Defence`s Feeds

The first two F-35A Lightning II of the 158th Fighter Wing have arrived at Burlington Air National Guard Base. On Sept. 19, 2019, the first two ANG F-35A aircraft have landed at Bulrlington ANGB, Vermont. [...]

A Belgian Air Force F-16BM has crashed in France. One Of The Pilots Hanging From High-Voltage Line After His Parachute Got Caught Before Being Rescued. A Belgian Air Force two-seater F-16BM Fighting Falcon has crashed [...]

Defence is a central public sector which consumes a significant amount of energy. Increasing energy efficiency and boosting renewable energy can bring significant advantages to the sector and help with the protection of critical energy infrastructure. In addition, these efforts can contribute to the EU’s climate-neutrality objective for 2050. The importance of these policies for the defence sector was highlighted by the launch in Brussels on 19 September of the third phase of the Consultation Forum for Sustainable Energy in the Defence and Security Sector (CF SEDSS III). Miguel Arias Cañete, European Commissioner for Energy and Climate Action, and Jorge Domecq, Chief Executive of the European Defence Agency (EDA), gave the green light for the Phase III of the Forum to start as of 1st October 2019. 

EDA Chief Executive Jorge Domecq welcomed the welcomed the launch of phase III, stressing that “the Consultation Forum enabled several Ministries of Defence to develop national defence energy strategies, implement Energy Management Systems and launch projects related to energy performance. Particularly, the forum facilitated the elaboration of 18 defence-energy project proposals, in addition to numerous project ideas. EDA expects that the realisation of these projects can act as an enabler of military operational capabilities and support the Ministries to address common energy challenges at multi-national level.” 

Phase III of the Forum, which will last for four years, will continue to address the implementation of the EU legal framework on energy efficiency, renewable energy and energy security in the defence and security sector in. It will also aim at preparing the defence sector for new technologies such as digitalisation, artificial intelligence, e-mobility and other innovative energy systems.  

Phase III will also see the organisation of a series of important events, from high-level conferences to thematic workshops and table-top exercises. Another focus will be put on bringing closer the energy and defence communities and facilitate the dialogue between experts from the Ministries of Defence, Energy and Interior to create synergies and effective solutions. To this end, the EDA and the European Commission’s Directorate for Energy intend to organise a Joint Defence Energy Conference.
 

More information:

• Website: Consultation Forum for Sustainable Energy in the Defence and Security Sector 
• Factsheet: CF SEDSS (Phase II)

One more in the series of policy briefs on Russian strategic culture and leadership decision-making, written for a collaborative project organized by the Marshall Center with support from the Russia Strategy Initiative. This one is on Russian naval strategy in the Mediterranean, written in June but only recently published. As with the last one, I am posting the full text here with permission from the Marshall Center. Please go to the Marshall Center website if you would prefer to read a PDF version.

Executive Summary

• Over the last decade, Russia has expanded its military footprint in the Mediterranean. Since establishing its Mediterranean Squadron in 2013, it has largely maintained a permanent naval presence in the region, based primarily on ships from the Black Sea Fleet, with support from ships and submarines of the Northern and Baltic Fleets.
• Russia’s strategy uses the Mediterranean’s geography to protect Russia’s southern flanks while seeking to challenge the naval supremacy of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the United States in the eastern Mediterranean. Russia depends on maintaining and gradually expanding its naval presence in the Mediterranean while also securing expanded access to ports and bases, with the possibility of eventually contesting NATO’s dominance in the central Mediterranean as well.
• Although the Russian Navy’s missions in the Mediterranean are primarily related to coastal defense and protection of territorial waters, conventional deterrence has come to play an increasingly important role since the development of a ship-based cruise missile capability. The Russian Navy has sought to establish credible maritime conventional deterrence versus NATO through the combination of air defenses and cruise missile–equipped ships, which work together to signal that any use of NATO naval forces against Russian ships and facilities would be highly costly for the adversary.

Russia’s Strategic Goals

Russia’s strategy in the Mediterranean is focused on three key goals: taking advantage of the Mediterranean’s geographical position to improve Russia’s security, using Russia’s position in the Mediterranean to increase Russia’s status as an alternative world power to the United States, and providing support for the Syrian regime. The strategy has three key elements. The first element is the positioning of a credible military force in the Mediterranean. A permanent force in the region is important for several Russian objectives, including protecting Russian approaches and reducing Russia’s vulnerability to surprise.

This force also affords Russia more flexibility and capability in countering Western activities in the Mediterranean, grants Russia more-ready access to the world’s oceans, reduces the time needed to shuttle forces and platforms to the region in case of a conflict, and gives Russia a constant presence for spreading influence in the surrounding countries.

The second element of the strategy consists of an effort to secure allies and partners in the region with the goal of increasing port access for Russia’s naval squadron. Although Syria remains the critical ally for Russia, efforts to enhance cooperation with Egypt, Cyprus, Greece, and other states have been successful to a greater or lesser extent.

The third element of the strategy builds on the second and focuses on establishing naval bases in the region—an effort successful only in Syria, so far. A base in the central Mediterranean, such as in Libya, would be particularly important from a strategic point of view, allowing Russia to expand its naval footprint beyond the eastern Mediterranean.

Without access granted by allies in the Mediterranean, a standing military presence, and regional basing, Moscow would likely find it more difficult to conduct operations in pursuit of its overarching strategic goals in the region. Were the three elements achieved, the Russian military would be in a much more favorable position in the event of hostilities or conflict in the Mediterranean.

Russia’s Naval Capabilities in the Mediterranean

In 2013, Russia reestablished a permanent naval presence in the Mediterranean Sea with its Mediterranean Squadron. The Black Sea Fleet (BSF) has been the primary supplier of ships and logistics for the squadron. Since 2014, the BSF has acquired six new attack submarines, three frigates, and several patrol ships and small missile ships. In conjunction with these acquisitions, Russia has begun major overhauls of some of its Soviet-era ships. Russia has moved air defense batteries into Crimea, where these batteries provide further cover for Russian platforms operating in the Black Sea and eastern Mediterranean. The introduction of multiple platforms armed with long-range cruise missiles, and the addition of air defense batteries in Crimea, has fundamentally changed the way the Black Sea Fleet operates. Armed with Kalibr missile systems, which have a demonstrated range of 1,500–2,000 km, the fleet’s newest ships can strike distant targets from well-protected zones near Russia’s coastline in Crimea and Novorossiysk.

Since the addition of six Varshavyanka-class submarines to the BSF in 2017, Russia has stationed two such vessels in Tartus, Syria. Surface ships and submarines from Russia’s other fleets, mainly the Northern and Baltic, have participated in squadron operations at various times as well. The force has actively contributed to Russia’s military operations in Syria. In addition to delivering troops, BSF vessels have fired Kalibr missiles at ground targets throughout Syria. Russian ships have also shadowed U.S. ships in the eastern Mediterranean, and Russian submarines deployed to the Mediterranean have tracked U.S. and NATO platforms there as well. The squadron has also facilitated Russian naval diplomacy efforts, as ships from the squadron have called at ports at Cyprus, Egypt, and Malta.

The BSF will continue to acquire new ships during the next ten years, allowing Russia to increase the number of ships potentially able to deploy for operations in the Mediterranean. In addition, Russia has strengthened its air and air defense forces in the Mediterranean, positioning a range of tactical combat aircraft at its air base in Syria and having demonstrated the ability to surge long-range aviation into the Mediterranean from bases in Russian territory. Russian defenses can control the entire Black Sea from Crimea, including all approaches to Russian coastal areas. Russia has been deploying similar protective capabilities in the eastern Mediterranean, including placing S-400 and S-300 air defense systems, Bastion and Bal coastal defense systems, and Pantsir point-defense systems together with air force and naval units. Although the political geography of the region and the more-limited nature of Russian forces there mean that Moscow does not have the same kind of defensive control as it does in the Black Sea, its forces in the Mediterranean are strong enough to present a potent challenge to U.S. and NATO naval dominance in the region.

The Missions of the Russian Navy

Strategic deterrence remains the most important mission for the Russian Navy globally, but coastal defense and control of territorial waters are a close second and are paramount concerns in the Black Sea and Mediterranean. Russia has traditionally considered coastal defense to mean simply keeping foreign navies away from the Russian coast; since 2015, however, the coastal-defense mission has come to encompass protection of Russian forces in Syria as well. Furthermore, over the last decade, the Russian Navy has increasingly focused on improving its ability to work closely with Russian ground forces and the Russian air force in joint operations. This coordination was on display as early as 2014, when all of the services worked closely together to move forces to Crimea as part of the operation that resulted in Russia’s annexation of that region. Since that time, Russia has repeatedly focused its military exercises on joint operations. The positive effects of that focus have been evident in Russian naval operations in and near Syria, where Russian naval forces have coordinated closely with Russian air and ground forces both in striking targets on shore and in transporting personnel and equipment for Russian operations.

Russia is achieving its coastal-defense mission primarily through capability development rather than platform acquisition. This is why the Russian Navy is not as concerned as some Western analysts think it should be about the difficulties and delays it has faced in building large surface ships. Instead, it has built a large number of smaller patrol ships and corvettes that are highly capable in anti-access and area denial (A2/AD) operations. The idea is that the Russian Navy can use these ships to create maritime zones that are difficult for enemy forces to penetrate. These “A2/AD bubbles” in the Black Sea and eastern Mediterranean form a set of layered defenses and multiple vectors of attack through the combination of long-range sea-, air-, and ground-launched missiles used to deny access, with shorter-range coastal and air defense systems focused on area denial. As part of the coastal-defense mission, the Russian Navy will seek to establish credible maritime conventional deterrence against NATO through the combination of air defenses and cruise missile–equipped ships, which will work together to highlight that any use of NATO naval forces against Russian ships and facilities would be highly costly for the adversary.

In contrast, the Russian Navy has a relatively limited focus on traditional power projection and expeditionary warfare in the Mediterranean. Russia’s largest naval surface ships are Soviet legacy vessels that are becoming less reliable over time. Most of the new surface ships being built are relatively small and are unlikely to deploy far beyond Russia’s naval outposts in the Black Sea and eastern Mediterranean. As a result, power projection will be largely based on the new generation of advanced Kilo-class diesel submarines and the regular presence of one or two cruise missile–carrying nuclear submarines deployed to the Mediterranean from the Northern Fleet. Russia’s legacy fleet of Soviet-era surface ships will continue to focus on status projection, carrying out port visits and similar activities to project the image of a great power. The Russian Navy also has a fairly limited expeditionary capability. Its small number of aging landing ships have reached the limit of their operational capacity in supporting Russia’s operations in Syria.

Constraints on Russian Naval Operations in the Mediterranean

The Russian Navy’s future plans in the Mediterranean face several constraints. On the financing side, Moscow invested heavily in naval procurement as part of the 2011-2020 State Armament Program. It was not willing to maintain such a high level of spending for the next ten years, especially given the constraints on overall military spending resulting from a relatively stagnant economic situation. As a result, the Russian Navy appears likely to be the biggest loser in the 2027 State Armament Program.

On the shipbuilding side, most Russian naval construction projects have faced significant delays. This is due to the combination of a long-term decline in naval research and development that is only starting to be reversed, an inability to modernize its shipbuilding industry, budgetary constraints that have forced the government to make tradeoffs about which construction and modernization programs to fund, and the end of defense cooperation with Ukrainian and Western suppliers in the aftermath of the 2014 conflict with Ukraine.

In terms of industrial capacity, most of Russia’s shipyards are not in the best shape. The Sevmash and Admiralty shipyards are exceptions and reveal the importance attached to submarine construction over surface ships. Russia’s other shipyards have generally been very slow in building ships. The situation has not been helped by the disruption of supply chains as a result of Western sanctions. Until the advent of Western sanctions in 2014, many key components were purchased from abroad. Although this disruption has been most evident in the cases of gas turbines and diesel engines, Moscow has also experienced problems with the acquisition of various electronic components and precision machine tools. For several years, therefore, the acquisition and development of advanced components were the biggest constraint on the construction of new ships with modern systems. However, most of these issues are now being resolved through the development of domestic alternatives, so faster naval construction is likely in the future.

Russia also faces operational challenges in naval operations in the Mediterranean. The primary challenge is one of logistics and bringing platforms to the fight. The Turkish Straits would likely be a severe hindrance to sending reinforcements and to Russia’s ability to redeploy back to the Black Sea in the event of a conflict involving NATO, especially if Turkey continues to follow the strictures of the Montreux Convention. Additionally, Russian intermediate-range bombers would likely face challenges transiting from Russia to the airspace over Syria.

Because of these challenges, Russian leadership would, prior to any outbreak in the eastern Mediterranean, have to choose whether to fight in the Mediterranean or attempt to bring forces back to the Black Sea to defend Russia’s southern borders. Should Russian forces stay in the Mediterranean, they would pose a serious threat to U.S. and NATO forces by creating an increasingly dense missile and electronic-warfare environment farther into the eastern Mediterranean Sea. Russia would have to expect that it would lose these forces to an ultimately numerically and qualitatively superior enemy force, albeit after exacting a potentially high cost on its adversary.

Russia’s Future Naval Role in the Mediterranean

In the future, the BSF is expected to support an even larger Mediterranean squadron, with a constant presence of one to two multipurpose submarines from the Northern Fleet and 10–15 surface ships (primarily from the BSF). Russia’s efforts to expand its presence in the Mediterranean would also require the establishment of more and bigger bases in the region. Such bases would not just provide an opportunity for refueling and repair of ships: They could also house coastal defensive systems that would protect the squadron.

In the near to medium term, the Russian Navy’s role will be to serve primarily as a deterrence force to constrain U.S. and NATO operations in the eastern Mediterranean and to provide forward defense for approaches to the Russian homeland through the Black Sea. It will have some power projection through its ability to hold opponents’ territory at risk with its cruise

missile capability, rather than through traditional naval strike groups. Out-of-area deployment capability will increasingly shift to smaller patrol ships and to submarines as Russia’s remaining Soviet-era large surface ships become increasingly less reliable.

Over the last decade, there has been a transition in the Russian Navy’s future planning from unattainable blue-water aspirations to establishing a fairly capable green-water force. Its overall focus remains defensive in the near term, with the possibility of greater emphasis on power projection in the medium term as more Yasen-class nuclear attack submarines come online and older Soviet submarines are armed with Kalibr cruise missiles as part of ongoing modernization plans.

This future force has the potential to threaten the naval forces of the United States and its allies with land-attack and antiship cruise missiles based on small ships in enclosed seas that are highly protected from attack and with difficult-to-detect modern submarines. The result will be a Russian Navy that, compared with the past, has much greater firepower and offensive range despite its dependence on relatively small platforms. This capability will make the Russian Navy a far more potent regional threat by the mid-2020s than it has been for several decades.

