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Stability, Security and Development. GP3200 May 16, 2012 Rule of Law, Justice, Reconciliation Dr Robert E. Looney relooney@nps.edu. Outline. Rule of Law NDU Presentation – Main Considerations Overview – Iraq and Afghanistan Afghanistan: General Lessons Necessity of Immediate Action
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Stability, Security and Development GP3200 May 16, 2012 Rule of Law, Justice, Reconciliation Dr Robert E. Looney relooney@nps.edu
Outline • Rule of Law • NDU Presentation – Main Considerations • Overview – Iraq and Afghanistan • Afghanistan: General Lessons • Necessity of Immediate Action • Criminal Activity in Iraq • The Afghanistan Opium Business • A Comprehensive Strategy for Afghanistan • DDR – Disarmament, Demobilization, Reintegration • Justice/Reconciliation
Rule of Law: General Principles • Immediate imperative to stabilizing post-conflict environments is • ensuring that the criminal economy does not suffocate growth of licit commercial and social activities • Requires the establishment or support of law enforcement and judicial bodies that can prevent, investigate, and punish corruption and criminality • Military commanders may rightly contend that in early stages of an intervention they have too many challenges to deal with • and that policing operations focused on illicit power structures would divert resources from other vital security functions • However, U.S. experience in Iraq and Afghanistan has shown that such rule of law functions are inseparable from the goals associated with stabilization operations
Rule of Law: Afghanistan Lessons • In Afghanistan part of the rule of law problem has involved the lack of a coherent strategy, and consequently a coherent means of measuring success • “after almost five years of donor activities in Afghanistan, the baseline knowledge about the formal justice system outside of Kabul remains fairly rudimentary. • One problem: for roughly first five years of engagement in Afghanistan, only 1% of USAID budget went to Rule of Law programming. • Despite fact that large segments of the population were concerned with government corruption. • Picture that emerges is one of ad hoc development programs focused on immediately accessible institutions with limited impact on the majority of the country’s population. • Major lesson from Iraq and Afghanistan • Future planning should recognize the full scope of post conflict needs and properly plan a substantial law enforcement component in stabilization operations. • Stabilizing forces must lay out a clear rule of law strategy with measurable timelines, and goals from the outset
Rule of Law: Necessity of Immediate Action I • Violent conflict often leads to the breakdown of state institutions • As armed groups battle with a certain territory, governing institutions may be unable to provide services or may be totally destroyed • Thus a “transition gap” is created wherein government institutions fail to take adequate responsibility for enforcing the law • This gap creates opportunities for the malevolent to develop sophisticated networks with they can pursue illicit activity • As early as April 2003, one month after the U.S. overthrew Saddam Iraq, reports indicated that criminal organizations had begun to develop around the main population centers of Basra, Baghdad and Mosul • By July, many of these organizations had had developed sophisticated means for arms and drug smuggling in and out of the country.
Rule of Law: Necessity of Immediate Action II Iraqi Crime (contd.) • These organizations inevitably will develop ties with local governing institutions, allowing them protection, access to resources and additional opportunities for illicit profit • Such trends are not unique to Iraq. • In Bosnia the smuggling networks that were critical to various wartime activities transitioned seamlessly into profit centers during the peace, pursuing a number of illicit activities • Similar accounts in conflict situations throughout Asia and Africa • One of the most serious mistakes stabilizing forces can make is discounting the likelihood of the organized criminalization of post conflict states. • Ignoring such developments sets a path for subsequent institutional and social trends that lead to profound corruption and potentially the inability of a state to sustain governing institutions
Rule of Law: Necessity of Immediate Action III Iraq crime (contd.) • Despite its authority and control, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), the U.S. government organization established in 2003 to guide Iraq from conflict to stability: • Seemed unconcerned with any comprehensive policing strategy • Saw crime as an Iraqi responsibility • Despite exploding crime not until 2006 that any prominent US official called for a more intense focus on corruption and criminality • Similar mistakes made in Afghanistan • Warlords who led the Northern Alliance were allowed to divvy up the country into own spheres of influence • Many now run roughshod over the Afghan people and control various aspects of the licit and illicit Afghan economy • Despite years of significant international presence in both countries, Iraq and Afghanistan continue to rank amongst the most corrupt countries in the world
Afghanistan: Elements of a Localized Strategy • Lessons from Afghanistan: To deal with the insurgency, it is critical to address the way projects, programs and policies impact and interact with: • The eradication of the poppy-opium economy • The transformation or dissolution of the informal/shadow economy, • The pacification insurgency/warlords • The object of policy is to create positive linkages and feed-back loops between these elements and the economy, so as to create virtuous circles of growth and development • A key objective in any economic strategy is overcoming the corrosive forces associated with the country’s narcotics production and trade. • The rule of law plays a critical role in this process
The Afghan Opium Business I • Afghanistan’s opium poppy economy is fairly recent • In the 1980s and 1990s, competing factions financed their war efforts with narcotics revenues. • During the Soviet occupation, the absence of a central government in mujahedeen areas allowed poppy cultivation to amplify a cycle of increasing criminal activity, arms smuggling and private armies • After seizing power in 1996, the Taliban taxed and often appropriated established production and trafficking rings. • Opium poppy production doubled from 1996-99 and financed much of the regime's operations. • In an effort to garner international recognition, the Taliban banned opium poppy cultivation in 2000. • Cultivation reached a record high after the regime was deposed in 2001, largely because prices increased ten-fold following the ban.
