Afghan Democracy and COIN

Jennifer Andrew

Despite attempts to impose democracy in Afghanistan the very approach appears to be undermining U.S. counterinsurgency. According to BBC election watch, As it happened: Afghan election 2009, the elections were marred by widespread and deadly Taliban attacks, patchy turn-out and claims of fraud. It is learned, through Nader Naderi, Director, monitoring organization of Free and Fair Elections in Afghanistan (FEFA) that the Taliban had first threatened and later actually amputated ink-stained fingers; in the countryside they set up roadblocks to keep people from getting into polling stations; in major towns they launched bomb and rocket attacks to keep people homebound. In many areas no one dared to designate polling stations for women.

Envisioned to stimulate necessary mechanism of governance required to hold 'something of Afghanistan' accountable for the aid and assistance injected in the theatre of doom, the ongoing presidential elections have yielded fierce reaction from the leading Pushtoon population. Taliban and their nationalist allies, who constitute majority of the Pushtoons have rejected the election as a fraud concocted to validate prolonged stay by the 'foreign occupiers'. They would only participate in the elections when US and NATO troops withdraw. Moreover, these elections have obliged Karzai to shed all that dignifies by enforcing bills that legalize marital rapes and allow husbands to starve their wives on their refusal to have sex; teaming up with notorious drug/warlords - all to fortify his chances of winning. Clearly this doesn't look quite like the investment the American and British taxpayers had in mind and lies far beyond the premise of receiving fresh body bags every week in return for enormous aid packages.

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