Group he said:

“Either we aim for controlled nuclear reduction and abolition or we learn to live with slow but certain nuclear proliferation and die with the use of nuclear weapons. In public debate, we must confront all who dismiss us as naive and utopian dreamers to confront this stark reality. If, rather than commit to nuclear abolition, they are prepared to sign on to a world of cascading proliferation with many more countries acquiring nuclear weapons, including North Korea, Iran, Saudi Arabia and others as their preferred alternative, let them say so publicly and accept the resulting public opprobrium. If not, force them into the corner of asking: so who is being unrealistic? The idea that a self-selecting group of five can keep an indefinite monopoly on the most destructive class of weapons ever invented defies logic, defies common sense, defies all of human history. With realists like these…”

Reluctance to wade into the debilitating spectacle of Washington’s political gridlock is obviously part of what’s behind the reluctance to come to the energetic defence of New START (the designation given to the US-Russia agreement to reduce deployed nuclear warheads to no more than 1,550 each). Because it can’t be doubts about the Treaty itself.

States outside the US, especially the 188 that are States Parties to Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), made their support ratification of the New START clear through the final document of last May’s Treaty Review Conference. All endorsed the US-Russian commitment in Action 4 of the “conclusions and recommendations” section of the final document: that is, “to seek the early entry into force and full implementation of the Treaty….” States also encouraged the two major nuclear powers “to continue discussions on follow-on measures in order to achieve deeper reductions in their nuclear arsenals.”[ii]

That was also the last reference by the Government of Canada to New START. In his speech to the Review Conference, Foreign Minister Lawrence Cannon said that “…we welcome the New START agreement between the United States and Russia as an important step toward a world without nuclear weapons.”[iii] Since then, nothing.

In recent days, the Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Jonas Gahr Støre has said Norway awaits the ratification of New START.[iv] And the German Foreign Minister, Guido Westerwelle, used his Nov 11 address to the German Bundestag to note that “we very much hope that this Treaty will be ratified by the US, notwithstanding the changes wrought by the congressional elections, so that it can come into effect.”[v]

But these are rather modest, and isolated, appeals. There is still time for a louder set of international voices to join the domestic American voices urging support for the beleaguered Treaty.

The Arms Control Association in Washington has been a leader in the fight for ratification and it recently published the Treaty endorsements of a very long list of current and former military leaders and former Senior Government Officials.[vi]

General Kevin Chilton, Commander of U.S. Strategic Command, spoke to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 16, 2010: “If we don’t get the treaty, [the Russians] are not constrained in their development of force structure and… we have no insight into what they’re doing. So it’s the worst of both possible worlds.”

Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of State and National Security Advisor in the Nixon and Ford administrations, spoke to the same Committee on 25 May 2010: “The current agreement is a modest step forward stabilizing American and Russian arsenals at a slightly reduced level. It provides a measure of transparency; it reintroduces many verification measures that lapsed with the expiration of the last START agreement; it encourages what the Obama administration has described as the reset of political relations with Russia; it may provide potential benefits in dealing with the issue of proliferation.”
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At York University a group of students linked to the Global Zero campaign is urging Prime Minister Harper to get more actively on board. The students are circulating the following petition:

“Like most Canadians, we, the undersigned, are deeply concerned about the nuclear threat. We are convinced that Canada must be in the forefront of the ongoing international efforts to reduce nuclear weapons to Global Zero. The new US-Russian START Treaty signed by Presidents Obama and Medvedev on April 7 in Prague is an important step toward this goal. Mandating 30% reductions in the world’s biggest nuclear arsenals, this Treaty is in the best interests of Canada and the world. Now that it has been submitted to the US Senate for consideration, we urge you to communicate to President Barack Obama, in a form you might find appropriate, Canada’s unequivocal support for the Treaty’s ratification.”

 It is still possible to see and sign the petition online at http://www.globalzerocanada.org/get-involved/sign-the-petition (in the meantime the list of signers to date, along with their comments, has gone to the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, and the leaders of the other  parties in the House of Commons). 

 The stakes are high, but the attention has been strangely muted outside Washington.

 eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

 Notes

[i] “Can New START Treaty Survive Partisan Divide in Congress?” PBS NewsHour, 17 November 2010.  http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/politics/july-dec10/start2_11-17.html.

[ii] 2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Final Document (NPT/CONF.2010/50 Vol. I), p. 20.  http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=NPT/CONF.2010/50  (VOL.I).