The Afghan Opium Business II • Afghanistan's opium business is an uncoordinated, competitive industry, not an organized effort in which all facets of trade are controlled by several cartels (like the cocaine trade in Colombia) • Afghan opium poppies are cultivated are small family farms • Makeshift laboratories convert raw opium into a morphine base, white heroin, or one of three grades of brown heroin, which are sold to foreign traders • Afghan drug lords maintain their operations by buying off government officials, retaining private armies and posing more authority than the government • While Afghanistan's opium business is comparatively rudimentary, the country’s limited economic output amplifies the significance of poppy cultivation
The Afghan Opium Business III • The Karzai administration considers opium poppy cultivation the greatest threat facing the country • In 2004, Kabul ordered provincial governors to eradicate opium poppy fields. • The newly established anti-narcotics ministry simultaneously conducted separate eradication campaigns. • However gains in curbing cultivation have not been matched by breaking up trafficking rings – the police and judiciary have only imprisoned a few mid-level traffickers • Reports of government collusion – mostly involving Interior Ministry officials – continue to raise questions about government capacity to realize its rhetoric about clamping down on narcotics. • As a result, opium production has exploded in recent years with the country now producing over 90% of world output. • There have also been dramatic shifts in production to more unstable areas in the country, largely in the south.
Afghan Opium Production by Metric Tons as a Percent of Global Production Afghan Index: Tracking Variables of Reconstruction & Security in Post-9/11 Afghanistan, Brookings Institution September 23, 2008, p. 20.
The Opium Challenge • Opium remains a significant challenge for Afghanistan and the international community. • Secretary of Defense Gates has noted (December 11, 2007) “The drug trade continues to threaten the foundations of Afghan society and the young government of Afghanistan • The narcotics trade dissuades work and investment in legitimate, activities, provides the insurgents with a lucrative source of funding and contributes heavily to heroin addiction in Central Asia, Europe and increasingly East Africa. • Poverty alleviation is the most prevalent reason given for opium poppy cultivation • There is a considerable income differential that favors opium poppy cultivation over other more traditional crops
Opium and the Taliban • As documented in Jane’s Terrorism and Security Monitor (September 12, 2007) there are a number of significant links between opium and the Taliban • Sheik Omar reversed his opposition to drugs, emphasizing instead protection of local economy • 53% of opium is grown in Helmand Province generating $528 million in 2007 • The Taliban is present in all 13 districts of Helmand, controlling six • In these six districts there are as many as 60 Taliban labs • The Taliban's 10% tax on opium raised $30-$40 million a year • 80% of farming families in Helmand grow opium, with 35% of income originating from this crop • Production has had its most dramatic increase in Helmand
U.S. Counter-Narcotics Strategies • U.S. counter-narcotics policy in Afghanistan has varied from tolerating with the drug situation to advocating it complete eradication. Success has been limited due to a number of adverse side-effects • Counternarcotics policies compromise intelligence gathering, alienate rural populations, and allow local renegade elites successfully to agitate against the central government • Among the three most common counternarcotics strategies – eradication, interdiction and alternative development – eradication poses potentially disastrous risks for Afghanistan’s political stabilization and economic reconstruction, while interdiction greatly complicates counterterrorism objectives • The obstacles to achieving successful alternative development are considerable • A fourth, softer strategy toward the drug dealers—amnesty—also risks serious negative repercussions
Poppies and Development • Much effort recently has focused on USAID’s Alternative Development and Agriculture (ADAG) programs, which aim at creating licit alternatives to poppy production by promoting and accelerating rural development. • ADAG programs are depend on cooperation from the Afghani government, civil society, organizations, the private sector, other donors, PRTs and the U.S. military to coordinate actions • Their goals are to increase commercial agriculture opportunities, improve agricultural productivity, create rural employment, and improve family incomes and well being • Improved job opportunities and incomes provide significant alternatives to poppy production • These programs can be strengthened by appealing to a strong sense that poppy cultivation is counter to Islamic teachings
The Informal Equilibrium I • World Bank Assessments of Afghanistan's opium business suggest that: • Little progress will be made in reconstruction and development without an integration of the different elements of Afghanistan’s development agenda: security; reconstruction; economic growth; governance; state building and counter-narcotics • The World Bank found that the “vicious circle” or low-level “informal equilibrium" that developed during the conflict years is still in play • This "informal equilibrium" captures most of the discussion so far. It summarizes • the key factors keeping Afghanistan poor, dominated by the informal sector, weakly governed with a lack of rule of law and subject to chronic insecurity • Based on this setting the World Bank has outlined a comprehensive strategy for Afghanistan designed to achieve sustained development and growth
The Informal Equilibrium II • In Afghanistan, an informal equilibrium developed during the conflict period (post Soviet): • Since the failed state could not ensure security, local powers (warlords) took over this role • They further undermined rule of law and had limited incentives to provide public goods • Instead, they often developed profitable illegal activities to pay for their armed forces • Entrepreneurs had little incentive to become formal and, as a result, did not pay taxes • As a result, the government was not able to acquire resources to provide security and other services • Thus this vicious circle was self-perpetuating and created a strong constituency hostile to a stronger central government
Moving to Formal Equilibrium I • In order to shift Afghanistan from an informal to a formal equilibrium conducive to medium-term economic growth and state building: • The government must build its capacity to provide public goods and enforce the rule of law • Increased government capacity changes the incentives for private businesses so that some choose to move into the formal sector • More formal sector activity results in higher tax revenues, which enable the government to build further capacity, creating additional incentives to go formal, etc. • With time, warlords are removed from play as their militias are disarmed, their soldiers are drawn into the formal sector, and they are forced to operate through legitimate political and economic channels
