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Richard
02-01-2014, 11:28
Everything in A'stan depends on a sustainable economy. Guess what?

And so it goes...

Richard

Afghanistan's Misguided Economy
BGlobe, 28 Jan 2014
Part 1 of 2

On my first trip through Afghanistan in 1978, I was met with the richness of agricultural production at a time when the country had achieved food security for a population of 15 million. My trip was in early spring, when pomegranates, apricots, cherries, figs, peaches, grapevines, and mulberries had started to bloom, and wheat was sprouting. U.S. and Soviet aid had been pouring in since the 1940s in an effort to influence Afghan policies, opening up irrigation projects on thousands of acres of land in the provinces of Helmand and Kandahar.

In the late 1970s, the country was famous as an exporter of fresh and dried fruits, of karakul skins, carpets, and cotton. The northern city of Kunduz, surrounded by fertile agricultural land producing cotton, wheat, rice, millet, fruits, and other crops, was known as “the hive of the country.” There, the Spinzar Cotton Company, built in the 1930s, employed around 5,000 people full-time. It was financed by the national bank, Bank-i-Melli which acted as an investment bank. In the west, the city of Herat was known as the “breadbasket of Central Asia.” In the south, Kandahar acted as the main trading center and a market for fresh and dried fruits, grains, sheep, wool, cotton, and tobacco. The city had plants for canning, drying, and packing fruits, and for manufacturing woolen cloth, felt, and silk. Afghanistan was dignified if poor, at peace internally and with its neighbors.

Today, Afghanistan’s economy is a house of cards. It will likely collapse when foreign combat troops leave and as aid continues to fall. It is estimated that Afghanistan will need at least $8-$12 billion of economic and military aid a year for the next decade to recover. Even if it constitutes just a pittance compared to the cost of the war, this amount is not at all realistic. Moreover, although the government plans to build self-sufficiency during the transformation decade, IMF projections show that, unless there is a sharp shift in policies, the country will remain dependent on aid until well beyond 2025. What happened, and what can be done to return Afghanistan to a peaceful, productive, and stable state?

• • •

Two weeks after my trip, the bloody communist coup d’état in April 1978 led to the Saur revolution. In December 1979, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan, which would become the last political battleground for the Cold War. The mujahedeen—a diverse group of “freedom fighters” including radical Islamic groups that received heavy financing from the CIA—announced a jihad against the Soviets. The Soviets fought mostly in rural areas, laying 10 million landmines and destroying agricultural life and production. At the same time, Afghans began producing natural gas and exporting it to the Soviet Union. In the process, the share of mining in total exports increased and government revenue rose.

Kabul was destroyed both physically and economically by the brutal civil war that followed Soviet withdrawal in 1989 and continued among different mujahedeen after the collapse of the Soviet-backed government in 1992. Opium production and trade fuelled the civil war and weakened the Kabul government. The Taliban took power of Kabul in 1996 and served as de facto rulers of the country until the end of 2001 when they fled the city, almost three months after the start of Operation Enduring Freedom. By then, arms trafficking and smuggling were widespread, and the only domestically produced exports were narcotics and some timber and gemstones.

The promises made by President Bush in April 2002 to help rebuild Afghanistan in the tradition of the Marshall Plan created high expectations among the Afghan population after the rout of the Taliban and the Bonn Agreement of December 2001. But despite costly international efforts, Afghanistan has relapsed into conflict and become one of the most aid-dependent countries in the world. The failure of peace negotiations with the Taliban, the upcoming presidential elections in April 2014, and the impending complete withdrawal of U.S. and NATO combat troops by the end of this year have contributed to uncertainty and instability in the country. Meanwhile, the population has grown to 33 million (from around 23 million in 2002), and the economy remains highly dependent on drugs, imports, and aid.

Afghanistan is not unique, of course. The success rate of peace transitions in countries torn by civil war since the end of the Cold War is dismal: roughly half the countries that embarked in a multi-pronged transition to peace involving security, political, social, and economic reconstruction—either through negotiated agreements or military intervention—have reverted to conflict within a few years. Of the half that managed to maintain peace, a large majority ended up highly dependent on foreign aid. What can the history of the last two decades teach us about how to improve international assistance to Afghanistan and to other countries coming out of conflict in the Middle East and North Africa?