[iii] 2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). Statement by the Honorable Lawrence Cannon, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada, NEW YORK, MAY 3 2010. http://www.canadainternational.gc.ca/prmny-mponu/canada_un-canada_onu/statements-declarations/general_assembly-assemblee-generale/03.05.2010_review_conference_dexamen.aspx?lang=eng

[iv] Address at the Kazakhstan–Norway Conference on Nuclear disarmament strategies, non-proliferation and export control, Oslo, 12 October 2010. http://www.regjeringen.no/en/dep/ud/aktuelt/taler_artikler/utenriksministeren/2010/kazakhstan_conference.html?id=620691.

[v]Foreign Minister Westerwelle’s statement to the German Bundestag on NATO’s Strategic Concept, 11 November 2010.  http://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/diplo/en/Infoservice/Presse/Reden/2010/101111-BM-BT-Nato-Rede.html.

[vi] “U.S. Military Leaders and Bipartisan National Security Officials Overwhelmingly Support New START,” Arms Control Association, 12 November 2010. http://www.armscontrol.org/issuebriefs/bipartisanNewSTARTSupport.

From training to a diplomatic surge in Afghanistan

Posted on: November 18th, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

If Canada’s newly announced post-2011 military mission in Afghanistan is to amount to more than training Afghan forces for perpetual war, it needs to be Add the right supplement to enhance the nitric production in the blood vessels and blood flow into the levitra sales online supplementprofessors.com tissues, the organ gets denser and gains volume. It is the pills approved online pharmacy sildenafil by FDA for curing impotence in men. It’s a vital method to solve sexual cheapest viagra in uk supplementprofessors.com dysfunction. Specifically, exposure of even powder from a broken Propecia tablet to the skin of a pregnant cialis soft canada woman can cause abnormalities of the external genitalia of a male fetus. accompanied by a parallel diplomatic surge in pursuit of a political settlement of the conflict.

Read further at the Globe and Mail online: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/opinions/opinion/since-we-cant-beat-the-taliban-focus-on-reconciliation/article1803418/.

Afghans support negotiations while rejecting insurgency

Posted on: November 12th, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

In an enviable display of political maturity, Afghans express overwhelming support for negotiations with insurgent groups, even as public sympathy for the insurgents and their aims and methods is in significant decline.  

This is one conclusion to be drawn from the 2010 survey of Afghans conducted by The Asia Foundation.[1] The survey addresses, as it does annually, a broad range of issues; the findings on attitudes towards reconciliation and negotiations are especially timely in the context of recently reported speculations about political initiatives.

The survey found that “83 per cent of respondents support the government’s attempts to address the security situation through negotiation and reconciliation with armed anti-government elements.” A year ago that support stood at 71 per cent.

While support for negotiations increased by more than 10 percentage points, the level of sympathy for the insurgents with whom negotiations and reconciliation are sought dropped by 16 percentage points. The level of “sympathy with the motivations of armed opposition groups” fell from 56 per cent in 2009 to 40 per cent in 2010. The majority of the 2010 respondents (55 per cent) say they have no sympathy at all for armed opposition groups, a significant increase over 2009 when only 36 per cent they had no sympathy for insurgents.

A population that is losing sympathy for the Taliban is increasingly interested in negotiating with them. Thus, almost three quarters of all respondents (73 per cent) think that “the government’s reconciliation efforts will help stabilize the country.”

All of this suggests that Afghans are comfortable with the notion that the pursuit of peace requires that you talk with your adversaries – those with whom you have the deepest, most fundamental differences.

Not surprisingly, support for negotiations is highest in those areas where respondents are most like to declare that they have “some level of sympathy with the motivations of armed opposition groups” – and that sympathy is highest in the South West (where 52 per cent), the South East (50 per cent), and the West (50 per cent).  Support for negotiation and reconciliation is thus highest in the East (89 per cnt), South East (85 per cent) and North West (85 per cent). Support for negotiations is lower in the Central/Hazarajat region (78 per cent), but is obviously still very high.

Reintegration efforts also enjoy broad support – that is, 81 per cent agree with programs that offer government assistance, including the provision of jobs and housing, to those insurgents who lay down arms and want to reintegrate into society. That is up from 71 per cent in 2009.

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The survey also indicates that the high level of support for negotiations does not imply any acquiescence to the limits on personal and public freedoms that are broadly associated with insurgent aims. Support for talks is matched by 81 per cent support for “the democratic principle of equal rights for all groups to participation and representation.” Support for “allowing peaceful opposition” stands at 83 percent.

A variety of gender-related issues were also addressed in the survey. It found, for example, that 87 per cent of respondents say they agree that women should have the same opportunities as men in education. The survey reports that 81 per cent of Afghans support equal rights under the law, regardless of gender, ethnicity or religion.

