Hello and welcome to a reading from The Taliban – Afghanistan’s Most Lethal Insurgent Group, written by Mark Silinsky and published by Praeger, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing in New York, New York. This reading is brought to you by Kensington Security Consulting, where we bring education to national security.
To Build an Army
In 2002, Afghanistan lacked a professional army, and one had to be built to maintain order and prevent the Taliban’s return. The Army’s facilities had been shattered during the incessant wars of the previous 2 decades. The military’s leadership was sapped, and most of the weapons were antiquated and unserviceable. The last military entity that could reasonably be classified as an Army crumbled with Dr. Mohammad Najibullah’s Soviet-supported regime in 1992.
What remained was a large pool of guerrilla fighters tied to regional militias or, later, to the Taliban. There was no standardized training, career advancement, nationwide billeting program, unified ranking system, or other indicators of a modern, professional army. Developing the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF), which includes the Afghan National Army (ANA), became a top priority for Western donors to Afghanistan, particularly the United States.
An important early security task for the new Army was disarming many Afghans, particularly the Taliban. That would be difficult because firearms hold an important place in Afghan culture. Effective, unified, and credible armed forces could not exist until local militias and former Taliban surrendered most of their weapons, particularly crew-served weapons. A strong security apparatus—robust military capabilities, effective paramilitary forces, and strong civil-military relations—would shore up the government. It would also underscore the government’s monopoly on the legitimate use of force.
Many Afghans, particularly those living in areas contiguous to Pakistan, vacillated between periods of optimism, pessimism, confusion, and fatigue as they tried to gauge the staying power of government forces in contested areas. The Afghan government determined that reintegrating militias into a unified, ethnically balanced, well-armed, and well-trained military force would win the confidence of doubting Afghans.
In building the Afghan Army, there were knotty problems from the beginning, such as high levels of desertion, drug use, illiteracy, and national confusion. The early record of building the Army was mixed. It was commanded by maladroit leaders, offered meager pay, provided uncomfortable billeting and foul food, and made little effort to retain the services of young men who were away from home for the first time. The high rates of desertion declined by 2009, but still remain high. The lower rate of desertion was attributed to a presidential decree criminalizing unauthorized leave, a media campaign to discourage it, and higher unemployment. It also indicates that employment in the Army became more attractive to many soldiers. But in summer and fall 2012, the Army was plagued with a desertion rate somewhere between 14%-20% per year, which is staggering.
To Build a Police Force
“I need 20 good police officers, and could use 100. Good people, not any hashish smokers. And I need sleeping bags and mattresses and a generator for power.” Lt. Col. Amanuddin, Afghan police supervisor, early 2008
Some of the conferees in Bonn in 2001 recognized the importance of a strong national police. They looked to history. In the early 20th century, then-Captain John Pershing built a constabulary force in the Philippines, which became a model for future counterinsurgency operations. Strong policing helped establish zones of security. As the French counterinsurgency theorist David Galula noted, police help identify insurgents and their supporters. Today’s U.S. Army counterinsurgency field manual states that the police, not the military, are the front-line forces in a counterinsurgency.
This applies to Afghanistan. In rural Afghanistan, the police are responsible for maintaining security, addressing community problems, and brokering disputes. Police interact with the public daily, forging ongoing relationships with key community members. Through these daily interactions and relationships, police develop intimate knowledge of the physical and human terrain. For these reasons, the Taliban made the police primary targets for death and intimidation.
Some of the Afghan National Police (ANP) and Interior Ministry Forces have become effective at patrolling. However, there is a strong consensus that the overall ANP training program has been weak. The poor quality of the police was, and remains, a large problem for the public administration and security sectors of human development. The police force was rampant with tribalism and favoritism, which has played into the hands of the Taliban.
Profile 8: The “Gangster” Policewoman of Kandahar
"You have long mustaches, but you have no bravery.” Officer Malalai Kakar to fellow police officers who ran from the Taliban in a gun fight
Like her father and brothers before her, Malalai Kakar was determined to become a police officer. She entered the police academy at 15 and became an officer in 1982. “I’m very famous as a dangerous person in Kandahar. People fear me.” The 5-foot dynamo earned this local fear, as well as nationwide respect, by standing firm when men fled in the face of the Taliban. She also grappled, literally, with street-thug violence. She explained that her arms bore scars from a suspect’s teeth marks after she wrestled him to the ground and arrested him. She called herself “part gangster.” But women in Kandahar loved and trusted her, coming to her to plead for protection from abusive husbands.
Tales of her bravery served as a recruiting tool at a time when many Afghan city police forces, particularly in Kandahar, were seeking more women recruits. In 2006, 10 men reported to her in the field. “She is higher-ranked than me,” explained a young male subordinate. “So she has to give orders, and I have to obey.” She had long shed her burka and, when she became Kandahar’s first woman investigator, began wearing a man’s loose-fitting police uniform and visibly carrying sidearms. In her office, she adjudicated problems with an emphasis on domestic abuse. Malalai became a touchstone for Afghan police officers.
During the Taliban era, while living in Pakistan, she married a Western-oriented United Nations employee and, by 2008, had five children. She would prepare breakfast each morning, usually green-onion pancakes. On September 30, 2008, while leaving for work with one of her sons, she was shot in the head by the Taliban, killing her at the scene. Later, at the ribbon-cutting ceremony of the Malalai Kakar Women Police Training Center, which opened in December 2009, Malalai’s father said, “Malalai was proud to serve her country. I thank the United States for making this possible.”