One thing that recent history teaches us is that, because economic reconstruction takes place amid the multifaceted transition to peace, it is fundamentally different from development in countries not affected by war. Economic reconstruction has proved particularly challenging because Afghanistan must reactivate the economy while moving away from the economics of war—that is, the underground economy of illicit activities (drug production and trafficking, smuggling, arms dealing, extortion,etc) that thrives in situations of war and makes the establishment of governance and the rule of law extremely difficult. To succeed, economic reconstruction requires peace-building activities like the reintegration of former combatants, returnees, and other conflict-affected groups into productive activities, as well as rehabilitation of services and infrastructure. As John Maynard Keynes argued at the end of World War I, the economic consequences of building peace are high. The imperative of peace consolidation competes with the conventional imperative of development, putting tremendous pressure on policy decisions, especially budgetary allocations. Because there cannot be economic stability and long-term development without peace, it follows that, to avoid a relapse into conflict, peace should prevail as the main objective at all times—even if it delays the development objectives.

Another thing we learned from recent history is that economic policymaking in war-torn countries at low levels of development requires a simple and flexible macroeconomic framework. But the fiscal and monetary framework established in Afghanistan early on by the Minister of Finance—supported by only a few other cabinet members and adopted by decree since there was no legislative body until the parliamentary elections of 2005—was neither simple nor flexible. The independence of the central bank and the “no-overdraft” rule for budget financing adopted—policy components that make sense for countries in the normal process of development—deprived the government of any flexibility to provide subsidies or other incentives necessary for carrying out peace-related activities. At the same time, a simpler framework would have required less foreign expertise (reducing the distortions created by such presence) and restricted the opportunities for mismanagement and corruption among uneducated and low-paid civil servants.

The restrictive monetary and fiscal framework—in conjunction with a dogmatic belief of the economic authorities and their foreign supporters in trade liberalization, privatization, and private sector–led development, severely restricted the role of the state in reactivating investment and employment. Moreover, donors channeled about 80 percent of their aid through NGOs or U.N. agencies rather than through the government budget and according to government priorities. As an example, the Spinzar cotton company, by then a state-owned enterprise, could have been part of a government project to reactivate the cotton sector but was put up for privatization instead.

Not every aspect of the macroeconomic framework failed. The exchange rate policy worked well. The Minister of Finance opted to introduce new afghani bills issued by the central bank (Da Afghanistan Bank) rather than adopt the dollar or another foreign currency as the International Monetary Fund recommended and as other countries emerging from war often do to help stabilize their economies. In a currency exchange supported by the U.S. Treasury that began in October 2002 and was completed in only four months, the afghani became an important symbol of sovereignty and unity, restoring confidence in the domestic currency.

But a stable currency was not enough to reactivate production. Perhaps the most serious mistake was the neglect of the rural sector—on which roughly 75 to 80 percent of the Afghan population depends. Efforts to move the economy directly into higher productivity through commercial agriculture were misguided since it takes time to build infrastructure. Instead, the government should have used aid to provide subsidies and price support mechanisms to promote subsistence agriculture. Such measures would have improved the livelihoods of the large majority and given them a stake, however small, in the peace process.

(Cont'd)

Richard
02-01-2014, 11:29
Afghanistan's Misguided Economy
BGlobe, 28 Jan 2014
Part 2 of 2

The neglect of the rural sector drove production away from licit agriculture to drugs. Without other viable options, farmers increasingly turned to growing poppies. They got support from traders who provided credit and technical advice for future production, bought the opium in situ, and shared the risks. Drug production took the best available land, replacing food crops and necessitating large food imports. At the same time, drug production financed the insurgency, created insecurity, and promoted corruption among government officials and other stakeholders.

While this narrative may be familiar, few have looked closely at the way these developments have impacted Afghanistan’s economy today. In my forthcoming book Guilty Party: The International Community in Afghanistan I use original data from a variety of sources—the IMF, OECD, U.N. system (particularly UNCTAD, UNDP, UNODC), and several U.S. and Afghan government sources and extensive interviews—to develop a comprehensive picture of the Afghan economy. A few figures illustrate the magnitude of the problem.