The Mediterranean will play a key role in Russian naval strategy because of its strategic significance as an access point to southern Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. For Russia, the Mediterranean symbolizes the larger competition between Moscow and Washington. By building up its naval forces, Russia is hoping to circumscribe NATO access to the region, protect Russia’s southern flank, and assist its current and potential future client states in the region. At the same time, maintaining forces in the eastern Mediterranean is less of a priority for Russian strategy than defending the homeland. Maintaining naval presence in the Mediterranean is a far more effective strategy for the Russian Navy than pursuing a globally active blue-water navy because Russia has neither the resources nor the global ambitions to challenge U.S. naval supremacy around the world. Moscow’s focus on developing and augmenting the Mediterranean squadron is thus a far more achievable limited objective that is well-aligned with Russia’s foreign policy objectives in the region.

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One ticket has fallen apart and one candidate has withdrawn his candidacy in favour of another. This has reduced the number of presidential candidates from 18 to 16 and left the two incumbents, President Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Dr Abdullah, as the main contenders in the race. In this piece, AAN’s Ali Yawar Adili and Thomas Ruttig discuss the campaigns that started, the threats to boycott the election, the security concerns and the presidential tickets that have fallen apart. They conclude that the campaign that started on 28 July and will continue until 48 hours before election day has, so far, been uninspiring and marred by disbelief that the election will take place on 28 September.

Lacklustre start and uninspiring continuation of election campaign

When the official race for the Afghan presidency started on 28 July, two months before the polls, only three out of 18 candidates officially organised public campaign events. These included the two incumbents and main contenders, President Ashraf Ghani and Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, and also Enayatullah Hafiz, a fringe candidate. Ghani’s electoral ticket, Daulat-Saz (State-Builder), was the first one. It launched its election campaign at the Loya Jirga tent in northwest Kabul. The president said that he had managed to undercut the “domination of gold, force and oppression” in Afghanistan’s political system during his first term and asked people to grant him another mandate to implement “law and justice.” Ghani said that he would put into practice “Omarijustice,” a reference to the second caliph of Islam and a shot at claiming religious legitimacy for his presidency. Ghani followed this by travelling to a few provinces, for example to Paktia on 8 August (media report here), to Herat on 23 August (media report here) and to Kandahar on 14 September (see the video here). Even before the official campaign started, he had toured the country to inaugurate infrastructure projects, which his opponents condemned as unfair and illegal electioneering. Abdullah and his Stability and Integration team was second, launching the campaign in the large Uranus Wedding Palace on the main road to Kabul’s international airport. This gave him the chance to refer to and criticise Ghani’s speech. He said, “Today, someone has said that he would implement Omari justice. Listen very carefully. . . . If our people think that Omari justice was like what happened in the last five years [of the Ghani presidency], their faith would be harmed.” Abdullah –a partner in the post-2014 National Unity Government (NUG) with Ghani – accused the president of double standards in fighting corruption. He referred to the corruption charges against former minister of communication and information technology Abdul Razeq Wahidi who had been acquitted two days earlier(he was acquitted by the appeal court seven days earlier, on 21 July, though, media report here) while someone being investigated by the attorney general had, again two days earlier, been appointed as acting deputy minister of finance for revenue and customs, one of the key revenue-raising positions in government. He was referring to Walid Tamim who announced his ministerial appointment in a tweet on 26 July. All this while waiting to receive India’s agreement to go there as Afghan ambassador (see AAN’s reporting here). Abdullah called it “appointing the wolf as shepherd.” The third candidate, Hafiz, chose a different method to open his run for the presidency. With a group of aides and supporters, he went to three areas in western Kabul predominantly inhabited by his Hazara ethnic community and cleaned roads there (see media report here). No other campaigns started on 28 July. Instead, as discussed below, the 13-member Council of Presidential Candidates decided to delay their campaigns and even warned they would boycott the election. Although some candidates finally began their campaigns, the campaigns have remained insipid and affected by insecurity and the uncertainties around the now stalled peace negotiations.

Boycott threats

On the same day the campaigns started, 28 July, the Council of Presidential Candidates issued a statement warning they might boycott the election, as they consider the poll “fraudulent, pre-engineered and crisis-generating.” The council comprises 13 candidates and was formed in April 2019 (then by 11 of the 18 presidential aspirants) in response to the delay in the presidential elections and what they saw as the unconstitutional extension of Ghani’s presidential term (see AAN’s reporting here and here). Its members gave the president and his team one week to address a number of problems, such as the protection of “the independence of the independent electoral institutions,” including those “related to procurement and recruitment”; the interference of “high-ranking government officials . . . in favour of the ruling teams”; threats against government employees who do not support the teams of the NUG leaders and “deliberate insecuritisation of areas where rival candidates to the ruling team are assumed to [receive] more votes.” If that did not happen, the council’s members would instead “focus on the struggle to make the peace process successful and build national consensus for developing an accountable administration so that such an impartial and national administration undertake the responsibility for holding a free and fair and credible election.” (1) On 1 August, the Council of Presidential Candidates met the Election Support Group, which comprises key donors (the European Union; Australia; Sweden, on behalf of the Nordic Plus group; Germany; Japan; the United Kingdom and the United States), NATO and UNAMA, to communicate their above-mentioned statement issued on the first day of the election campaign. (2) Ahmad Wali Massud, one of the candidates and a member of the council who shared the news of the meeting on his Facebook page, wrote that the council was determined to use all available resources for making the election transparent before launching their campaign, which fell short of a boycott declaration.

Facing a possible boycott by at least half the candidates, Abdul Aziz Ibrahimi, an IEC spokesman, told Hasht-e Sobh on 5 August that the IEC was prepared to hold the election even if it were between two candidates only. It did not come to a boycott. One by one, candidates began to launch their campaigns. Below is a timeline of the first campaign events of some of them:

• Leader of Hezb-e Islami Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who is experiencing his first presidential election in post-Taleban Afghanistan after his deal with the government in 2016, launched his campaign on 1 August.
• Former NDS chief Rahmatullah Nabil launched his campaign at the Loya Jirga Tent on 3 August, 7 days after the official commencement of the race.
• Sayyed Nurullah Jalili launched his campaign at the Loya Jirga Tent on 4 August
• Massud –not seen as one of the election favourites – (video here) launched his campaign, also at the Loya Jirga Tent, on 9 August, 13 days after the race had officially started. At that point, Massud’s ticket could have been ranked third among in terms of including powerful leaders of Jamiat-e Islami party, after Abdullah’s Stability and Integration team and that of former NSC Hanif Atmar (which included former interior minister Yunos Qanuni, another leading Jamiati, as a vice-presidential candidate). However, after the Atmar ticket collapsed (more on that below) and Amrullah Saleh (who originally belonged to the same political camp) joined Ghani, a number of Jamiat heavyweights (such as Qanuni, former Balkh governor Atta Muhammad Nur, Herat strongman and former minister of water and energy Ismail Khan, and former defence minister Besmellah Muhammadi – who had been with Atmar) have been weighing whether to back Massud or Abdullah. The latter is still seen by many in the party as having squandered the political chances linked to his powerful position in the NUG and has drawn harsh criticism for it, for example by Ismail Khan, who had urged him not to run again. However, he might appear to be the more likely choice, given Massud’s low-key performance.
• Shahab Hakimi also launched his campaign on 9 August. Instead of talking about the election, he said that “There is no peace nor the possibility for holding a general election. Inshallah, interim government is coming. This administration [NUG] cannot hold general, fair and acceptable elections.”
• Latif Pedram launched his first campaign event at the Intercontinental Hotel on 15 August in which he promised to create a “Federal Islamic Republic of Afghanistan-Khorasan” if he won the election.

The election team security factor

Hours after the inaugural ceremony of Ghani’s election campaign ended, the office of his first running-mate, Amrullah Saleh’s Green Trend movement (AAN background here) in Shahid Square north of Kabul’s city centre and near the airport, came under a complex attack. The attack included a car bombing followed by a gunfight involving at least four attackers. The attack left 20 dead, including 16 civilians, and as many as 50 wounded (media report here). No group, including the Taleban and the local Islamic State franchise, claimed this attack. It was widely condemned by officials and presidential candidates such as the president, the chief executive, Atmar and Nabil (see media report here) and UNAMA. The latter’s statement underlined, “Candidates are civilians. Violence has no place in Afghanistan’s presidential campaign.” However, it had a demoralising effect for the election campaign which had just kicked off. An attack by unknown gunmen on a Ghani campaign office in Mazar-e Sharif was also reported on 1 September 2019. It resulted in a 15-minute firefight, but no one was injured.

Ten days into the campaign period, on 6 August, the Taleban, writing in English, warned voters to “stay away from gatherings and rallies that could become potential targets,” saying that it instructed “all its Mujahideen to stand against this theatrical and sham of a process” and “prevent the enemy from succeeding in their malicious plans.” They also challenged the election’s legitimacy by saying voting would take place only in selected cities and even there most of the inhabitants would not be participating. They added that while negotiations were underway “to bring an end to the occupation and arrangements for intra-Afghan understanding are being put into place,” the elections would only serve to satisfy “the ego of a limited number of sham politicians, resulting in the waste of time, money and resources.” In reaction, on the same day the palace condemned “the Taleban’s threat against the people.”It argued it was the people’s legal right, including under Sharia, to elect their leaders (using the religious term “auli-l-amr) “through direct vote.” It said that the government had made “all the necessary preparations” to guarantee this through “free, transparent and general elections.” It also said that the country’s security forces were “instructed” and “fully prepared” and would not allow anyone “to stop their participation in determining their destiny.” Meanwhile, the commander of the US and Resolute Support forces in Afghanistan, General Austin Miller, also assured his Afghan counterparts of their “full support and readiness to work with Afghan security forces in all areas, especially in suppressing insurgents.”

On the first day of campaigning, Nabil’s team had already claimed that most of the “enemy’s threats” were against it and complained that its “security package” had not “yet been implemented” by the government. Nabil said it did not “pay much attention, and this deliberate negligence has caused serious problem for our public gatherings and provincial travels of the leadership members of our team.” He did not specify who were posing threats or their nature. (3) Later, on 10 September, a source from his election campaign who did not want to be named told AAN that threat reports came from the government,  and were mostly against Nabil himself and his first running-mate Murad Ali Murad.

The Council of Presidential Candidates also complained about insufficiency in the security measures on 24 August, saying “Security measures for the candidates are incomplete and worrisome, and the government has not provided services in accordance with professional standards. In the event of any unpleasant incident, officials at the top and Ghani should be held responsible.”

Meanwhile, after his 23 August campaign trip to Herat mentioned above, President Ghani suddenly stopped campaigning in the provinces. Instead, he started “virtual rallies” where he speaks to supporters in different provinces on the phone or through video conference. No reason was given for this measure. The New York Times Kabul-based correspondent Mujib Mashal wondered in a 30 August tweet whether this shift was reflecting “good use of technology” or a reaction to higher security threats. He said, “Politicians who at least during election times went to meet people in far away districts (away from their blast walls and armored vehicles) now talk to gatherings via Skype.” Afghan journalist Harun Najafizada, editor with Iran International, answered that question in another tweet on 2 September: “In Afghanistan security does not allow actual rallies [before] the Sept. 28th presidential polls.” The chief executive has had no provincial campaign trip yet.

It is worth mentioning that some of the election observer organisations (eg Afghan Amputee Bicyclists for Rehabilitation and Recreation (AABRAR), Afghanistan Civil Society Forum-Organization (ACSFO), Training Human Rights Association for Afghan Women (THRA)) conducted a pre-election assessment before the start of the election campaign. AAN was invited to attend the meetings. One official from the Ministry of Interior who did not want to be named told the assessment team that, even in Kabul, they had informed the candidates that the security forces could only secure campaign events held at the Loya Jirga Tent and a few other specific venues, which he refused to name.

Elections versus peace

Apart from technicalities and security threats, the campaign has been so slow for a much larger reason: it was simply not clear to the candidates and their political allies whether the election would go ahead. This uncertainty emanated from the – now defunct – negotiations between the US and the Taleban in Doha. The US made it clear that election might stand in the way of the larger aim, ending the war. For instance, on 24 August, US ambassador to Afghanistan John Bass, while visiting Mazar-e Sharif, said that while both elections and a peace accord were “important for the United States . . ., [p]eace is our highest priority because it is also the highest priority of the Afghan people. And every day, we have Afghans telling us that peace is their highest priority.”

Campaign posters on the airport road. Apart from incumbent President Ghani’s campaign, other candidates started their campaign reluctantly and put up their posters around Kabul city. Photo: Ali Yawar Adili, 14 September 2019

The widespread assumption was that these negotiations would culminate in a cancellation of the election in favour of an interim power-sharing arrangement. This was fuelled by media reporting of rumours, such as al-Jazeera reporting almost a month into the election campaign, on 24 August, that the US and the Taleban had agreed to an interim government that would be in charge for 14 months (media report here). While both US Special Representative Zalmai Khalilzad and the spokesman for the Taleban’s Qatar office, Suhail Shahin, rejected the reports on the very day in separate tweets (see here and here), it did not dilute the suspicion that both sides might be hiding something. As AAN has already reported, even Chief Executive Abdullah, who had consistently supported the holding of the election and accordingly started his electoral campaign, modified his position – and increased his options – saying that he was “fully ready to render sacrifices before and after election to reach a durable peace in the country.” According to this report this included “quit[ting] elections for the sake of peace.” While the election looks to be the only option for moving forward after President Trump declared peace negotiations as “dead,” there are no signs to indicate that the election campaigns have picked up enough steam.

Moreover, there is a trust deficit in the election itself, resulting from the deficient previous elections. Ghani himself has called the 2018 parliamentary elections “a catastrophe” (AAN reporting here), while the EU election observation mission called the 2014 presidential election, from which Ghani emerged as the president but in the unloved NUG, a “disaster.” The findings of a survey released by Transparent Election Foundation of Afghanistan (TEFA) on 8 August showed that only 42.87 per cent of the respondents (5,200 from all 34 provinces) said they would participate in the upcoming election and  the remaining 57.13 per cent of them had no interest in voting in the upcoming election. The reasons included: electoral commissions have no freedom or the required capacity to hold the election; citizens’ votes were sacrificed for a political deal in the 2014 presidential election; and severe security threats and challenges.  AAN has repeatedly reported that necessary electoral reform has remained embryonic, making the coming election as problem-ridden as the previous ones, with electoral institutions widely considered non-credible and partial, while reports surrounding the preparations for biometric verification suggest the likelihood of renewed chaos. In addition, the election has a significant problem with inclusiveness: many voters, particularly in rural Taleban-controlled areas, are already deprived of their right to vote due to lack of security, with 2,005 out of 7,378 polling centres remaining closed.

Out of the race

1. Collapse of Atmar’s team

Even before the start of the official campaign season, the ticket of one of three election favourites collapsed. Atmar’s candidacy would have transformed the duel between the two NUG heads Ghani and Abdullah (which repeated the one between Ghani’s predecessor Hamed Karzai and Abdullah in 2009) into a three-horse race with an unpredictable outcome.