Support for negotiations, therefore, is not evidence of diminishing support for the freedoms that Government and international military forces say they are fighting for; instead, it is fair to say that Afghans simultaneously reject the Taliban, value freedom and equality, and favour negotiations.

It seems Afghans have the idea that prospects for achieving freedom and equality, and peace, are better at the negotiating table than on the battlefield.

eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

Notes

[1] “Afghanistan in 2010: A Survey of the Afghan People,” Key Findings, The Asia Foundation. http://asiafoundation.org/country/afghanistan/2010-poll.php

New START: messy but urgent

Posted on: November 6th, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

In his post-election press conference, President Barak Obama acknowledged – in the context of recalling health care reform – that getting things done in Washington can be “an ugly mess when it comes to process.” True to form, the effort to get the new US-Russia nuclear arms deal through the US Senate has accumulated a string of unsavoury compromises, but successful ratification will be well worth the mess.

The current US Senate has one brief session left before the newly-elected one takes over in January, so it has one last chance to keep the nuclear disarmament momentum going by ratifying the US-Russia Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (referred to as New START). A two-thirds majority is required, which means garnering the support of at least some Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats, and that won’t happen without some heavy horse trading that has already gone from messy to odious.

The standard objections to New START are threefold: inadequate verification of Russian compliance, limits on future US ballistic missile defence (BMD) prerogatives, and concerns about the reliability of remaining warheads in the US arsenal. On the first two there aren’t really any further deals to be made.

Verification of the Treaty is reciprocal, it largely follows earlier START models of inspections, and if ratification fails there will be no verification of any kind, and no US inspections of Russian nuclear facilities. The 2002 Moscow Treaty (the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty – SORT) promised to reduce US and Russian arsenals to no more than 2,200 deployed warheads each by 2012, but without any verification provisions there is no guarantee of compliance.

On ballistic missile defence, New START prevents both the US and Russia from using existing missile silos for BMD interceptor launchers. But, as a recent editorial in  Air Force Magazine pointed out, the US Missile Defence Agency has no intention or interest in doing that, and, furthermore, BMD advocates have been given assurances that the treaty in no way restricts future missile defense programs or capabilities.[i]

On those two issues, Senators will either be persuaded or not; Washington isn’t in a position to unilaterally change verification or BMD references, even if it now wanted to. On the third, the question of warhead “reliability,” there has already been plenty of controversial compromise.

Indeed, compromise has come rather more easily to the Obama Administration than one dared to hope, in part because the worriers about warhead reliability include his own Defense Secretary, Robert Gates. Before the 2008 election he argued that arsenal reductions could not be accepted without allowing either tests on remaining stocks or building new warheads to replace existing ones.

In the election campaign, then Senator Obama rejected both of those options – arguing that the reliability of a reduced arsenal could be assured without warhead testing or replacing existing warheads with new ones.[ii] That was and is certainly the overwhelming view in the scientific arms control community, and President Obama has remained firm. But warhead “replacement” has been traded for warhead “modernization” (replacement of some components) and a major infusion of new money into the US nuclear weapons establishment.

The Obama Administration is spending at least 10 per cent more than the George W. Bush Administration did to extend the life of existing strategic nuclear warheads and to expand and modernize the nuclear weapons infrastructure (but it’s worth noting that the same infrastructure also supports arms control and non-proliferation capacity). In the decade of 2010-2020 the bill for the nuclear weapons maintenance system will come to more than $80 billion.[iii] Another $100 billion will go to maintaining their missile and bomber delivery systems.[iv]  

The path to a world without nuclear weapons should not have to go through an expanded US nuclear weapons infrastructure, but to be fair, President Obama’s compromises have not betrayed his election campaign promises or his 2009 Prague speech. In both cases he insisted that while the commitment to a world without nuclear weapons is firm, as long as other states still have nuclear weapons the United States will maintain a nuclear deterrent arsenal.
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It is the kind of messiness that should not obscure the extraordinary achievement that New START ratification would represent. For without real and treaty-compelled reductions in the nuclear arsenals of the major powers, without a legally binding commitment to prohibit both warhead testing and the production of fissile materials for weapons, the struggle to keep nuclear weapons out of the arsenals of smaller powers will fail. Not immediately, but inevitably.

Achieving major cuts in nuclear arsenals and legal blocks to further weapons development involves some messy compromises – and that still doesn’t guarantee that they’re going to get it done. But we can be sure of one thing, if the New START and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty are not ratified, things will get a whole lot uglier.