Of the $650 billion appropriated by Congress for the war, as little as 10 percent may have been spent in Afghanistan itself. Although difficult to estimate with any degree of certainty, as much as 80-90 percent was probably spent in the United States: on war equipment and other procurement (including food) for our troops; on wages and compensation to military and civilian staff; on salaries and fees for our own consultants, contractors and law firms as well as for security companies that protect our people in Afghanistan; and on other imports, including food for the local population.

Of the $70 billion disbursed for Afghan reconstruction, over 60 percent—an amount equal to one third of Afghan GDP during this period—was used to establish and train the Afghan security forces. This allocation has created a security force that is fiscally unsustainable. Of the less than 40 percent allocated to non-security expenditures—including for governance and development, for humanitarian assistance, and for counter-narcotics purposes—the large majority benefited a small elite in the urban areas or has been wasted trying to rebuild infrastructure and other projects in insecure areas.

Despite the government’s remarkable efforts to bring in taxes and customs revenues in border provinces, domestic revenue increased only to 11 percent of GDP in 2012 from slightly over 3 percent in 2002. As a result, donors still cover over 60 percent of the national budget, not to mention off-budget development expenditure. An alternative way to highlight the large aid dependency is to note that donors finance most of the huge trade deficit—the excess of imports over exports—which amounts to over 30 percent of GDP. Misguided agricultural policies contributed to this deficit. Fruit exports, for example, fell to less than half, whereas food imports almost doubled from 2008 to 2011. While the country imported wheat, the area under cultivation dropped. Afghanistan also imported chicken meat, beef, rice, vegetable oil, tea, and even spices, products that could be easily produced within the country.

Despite the rapid economic growth—9 percent a year on average since 2002—that has led to frequent congratulatory remarks from different stakeholders, and despite the huge amount of aid the country has received relative to its size—75 percent of GDP on average since 2002 and 90 percent from 2009 to 2011 (the last year for which there is full data)—the Afghan economy remains small: it amounted to slightly over $20 billion in 2013. While income per capita in real terms almost tripled since 2002 to about $650 a year, it remains among the lowest in the world. Furthermore, construction and services were the most dynamic sectors. Since these sectors were geared to the large presence of foreign troops and civilian aid workers, their growth is not sustainable going forward.

Even the huge investment in security, especially after the 2009 surge, hasn’t paid off. Afghanistan is ranked as the most violent country in the 2013 Global Peace Index and in seventh place in the Failed States Index. Afghanistan is also ranked as the most corrupt country in the world in the Corruption Perception Index, together with North Korea and Somalia. In 2013, the Anti-Money Laundering Index ranks Afghanistan as the country most at risk for money laundering and terrorist activity, out of 150 countries in the index, displacing Iran from the first place.

Neither has the country’s position in the Human Development Index improved in relation to other countries. In 2012 Afghanistan was still ranked at the bottom 6 percent of the index, together with countries such as Mali where war was still raging. While many schools have been built, and attendance has increased significantly for both boys and girls, literacy remains below 30 percent. Basic health services coverage has increased to almost 60 percent of the population, but infant and maternal mortality remain among the largest in the world and life expectancy is still below 50 years of age.

Expectations for large foreign direct investment in mining and other sectors were also shattered. While these flows increased rapidly up to 2005 (mostly in construction and services), they have been anemic (averaging much less than one percent of GDP) since 2007 when security deteriorated, and fell to only half percent on average in 2011–2012.

The international community also failed to support Afghanistan in controlling the drug sector and providing viable livelihood alternatives for farmers. Opium production averaged 5,200 metric tons per year from 2002 to 2013—twice the average produced during the six years of Taliban rule when production was legal. Since 2002, Afghanistan produced on average 85 percent of global opium production.

• • •

The picture that emerges from these data is clear. Donor policy has failed to support a simple, well-thought, and integrated economic reconstruction strategy for Afghanistan and resulted in ineffective, fragmented, and wasteful aid. It is important to reassess the type of economic strategy that donors will support going forward and to shift policy to both minimize the high risk that Afghanistan faces of relapsing into civil war and the extraordinary aid dependency that afflicts the country.