Atmar (a Pashtun from Laghman who served as national security adviser to President Ghani until 2018 and before as minister of rural rehabilitation and development, education and interior under Karzai) had formed one of the strongest and most diverse tickets. His first and second running-mates were respectively former vice-president Muhammad Yunus Qanuni, a Tajik from Panjshir and a senior Jamiat member, and Muhammad Mohaqeq, the second deputy to Chief Executive Abdullah and the leader of Hazara-dominated Hezb-e Wahdat-e Mardom-e Afghanistan. Atmar had also fielded a third, informal, running-mate, Alem Sa’i, an Uzbek and a former governor of Jawzjan, to tap into the Uzbek voter base usually dominated by Abdul Rashid Dostum, who is supporting Abdullah. Sa’i is a member of the anti-Dostum New Jombesh party founded in June 2017 (AAN background here). In addition to Qanuni, Atmar had cultivated other influential Jamiat stalwarts who, Qanuni said on 18 January 2019, included Atta Muhammad Nur and Ismail Khan. (4) Qanuni particularly underscored Nur’s and Khan’s role in forming the ticket, without whom, he said, they would not have been successful (see AAN reporting here).

In the end, a row broke out in the Atmar ticket about Nur’s role and his claim to the future prime ministerial post. On 24 July, Nur told Tolonews in an interview that “I am the prime minister of this team.” Six days later, on 30 July, Radio Azadi reported, based on a source close to Atmar’s electoral ticket, that at the launch of the team’s election campaign Nur wanted to be introduced as the ticket’s candidate for this prospective position but that Atmar opposed it. The report said that Atmar wanted his plan to re-establish the prime minister’s post to be mentioned in his campaign charter but that it would be implemented only after being approved by a Loya Jirga after an election victory. Atmar had laid this approach out himself in an interview with Tolonews a few days earlier, on 20 July, in which he said:

The agreement of our team is that if we win, we will maintain the presidential system hundred per cent [but] under this system, for the betterment of governance affairs [and] considering the successful experience of His Majesty’s reign [referring to the same system in place under King Muhammad Zaher [1933–73], we will create the post of sadr-e azam [prime minister] by amending the constitution who will be appointed and dismissed by the president.

What really happened might have been a bit more complicated, at least according to Sayyed Muhammad Ali Jawid, the head of one faction of Harakat-e Islami party that was part of the Atmar team. In this position, he had some insight into the team’s internal dealings. In a Facebook post on 9 August, he alleged that Atmar had signed a secret agreement with Nur to create the post of prime minister and introduce him as his candidate to the post. According to Jawid, Atmar informed the leadership council about the agreement on 6 Asad (28 July), only after the disagreement between him and Nur became serious, and asked the council members to mediate. Jawid claimed that members of the team’s leadership council, including himself, tried to do so but to no avail. Jawid also said that Atmar had accepted to announce Nur’s prime-ministership but refused to yield to his demand that the prime minister also would pick his ministers after the election victory, which Atmar considered as rendering himself powerless as the prospective president. (5) Before, on 3 August, Jawid had announced his party’s separation from Atmar’s team, citing Atmar’s and Nur’s unrelenting stances regarding the prime-ministership issue, with the result that the credibility of this team in the public opinion had “decreased to zero.” 12 days later, on 15 August, Jawid announced that his party would support Ghani’s State-Builder team.

In any case, Atmar’s team declared its election campaign “halted and suspended” on 8 August. His statement gave three reasons, but did not mention the Atmar-Nur ruckus about the prime ministerial post and the imminent implosion of the team. It rather:

• blamed the continuing “naked interferences by the Palace’s apparatus” in the election preparation and its own lack of “confidence in the transparency of the elections and guarantees for a free and fair setting” for it;
• blamed the deteriorating security threats to the electoral teams and their campaign activities as well as the voters; and
• said that it had prioritised “efforts at peace” over the election.

It also said that it would reserve all Atmar’s election ticket’s legal rights and would review its “role constantly and take necessary decisions in accordance with the future political situation and developments.” This hinted at a possible resumption of his campaign. This seems to be very unlikely, though, in particular as two weeks later, on 23 August, Atmar’s second running-mate, Mohaqeq, officially joined the Abdullah team (see the video here), though he still insisted there was no discord among the team members.

On 15 August, already, Ghani’s campaign manager, Muhammad Omar Daudzai, posted a photo of himself shaking hand with Sulaiman Kakar who had been Atmar’s deputy in the office of the National Security Council until September 2018 when he resigned ten days after his boss (media report here) saying that an “experienced and patriotic personality” joined Ghani’s State-Builder campaign. Kakar, he said, would work as the deputy campaign manager. Before, Kakar was crucial to Atmar’s team and had been described as the “executive arm” of his election team. This led to media reports (see one here) that Atmar would also join Ghani’s State-Builder team. However, five days after the suspension of his campaign, on 13 August, Atmar denied these reports. Atmar replied in his short media notice:

Since last night, reports indicating that the leader of the Peace and Moderation team Muhammad Hanif Atmar, senior members of the team and in general the Peace and Moderation team plan to join another electoral ticket have been published in the media and on social media. The news is absolutely inaccurate and untrue. The Peace and Moderation team pursues its goals and programmes with full strength.

However, AAN had heard that Ghani’s national security adviser, Hamdullah Moheb, had met Atmar to persuade him to join the president’s team and that Atmar had, instead, asked to be appointed as the chief negotiator in the possible upcoming intra-Afghan negotiations.

2. Withdrawal of Rasul

Meanwhile, Zalmai Rasul withdrew from the race and also announced his support for Ghani’s team in a ceremony held on 6 August in Kabul (media report here). Rasul, who served as foreign minister and national security advisor under Karzai, did not provide any specific reasons for his withdrawal. Rasul’s running-mates, Abdul Jabbar Taqwa (a Tajik from Farkhar district of Takhar) and Ghulam Ali Wahdat (a Hazara from Bamyan), did not follow his suit and, on the same day, announced their separation from him. Unlike in 2014, when Rasul was one of the most viable candidates and came third in the first round of the election (he supported Abdullah in the second round), this time around his team was not considered as among the frontrunners.

One IEC commissioner wrote in response to AAN’s written query on 4 September that no candidate had officially written to the IEC to withdraw from the race, the ballot papers had been printed and were now being dispatched to the provinces, and that all the (18) candidates who had been cleared to contest the election are on the ballot. According to the electoral law, candidates could withdraw until 25 April when the IEC published the final list of candidates. Should they want to withdraw from the contest after this date, their names will remain on the ballot, but any votes cast for them will not be counted and their deposits will not be returned (the money would go into state coffers).

With the collapse of Atmar’s team and withdrawal of Rasul, the number of candidates has decreased from 18 to 16, leaving the two incumbents, Ghani and Abdullah, as the main contenders in the race.

Some extra institutional arrangements

As Atmar’s ticket, with its busted plan to build up one of its key members as the prospective prime minister – a position not envisaged in the current constitution – Abdullah’s team also came up with some innovation. When he launched his election campaign on 28 July, Abdullah said (his video here) that his team’s leadership had decided that his ticket would include three, not two, deputies for the position of chief executive, the quasi-prime ministerial position invented under the NUG. He then introduced the Pashtun politician Anwar ul-Haq Ahadi, a former finance minister and head of New National Front of Afghanistan coalition as chief executive candidate. He named a Hazara, Ghani Kazemi (the leader of one Hezb-e Harakat-e Islami faction) as his first deputy and Roz Muhammad Nur (a Turkman) as the second, while the third position would go to a – not yet announced – woman. (6) Abdullah’s move addressed what is seen as a necessity in Afghanistan’s highly factionalised and ethnicised political landscape: to have a representative of each major ethnic group on a ticket to appeal to voters of these particular groups. His ticket was still missing a Pashtun, while the Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara slots were taken by himself, Enayatullah Babur Farahmand and Asadullah Sadati.

Ahadi’s acceptance of the position is remarkable insofar as he had broken away from a large political coalition, the Grand National Coalition of Afghanistan (see AAN’s reporting) in November 2018 in protest against exactly the same issue – the coalition’s plan to create the post of a prime minister.

Abdullah has also promised to form another political body, called the Supreme Leadership Council, composed of leaders of major political parties. This has in particular been reflected in his agreement with Hezb-e Wahdat-e Mardom leader Mohaqeq. When he left Atmar’s team and joined Abdullah’s, he was promised the post of deputy to the leader of the council. This council is to advise the president “about fundamental issues in the country,” according to Muhammad Nateqi, Mohaqeq’s deputy in the party, who himself has been promised a post as a special representative of the president in the case Abdullah wins.

Nabil appointed a Turkman, Abdul Majid Sattari, as his third vice-presidential candidate on 28 July. (7) In this, he follows Ghani, Atmar (see AAN’s previous reporting here) and Abdullah who have now introduced informal third vice-presidential candidates, so far introduced as “special representatives” of the president. These additional posts are not covered by the current constitution. According to article 60, only two (first and second) vice-presidents are envisaged and must be declared by the presidential candidates when registering to run, not during the campaign.(8) Consequently, the Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) warned in its 30 July 2019 decision that none of the candidates and electoral tickets could use titles such as prime minister, third vice-president or vice-presidential candidate in their election campaign.

Campaign violations

Two days into the campaign, the ECC, in its 30 July decision quoted above, issued warnings for the first electoral violations, which occurred during Ghani’s and Abdullah’s campaign launches. The ECC cited the illegal use of government’s money and facilities, such as using the Loya Jirga tent (a government venue), government equipment and vehicles and the participation of high-ranking government staff in the gatherings. The ECC said that this had violated article 98 (paragraph 1, section 31) of the electoral law, article 5 (paragraph 5), article 6 (paragraph 2) and article 7 (paragraph 1, sections 4 and 7) of the amended regulation regarding the 2019 election campaign as well as article 6 (paragraph 4) of the regulation for management of financial affairs of the election campaign of candidates. It said that the ECC members unanimously decided to issue serious warnings to both Ghani’s “State-Builder” and Abdullah’s “Stability and Integration” teams in accordance with article 30 of the electoral law (paragraph 1, section 3)and urged them to observe the procedures of the electoral commissions and other electoral regulations.

A day after the official commencement of the election campaign, on 29 July, Atmar’s team issued a “statement about illegal appointments by Dr Ashraf Ghani.” The statement said, “Former president and 2019 presidential candidate, Dr Muhammad Ashraf Ghani, in continuation of [his] illegal actions, has appointed a number of people to the important government positions . . . as heads of customs (from Herat to Nangrahar and from Kandahar to Farah) on the first day of the start of the election campaign.” It said that all these appointments had “political, electoral and campaign dimension and are in direct conflict with the electoral law, the principle of rule of law, political morality and sound competition which in turn can deal a heavy blow to the credibility of the government and irreparable harms to the election.” (9)The appointments came despite the Independent Directorate of Local Governance’s announcement on 21 July that it had halted all “new appointments and recruitments related to the agency until the end of the election” (AAN’s reporting here). Presidential spokesman Sediq Sediqi, however, insisted on 30 July that all the appointments, firings and hirings that had taken place within the government institutions were “needs-based” and covered by law.

On 9 September, the Kabul provincial ECC announced that foreign minister Salahuddin Rabbani had been charged with a cash fine of 15,000 afghanis (almost 200 US dollars) for participating in Abdullah’s campaign events. It also fined two presidential advisers, Abdul Rahim Azizi and Shah Hussain Murtazawi, and the chancellor of Kabul University, Hamidullah Faruqi, with a fine of the same amount for campaigning in favour of Ghani’s team. Murtazawi was also penalised with a ban from voting. Kabul-based Pajhwok News Agency also compiled a long list of examples of the use of “foul” and “aggressive” language, which is against the electoral law.

Conclusion

The campaign for Afghanistan’s 28 September 2019 election has been lacklustre because of the uncertainty resulting from the – now collapsed – US-Taleban talks and US pressure to further delay the poll to not stand in the way of an agreement on troop withdrawal and intra-Afghan negotiations envisaged for after the conclusion of the deal. This and the precarious security situation even forced the incumbent – the only candidate fully committed to the election – to suspend his campaign travels outside Kabul (which he resumed only on 14 September).

AAN’s count of the IEC’s official figures from the 2018 parliamentary election shows less than 3.5 million (3,467,541, to be exact) valid votes (in private meetings, election observers have been saying that the number was even much lower). With this uninspiring campaign, AAN has heard concerns that the turnout might be much lower, especially given that there is no local election to help get the voters to polls. It is feared that the election might fail to deliver a legitimate mandate to the next president.

Even so, the little campaigning so far has been marred by accusations of irregularity and manipulation which reflect the mistrust in the unreformed electoral institutions seen by his opponents to work in the incumbent’s favour.

With the disintegration of the Atmar ticket, the election is expected to become a two-horse race between the incumbent, Ashraf Ghani, and his estranged NUG ‘partner,’ Abdullah Abdullah. Together with the lack of electoral reform promised after the 2014 ‘disaster’ – an election without an official result and a compromise unloved by the two ‘partners’ who largely cancelled out each other – this constellation might increase the danger that the post-2014 election chaos might repeat itself. Under these circumstances, any result could easily be challenged – again.

 

Edited by Thomas Ruttig and Sari Kouvo

 

(1) Presidential hopeful Muhammad Shahab Hakimi, a member of the council, told a local newspaper, daily Hasht-e Sobh on 30 July that eight candidates had so far agreed to boycott the 28 September elections and that consultation in this regard continued. He did not provide the names of those planning to boycott.

The council’s statement listed the following as “plausible reasons of the Council of Candidates to boycott the presidential election”:

First: our recommendation for establishing a committee comprising representatives of presidential candidates, political parties and representatives of civil society organisations related to the election to assist and support holding a free and fair election to protect the independence of the independent electoral institutions and forge national and international cooperation to hold a free, transparent, fair and credible election in accordance with the law has been ignored.

Second: the organisational changes in the government not only were not cancelled but also two new ministries named State Ministry for Peace Affairs and State Ministry for Human Rights Affairs have newly been established. These have fully political dimensions and are against the basic state structure.

Third: the appointments and dismissals of senior government officials and employees which have taken place since the leaders of the National Unity Government registered as presidential candidates have not been reversed.

Fourth: the real independence of the IEC and ECC in decision-making related to procurement and recruitment of provincial staff and secretariats has not been clearly and transparently ensured. Non-transparent appointments have not only not been cancelled but have also been maintained.

Fifth: high-ranking government officials in the centre and provinces directly interfere in the election affairs in favour of the ruling teams. New posts are created in districts for this purpose.

Sixth: the head of the National Unity Government and the ruling team in the centre and provinces have launched cosmetic and campaign activities by using government resources such as inaugurating projects and celebrating independence, which are considered fully political and campaign activities.

Seventh: the National Television of Afghanistan and other government media have been provided to the ruling candidates unfairly and against the legal documents.

Eight: abuse of the national budget, especially codes 91, 92, and 95 and operative money, for campaign activities of the leaders of the National Unity Government, especially of the president intensely continue.

Ninth: abuse of government projects by the head of the National Unity Government, especially by the first lady and her office which has in essence been created against the law continue.

Tenth: Abuse of the National Procurement Commission and signing contracts through single-source method, including the contracts signed by the Presidential Protection Unit not only have not been cancelled but have also continued.

Eleventh: the relevant government institutions have not provided the necessary and appropriate resources to meet the legal and legitimate needs of other candidates and their team members, including security facilities, in accordance with the law and their needs.

