"Bags of Cash" in Afghanistan

Reports have surfaced this week describing how the CIA has been delivering bags of cash to the office of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The cash delivery was confirmed by President Karzai who stated that the money was given to charitable and humanitarian causes with Afghanistan. However, anonymous CIA officials described the cash being used to payoff regional warlords and to buy influence with representatives of the Afghan government. The best estimates suggest this covert CIA program has been going on for many years and likely has resulted in the transfer of tens of millions of dollars to President Karzai and his aides. In 2010, Karzai confirmed receiving similar cash payments from the Iranian government. The Iranian payments ceased after Afghanistan signed a strategic partnership agreement with the US.

Presumably, the CIA is providing the cash to gain influence with the Afghan leader. Strategic influence is certainly important and it cannot be understated that cash is king in the corrupt world of Afghan politics, however, the transfer of tens of millions of dollars (with no strings attached and no way to track the money) must stop. The relationship between the US government and Karzai is one that has been fraught with tension and posturing. From the US perspective, we hold that Karzai was basically our chosen leader for Afghanistan after the Taliban was driven out late in 2001. He was a supporter of the US led invasion and thus gained the backing of the US during the Afghan process of forming a transitional government. While this by no means implies that Karzai should be a puppet of the US, I do contend that a natural loyalty should exist without the need for direct untraceable million dollar cash payments.  From Karzai's perspective, he is looking to become the first Afghan leader to complete his tenure and leave office without becoming the victim of a coup or assassination. He must constantly contend with the propaganda promulgated from the re-emerging Taliban stating that he is in fact a puppet of the US government and therefore cannot be trusted. In order to combat those allegations he has repeatedly made statements publicly damning the US mission in Afghanistan (for things such as a failure to transfer detainees to Afghan control or airstrikes on areas reclaimed by the Taliban claiming civilian lives) in order to bolster his independent credentials. All of these derogatory statements come publicly while privately he continues to accept vast sums of CIA (aka US taxpayer) money.

I understand the game being played by both sides. Karzai keeps his distance in the daylight and snuggles up to the US under cover of darkness. Money flows to grease the wheels of politics. All is right with the world. But here is the problem that I see, while the CIA and the Afghan leadership may reap a benefit of the cash payments, two groups do not. The first are the poor within the Afghan society. The tens of millions of dollars could have been spent to boost support among the Afghan locals. Regardless of who holds power in Kabul, the only way for Afghanistan to move beyond the current quagmire is for the local populations to rise up and form functioning local governments. We should be encouraging those grassroots efforts to build a stronger Afghan society from the bottom up, not expecting the cash to trickle down to those who could use it most. Payments to local villages would not only endear the US and our ideals to the people, it would provide for the necessities so those populations do not need to look to the Taliban for money and structure. Secondly, we should not forget that US troops are still on the ground at least until the end of 2014. Allowing cash to be funneled to warlords as payoffs runs counter to the mission US troops are asked with. We are trying to stabilize regions within the country, while the regional warlords long to regain the strength they possessed pre-Taliban. It appears to me that the entire CIA operation is misguided. Regardless of the desire to control the political realm in Afghanistan, the CIA must understand that theirs is not the only game in town. Both the CIA and US led forces must work in conjunction with the Afghan National Army and President Karzai to build a stronger Afghanistan though trust and security, not through payoffs and shady dealings.