In order to reduce the risks associated with investing in Afghanistan—which has led to the collapse of foreign direct investment since 2007—the government must create a system that benefits local communities and foreign investors alike. By restricting investment incentives exclusively to foreigners and domestic elites, the government has not only increased the potential for conflict with local communities but also neglected the vast potential of small farmers and micro-entrepreneurs who can contribute to steady growth and food security.

It was in this context that I have proposed the creation of “Reconstruction Zones” (see Rebuilding War-Torn States, Oxford University Press 2008). Reconstruction zones would consist of two distinct but linked areas to ensure synergies between them—an export-oriented zone and a local-production zone. In the export zones, the government would provide tax incentives, basic infrastructure and services, security, and a stable legal and regulatory framework for foreign and large domestic investors to produce exclusively for export. In exchange, investors would commit to train local workers, create employment by purchasing local inputs and services, improve corporate practices and local providers’ standards, facilitate the transfer of innovative and productivity-enhancing technologies, and establish links with local technical schools and universities. Export zones could produce commercial agriculture for countries in the Gulf, exploit natural resources, or assemble low-skilled manufacturing goods.

The local zones would focus on integrated rural development of agricultural and livestock products for the domestic market to boost food supplies and reduce Afghanistan’s exorbitant dependence on imports. The local zones would complement the government’s National Solidarity Program—a program that has succeeded in improving local governance but has lacked a mandate for income-generating activities. By providing a level playing field for all Afghans—men and women—in terms of security, social services, infrastructure, credit, and inputs (such as seeds, fertilizers, and agricultural machinery), the local zones would also help to bolster gender equality in the rural areas where women’s productivity is low and they have seen little progress in terms of gender rights.

These and other ideas for sustainable economic reconstruction—including direct cash payments to women for improving human development of their families, direct purchase agreements with global producers that support local farmers, and the creation of a development bank to finance activities in the rural sector—must be broadly debated if Afghanistan is ever to move into a path of peace, stability, and prosperity. As U.S. and NATO combat troops withdraw, we can continue to ignore the negative impact of our actions only at our own peril and at the peril of the Afghan people.

http://bostonreview.net/world/graciana-del-castillo-afghanistans-misguided-economy

MtnGoat
02-01-2014, 21:03
This is a really good..no great article.

As far as any kind of sustainable economic reconstruction in AFG has been less than 10%. Most of it has or was in the form of handouts and money giving to the key people. Which used some of it but pocketed most of it.

I think what could have worked it look at what the neighbors of Afghanistan to the north Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan; and to the south Pakistan are doing have been doing. Most have a sustainable economic in the form of incentives to former military and political leaders running major businesses. There is a tie between these leaders and DoS USAID and how it all ties back to making money or as part of a retirement plan. Yes you can say there is SOoo much corruption in Afghanistan, well sorry to break it to you, American is just as bad. But I people just care more about what will be reported and we do send our politicians to jail for it. Afghanistan has no sustainable economic because Afghans don't want it because most of Afghanistan is an agricultural based economics and has no real industrial based business. Yet if you look South and North; Pakistan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have almost the same and cane export agricultural produces to where? Afghanistan!!! NATO and all the economic reconstruction partners failed at developing anything along these lines. U.S. NG Agribusiness Development Team (ADT) did a great job of teaching locals and farmers how to be real farmers instead of being survivor farmers. Yet IMO USAID didn't do much for overall development. Yes the built some schools and updated the hospitals, but minimal outside of that.

The main issue is with Afghanistan is the psychology of the people. To many uneducated and the few that are educated how nothing to work for. The will of the people is built on a ancient system that is still like the caveman of this is mine and you can't have it. I could write on and on, but I don't care about that country. I pray what we have done will endure the test of time.

Once the NATO and US forces pull out, I would hate to see how bad it gets.

Guy
02-03-2014, 13:45
The main issue is with Afghanistan is the psychology of the people.No it's not! The issue is "western" civilization assuming that a culture can be changed in a generation.:munchin

To many uneducated and the few that are educated how nothing to work for. I'd reverse that and say: Many "western" educated people are institutionalized into the theory of: "What works for us, will work for everyone...":rolleyes:

mojaveman
02-03-2014, 14:09
The main issue with Afghanistan is the psychology of the people.