Twelfth: psychological and career threats against government employees who support non-ruling electoral teams have not been prevented.

Thirteenth: unfortunately, deliberate de-securitisation of areas where the candidates rival to the ruling team are assumed to have more votes continues.

Fourteenth: unfortunately, the IEC has not had the necessary coordination with electoral tickets about the purchase and maintenance of biometric devices, training of staff in how to use the devices, cleaning the fake tazkeras, cleaning the voter list, questionable mobile polling centres and existence of hundreds of polling centres in insecure areas and other important instances which has caused serious concern for the candidates.

Fifteenth: rejecting the recommendations by credible international organisations to improve the 2019 presidential election.

(2) The commencement of the election campaign received only a lukewarm welcome from the international community. The European Union Delegation in Afghanistan tweeted on 28 July, “Today starts the presidential election campaign.” It called on Afghans to “seize this historical opportunity [and] make candidates accountable of their vision of post-conflict” Afghanistan. It also called on “candidates to make this campaign a moment of transparency [and] integrity.” A day later, on 29 July, UNAMA issued a statement saying that “all candidates and supporters are expected to engage in a fair campaign as outlined” in the electoral law, IEC’s code of conduct for the candidates and other regulations enacted by the IEC. It also called on all the stakeholders to “work toward building trust and confidence in the election process.” UNAMA reiterated its “continued commitment and support for an Afghan‐led and Afghan‐owned election” and acknowledged “the efforts made by electoral management bodies, the government and other stakeholders to hold a timely, transparent and credible presidential election.”

(3) In its statement, Nabil’s “Security and Justice” election ticket accused the government of “double standards.” It accused“the government led by the Palace” of acting “in an extremely biased, narrow-minded and selfish way in the management of the election.” Later on the same day, Nabil repeated his accusations, saying a in tweet that they were worried about “the interference and engineering of the upcoming election by the ruling team and Ashraf Ghani.” However, he said that his team would not boycott the election “at this stage.”

(4) Others include Kalimullah Naqibi, deputy head of Jamiat; Abdul Satar Murad, head of the political committee of Jamiat and former minister of economy; Engineer Aref Sarwari, former head of NDS; Abdul Malek Hamwar, former minister of rural development and rehabilitation and Baz Muhammad Ahmadi, deputy minister of interior for counter-narcotics.

(5) Jawed also gave other reasons for the disintegration of Atmar’s team:

• broken promises, including to pay those officials of the Ghani administration who had joined his team and were subsequently fired by Ghani who also cancelled their benefits;
• Atmar inaccessibility: “I . . . tried for more than one month through different ways to meet Atmar but he did not take time to meet. So I said to myself: He ignores people while he has not even become the president yet; if he becomes the president, meeting him would be impossible”;
• broken relations with two former mujahedin parties, the National Liberation Front of Afghanistan of late Professor Sebghatullah Mojaddedi and the National Islamic Front of Afghanistan led by Sayed Hamed Gailani;
• Atmar forming a special circle of close aides, “mostly” Pashtuns, where all main decisions were taken and not sufficiently shared in the leadership council.

(6) Below are short bios of candidates for chief executive and its deputies under Abdullah’s ticket. We only provide biographical detail of politicians who newly appeared on the presidential tickets. For the originally 18 tickets and their members, refer to this AAN dispatch.

• Ahadi, a Pashtun born in 1941 in Kabul, holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in economy and political science from the American University of Beirut, a master’s degree in financial and administrative affairs and a PhD in political sciences from Northwestern University, US. He served as the head of Afghanistan’s central bank from 2002 to 2004 and finance minister from 2004 to 2008 (see his bio on the Stability and Integrity website here). Ahadi backed Ghani in the 2014 presidential election, but in January 2016 established an opposition group called the New National Front of Afghanistan (see AAN’s reporting here).
• Kazemi, born in Lashkargah of Helmand province on 26 April 1963, has served as a military commander of Hezb-e Harakat-e Islami-e Afghanistan in Helmand, head of the party’s provincial council in Helmand and member of the central council of the party, representative of Harakat to the Supreme Military Council of Islamic State of Afghanistan and United Front. With changes to the structural organisation of the party, he was elected as the head of the central council of the party on 15 Jawza 1388 (5 June 2009). After entry into force of the amended political party law in 2009, he registered Hezb-e Harakat-e Islami based on the new conditions enshrined in the law. Kazemi has also served as deputy secretary general (2004) and then secretary general (2005–2010) of the Afghan Red Crescent Society. He worked as presidential adviser on disaster management from 2012 to 2015 and as an adviser to the chief executive from 2016 onward (information is extracted from his bio shared by one of his campaigner with AAN).
• Roz Muhammad Nur was born in 1339 (1960) in Mardian district of Jawzan province. He graduated from Balkh Agricultural High School in 1359 (1980) and holds a bachelor’s degree in economy from Turkey. He served as second secretary at the Afghan embassy in Turkey from 1373 to 1381 (1994-2002), governor of Jawzjan from 1381 to 1384 (2002-2005), and then as the councillor in Afghan embassy in Turkmenistan until 1388 (2009). Since 1389 (2010), he has been active in political activities and is now picked as the second deputy to the chief executive in Abdullah’s Stability and Integration team (information is taken from his short bio shared by one of Abdullah’s campaigner with AAN).

(7) Sattari, ethnically Turkman, was born in Qurghan district of Faryab province in 1977. He holds a bachelor’s degree in economy from Selcuk University, Konya, Turkey. He has worked with the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs (2002–2003), international military forces (NATO) (2011–2014), civilian trainer for officers of the Ministry of Interior (2015–2016) and Turkish consulate in Jawzjan (2016–2018) and as logistics officer and then acting head of RET International (2018–2019). He has now been nominated by Turktabaran (Uzbeks and Turkmans) as the third vice-presidential candidate on Nabil’s election ticket (the information is obtained from his biography which AAN received from one of Nabil’s campaigners on 4 August).

(8) Article 60 of the constitution says:
The President shall be the head of state of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, executing his authorities in the executive, legislative and judiciary fields in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution.

• The President shall have two Vice-Presidents, first and second.
• The Presidential candidate shall declare to the nation names of both vice-presidential running mates.
• In case of absence, resignation or death of the President, the first Vice-President shall act in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution.
• In the absence of the first Vice-President, the second Vice-President shall act in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution.

(9) This statement apparently referred to a letter of appointment which was posted (see here) on social media on 29 July. The letter number 3710 was issued by the recruitment section of human resources of the Ministry of Finance and signed by the acting deputy minister for administration on 6 Asad 1398 (28 July) to the Customs Department of Herat Province. It approved the following appointments:

• Muhammad Akbar, head of Kandahar customs, as head of Herat Customs (replacement)
• Feruz Khan as head of Nangarhar customs
• Zaherullah Jilani, son of Abdul Dayan, employee of general department of customs, as head of Kandahar customs
• Ahmad Nawid as head of the general department of customs for operation
• Sanaullah Ibrahimi, the technical head of the general department of customs, as head of Farah customs
• Shams Alekozai, the head of the general department of customs, as airport customs officer.

 

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The bearded vulture, the rich diversity of wheatears and, above all, the Afghan snowfinch – found nowhere else in the world – are what drew a young ornithologist, Voislav Vasić, to travel from Yugoslavia to Afghanistan in the summer of 1972. In this guest dispatch, Vasić, now the retired head of the national Natural History Museum in Belgrade,* recalls his journeys in search of birds, by bus, truck, taxi, jeep, as well as on a bicycle, horse and camel through almost all parts of Afghanistan. He recalls the birds he saw, the actor-friend he made and the ornithological scandal he heard about.

Why Afghanistan?

Ever since AAN published a dispatch on the lizards of Afghanistan based on a collection of lizards I brought back from Afghanistan to Europe in 1972, I have felt the need to write about the main purpose of that journey – to discover more about the birds of Afghanistan. I also wanted to share some recollections about my journey, which was in itself highly unusual. The ‘hippy trail’ through Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India was well-trodden by youngsters from western Europe in those years, but few from Tito’s Yugoslavia made that journey. Moreover, I was not a hippy. I was a naturalist driven to head east by a desire to see the particular and very special birds of Afghanistan. I knew there would be exciting birds, but in 1972, there was no pocket field guide with illustrations of the birds of Afghanistan or the region.

At the time, I was passionately interested in ‘zoogeography’, the branch of zoology that deals with the geographical distribution of animals. I had graduated in biology from the University of Belgrade in 1967 and was working at the Institute for Biological Research, Siniša Stanković. I thought that traveling from the Bosporus to the heart of Asia would give me a great opportunity to get to know and truly understand the wildlife of ‘real’ steppe and desert. Up until then, I had only encountered its miserable and modified fragments in the Balkan Peninsula. In addition, although I had climbed almost all the highest mountain peaks in Yugoslavia, my mountain climbing record was Triglav peak in Slovenia, barely 2,870 metres high. In Afghanistan, the Hindu Kush, which averages an altitude of 4,500 metres, was awaiting me.

My choice of destination was greatly influenced by the emergence of a remarkable book – a handbook on the birds of the Middle East, “Les Oiseaux du Proche et du Moyen Orient” by two famous French researchers, François Hüe and Robert Daniel Etchécopar, with incredibly good illustrations by Paul Barruel. It encompassed Afghanistan, but only to a certain extent. This book inspired me to see what more I could find in this, for bird-lovers, under-researched country. There was more, of course. My classical secondary education meant the idea of visiting cities founded by Alexander the Great, which still lay scattered like a strange constellation, and the prospect of being in the presence of the great Greco-Buddhist monuments only fed my curiosity to travel more. My decision to embark on this rather uncertain zoological exploration was buoyed up my having just finished my year-long national service in the Yugoslav People’s Army. I felt strong and confident.

Voislav’s visa, issued in Belgrade, 1972. Photo: Author

Three great expectations

Of my many ornithological ‘great expectations’, I will name just three – and how I came to see them all in Afghanistan. Third-ranking was my desire to observe spectacular birds of prey, above all, the Bearded Vulture (Gypaetus barbatus), also known as the Lammergeier, which I had only seen once before in Macedonia, the most southerly of the six republics then making up Yugoslavia. Even 50 years ago, such large predators had already become rarities in most of Europe. In Afghanistan, on the contrary, I was to encounter a few more species of eagles and falcons that I had never seen before. Before setting out, I carefully wrote notes and glued thumbnail pictures of the raptors I hoped to see into one of my two field notebooks (the grey notebook).

Afghanistan was to be full of ornithological surprises and I was certainly not disappointed by the raptors. After the Egyptian Vulture, the Lammergeier was the most common type of vulture throughout Afghanistan, and was especially common in the central mountainous areas, where I saw it daily. It was somewhat less frequent in the lower parts in the districts of Qala-ye Naw and Bala Murghab of Badghis province. By any measure, the Lammergeier is a huge, amazing bird that feeds almost exclusively on the marrow bones of dead animals. It is attracted to carcasses that have been previously gnawed away at by jackals and feathered scavengers.

However, the most abundant vulture in Afghanistan was the Egyptian vulture (Neophron percnopterus), which was found especially around villages and nomad camps, as it feeds on the worst kinds of waste. Once, in the Dara-ye Ajdahar, the Dragon Valley in Bamyan, two men suddenly appeared before me with rifles and one freshly-killed Egyptian Vulture. They offered it to me to buy. They mimed and gestured to say that it would taste great when cooked. I instantly recalled the street urchins in Kabul who had gathered around me as around any other stranger, mocking me with: “Mister Kachaloo, Mister Kachaloo!” (Mr Potato), for reasons I could never discern. Likewise, I believe these vulture murderers also thought strangers were completely ignorant and worthy of any sort of deceit. (1)

The vultures Voislav hoped to see in Afghanistan as seen in his Grey Notebook. Photo: Author

My second great desire was to get acquainted with as many as possible of the species of wheatears of the genus Oenanthe. Central Asia is the centre of diversity of these largely desert-steppe dwelling passerines (ie birds with claws adapted for perching)  with their characteristic white rumps. Every wheatear species looks similar to at least one other and it is especially difficult to identify females and youngsters in their transitional seasonal plumages. I was to encounter this problem throughout Afghanistan. I had to deal with an extraordinarily wealth of varieties of wheatear and cope with the serious problem of how to reliably identify them without a guidebook.

That is why as soon as I got to Kabul (overland from Herat), I went to the Kabul Zoo that then and now hosted a small zoological museum. It was founded by the German zoologist Jochen Niethammer, son of the even more famous Günther Niethammer, the curator-zoologist of the Berlin, Bonn and Vienna Natural History Museums. Niethammer Jr was in Kabul from 1964 to 1966 as part of collaborative programme between Bonn and Kabul Universities, where he studied mammals and birds. (2) At that time, the museum had a collection of birds whose specimens had been identified personally by Niethammer Jr.

When I got there, the zoo and museum were being run by two other German zoologists, Günther Nogge (assistant professor at the Kabul University and later long-time director of the Cologne Zoo, author of “Afghanistan, Zoologically Considered”) (3) and M Bokler (about whom I know nothing), to whom I had previously announced myself by a letter. They welcomed me in and allowed me to inspect the entire collection of birds in detail and to use the museum’s library.

A ticket to the Zoo. Photo: Author

For two weeks, I studied the stuffed birds of Afghanistan held by the museum and learned how to identify the living ones in the field. I recorded all of the information in the first of my two notebooks, the grey one, from which I was never parted. My companion for those weeks was an orphaned chimpanzee who, while I was studying birds, sat on my lap, embracing me tightly with her long arms. Thanks to that self-study at the Kabul zoo and the museum in July 1972, I was able to identify as many as eight different species of wheatear in the field. That might sound easy, but those eight species appeared to me in at least twenty different ‘morphs’, ie having different physical features, such as variations in colour and pattern of plumage, but belonging to the same species.

Voislav’s grey and red notebooks. Photo: Author

Finally, the third and most important reason for me visiting Afghanistan was my desire to see the Afghan snowfinch (Pyrgilauda theresae), a species endemic to Afghanistan. I should say here that birds fly long distances with ease so, compared to animals and plants, bird species whose overall distribution remains within the borders of one country, particularly one as small as Afghanistan, are rare. This is true unless the country is an island when the barrier of the ocean encourages distinctive evolution. Therefore, it is not surprising that the Afghan snowfinch is the only endemic Afghan bird. However, Afghanistan is a place where two biogeographical regions meet, regions known to biologists as the Palearctic, which stretches across all of Europe and Asia north of the foothills of the Himalayas, as well as North Africa and the northern and central parts of the Arabian Peninsula, and the Indomalaya, which extends across most of south and southeast Asia and into the southern parts of East Asia. It Is such places that biodiversity is born. (4)

About the Afghan snowfinch and a wicked historical, ornithological scandal

The Afghan snowfinch is a grey-brown passerine bird that lives in the mountains about 3,000 meters above sea level. Despite its standard English name, it is not a finch but a species that belongs to the sparrow family, the Passeridae. It is very similar to the White-winged snowfinch (Montifringilla nivalis), which lives in the summer snow zone of the high mountains of southern Europe (Pyrenees, Alps, Apennines, Balkan Mountains), as well as in Afghanistan.

