US general warns Karzai on Afghanistan’s future

The Afghan president’s push to delay a security pact with the US has undermined confidence in Afghanistan’s future testing international support for the country at a crucial moment, said the US-led coalition’s top commander.

US Marine Corps Gen Joseph Dunford warned that President Hamid Karzai’s failure to quickly sign the agreement could weaken the Afghan economy, embolden the country’s powerful neighbors and ultimately lead to the collapse of the country’s security forces.

“I don’t know if he fully realises the risks,” Gen Dunford said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. “He certainly understands it from an Afghan perspective. I don’t know if he fully appreciates what the implications are for the United States.”

The lack of clarity about the security agreement, which is needed for a US-led force to remain in Afghanistan after the coalition’s current mandate expires in December 2014, is already exacting a toll, Gen Dunford said.

“The uncertainty and the lack of confidence about the post-2014 environment has had an adverse effect on the people in some very real ways, whether it be the flight of young people who try to leave the country, whether it be plunging real-estate prices, the rate of the Afghani currency,” Gen Dunford said.

Over the past week, Karzai has stepped up his confrontation with Washington over the bilateral security agreement, which was approved by Afghanistan’s Loya Jirga assembly on Sunday, after more than a year of difficult negotiations. In addition to providing a framework for long-term US military presence here, the deal is a prerequisite for billions of dollars in critical military and civilian aid to Afghanistan.

Despite a request for prompt ratification by the Loya Jirga, Karzai in recent days raised several new preconditions before signing the agreement, asking for more time and saying the US must first jump-start the peace process with the Taliban insurgents.

In response, the White House warned that a failure to sign the deal by year-end would trigger planning for the so-called “zero option” – the complete withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan at the end of next year.

“Right now, I don’t see Afghanistan being able to sustain the Afghan security forces without the Chicago commitments,” Gen Dunford said.

The Chicago commitments are in addition to a similar amount of civilian aid that was pledged last year at a donor conference in Tokyo. Karzai’s failure to promptly sign the security agreement would “jeopardize” both pledges, the White House said this week.

Karzai’s delays are causing growing impatience in Western capitals, said Gen Dunford, who commands some 48,000 US and 25,000 allied troops in Afghanistan. The US and its NATO allies, he said, would be hard pressed to muster the political will to meet these promises if the security deal gets bogged down.

Western ambassadors to Kabul met this week with senior Afghan cabinet members to deliver a similar message. The money pledged by donors, they said, wouldn’t be forthcoming without a security deal.