Once the NATO and US forces pull out, I would hate to see how bad it gets.

I've been thinking the same thing all along with both Iraq and Afghanistan. Those people have been doing it their way for thousands of years. How can one culture get involved with another one that is completely different and in only a few years expect to turn it both right side up and inside out?

I really question the future of both countries.

Flagg
02-03-2014, 14:41
The numbers I've read on Afghanistan's economy seem to show a REAL economy of approx $2 billion in genuine government revenue for spending, with an additional approx $14 billion in foreign aid/assistance spent annually.

I just do not see how Afghanistan's government revenue will grow at a rate fast enough to counteract a significant decline in foreign aid/assistance.

A big factor in that would be how much of that money has been going straight to Dubai...I'm guessing the worse the corruption the lower the impact of declining foreign aid as the money never got properly injected into the local economy in the first place.

But still.....even with rampant corruption, a decent chunk of that foreign aid drying up that WAS partially injected into the local economy will likely lead to an economic depression/convulsions/seizures which is a poor diagnosis for a 1st world country with good security and stability, but a death sentence for a country with extremely poor security and stability.

I haven't been to Afghanistan in nearly a year, but heading back again shortly.

My last time in Kabul it appeared(anecdotally) that things such as real estate prices/rentals were beginning to plummet.

It will be interesting to see how places like Herat and Mazar hold up(or don't) and if they go the way of city-states within the "country" of Afghanistan.

Team Sergeant
02-03-2014, 14:46
No it's not! The issue is "western" civilization assuming that a culture can be changed in a generation.:munchin
I'd reverse that and say: Many "western" educated people are institutionalized into the theory of: "What works for us, will work for everyone...":rolleyes:

An intelligent culture, yes, just look at what we did with Japan and Germany......

The religious fanatics of A-Stan/Iraq and the rest of the Middle East with 99% of them possessing the education of a second grader, no, ain't going to happen.

mark46th
02-03-2014, 16:29
"An intelligent culture, yes, just look at what we did with Japan and Germany......" TS

... and South Korea. There has to be a willing acceptance of an idea. In the countries Team Sergeant and I have mentioned, the governments were pretty much destroyed so it was a little easier to institute a new culture of government. That being said...

MtnGoat
02-03-2014, 17:41
I say it not the Western thing, I say it is the mindset, religion along with most not wanting to change. A Pashtun in the mountains along the AF/PK border thinks different from one that lives in a city. The same can be said from one living in Kandahar to Kabul. This plays true to a hazaran, Uzbek and tajiki. Hazarans are a different breed of people in that country.

Back to my thought over this, it's not a western thinking to trying to change a country in a way of thinking or a economy system or a whatever. Afghanistan will never change as a country as a whole. Most Afghani leaders could never do it. Amanullah tried social and economic reform in the late twenties, this continued to the soviet invasion. They have never had no real commerce that is developed within the country is always been a through fare for exports through the silk Road or the ancients into the current soak road of the drug trade. No no one from history till current has ever developed that country economically and in my opinion it will never happen.

I say this, if you look at when the British partitioned their Britished in 1947, Afghanistan wanted the Pathans of what would become the North-West Frontier Province. If we could go back and look at what the Afghanis had wanted in 1955, the creation of an autonomous Pathan state, Pushtunistan (Pakhtunistan). Gee what does Pakistan call the North-West Frontier Province when? Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan.

Now why didn't USAID or other European and world bank partners not invest more in the afghan he economy? I say the history in the Afghanistan religion separatist within this country, over a period of time, plays out to the answer of why.

Guy is right. I say it will not change in a generation nor IMO will it be changed in two generations.

mark46th
02-03-2014, 22:07
I said something simialr in an old thread. If you really want to change Afghanistan, it would have to be a multi-generational commitment. We would have to close all the medrassas and educate them in secular schools.

Team Sergeant
02-04-2014, 11:45
"An intelligent culture, yes, just look at what we did with Japan and Germany......" TS

... and South Korea. There has to be a willing acceptance of an idea. In the countries Team Sergeant and I have mentioned, the governments were pretty much destroyed so it was a little easier to institute a new culture of government. That being said...