Perhaps a better alternative name in English would be the Afghan ground-sparrow, since the most striking feature of this species is the way it nests in the burrows of rodents, most commonly, ground squirrels. As it makes its nest of hairs and feathers deep underground, at the end of the tunnel farthest from entrance, we can really consider it a subterranean sparrow.

For science, the Afghan snowfinch was a relatively late discovery. It was identified in 1937, on the Shibar Pass between Kabul and Bamyan, and described under the name Montifringilla theresae that same year by a British army colonel, Richard Meinertzhagen (1878–1967). Meinertzhagen was a controversial character, not only a miles gloriosus, a ‘boastful soldier’, a master of espionage and an adventurer, but also an ornithologist-researcher. Such combinations are not uncommon among ornithologists and other naturalists.

At the time, 47 years ago, Meinertzhagen was considered one of Britain’s greatest ornithologists, finding many new species and subspecies on expeditions across continents, around the world. However, he has since been exposed as a fraudster, a writer of fake diaries and reports, a forger of findings and a thief of bird skins from other people’s collections. One by one, all his scientific discoveries were discredited. The only one that has actually been authenticated is our Afghan endemic, the snowfinch, which he named ‘Teresa’s sparrow’.

But who was Theresa? She was also a zoologist (and according to some sources, also a member of Britain’s intelligence service during the Second World War). Theresa Rachel Clay (1911–1995) was Meinertzhagen’s cousin, thirty years his junior. She became his favourite and goddaughter at the age of fifteen, and after the mysterious death of his second wife, also his housekeeper, caretaker, associate, secretary, confidante and inseparable companion. Meinertzhagen dedicated many of his false ornithological discoveries to his cousin Theresa, including the only one that was genuine – the species known as Afghan snowfinch.

I had the opportunity to see the endemic ‘Theresa’s sparrow’ in several places along the massif of the Hindu Kush. On 8 August 1972, I also sighted it on the Siah Koh mountain in Herat province, on a 3,000 metre-high pass between Shahrak and Jam. This was then its most westerly-ever sighting. My happiness had no end and I boyishly believed that, with this discovery I had done a great thing for Afghanistan and ornithology. However, as will be seen below, I was mistaken. (5)

Minaret of Jam near where Voislav sighted the Afghan snowfinch in 1972, then the most westerly-ever sighting. Photo: Author

The red notebook

I recorded everything I observed about birds that summer into another notebook, my ‘red notebook’. This was my field diary. I then published my observations in French in an article for the international ornithological journal “Alauda” (Skylark). (6) The editor-in-chief at the time was a French ornithologist Jacques Vieillard. Like some other French and Germans of the time, Vieillard himself was also interested in the birds of Afghanistan. (7) Alas, like many ornithologists, he died of a disease while birdwatching – in his case, malaria caught in Brazil in 2010. Publishing in English scientific journals back then was not as compulsory as it is today. So, my choice to publish the article in French was not surprising at the time. (8) However, now I see that my paper “Observations Ornithologiques en Afghanistan” (Ornithological Observations in Afghanistan) and that exciting, then most-westerly record of the Afghan snowfinch is almost forgotten, and that today’s authors almost exclusively quote English sources.

Thanks to the Afghanistan Analysts Network, many memories from that journey to Afghanistan have returned to me. I took a peek at my notebooks and diaries for the first time in many years. I remembered the first bird that caught my eye. On my very first day in Afghanistan near the border with Iran in Herat province, I was fascinated by the common mynah (Acridotheres tristis). This lively, curious and noisy, colourful bird of the starling family is, as its name suggests, familiar to many, but I had never seen a living specimen before. Mynahs were originally Middle Eastern residents, but have invasively spread across the subtropical and tropical zones of the world.

I also remembered my then companion asking me what the common mynah’s Latin name, ‘Acridotheres tristis’, meant. I said it was actually a Greek-Latin name that translated as ‘Sad locust-hunter’. “Why did it hunt grasshoppers?” she asked. “It feeds on them,” I replied. “It eats them.” Ah,” she said, “Now I see. If it has to eat grasshoppers, I understand why it’s so sad.” During July and August of that year, I managed to travel to the most important (for me) parts of Afghanistan, observing and keeping notes on birds everywhere I went. I also collected some specimens of reptiles and amphibians to take back to a zoologist colleague in Belgrade. I took paths that none of the earlier naturalist explorers had travelled, not even my predecessor and unofficial role model, Knud Paludan of Denmark. (9) By all accounts, none of the ornithologists had traversed the vast Black Mountain (Siah Koh) in Herat province or visited the Hari Rud Valley, upstream of the village of Farsi, in the same province, or explored the surroundings of the minaret of Jam in neighbouring Ghor province. By bus, truck, taxi, jeep, as well as on bicycle, horse and camel, I travelled through almost all areas of Afghanistan except the Wakhan and Nuristan, which were prohibited zones at that time. At the Yugoslav Embassy in Kabul, I had been warned that almost all rural parts of Afghanistan were unsafe and it would be better to give up some of the remote stages of my planned itinerary. But at 27, not every warning can be taken seriously.

Some observations of daily life

While riding Afghanistan’s busy highways, but also the roads less travelled, I could not help noticing, as in neighbouring Iran, the striking presence of armed ‘askars’ (soldiers) both from army and the police. This fitted my general impression that the crown had difficulties managing the entire country. The soldiers had interesting hats with some sort of ears or horns on the side.

Everywhere outside the cities, I saw groups of turban-wearing civilian men, not only armed but also proudly decorated with bandoliers and cartridge belts. I liked the fact that, since the traditional costume does not have any strap over the shirt, revolvers and pistols were worn on a belt slung over the left shoulder. I was less comfortable with how they sometimes treated strangers and travellers. Typically, instead of a ‘hello’,  these men, with looks of hatred, bulging eyes and bared teeth, made two hand gestures: the first was a hand cutting the throat with the edge of the palm and the second was a sudden movement with the same hand extended upwards – meaning “There goes your head!” Later, I stopped paying attention.

In those seemingly still relatively-peaceful times in non-aligned Afghanistan, the influence of the great powers was visible to the naked eye. In Kabul and in the north of the country, along the border with the USSR, the streets were dominated by Soviet GAZ-24 Volga cars, while in the south, especially around the US hydropower plant construction site on the Helmand River, large General Motors vehicles prevailed.

A teacher acting as a taxi driver took me in his huge 1960’s Chevrolet from Lashkar Gah to Kajaki, where the Americans were then building the famous Kajaki Dam. The taxi driver asked me for 1,500 Afghanis (then the equivalent of 40 US dollars), a huge amount. The driver boasted that he was a serdar, meaning he was a tribal leader. As soon as we hit the road, he stopped by his house to bring three of his relatives with him, just in case. They all sat in the front seat, next to the driver. My companion and I were sitting in the back. Yet that trip, which started so strangely, also brought me, among other things, my first encounter with the most beautiful species of swallow – the wire-tailed swallow (Hirundo smithii) chasing insects above the waters of the Helmand River.

A straw hat for Afghanistan

Finally, I must mention my great driver-mechanic-interpreter Matin who, for three weeks drove the Toyota Land Cruiser I had rented from Hertz in Kabul. He found the things I did very strange and it was hard for him to grasp why I would expose myself to so much expense, effort and risk. Initially, he was suspicious of me, keeping a close eye on my every move. It happened once, somewhere in the middle of a mountain desert, that I sneaked cautiously, hidden behind rocks, actually towards some very timid lizard I had never managed to catch before. I was so focused on my potential prey that I was not even aware that the planned path of my attack was passing right next to Matin who was standing in the shade, resting against a boulder. Matin, however, followed my slow advance and wrongly concluded that I was preparing to strike him. Of course, he had not even noticed the lizard. I later learned that he was remembering our sharp debate that morning about the direction of that day’s journey and thought I wanted to settle accounts or just get rid of him without a witness.

Voislav’s “great driver-mechanic-interpreter Matin.” In 1971, Matin took part in John Frankenheimer’s The Horsemen, starring Omar Sharif (photo taken at the Noh Gumbad, Afghanistan’s oldest mosque, in Balkh). Photo: Author

When I estimated that the unfortunate lizard had moved far enough from his retreat among the rocks, I rushed at it with all my might. The stones at my feet shattered, and poor Matin thought his darkest fears had come true. Believing it was his doomsday, he screamed and started running away. I only became aware of all this when, after a goalkeeper’s dive, I found myself on the ground, covered in dust, but firmly holding the wriggling lizard in my hand.

Later, when I explained everything to the good-natured Matin, he felt bad. For a while, he was upset and refused to answer even basic questions. I then presented him with my straw hat which I knew he longed for. It was a perfect fit for him. In return, he gave me a shirt. It was too tight for me, but it had a secret pocket under a sleeve. What was it for? “For the hidden dagger (khanjar),” Matin answered.

It was unequivocally established and recorded (10) that for several years, Matin remembered the eccentric young man chasing and catching lizards, snakes, geckos and frogs, while only watching birds with binoculars. Matin, in his own words, was an actor. In 1971, he took part in John Frankenheimer’s The Horsemen, starring Omar Sharif, a movie based on the French novel, Les Cavaliers, by Joseph Kessel.

I am not sure, if, beyond one straw hat, I left any trace on Afghanistan. However, Afghanistan, for sure, left a very deep impression on me.

Edited by Jelena Bjelica and Kate Clark

 

*Voislav Vasić is a Serbian ornithologist and former head for over 20 years of the national Natural History Museum in Belgrade. He is an expert in biodiversity, editor and the author of the first book on biodiversity in Yugoslavia, published in 1995, as well as of The Red Data Book of Birds in Serbia in 2018. He is specialised in the biogeography, taxonomy and the faunistic study (distribution) of birds. He is also still teaching ornithology, ecology and zoology and writes television scripts, popular books and articles on natural history and the environment. He regularly publishes about his travels and adventures on a blog (in Serbian).

(1) Note from the editor: Such scams continue, as we reported in 2013 in the dispatch “The ‘Bagram Duck’: Migrant bird killed north of Kabul and offered as game”

(2) That programme resulted in these publications. 1966: Der Zug von Kranichen (Gruidae) bei Kabul, Afghanistan. Vogelwarte 23: 308–309. 1967: Zwei Jahre Vogelbeobachtungen an stehenden Gewässern bei Kabul in Afghanistan. J. Orn. 108: 119-164. 1967: Störche in Afghanistan. Vogelwarte 24: 42–44. 1967: Neunachweise für Afghanistans Vogelwelt. J. Orn. 108: 76–80. 1967. Hochgebirgs-Vogelzug in Afghanistan. Zool. Beitr. 13: 501–507. (G. Niethammer & J. Niethammer) 1970: Die Flamingos am Ab-i-Istada in Afghanistan. Natur und Museum 100: 201–210. 1976: Die Vögel auf den Basaren von Kabul und Charikar. Afghanistan J. 3: 150–157. (G. Nogge & J. Niethammer).

(3) Afghanistan zoologisch betrachtet, Scientia Bonnensis, Bonn 2012. Revue internationale d’ornithologie.

Again a note from the editor:

We mentioned another article by Nogge, “Beobachtungen an den Flamingobrutplätzen Afghanistans”, (Observations at Afghanistan’s Flamingo Breeding Grounds), in this dispatch from 2010, “Afghanistan Bird Watch”.

(4) For more on Afghanistan as a centre of plant diversity notes the editor, see our two dispatches “Plants of Afghanistan 1: Centre of Global Biodiversity” and “Plants of Afghanistan 2: the Koh-e Baba Foraging Top Ten”.

(5) Note from the editor: On Meinertzhagen’s frauds and his relation with Theresa Rachel Clay, read this fascinating story from the New Yorker, “Ruffled Feathers.”

(6) Revue internationale d’ornithologie.

(7) Données biogéographiques sur l’avifaune d’Asie occidentale, I. Afghanistan. Paris: Alauda 37: 273–300.

(8) Paris: 1974: Alauda 42: 259280.

(9) Knud Paludan: On the birds of Afghanistan. Zoological results, The 3rd Danish Expedition to Central Asia, 25. Videnskabelige Meddelelser fra Dansk Naturhistorisk Forening i København, bd. 122. København: C.A. Reitzel, 1959.

(10) In the book: Tout Sur l’Afghanistan by Anne Yelen. Guide reportage Nathan. Fernand Nathan, Paris: 1977.

Poland to buy the F-35 Lightning II aircraft, becoming first ex-Warsaw Pact member to get the stealth jets. The US State Department issued a clearance for Poland to acquire the F-35 fifth-generation aircraft in a [...]

Here’s the second in a series of policy briefs on Russian strategic culture and leadership decision-making, written for a collaborative project organized by the Marshall Center with support from the Russia Strategy Initiative. This one is on Russian strategic goals in a Nordic crisis. With permission from the Marshall Center, I am posting the full text here, though please go to the Marshall Center website if you would prefer to read a PDF version. The first of these briefs, focusing on the Baltics, was posted last April.

Executive Summary

• This policy brief examines how Russian strategic culture operates in the distinct geographic and geopolitical environment of the Nordic region. This analysis is based on a model of Russian decision-making in crisis situations that describes Russian leaders as prospect theory players who take greater risks to prevent anticipated defeats than they do to pursue potential opportunities. They seek to prevent foreign policy defeats that could translate into a loss of power in the region, a loss of great power status, or, in some cases, political defeats at home.
• Russia’s strategic objectives in the Nordic region are thus focused primarily on maintaining the status quo rather than changing the strategic environment or expanding Russian influence in a significant way. The primary objective is simply to maintain Russian influence in the region. Russia is also working to prevent the formal admission of Sweden and Finland to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and to deter Sweden and Finland from joining NATO in fighting against Russia in the event of a conflict.
• We can expect Russia to act cautiously in the Nordic region because it is not facing a loss situation. Russian leaders will tend to pursue their goals through nonmilitary means and will be careful to avoid unintended escalation. The one exception to their preference for nonescalation would occur in the event of an attack on Russian territory, which would create a loss situation for Russia and therefore allow for a robust defense and/or counterattack.

Introduction

 This policy brief, the second in a series that addresses how Russian strategic culture can explain Russian foreign policy behavior, examines how Russian strategic culture operates in the distinct geographic and geopolitical environment of the Nordic region. The Nordic region is presented as a case study to generate conclusions with regard to the drivers of Russian strategic behavior, especially the factors that incentivize or constrain risk-taking.

Overview of Russian Strategic Decision-Making

This analysis is based on a model of crisis decision-making developed by the Russian analysis team at CNA. As an abbreviated version of this model has already been presented in a previous article in this series, what follows is a brief summary. The model presents Russia as a prospect theory player on the international scene that takes greater risks to prevent anticipated defeats than it does to pursue potential opportunities.