(Published as “Nuclear disarmament can be a messy business,” The Record, Waterloo Region, 9 November 2010)

eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

Notes

[i] Adam J. Hebert, “Arms Control, On Schedule.” Air Force Magazine, October 2010. http://www.airforce-magazine.com/MagazineArchive/Pages/2010/October%202010/1010edit.aspx.

[ii] See Disarming Conflict post, 5 January 009. http://disarmingconflict.ca/2009/01/05/complication-and-compromise-on-obama%e2%80%99s-ctbt-action/

[iii] “The New START Treaty – Maintaining a Strong Nuclear Deterrent,” n.d., US State Department New START Fact Sheets. http://www.state.gov/t/avc/newstart/c39906.htm.

[iv] “The New START Treaty – Maintaining a Strong Nuclear Deterrent,” n.d., US State Department New START Fact Sheets. http://www.state.gov/t/avc/newstart/c39906.htm.

Canada’s Afghanistan mission after 2011

Posted on: November 1st, 2010 by Ernie Regehr

Prime Minister Stephen Harper is said to be planning to set out his Government’s plans for the post-2011 Afghanistan Mission in advance of the Summit Meeting of NATO Heads of State and Government in Lisbon on 19-20 November 2010.[i]

The context for setting future priorities for Canada’s Afghan mission is not only Canada’s impending military withdrawal, it is also the admission, made almost two years ago by Mr. Harper, that the war in Afghanistan will not lead to the defeat of the insurgency.[ii] More recently, Richard Holbrook, the US special envoy on Afghanistan and Pakistan, said the same,[iii] as have many others.

That means that the objective of the current military surge is not to defeat the insurgency, but to set it back on its heels. A stalled insurgency, the reasoning goes, would create more favorable conditions for weaning fighters away from the insurgency (reintegration[iv]) and for inducing their leaders to seek negotiations with the Government of Afghanistan and its international partners to end the war (reconciliation[v]).

Not all agree it is a workable strategy. Matt Waldman, formerly of Oxfam in Afghanistan, writes in a US Institute for Peace briefing that “field research indicates that the coalition’s military surge is intensifying the conflict, and compounding enmity and mistrust between the parties. It is therefore reducing the prospects of negotiations, which require confidence-building measures that should be incremental, structured and reciprocal.”[vi]

The implication is that the priority now should be to upgrade diplomacy and to focus on improved governance, services, and reconstruction measures, especially in those areas of the country where the insurgency is not a strongly debilitating presence. In other words, programs and activities that build confidence in a stable future, rather than intensified fighting, are what is needed to set the stage for the serious pursuit of a political settlement. The years of military effort to downgrade the Taliban have parallelled the insurgency’s steady ascent. So much so, says Ahmed Rashid, the Pakistani author, journalist, and expert on the entire region, that the Taliban are now a nationwide movement.[vii]

The debate about the impact of the “surge” will not be quickly resolved – for example, the New York Times has run prominent stories of new success in routing the Taliban[viii] — but Ahmed Rashid goes on to say that despite the significant advances and spread of the insurgency, the Taliban may have hit both a military and political wall: “Taliban leaders may also realize that they are now at their apogee. They are a nationwide guerilla insurgency, but they cannot take or control major population centres given NATO’s firepower. There is no populist insurrection they can lead against US forces as there was in Iraq – the majority of Afghans do not want the return of a Taliban regime.”[ix] 

If this analysis is correct, Afghanistan fits the classic “hurting stalemate.” The Government of Afghanistan and its international partners, the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) cannot defeat the Taliban and the Taliban cannot defeat the Government and its international security backers. It’s a stalemate that is politically and economically hurting both sides and calls out for a political solution.

That, in fact, is the central reality that should guide those planning Canadian policy for Afghanistan after 2011.

In August a leaked Government draft[x] proposed that after 2011 Canada focus on four priorities (down from the current six):

•           Securing a future for Afghan children and youth,

•           promoting regional diplomacy,

•           advancing the rule of law and human rights, and

•           delivering humanitarian assistance.

All are worthy and urgent. The reconciliation priority would, in this approach, focus on regional diplomacy – also very important and essential to future stability.

But the political way out of the currently stalemated war has a chance of being stable and durable only if that political process is transparent, inclusive of Afghans from all sectors of society, and respectful of the civil and human rights that are acknowledged around the world as basic to stable governance and the safety and well-being of people. Any such political process must be Afghan led, as Ottawa has rightly insisted, but Canada and the international community have an important role to play in encouraging a constructive and inclusive process.

So how should Canada shape its post-2011 mission in Afghanistan?

In the first instance, as a country that has invested heavily in the future of Afghanistan and has acknowledged at the highest level that the war is not winnable and that diplomacy is required, Canada needs to find a public voice to actively encourage pursuit of a transparent and inclusive reconciliation process.

