Salman Rafi Sheikh
While there have been too many reports in the mainstream western media about possible “chaos” in Afghanistan following a deal between the US and the Taliban and the latter’s return to institutional politics from the battlefield, these reports have paid too much and rather un-necessary attention to how a Taliban return to politics would undo the so-called “democratic gains” Afghanistan has supposedly made during the US military’s 17 years long stay in Afghanistan.
While the war would not end without a Taliban’s return to politics, it is not the return that would spread “chaos”, the real reason, as a recent report of Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), for chaos might be lack of integration of the Taliban fighters into the Afghan society. Unless steps are taken to make sure that the fighters return to a normal life after 17 years of war, Afghanistan would remain a tickling time-bomb.
What we are talking about here is not one or two thousand Taliban fighters. Their number is currently estimated at 60,000 according to the figures provided in the report.
“Successfully reintegrating these tens of thousands of former fighters into society—a complex and long-term process with social, economic, political, security, and humanitarian dimensions—will be critical for Afghanistan to achieve lasting peace and stability”, says the report.
Reintegration is not just a political process. It entails both social and economic aspects. According to the UNO’s definition, reintegration is “the process by which ex-combatants acquire civilian status and gain sustainable employment and income”, which, to a great extent, depends upon the availability of reasonable economic sources for the combatants to channelize their energy to socially and economically more productive aspects than war.
While none of the previous SIGAR reports ever mentioned reintegration as a potential “high risk” area, needing high level attention, the Afghan High Peace Council, which was primarily constituted by the then president Hamid Karzai in 2010 to develop consensus in Afghanistan and to prepare the ground for a new social consensus about the Taliban’s return has, according to the report, failed to achieve this purpose.
To quote the report, the US provided US$ 3.9 million in 2017 to support the Council’s efforts “in building consensus for peace throughout the country and in developing Afghanistan’s institutional capacity to facilitate reconciliation.” “However these funds do not appear to have been used to promote reintegration”, the report concludes.
An important aspect of this reintegration is, as mentioned above, the economic health of the country, which, according to the report, is “sluggish.”
If, for example, the Taliban fighters are to be integrated in the labor market, this market is already struggling “to provide sufficient job opportunities for Afghanistan’s youth.”
While sustainable economic development has always been a part of US reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan, even after doing efforts for 17 years, the economy remains sluggish.
While it seems reasonable to believe that economic growth couldn’t have been robust during the war, the peace process i.e., the end of war and the Taliban’s return to politics, would only help the economy.
Therefore, as against a popular fear in the west about “chaos” following a deal with the Taliban, a USAID report recently said that successful peace negotiations would catalyze growth in Afghanistan. The USAID thus see “increased economic growth as both an input to, and a potential outcome of, a durable peace agreement.”
But how will this happen? How will a sluggish Afghan economy provide for reintegration?
The US war has, in the first place, led to the present situation in Afghanistan. The November 2018 Geneva conference realized that peace in Afghanistan without prospects and sufficient resources for economic growth, rather than a mere return of the Taliban, would spread chaos. And that a lot would depend upon how much and for how long donors would support the country after peace settlement, meaning thereby that a potential drop in aid and support for Afghanistan by donor countries would directly impact the reintegration process, for such a drop would mean fewer opportunities for the former combatants to earn a sustainable livelihood, and much slower growth rate than even today.
As the SIAGR report concludes, “slowing growth raises broad concerns regarding the sustainability of Afghanistan’s recovery and thus its long-run economic prospects, whether or not there is a peace agreement.”
Conditions as such would worsen not just because the Taliban would return to power after the war, but also because thousands will return from Pakistan back to Afghanistan and they, too, would need to be reintegrated in economic terms.
After US sanctions on Iran after the former’s exit from the deal and following Iran’s bad economic conditions, almost 720,000 Afghanis returned from Iran only in 2018. If this number keeps growing, so will Afghanistan’s economic needs.
In such a scenario, if a settlement doesn’t include a potential financial backup for economic build up, a huge part of which needs to come through donor countries, prospects of “chaos” following a deal with the Taliban would increase.
It’s reason, however, wouldn’t be the Taliban’s return to power; it’s reason would be the inability and a failure of Afghanistan and the US to create conditions of peace and integration even after spending billions on “reconstruction” over the last one and a half decade. Report after report of SIAGR continue to emphasize how US “reconstruction” plan has been a massive failure in Afghanistan.