Russian strategic objectives are rooted in and derived from the following three principal Russian foreign policy motivations:

• Maximizing security, which results in the pursuit of extended defense and has been the main driver for Russian aggression in its near abroad and Russia’s military modernization at home.
• Russia’s desire for a privileged sphere of influence as an effort to achieve regional hegemony based on the goal of maximizing its overall power.
• Maintaining great power status in the international system by ending U.S. primacy and thereby upending the unipolar nature of power distribution in the international system in favor of a multipolar one. However, this motivation does not necessarily mean that Russia wants to challenge the United States directly, given the power disparity.

Russian leaders prefer to achieve their political goals through coercion and threats of violence, rather than actual violence. Russian strategy in a conflict seeks to establish escalation dominance over potential adversaries by convincing them that Russia is able and willing to use force in pursuit of its objectives. When pressed to use force, Russia tends to use the minimum amount of force required to achieve its objectives in order to minimize losses and costs. This approach also allows Russia to maintain the threat of bringing in additional force if the adversary does not accept Russian objectives. Russia is happy to use force multipliers, such as local militias and mercenaries, to absorb the bulk of combat losses. Ambiguity is used to maintain plausible deniability and thereby slow adversary decision-making. Finally, Russia seeks to deter external actors from interfering in a conflict in order to prevent escalation.

Russia’s Strategic Assessment of the Nordic Region

Russia’s strategic calculus suggests that in the event of a crisis in the Nordic region, Russia will focus on the geographic and political environment in the region in determining its strategic objectives and minimum and maximum goals for the situation.

The geography of the Baltic Sea would play a particularly important role in Russia’s assessment of a potential maritime conflict scenario. The geography of the Baltic Sea in many ways mirrors that of the Black Sea, except that the geography favors NATO and its partners, rather than Russia. Like the Black Sea, the Baltic Sea is enclosed, with passage restricted by the Danish Straits. Although the Oresund and Fehmarn Belt are considered international straits, as governed by the Copenhagen Convention of 1857, they could easily be closed by NATO forces in the event of a conflict, effectively preventing Russia from bringing naval reinforcements to the Baltic Sea from the Northern Fleet or the Mediterranean. In addition, a series of islands can provide effective control over the sea itself. Bornholm (controlled by Denmark), Gotland (Sweden) and the Aland Islands (Finland), can be used to control the sea lanes in the Baltic Sea as well as the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia. These islands thus can play the same role in the Baltic as Crimea does in the Black Sea. Furthermore, Estonia and Finland effectively control entrance to the Gulf of Finland and therefore to St. Petersburg.

Although Western analysts often paint Russia’s Kaliningrad enclave as a militarized territory that threatens the security of the NATO member states in the region, Russian planners view the region as a vulnerable outpost surrounded by potentially well-armed NATO states. As a result of these factors, Russia feels that the region’s geography is relatively negatively set up for Russian forces to act in the event of a conflict with NATO and its partners.

Russia’s political assessment also emphasizes the potential challenges of a military conflict in the region. Although Sweden and Finland are ostensibly neutral, Russian leaders fully expect them to be involved on the side of NATO in any conflict between NATO and Russia. They point to statements that the two countries have made, such as the European Union (EU) solidarity clause and the EU Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) effort joined by Sweden and Finland in 2017, that strongly imply such a scenario. They also note that the two countries have been strengthening their military forces in recent years and have increasingly integrated these forces with NATO. Both Sweden and Finland have increased their frequency of participation in NATO exercises. These developments are seen in Russia as clear signals that neither country will stay out of the fight in the event of a conflict.

On the other side, Swedish planners fear that Russia might preemptively attack Gotland in a conflict in order to take control of the middle section of the Baltic Sea. They have responded by placing troops on the island for the first time in over a decade. Although the force is only the size of a regiment, it is meant as a symbol of Swedish intent in combination with the reintroduction of military conscription. Russia has decried this move as a step toward the further militarization of the region.

Finland’s history of relations with Russia makes its leaders cautious about exacerbating tensions with Moscow. They point to their losses in previous wars with the Soviet Union in the 1930s and 1940s, which resulted in the policy of “Finlandization” that effectively meant that Finland did not have full control over its foreign policy orientation until the end of the Cold War, a period of over 40 years. As a result, Finnish leaders have generally avoided hostile rhetoric against Russia while retaining more contacts with Moscow than other countries in the region. Furthermore, most of the Finnish population remains opposed to their country joining NATO. Although Finland has supported EU sanctions against Russia in the aftermath of the Ukraine crisis, it has retained significant trade relations and has a sizable expatriate Russian population in Helsinki. Russia has proved adept at using trade links and expatriate Russian populations in other European countries to undermine anti-Russian policies. Similar tactics could be used in the Nordic region.

Russia’s Strategic Objectives

Russia’s strategic objectives in the Nordic region are thus focused primarily on maintaining the status quo rather than changing the strategic environment or expanding Russian influence in a significant way. The primary objective is simply to maintain Russian influence in the region. To this end, Russia has undertaken a propaganda effort to show the citizens of these countries that Russia does not threaten them. Russia has pursued political influence operations to prevent the growth of negative political attitudes toward Russia. To this end, there are concerns that it has used the Russian expatriate population and other pro-Russian activists in the region, especially in Finland, as a supportive element. It has also provided support to political parties and societal organizations critical of the EU and especially of NATO as a way of limiting the trend toward closer cooperation between NATO and the two nonmember Nordic states. Russia has also sought to maintain and enhance economic linkages with Nordic states, most notably through the strategic use of its role as an energy supplier to Finland. It is estimated that forty percent of Finland’s energy comes from Russia, and Russia has taken steps in recent years to make the import of electricity cheaper for Finland in order to maintain that connection.

In regard to military issues, Russia has worked to prevent the formal admission of Sweden and Finland to NATO. To this end, it has used a classic carrot-and-stick approach. Russian media has highlighted popular opposition to NATO membership within these countries, noting the likelihood of negative political consequences for any government that chooses to pursue NATO membership. Russian officials have threatened political, economic, and military consequences for Sweden and Finland should they choose to formally join NATO. The implicit threat is that not only would cheap energy supplies end and trade be negatively affected, but Russia could use tactics it has pursued elsewhere, such as cyberattacks and funding of antigovernment groups, to undermine political stability in these countries. Russian media have also suggested the possibility that Russia might offer inducements to Sweden and Finland for remaining neutral or at least not joining NATO formally.

In the event of a regional crisis, Russian leaders would seek to deter Sweden and Finland from joining NATO in fighting against Russia. They would seek to preempt the threat by neutralizing Nordic militaries through a Russian military buildup in the region combined with the threat that Russia would target these countries’ territories should fighting break out. Russia’s minimum goal in a Nordic crisis is thus to maintain and exacerbate existing divisions in the Nordic states that prevent them from seeking to join NATO and to inhibit further integration of their military forces with NATO forces short of membership. Russia’s maximum goal is to reverse the existing close integration of the military forces of the Nordic states with those of the United States and NATO and ideally to have these states recommit to neutrality in deed as well as in word.

Russia’s Vulnerabilities

Russia’s vulnerabilities in a Nordic crisis are to a large extent the same as its vulnerabilities in other regions, though there are some aspects particular to this region. The Russian military has relatively few forces in northwestern Russia because its main focus in recent years has been on securing the Caucasus, reinforcing its border with Ukraine, and building up forces in the Arctic and the Far North. Russian forces in northwestern Russia are not equipped for a short-notice conventional conflict, with relatively few mechanized units and a command structure not set up to fight a war in this region. As noted above, the geography of the region makes a maritime conflict relatively complicated for Russia, though that disadvantage may be mitigated in a broader engagement due to the Nordic region’s proximity to Russia and the relatively long border with Finland.

Russia is hampered by its lack of allies in the European theater. Although Belarus is a member of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and a Russian military partner, it would be unlikely to actively participate in a Russian military campaign. It might, however, reluctantly allow Russia to use its territory as a staging area in a conflict with NATO. Recent political tensions about the extent to which Belarus can be expected to integrate with Russia have highlighted the limits of the relationship between Moscow and Minsk. Other allies are even less likely to get involved. Neither Russia’s other CSTO allies nor China will want to get involved in a fight with NATO and (with the exception of China) would not be able to contribute significantly to the effort.

As with any conflict with a powerful but distant adversary, Russian leaders would be concerned that the overall force balance between Russia and NATO would become highly unfavorable in a longer-term conflict. For this reason, they would want to keep the conflict short and ensure that any conflict in the region would not result in horizontal escalation, which could expose Russian territory to defeat by the much larger and stronger U.S. military in a regional or even global conflict. They would be particularly concerned about the possibility that the conflict could spread to other theaters, especially the Mediterranean, which would cause Russia’s forces to be stretched thin in a fight on multiple fronts.

Finally, Russian leaders may be concerned about the impact of any kind of extended or costly intervention on Russian domestic politics. They will want to make sure that they avoid costly and long-lasting entanglements that might result in the Russian public turning against the intervention. Such a situation would be especially likely if Western states pursued strong economic countermeasures that had a direct negative effect on the Russian economy or on Russians’ ability to travel to Europe. In particular, this scenario would be a problem in a conflict that the Russian public might see as a war of choice rather than of necessity, especially one that becomes costly in either financial or human terms. For this reason, Russian leaders will seek to avoid both defeat and long-term entanglement in a Nordic conflict, as these circumstances would increase the likelihood of a strong negative effect at the domestic level.

Red Lines and (De-)Escalation Drivers

As in the Baltics, Russian leaders would view a crisis in the Nordic region primarily as a potential opportunity to realize strategic gains rather than as a threat to Russia’s vital interests. As a result, they would consider the stakes to be relatively low in most situations. This assessment would lead to a strategy of managing the crisis carefully in order to keep costs low and avoid triggering a vigorous response by NATO. Although it is important for Russia to keep Sweden and Finland out of NATO, Russia would not be likely to mount a military response if the two Nordic states take steps toward that goal. Concerns about the vulnerabilities described above, especially the danger of horizontal escalation to other theaters and the risk of loss of popularity at home due to high casualties or serious financial impact from a conflict, would encourage Russian leaders to de-escalate hostilities in the event of a crisis in the Nordic region.

The one exception to this calculus would occur in the event of a NATO attack on Russian territory. Such an attack would lead to escalation as it would pose a direct threat to the homeland and regime survival while uniting the Russian population in defense of their homeland. The Russian people have shown repeatedly that they are far more likely to accept sacrifices to defend the country than to engage in a war of choice, so Russia should be expected to escalate any conflict where control of its own territory is at stake.

Conclusion

Russia’s main peacetime goals in the Nordic region involve preventing further military integration of the Nordic states with NATO. The primary means to carry out these goals are political and cyber in nature, rather than military. In a conflict, Russia’s main goals would be similar: to keep the Nordic states out of any conflict with NATO or to keep NATO out of any conflict with a Nordic state. Escalation poses serious risks to Russia, so Russian leaders would be unlikely to initiate a conflict in the region. Russia would be much more willing to defend itself if threatened or attacked but otherwise would limit itself to using indirect means to weaken the Nordic states and to undermine their unity with their NATO partners.

In the last week Taleban have attacked and entered three provincial centres, Kunduz city, Pul-e Khumri in Baghlan and Farah city, before being pushed back. This dispatch focusses on the offensives against Pul-e Khumri and Kunduz, considering them in the context of the regional security of northeastern Afghanistan. It finds that key lessons from earlier attacks on Kunduz were not learned. The dispatch was largely written before President Trump decided to scrap the talks with the Taleban. AAN’s Obaid Ali and Thomas Ruttig had thought that, whether or not it was the Taleban’s intention, it seemed they were sending a strong signal that they would not stop fighting even after a deal with Washington. With talks now – according to President Trump – off the table and the future seeming even more uncertain, it seems that an assessment of how the Taleban have been able, yet again, to menace provincial capitals seems even more pertinent.

For the first time during the post-2001 conflict, the Taleban simultaneously attacked, entered and held positions in two provincial centres of Afghanistan, Kunduz, the capital of the eponymous province, and neighbouring Baghlan’s capital Pul-e Khumri. Both attacks were also the first large scale offensives against any provincial capital in 2019.

A few days later, the Taleban staged a third attack, on Farah city, in the west of the country, also not the first such occurrence there. There, the Taleban made a large-scale attack in 2018 (see AAN analysis here and here). The last fighting in Farah city was reported on 6 September 2019 near the provincial police headquarters, since when government forces managed to push the attackers back. On 7 September, however, the Taleban took most parts of the Anardara district centre of in the same province, including the governor’s compound and the police headquarters while the government forces held on to an army base. According to local sources, the Taleban attack on the base was ongoing.

The first of the provincial capital attacks was launched on 31 August in Kunduz, followed by Pul-e Khumri on 1 September. In Kunduz’s case, it was the third attack in a span of four years (read AAN’s previous analysis here, here and here). Both of the recent attacks occurred during the final stages of diplomatic wrangling to finalise a US-Taleban withdrawal agreement that had been negotiated since October 2018 (AAN analysis here) but seem to be off the table now, and, notably, during the presence of US chief negotiator Zalmay Khalilzad in the Afghan capital. In Pul-e Khumri, some fighting was still on-going on 4 September, while the Kunduz clashes continued only for a day. The Kunduz offensive, however, was followed by a suicide attack on a police station two days later (more about this below). In both provincial centres, as well as in Farah, fighting continued in the outskirts and then moved to the districts.

How the attack unfolded: Kunduz

In Kunduz, Taleban fighters entered the city from three different directions and began targeting security forces. They moved from positions to the immediate north (police district (PD) 2), northwest (PD 1) and west (PD 3) of the city where they have maintained a strong presence over at least four years. Those areas administratively are part of Kunduz city, but are rural in character. The Taleban enjoy backing from the mainly Pashtun population in those areas. Taleban attacks from the west usually receive reinforcements and logistic support from Chahrdara district of Kunduz, where they have strongholds.

The Taleban started their attack in PD 1, in the early morning of 31 August. Their large presence in Zakhel-e Khomdan and Alikhel villages, in the west of PD 1, had helped them swiftly overrun police checkpoints and enter close to the city’s main chowk (roundabout), which is the acknowledge symbol of controls the city, and areas around Kunduz’s main hospital. They reportedly took control of that hospital; the defence ministry in Kabul accused them of taking the patients “as hostages.”

Attacking from PD 2 to the north of the city, the Taleban targeted police checkpoints in the city’s ancient castle area, the Bala Hessar, one kilometre to the north of the provincial governor’s office. The Taleban also have a strong presence in the outskirts of this police district and were able to quickly gather forces from Qala-ye Kow and Hazrat Sultan, rural areas further to the northeast of Kunduz city that are largely under Taleban control.

The third prong of the attack was directed against the PD 3 compound, located one kilometre to the west of the provincial governor’s office, but this offensive failed. There, the Taleban fighters had come through the Bagh-e Sherkat and Old Zakhel areas, both part of the provincial centre and located three to five kilometres away from the main chawk. These two areas have been largely controlled by the Taleban since 2015.

On the same day, 31 August, acting defence minister Asadullah Khaled, who had hurried to the city, said in an interview for Tolo News (video here) that security forces had carried out clearance operations and the Taleban had been pushed back from the city as well as from areas around it. However, Haji Zaher, a local resident from PD 2, said the Taleban had already left the area before the Afghan forces started their operations.