Second, an important way for Canada to engage more directly in support of reconciliation efforts would be for the Foreign Minister to appoint a special diplomatic envoy on Afghanistan.[xi] In addition to monitoring and supporting regional diplomacy, part of the mandate of the envoy should be to encourage the Government of Afghanistan, as well as civil society, to develop mechanisms for an inclusive and consultative approach (Canada has used special envoys in other contexts, for example in Sudan during the negotiations toward the Comprehensive Peace Agreement to monitor and observe talks and work with an international Friends of Sudan Group). 
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Third, given that Afghan civil society has already emphasized that for the people of Afghanistan to have confidence in a reconciliation process it must be transparent as well as inclusive, Canada should pledge financial support for building up the institutional capacity of Afghan civil society to engage actively in any forthcoming peace process. For civil society to be an effective participant it must have the organizational capacity to monitor the reconciliation process, to hold public forums and consultations, and to generally give leadership to citizen involvement in a process that will forge a new future for their country. That capacity can obviously be aided by financial support and international partnerships and Canada should make both a focus of its support.

And finally, community-level reconciliation, reintegration, and confidence building throughout the country are important, both to address local conflicts and concerns and to generate local support for and input into a national process. Canadian financial support for Afghan and international organizations that bolster local governance mechanisms, peacebuilding, and dialogue, and that have a capacity to work with traditional and informal authorities at local and district levels, should be part of our support for the reconciliation process. Ownership and leadership are not confined to national structures. Recognition of the traditions and advantages of decentralized governance in Afghanistan, along with the significant potential for local and informal authorities to serve as vehicles for conciliation, is part of the process of encouraging Afghan ownership of any reconciliation processes.

Canada is not positioned to play a decisive role in the move towards talking and reconciliation in Afghanistan, but we can most certainly play an important supportive role. And that support should be an increasing, indeed central, part of the Canadian mission in Afghanistan going forward.

eregehr@uwaterloo.ca

Notes

[i] Murray Brewster, “Afghan counterterror role might fly with war-weary Canadians: Diplomat,” Toronto Star.com, Canadian Press, 31 October 2010.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/883785–SOMNIA.

 [ii] Canada’s Harper doubts Afghan insurgency can be defeated, CNN.Com, 1 March 2009. http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/03/02/canada.afghanistan/index.html.

 [iii] CNN, Afghanistan Blog, 25 October 2010. http://afghanistan.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/25/holbrooke-nothing-close-to-formal-peace-talks/.

 [iv] In the Afghan context, reintegration is understood, not as a post-conflict recovery and peacebuilding enterprise, but as a tactical counterinsurgency initiative. It is pursued as a war-time effort to persuade rank-and-file insurgents to quit fighting and lay down their arms in exchange for promises of personal safety, immunity, employment, and other financial incentives.  A recent US Congressional Research Service report puts it rather directly: the focus is on the “reintegration of fighters amenable to surrendering.”Kenneth Katzman, Afghanistan: Post-Taliban Governance, Security, and U.S. Policy,  The United States Congressional Research Service, 21 July 2010. http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL30588.pdf.

 [v] In the Afghan context, reconciliation is diplomacy that seeks to engage insurgency leaders in pursuit of a political settlement that will end the fighting.

 [vi] Matt Waldman, Navigating Negotiations in Afghanistan, USIP PeaceBrief 52, 13 September 2010.  http://www.usip.org/publications/navigating-negotiations-in-afghanistan.

 [vii] Ahmed Rashid, “Meeting the mullahs takes more than meets the eye,” The Globe and Mail, 22 October 2010.  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/meeting-the-mullahs-takes-more-than-meets-the-eye/article1769959/.

 [viii] Carlotta Gall, “Coalition Forces Routing Taliban in Key Afghan Region,” The New York Times, 20 October 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/21/world/asia/21kandahar.html.

 [ix] Ahmed Rashid, “Meeting the mullahs takes more than meets the eye.”

 [x] Steven Chase, “Ottawa maps out post-combat role in Afghanistan,” The Globe and Mail, 24 August 2010.  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-maps-out-post-combat-role-in-afghanistan/article1682861/.

 [xi] The Liberal Opposition encouraged the Government to use the occasion of the January 2010 London Conference to announce the appointment of a Canadian special envoy to lead Canadian efforts related to governance and reconciliation and, more broadly, Canada’s post-2011 involvement in Afghanistan. “Liberals call for special envoy to Afghanistan,” http://www.liberal.ca/newsroom/news-release/liberals-call-for-special-envoy-to-afghanistan/.