On the Afghan election

I’ve been getting my teaching materials together for the fall term and didn’t have time to do much blogging today. I have no further thoughts on Afghanistan in the aftermath of the election, except to say that I don’t think the election itself was a very significant event one way or the other. The fact ...

Walt-Steve-foreign-policy-columnist20
Walt-Steve-foreign-policy-columnist20
Stephen M. Walt
By , a columnist at Foreign Policy and the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University.

I've been getting my teaching materials together for the fall term and didn't have time to do much blogging today. I have no further thoughts on Afghanistan in the aftermath of the election, except to say that I don't think the election itself was a very significant event one way or the other. The fact that the election did come off is modestly encouraging, though reports that turnout was lower than expected are somewhat worrisome. As everybody keeps reminding us, we won’t even know for certain who won until October.

I’ve been getting my teaching materials together for the fall term and didn’t have time to do much blogging today. I have no further thoughts on Afghanistan in the aftermath of the election, except to say that I don’t think the election itself was a very significant event one way or the other. The fact that the election did come off is modestly encouraging, though reports that turnout was lower than expected are somewhat worrisome. As everybody keeps reminding us, we won’t even know for certain who won until October.

But to me the real question — no matter who ends up winning — is whether the new government starts performing better than the Karzai government has done over the past several years. Holding a "successful" election won’t mean much if it doesn’t, and a deeply flawed electoral process wouldn’t matter if Karzai or Abdullah nonetheless managed to implement more effective policies, root out corruption, coopt contending warlords, and help make sure that external aid programs deliver more direct and tangible benefits. And we won’t know if the new government can achieve that goal for many months, if not years.

As far our current "war of choice" there, I thought Richard Haass’s op-ed in today’s Times was smart. He’s somewhat more supportive of the current effort than I am, but he understands that the stakes there do not justify any level of effort for an indefinite length of time. Money quote:

If Afghanistan were a war of necessity, it would justify any level of effort. It is not and does not. It is not certain that doing more will achieve more. And no one should forget that doing more in Afghanistan lessens our ability to act elsewhere, including North Korea, Iran and Iraq. There needs to be a limit to what the United States does in Afghanistan and how long it is prepared to do it, lest we find ourselves unable to contend with other wars, of choice or of necessity, if and when they arise.

Stephen M. Walt is a columnist at Foreign Policy and the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University. Twitter: @stephenwalt

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