After the 31 August offensive on the city ended, the Taleban changed their attack plan. Instead of face-to-face fighting, they used suicide attackers to target security officials and installations in the city. In the evening of 31 August, when the security forces had almost fully cleared the city of Taleban fighters, a suicide attacker targeted Manzur Stanakzai, the provincial police chief, when he was briefing the media. As a result, at least three members of the police media section, including Sayed Sarwar Hussaini, the police chief’s spokesman, were killed, along with six other civilians. The police chief and dozen others, police and civilians, were wounded. On 1 September, another suicide attacker targeted a police check-post in the north of the city, killing six police and wounded a dozen others (media report here).

Initially, the Afghan security forces failed to prevent the Taleban from entering the city. Local journalists and civil society activists told AAN that the Taleban managed to take control of some parts of the provincial centre for at least several hours. There were, however, no reports of house searches to capture government officials or of Taleban edicts ordering people to attend mosque prayers and to avoid working in the government offices as they did in 2015 when they ruled the provincial centre for two weeks. Zabihullah Majedi, a local journalist and civil society activist in Kunduz, told AAN that by mid-day the Taleban had taken control of some parts of the city in the west and northeast, where the provincial departments of anti-narcotics and mines and petroleum are located. He confirmed that they were pushed back after several hours only.  Speaking to AAN, Haji Abdul Aziz, a school teacher in Kunduz city, said the situation quickly turned unusual; the city was empty with the only noises heard shooting on the ground and helicopters in the air.

AAN contacts in Kunduz, including journalists, stated that the Taleban continue to surround the city and remain a serious threat to its security. There were reports of continued skirmishes in the rural outskirts of all four Kunduz police districts between 3 and 8 September, of anti-Taleban airstrikes and of further fighting on 10 September to the east of the city, halfway to neighbouring Khanabad district. On 5 September, fighting in PD3 lasted several hours.

Starting on that day, fighting also moved to the province’s districts. There was heavy fighting reported near the district centre of Khanabad, some 20 kilometres east of Kunduz city, temporarily closing the roads to the northern Kunduz district of Imam Saheb and to neighbouring Takhar province. Next day, on 6 September, the centre of this district fell to the Taleban after government forces had to abandon it due to a lack of supplies, while on 8 September, the district centres of Qala-ye Zal and of Dasht-e Archi also fell to them. Government troop reinforcements took both back the following day but fighting in both areas continued. Imam Saheb’s district centre was attacked by the Taleban on 9 September.

AAN’s contacts also said that the Taleban continue, after the offensive, to set up frequent mobile check points on various parts of the highways that connect Kunduz to Takhar province to the east and Baghlan province to the south, searching vehicles for government officials. This happened as close as four kilometres to the east of Kunduz city’s main chawk, on the Kunduz-Takhar highway, and to the south of the city, in Angur Bagh village, about six kilometres away on the way to Baghlan.

Landscape at the Kunduz-Qala-ye Zal road with grazing flocks.

How the attack unfolded: Pul-e Khumri

A day after the Kunduz attack, in the early hours of 1 September, the Taleban followed up with an attack on Pul-e Khumri, the capital of Baghlan province and one of Afghanistan’s major industrial hubs. The city is located on the main highway between Kunduz and Kabul, at a point where the strategic route leading north from Kabul over the Salang Pass forks into two major roads, one leading northeast to Kunduz and the other leading northwest to Mazar-e Sharif. Fighting, including in residential areas, lasted several hours and then continued to flare up over the following days.

Taleban fighters attacked security posts in two areas, Band-e Du, in the west of the city, and Diwar-e Madan in the southwest. Jawed Besharat, the spokesman for Baghlan police chief, said the Taleban attacks were repelled and the Taleban had suffered serious casualties (read media report here). Afghan media quoted an interior ministry official admitting that “security forces have surrendered the area [singular in the original].” According to Safdar Mohsini, head of Baghlan’s provincial council, “the whole city [was] closed” by the fighting. An Afghan media report said that armed residents had supported government forces against the attackers. According to AAN sources, the armed residents were members of several different local popular uprising groups led largely by Jamiat-e Islami affiliated-commanders.

Local journalists in Pul-e Khumri said it took almost two days to repel the Taleban from the city. Fighting to the north went on even longer, till 5 September, when several Afghan Air Force raids pushed the Taleban out of positions there. There was still sporadic fighting reported on 10 September.

Speaking to AAN, Rahmatullah Hamnawa, a local journalist in Baghlan province, stated that during two days of fighting, ten people, including three policemen, were killed and 35 civilians and security forces wounded. On 4 September, another Afghan journalist reported that, similar to Kunduz, the city was “still surrounded” by the Taleban. Also, traffic north to Kunduz was partly interrupted by Taleban check-posts in Baghlan-e Jadid district, at least for government reinforcements. The insurgents reportedly allowed civilians to pass. On 8 September, the Taleban claimed the capture of Baghlan’s Guzargah-e Nur district, on the border with Badakhshan; there was no independent confirmation of this report, and claims it had been recaptured by government forces.

Kunduz river, south of Pul-e Khumri.

Regional context

Both offensives followed Taleban attacks and Afghan security forces conducting what are called ‘clearance operations’ and dubbed “Operation Pamir 207”  in neighbouring Takhar and Badakhshan provinces (see interior minister Andarabi speaking about this here). The government forces’ operations had commenced in mid-June and are still on-going, also as a result of Taleban attacks on several districts centres. In Takhar, government forces concentrated their efforts on areas around the provincial capital Taloqan and the district centre of Baharak over several weeks. As a result, the Taleban were pushed back in both areas but remain a threat to Baharak’s centre (read media report here).

Only on 30 August, the Friday prior to the Kunduz and Pul-e Khumri attacks, Taleban fighters took over Chahab district centre in Takhar for a few hours, before they were pushed out again by government forces – but not before they set fire to the district compound. Fighting continued in the area, and another airstrike was reported on 4 September. There was also fighting in Baharak and Darqad districts on the same day and in Yangi Qala district on 3 September. Earlier, on 10 August, an airstrike was reported from Eshkamesh district, allegedly killing 15 Taleban, continued by more fighting that forced 400 families to flee the area. UNOCHA spoke of over 4,000 newly-displaced persons from this area in the last week of August alone.

In early September, Taleban forces attacked the districts centres of Khwaja Ghar and Yangi Qala, according to government sources. Khwaja Ghar was apparently partly captured during the third attack on 9 September. Government sources denied that the Taleban had taken the entire town while they said they were sending additional forces and that the situation would “soon be back to normal.” Yangi Qala was reported as taken by the Taleban on 10 September.

In most parts of Takhar province, the Taleban have expanded their presence over the past few years and, in 2019, carried out several offensives against security forces to further expand their territorial control towards the provincial centre, Taloqan. In June 2019, reports emerged in the media that the Taleban were active in Qulbarz, 12 kilometres north of the provincial centre of Takhar. In the same month, the Taleban targeted the district centre of Baharak, 15 kilometres to the north of Taloqan, but failed to overrun the district centre. On 28 August, a suicide bomber was reportedly caught before he could blow up the district compound of Rustaq.

In neighbouring Badakhshan, Operation Pamir 207 aimed at recapturing the Taleban-held districts of Warduj and Yamgan before the arrival of winter. The two centres were taken in the first week of September but, according to analysts, not without a preceding “massive US bombing campaign“ that forced parts of the local population to flee (see here and here). Both districts had been in Taleban hands for the past four years; they were captured on 1 October 2015 and 18 November 2015. In mid-July 2019, the Taleban captured a lapis lazuli mine in Keran wa Munjan district, and then the district centre. Keran wa Munjan was also targeted by airstrikes in late August. (More AAN background on the Badakhshan Taleban here, here, here and here.)

Leading up to the Taleban attack in Kunduz, Afghan and US forces killed a number of Taleban commanders in drone attacks and night raids. (1) These operations scattered the Taleban in the province, as they forced key commanders to change their locations several times per night in order to avoid becoming targets. The government believed these security measures sufficiently reduced the Taleban’s ability to gather forces and carry out large-scale operations, at least temporarily. It is possible that this contributed to the Afghan government forces feeling too secure, and therefore underestimating the Taleban ability to regroup and strike against the provincial capital.

Casualties and disruption of people’s lives

The Taleban attack on Kunduz caused serious casualties to members fighting on both sides, as well as to civilians. According to the Ministry of Interior, 20 security service members and five civilians were killed and 80 others wounded on the first day of the fighting (see media report here). Local journalists in Kunduz told AAN that 30 security forces and six civilians were killed and 90 others wounded during the fighting in the city.

Local sources confirmed that most casualties were the result of the two suicide attacks reported above. For the Taleban, local journalists in Kunduz said most casualties were caused by Afghan and US forces airstrikes that, in order to minimise civilian casualties, targeted only those Taleban fighters who were clearly visible in the streets. For example, a school teacher from PD3, told AAN that an airstrike targeted a group of Taleban in his area killed 14 fighters and a civilian on the first day of their attack. A local journalist said that, altogether, 40 Taleban fighters were killed and 30 others were wounded.

During the fighting, Taleban social media activists circulated video footage of a group of Highway Police that had surrendered to the Taleban in the north of Kunduz city, in an attempt to psychologically affect the security forces and locals’ morale. But in fact, apart from one security checkpoint, the rest of the forces in Kunduz successfully repelled the Taleban attacks.

Local sources in both provinces told AAN that the Taleban attacks had severely disrupted people’s lives. In Kunduz, shops, schools and government offices were shut. There was neither electricity, nor water and mobile networks were down for two days. Speaking to AAN, a local journalist from Kunduz said he had faced serious difficulties reporting about the situation because telecommunication networks were disconnected and the internet was down. Another journalist said that many people had fled because of their fear that the city could fall to the Taleban once again, as in 2015 and almost again in 2016 (read AAN’s previous reports here and here).

Hamnawa, a journalist from Baghlan, described a similar situation in Pul-e Khumri. He said the Kabul-Baghlan highway was blocked, schools and shops shut, electricity and water cut off and the prices of food items had shot up sharply. Ajmal Popal, a taxi driver in Pul-e Khumri, told AAN he had to pay 40 afghanis (USD 0.50) for a piece of bread that usually cost 10 afghanis (less than USD 0.10).

How were the attacks assessed?

The initial Taleban attack on Kunduz city continued for more than ten hours. Only Afghan special forces reinforcements, including NDS units, and possibly US special forces, tipped the balance. But Taleban groups were still holding out in parts of the north and south of the city for another half day.

Abdul Hadi Jamal, the spokesman for the Pamir Corp 217 based in Kunduz, insisted when speaking with AAN that the Taleban had failed to take over parts of the city for anything more than a brief moment. He said he considered it “more of a guerrilla attack than an attempt to take over the provincial centre.” The Minister of Interior said in the Tolonews interview already quoted above that the Taleban targeted Kunduz city to reduce the pressure on Taleban forces in neighbouring Takhar and Badakhshan.

The fact that the acting ministers for defence and interior, Asadullah Khaled and Masud Andarabi, and top US/NATO commander General Austin Miller visited the city on the first day while clashes were ongoing in other parts the city showed the enormous importance the government attached to repelling this attack and to demonstrating that all was well there. Their statement in a joint press interview with Tolo News, that security forces had been aware of the Taleban’s attack plan and security forces had been ready to defeat them, sounded hollow,  however, given the time taken to move in reinforcements and go on the counter-offensive.

The government official quoted above said the attack on Pul-e Khumri was not as heavy as the one on Kunduz. Initial casualty reports from the government side on 2 September – four civilians, two members of the security forces and 21 Taleban fighters killed, and 20 more civilians and two members of the security forces wounded– and an Afghan media report saying it was a group of only 30 to 40 Taleban who had launched the attack seemed to confirm this assessment. However, fighting there stretched over five days.

Whatever the size of this attack, it was special insofar as – in contrast to earlier attacks on Kunduz – the Taleban not only blocked the Kabul-Kunduz road in Baghlan province (usually this is done only their stronghold, Baghlan-e Jadid district), but also attacked its provincial centre.

Kunduz main road and chowk (in the background). Text photos: Thomas Ruttig (2007)

Conclusion

It is not clear whether the Taleban attacks on Kunduz and Pul-e Khumri (and later on Farah) were aimed at capturing the cities or rather were regular harassment attacks of the hit-and-withdraw type. The latter are often undertaken to keep defenders of government-controlled districts or provincial centres under pressure while avoiding the larger-scale concentration of forces necessary for a permanent occupation of an urban centre, that would likely provoke a powerful backlash, involving airstrikes and large-scale damage. This was seen, for example, in Ghazni in August 2018 (AAN analysis here and here). The attacks can also be read as a signal that the Taleban capabilities to launch effective attacks have not been diminished by airstrikes on their commanders and by government clearance operations.

Kunduz, a strategic province in the northeast, whose provincial capital also serves as the centre of this region of five provinces (together with Baghlan, Takhar, Badakhshan and Samangan), has also been the most insecure province in this region over the past five years. The Taleban took control of Kunduz city for two weeks in 2015, overran most of the city in 2016 (read AAN’s previous analysis here and here) and launched another, albeit weaker attack in 2017. However, this was not the beginning of the province’s troubles; security in the province began to erode around 2010 (see our 2015 dossier on this). In 2017, the US government’s Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) categorised Kunduz as the Afghan province with the largest percentage of districts under Taleban control or influence (five of seven); by October 2018 – the last time such data was provided – all seven districts of Kunduz, including its provincial capital, were in that category (here,  p246).

Baghlan followed in this same pattern, with only some delay; it has been plagued by insecurity since at least since 2013 (see also here and here).

Looking at the recent Taleban attacks on Kunduz and Pul-e Khumri, it is become clear that both cities remain vulnerable and that the Taleban presence in their outskirts, just some kilometres away, both was underestimated by local officials – and this presence has not diminished after the recent counter-attacks. If minister Khaled’s claims that he had information about the pending attack was true, preventive measures had clearly not been taken quickly enough. Lessons from earlier attacks had still not been learned, including the lack of, or ignorance of, the Taleban presence around the city, as well as weaknesses in the security belt surrounding  the city with its  insufficient number of soldiers. The major issue, however, appears to be the lack of coordination – yet again – among local security forces, the national police and army, the public protection forces and the provincial National Directorate of Security. That lead to insufficient measures being taken that could have preempt edTaleban attacks in the first place.

The recent offensives indicate that Taleban forces are still well-placed in Kunduz province and continue to pose a serious threat to the local Afghan security forces. As the two surprise attacks showed, their abilities must not be underestimated.

Farah is following the negative security trend of Kunduz and Baghlan. Abdul Samad Salehi, a member of its provincial council, told the German Press Agency (dpa) on 5 September, that government forces only control security forces bases in three districts of the province outside its capital while there was no even a check post in seven others. In the January 2019 SIGAR report (with data from October 2018), only six of 11 districts in Farah were considered ‘contested’ – the middle one of five SIGAR categories – with the other five under government influence or control. Baghlan then had 13 out of 15 districts as ‘contested’, one under government influence and one with ‘high insurgency activity.’