We pretty much destroyed Vietnam too but there's that culture/education barrier thingy again...... oh, and that pesky communism issue...... ;)

MtnGoat
02-04-2014, 18:53
Well we were talking about the upcoming elections in Afghanistan. With the state of Afghanistan Economy and its democracy or whatever you want to call the government and how they are basically in the same state. Well if you are looking at how both impact each other and without a strong economy means nothing if the government collapses after it's formed.

Someone had brought up Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai is a politician in Afghanistan who is currently running in the 2014 presidential election. A guy brought up how he won a government scholarship in 1977 to Columbia University.

I remembered how He stayed at Columbia University and he had worked at University of California, Berkeley and Johns Hopkins University.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashraf_Ghani_Ahmadzai

I remembered him from a book he wrote titled: “Fixing Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World.” This book discussing how a countries that could be in danger of collapsing or has collapsed already and how it impacts could be based off the roles that the country or state plays in building, internal societies and other factors.

I had picked the book up to see how it could be in analyzing these countries and what Geo-political elements can learned from them and find what they did wrong for current and future countries. I felt "Fixing Failed States" is a great book and is informative for Analyst, Civil Affairs leaders, Battalion level leaders and above.

Hopefully with Ashraf Ghani having a great base on Cultural Anthropology and understanding what a State needs to do to succeed would help him. Yet if Ashraf Ghani has been in Afghanistan for over ten years, then he is likely just like all the rest of the leaders in that country. Which mean, not a damn thing will be done under his terms if he wins this year’s election.

I will say this; NATO is doing it smart by only looking at the "Kabul-Centric" governing. It is the same thing that worked 40-50 years ago to some degree in Afghanistan.

Flagg
02-05-2014, 00:20
Well we were talking about the upcoming elections in Afghanistan. With the state of Afghanistan Economy and its democracy or whatever you want to call the government and how they are basically in the same state. Well if you are looking at how both impact each other and without a strong economy means nothing if the government collapses after it's formed.

Someone had brought up Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai is a politician in Afghanistan who is currently running in the 2014 presidential election. A guy brought up how he won a government scholarship in 1977 to Columbia University.

I remembered how He stayed at Columbia University and he had worked at University of California, Berkeley and Johns Hopkins University.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ashraf_Ghani_Ahmadzai

I remembered him from a book he wrote titled: “Fixing Failed States: A Framework for Rebuilding a Fractured World.” This book discussing how a countries that could be in danger of collapsing or has collapsed already and how it impacts could be based off the roles that the country or state plays in building, internal societies and other factors.

I had picked the book up to see how it could be in analyzing these countries and what Geo-political elements can learned from them and find what they did wrong for current and future countries. I felt "Fixing Failed States" is a great book and is informative for Analyst, Civil Affairs leaders, Battalion level leaders and above.

Hopefully with Ashraf Ghani having a great base on Cultural Anthropology and understanding what a State needs to do to succeed would help him. Yet if Ashraf Ghani has been in Afghanistan for over ten years, then he is likely just like all the rest of the leaders in that country. Which mean, not a damn thing will be done under his terms if he wins this year’s election.

I will say this; NATO is doing it smart by only looking at the "Kabul-Centric" governing. It is the same thing that worked 40-50 years ago to some degree in Afghanistan.

I believe he previously ran for president at the last election and polled quite poorly(like 1% poorly IIRC).

Interestingly enough his brother Hashmat Ghani is the leader of the Kuchis and was also a candidate in the 2014 election, but since Hashmat holds US citizenship is unable to run(or so I'm told my peers who have met him).

Hashmat has had a long and interesting relationship with the US and seems like a pretty switched on and politically/economically/tribally savvy(internally and externally) individual.

I get the sense that Ashraf is an academic without influence/control over any tribal groups unless it is by proxy through his brother's control of the Kuchis and a coalition of others.

I'm guessing he is unlikely to poll any higher than single digits and wonder why his brother Hashmat was originally running in opposition to Ashraf.

My understanding of Afghan politics is extremely limited and am happy to defer to those with a better understanding.

It's simply a very lucky coincidence that between my two closest peers and myself working in Afghan on and off the last 1-2 years we've had some direct run ins with a number of the 2014 candidates/players.

I seriously wonder how it's all going to work and hold together when the strongest candidate will probably be lucky to pull 30%(Abdullah Abdullah).

Hopefully a weak federal and strong provincial system will eventually evolve(and be recognized as such) without too much bloodshed.

For the record, I offer my opinion for free....and as such....is probably worth less than what you paid to read it! So caveat emptor ;)

mark46th
02-05-2014, 09:11
Vietnam is a lot like China. The government is communist but the society is capitalistic. The Viets are very ambitious and quite a few international companies have facilities in Vietnam. The have a sizeable, literate and skilled labor force that works for a wage that allows the companies to be competetive.

If you ever get out here to So Cal, I will take you for pho in Little Saigon. You will be amazed at the number of businesses and growth here. And unlike many cultures, they are assimilating quite well. Their children do very well in schools, they are involved in local and national politics, one is in the House of Representatives.

MtnGoat
02-05-2014, 17:44
I believe he previously ran for president at the last election and polled quite poorly(like 1% poorly IIRC).

Interestingly enough his brother Hashmat Ghani is the leader of the Kuchis and was also a candidate in the 2014 election, but since Hashmat holds US citizenship is unable to run(or so I'm told my peers who have met him).

Hashmat has had a long and interesting relationship with the US and seems like a pretty switched on and politically/economically/tribally savvy(internally and externally) individual.

I get the sense that Ashraf is an academic without influence/control over any tribal groups unless it is by proxy through his brother's control of the Kuchis and a coalition of others.

I'm guessing he is unlikely to poll any higher than single digits and wonder why his brother Hashmat was originally running in opposition to Ashraf.

My understanding of Afghan politics is extremely limited and am happy to defer to those with a better understanding.

It's simply a very lucky coincidence that between my two closest peers and myself working in Afghan on and off the last 1-2 years we've had some direct run ins with a number of the 2014 candidates/players.

I seriously wonder how it's all going to work and hold together when the strongest candidate will probably be lucky to pull 30%(Abdullah Abdullah).

Hopefully a weak federal and strong provincial system will eventually evolve(and be recognized as such) without too much bloodshed.

For the record, I offer my opinion for free....and as such....is probably worth less than what you paid to read it! So caveat emptor ;)

I ever knew Hashmat Ghani is the leader of the Kuchis , nor Ashraf's brother. That is something I would be looking into the Linkage behind it all.

In your observations in running into them. Any play out to being real, or just the typically Afghan. Just as any one running in politics in America is. Oh yeah TWO FACED.

Love to hear your insights.

Flagg
02-05-2014, 18:26
I ever knew Hashmat Ghani is the leader of the Kuchis , nor Ashraf's brother. That is something I would be looking into the Linkage behind it all.

In your observations in running into them. Any play out to being real, or just the typically Afghan. Just as any one running in politics in America is. Oh yeah TWO FACED.

Love to hear your insights.

Cheers.....

To be honest.....I only know just enough to be dangerous to myself and others....so be warned! ;)

My personal interaction, and the interaction of my two good mates, with the candidates was limited.

With the exception of meeting with Habiba Surabi(female former governor of Bamyan), I just happened to be at the right place/time to develop some very superficial anecdotal opinions about the rest.

I would view Hashmat as a quite savvy businessman, and while he doesn't have the most flattering things to say about some Americans who possess influence/control over policy in the region without the wisdom to back it up, I think his role as a political powerbroker is net positive for the US/west.

I also get the sense he operates as aboveboard as possible in light of the local environment.

It sounds like Ashraf may be entering an alliance with Dostum...another powerbroker for the Tajiks.

If Kuchis and Tajiks were aligned as a single voting block I could imagine decent polling numbers, but I'd guess not enough to make it on the very short list.

But it would be of great value in doing backchannel deals throwing support behind runoff election candidates.

If it were me.....I'd less prefer being President than a kingmaker in the shadows.

What do the kingmakers want to achieve for their ethnic voting blocks and for themselves?

In closing, I only know enough to know I don't know much at all when it comes to Afghan politics.

And I hope when I'm up there briefly around the elections that the crazy is kept to a minimum.