The attacks were also perceived by most media as a show of strength during what was expected to be the final stage before a US-Taleban withdrawal agreement. They underlined the Taleban’s repeated statement that even the then about-to-be signed agreement with the US, which was reported to include a ceasefire with the western forces, would not have covered Afghan government security forces. Now that talks with the Taleban are off, there are fears about a possible intensification of violence and a continuing uneasiness about the lack of preparedness among Afghan government forces to protect the population.

Edited by Christian Bleuer and Kate Clark

 

(1) Reported examples were of Qari Wasem, in Khanabad district, in August 2019 (media report here); Qari Muhammad and Mullah Najibullah, in March 2019, and Mullah Abdullah, in November 2018 in Dasht-e Archi. On 3 September, government sources claimed that the Taleban’s general commander for the province, Qari Mansur, had been killed in an Afghan commando operation. However, we use these reports with caution, as there have been cases of misreporting (see for example this AAN analysis).

United States president Donald Trump has called off talks with the Taleban and cancelled signing of an agreement with them. The trigger, he said, was a suicide bomb which killed one US soldier and “11 other people” carried out “seemingly [to] strengthen their bargaining position.” However, voices against the ‘agreement in principle’ deal had already been mounting in Washington and Kabul, especially since the Afghan leadership was shown the text of the deal last week. Trump’s cancellation of the agreement has allowed the Taleban to promote themselves as peacemakers, and President Ghani to restate his vision of elections followed by ‘wise and precise’ peacemaking. Kate Clark (with input from the rest of the AAN team) has been looking at today’s events and their implications. She observes that, even though the prospective US-Taleban deal did not look very promising as a path to lasting peace in Afghanistan, the collapse of negotiations has left everyone wondering – what now?

After almost one year and nine rounds of negotiations between President Trump’s special envoy on Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad and the Taleban, with a deal talked about as ‘imminent’ for weeks, President Trump has now tweeted the cancellation of the deal:

Unbeknownst to almost everyone, the major Taliban leaders and, separately, the President of Afghanistan, were going to secretly meet with me at Camp David on Sunday. They were coming to the United States tonight. Unfortunately, in order to build false leverage, they admitted to..

….an attack in Kabul that killed one of our great great soldiers, and 11 other people. I immediately cancelled the meeting and called off peace negotiations. What kind of people would kill so many in order to seemingly strengthen their bargaining position? They didn’t, they….

….only made it worse! If they cannot agree to a ceasefire during these very important peace talks, and would even kill 12 innocent people, then they probably don’t have the power to negotiate a meaningful agreement anyway. How many more decades are they willing to fight?

As we recently reported, talks to finalise the last details of an agreement between the Taleban and the US had been ongoing since January. In the last few weeks, it had seemed the deal was almost in the bag: on 30 August, AAN quoted several news agencies saying the deal was at the stage of  language-checking, as well as Taleban spokesman Suhail Shahin saying, “We hope to have good news soon for our Muslim, independence seeking nation.” Then, on 2 September, Khalilzad told TOLOnews the two sides had reached an “agreement in principle,” although contingent still on Trump signing off on it.

Last minute twists and turns

Then, on Thursday (5 September), the US general in charge of international forces in Afghanistan, Scott Miller, flew to Doha with Khalilzad to talk to the Taleban negotiators and the following day, it was announced that a trip by President Ghani to the US for a meeting with Trump on Monday (9 September) had been cancelled, with no explanation given (see reporting here and here). Matters appeared to be coming to a head, but it was not clear which way they were going. What Trump’s tweet has now revealed is just how far along things were, at least from an American point of view. He divulged that a secret meeting had been planned for today (8 September) at the president’s retreat in Camp David between himself and “major Taleban leaders” and “separately” with Ashraf Ghani.

That the suicide bombing in Abdul Haq Square on Thursday (5 September) claimed by the Taleban (reported on here), the second in the capital in two days, was the proximate cause of the cancellation of the deal is seemingly matched by events: the sudden trip by Miller and Khalilzad to Qatar immediately afterwards, and the cancellation of the Afghan president’s trip to Washington. Taleban violence has indeed sharpened in the last week. In a forthcoming dispatch on the Taleban’s attacks on three provincial capitals last week, (Kunduz, Baghlan and Farah), a publication which has been delayed by today’s events, we wrote that whether or not it was intentional, the attacks were “a strong signal” sent by the Taleban “that they will not stop fighting even after the pending US-Taleban agreement.”

Yet, US and Afghan government forces have not let up or diminished the ferocity of their fight, either, especially air strikes and night raids. Both sides have fought and talked. Moreover, Afghan civilians and soldiers and, albeit in far fewer numbers, members of America’s armed forces, have all continued to be killed throughout the negotiations, including in egregious attacks. So, Thursday’s attack as the trigger for calling off the deal would have to have been either the straw that broke the camel’s back, or a result of President Trump suddenly noticing what was happening on the ground, or a pretext if he had got cold feet about the nature of the deal.

It seems probable that the last possibility is the correct one. Concerns and opposition to the deal in Washington have been mounting. Prominent among those voicing fears were nine former ambassadors (read the text of their letter here). They said they “strongly support[ed] a negotiated peace in Afghanistan,” but expressed doubts that the current deal would actually lead to peace. They pointed out that the Taleban had made “no clear statements about the conditions they would accept for a peaceful settlement with their fellow Afghans, nor do they have a track record of working with other political forces.” Following on from that, the ambassadors warned about the possibility of a situation far worse than the status quo, a return to civil war, as in 1992:

… [C]ould follow a breakdown in negotiations if we remove too much support from the Afghan state. If the State totters, those with nasty memories of life under the Taliban will fight on. That disaffected group would include Afghanistan’s minorities, which together comprise a majority of the Afghan population.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had also, Kim Dozier for Time reported, declined to sign the agreement because of concerns that it would amount to him effectively recognising the Taleban as a legitimate political entity, given that they were reportedly named the ‘Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’ in the text.

A somewhat different version of why the deal was ditched has been reported in The New York Times by Mujib Mashal. Blaming Thursday’s suicide bombing was a pretext, he reported. “The main sticking point was the Taliban’s resistance to the American terms for how a peace deal should be finalized and announced.” Trumps’ plan, reported Mashal, according to Afghan, Western and Taleban officials “with knowledge of the peace talks,” had been to fly both Taleban and Afghan government teams to Camp David, have separate meetings with each team and then “have a grand announcement” of the deal by Trump. The Taleban had reportedly compared this proposal to “political suicide.”

The movement’s response to Trump’s tweets, more on which below (see AAN translation of their statement in Annex 2 of this dispatch) does say that after receiving the invitation to the US, they “had delayed the mentioned travel to the US till after the signature of the agreement in Doha.”

What was in the agreement?

What exactly Khalilzad and the Taleban had agreed between themselves is still not known because the text of the putative agreement is not public. However, Khalilzad had four topics for the talks, which he had said (earlier AAN analysis here) all had to be agreed for a deal to go ahead. However, as AAN reported in August, they were by then already watered down. They were:

• withdrawal of US (and other foreign) troops;
• anti-terrorism guarantees by the Taleban;
• inclusion of the Afghan government in the negotiations; and
• permanent, Afghanistan-wide ceasefire.

While topics one and two have apparently remained in the deal, although it is not entirely clear in what form, topics three and four were downgraded to a second set of negotiations which would be conducted, in Khalilzad’s words, “after we conclude our own agreements” and would involve “an inclusive and effective national negotiating team consisting of senior government officials, key political party representatives, civil society and women,” rather than specifically the Afghan government (tweets from Khalilzad on 28 July here and here).

According to Khalilzad speaking to TOLOnews on 2 September, the US would withdraw 5,000 troops from five bases in Afghanistan within 135 days if conditions in the agreement were addressed by the Taliban. That withdrawal, it seems was to be the start of a full, gradual of all US troops, although the exact details of what was agreed is still unclear. That two-stage timing was potentially very problematic, as the nine ambassadors’ letter concluded:

[A] major troop withdrawal must be contingent on a final peace. The initial US drawdown should not go so far or so fast that the Taliban believe that they can achieve military victory. In that case, they will not make compromises for peace with other Afghan political forces. 

Because Khalilzad has kept his cards close to his chest, it is not known what he said or promised to the various parties, the Taleban in Doha, President Trump and President Ghani, or whether he said the same things to everyone. It may be that when the text of the deal was available to all the principals, this is when it came unstuck. Various potential problems with the deal (from an American and Afghan government point of view) have been made public since it was shown to the Afghan leadership on 2 September (reported here and here).

They include, according to Time, quoting an Afghan official, that the agreement “doesn’t guarantee the continued presence of U.S. counterterrorism forces to battle al Qaeda, the survival of the pro-U.S. government in Kabul, or even an end to the fighting in Afghanistan.” The New York Times, also quoting a government official, reported that the agreement: “…would not have assured national elections on Sept. 28, as Mr. Ghani has demanded. Rather than requiring a nationwide cease-fire, it calls for a reduction of violence in Kabul and Parwan.” The Taleban were also apparently reluctant to specifically name al-Qaeda in their guarantee that Afghan soil would not be used by foreign jihadist forces to launch attacks. They were also reportedly insistent that any agreement would name them the ‘Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan’, which, for some looked to be a step too far in legitimising the movement.

If Khalilzad had conceded any of these points, possibly after failing to force enough concessions from the Taleban (as officials told The New York Times), that could have upset his boss. It certainly upset the presidential palace, as the anti-deal briefings to journalists show. Ashraf Ghani spoke out strongly against the agreement on Thursday after seeing the text and after the Abdul Haq Square bombing: “Seeking peace with this group who is still pursuing the killing of the innocent people,” he said in a statement “is meaningless.”

Responses to the ditching of the agreement

Trump’s cancellation has allowed the Taleban to present themselves as peace-makers. In a statement, they said they had been intent on a peace deal all along, and had been about to sign the agreement and were preparing for intra-Afghan talks on 23 September. Trump’s decision to pull out of the agreement had shown the Americans to be untrustworthy and would only bring them more financial damage, more casualties and a ‘jihad’ until the invasion ends.

In the Palace, meanwhile, there must be a strong sense of relief that a deal which the president was so against has been scuppered by another party. (See the text of Ghani’s statement in Annex 1 of this dispatch). After reiterating his stance that Taleban violence is the main obstacle to peace, Ghani must feel he has regained the upper hand: the deal is off, all talk of an interim government will be off and elections can now go ahead untroubled by the peace process:

The government of Afghanistan reiterates its stance on holding the presidential elections on September 28 to make sure the establishment of a legitimate government through the ballot box and to move forward the ongoing peace process with full wisdom and precision.

Structural problems with the talks

Whatever the facts of who was responsible for the scrapping of the agreement and the end to the talks – although it is still not clear from all sides’ statements whether they are indeed completely over – it seems there were always structural problems with them. There are three direct parties to the Afghan conflict and three parties which have to make peace. Only two were involved in the talks. It has also seemed all along that negotiations were driven primarily by the US and its president’s desire to get troops out of Afghanistan ahead of US elections in 2020. Meanwhile, those in the ‘Islamic Republic of Afghanistan camp’ – the government, opposition figures, women’s activists and others – were marginalised from the start because of the US decision to accede to Taleban demands for a two-way-only negotiation.

Yet, it was also never really clear that the Taleban, especially those in the Quetta Shura and field commanders were ready to make the compromises needed for peace. Certainly, there have been none of the preparations with cadre on the ground that one would expect of an organisation negotiating an end to fighting. US interlocutors told AAN that the Taleban speaking in Doha appeared to see the current negotiations through the prism of the 1980s and believed the US, like the USSR before it, was toppling in the face of a concerted Afghan ‘jihad’. The possibility was always that getting a deal for the Taleban was a way of getting rid of their main adversary on the battlefield and that they believed they could then walk into Kabul as military victors. This may have remained their main aim all along, rather than negotiating peace with their fellow Afghans.

In the ‘Islamic Republic of Afghanistan’ (IRA) camp, meanwhile, many fears have been voiced, but there has been no real effort to rally behind a unified stance to try to give their side more clout. Apart from the president’s stage-managed peace jirga (analysis here), designed mainly to stop calls for an interim government, President Ghani’s main actions have been to push for elections. All this means that, although the Palace may be breathing a sigh of relief that the US-Taleban talks are over, there is little unity or consensus on the IRA side of what should happen next.

It was always difficult to see how the agreement, or what we have seen of it, would lead to peace, but what follows now is even less clear. It is not certain, for example, what Trump does next: double down on the war or order unilateral troop withdrawals. The Taleban still have the upper hand militarily but it is difficult to see anything certain arriving via the battlefield with the exception of more violence. Presidential elections should now go ahead. However, Khalilzad’s talk of an interim government has dented confidence that the poll would actually happen. The result is that most candidates have yet to really start campaigning. Whether it can even approach being a representative and fair election is questionable.

Most importantly, what looks to be the failure of these particular talks makes a negotiated end to the war, for now, less likely. Trust has been lost; finding a way for the parties of the conflict to talk to each other again has been made more difficult. No wonder many Afghans are confused about what they should think about the Trump tweets and the apparent end to the ‘peace deal’ – and fear that a further intensification of the violence will be the major result.

Edited by Jelena Bjelica

 

Annex 1: The Government Of Islamic Republic Of Afghanistan’s Statement Over The Peace Negotiations

8 September 2019

The people and the government of Afghanistan pursue a dignified and sustainable peace and are committed to putting any effort into ensuring peace in the country. However, the government considers the Taliban’s obstinacy to increase violence against Afghans as the main obstacle to the ongoing peace negotiations. We have consistently stressed that genuine peace is possible when the Taliban stop the killing of Afghans, embrace an inclusive ceasefire, and enter into direct negotiations with the Afghan government.

The government of Afghanistan as the main initiator, advocate and executor of the peace process, respects the decision emanated from the Consultative Loya Jirga on Peace and is responsible to follow its mandate with the Afghans playing the central role and the government owning and leading the process. 

The government of Afghanistan praises the earnest efforts of its allies and is committed to working together with the United States and other partners to ensure honorable and enduring peace in the country.

The government of Afghanistan reiterates its stance on holding the presidential elections on September 28 to make sure the establishment of a legitimate government through the ballot box and to move forward the ongoing peace process with full wisdom and precision.

Annex 2: The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan Declaration about the Tweet of Donald Trump Regarding the Negotiations

8 September 2019

We had fruitful negotiations with the American negotiation team and the agreement was finalised. The American negotiation team was happy with the progresses made and we ended the talks in a good atmosphere. Both teams were busy with preparations for the announcement and signing of the agreement. We had selected 23 September as the first day for the intra-Afghan talks [to begin] after the agreement had been signed and announced.

The region and the countries of the world and international organisations have backed the process. Now, the announcement by the president of the United States, Donald Trump, of an end to negotiations with the Islamic Emirate will harm America more than anyone else; it will harm its credibility, and further expose its anti-peace stance to the world; it would [result in] an increase in financial damage and casualties to its forces; it would demonstrate its political interactions as untrustworthy.

Keeping going with the negotiations, the Islamic Emirate has proved to the world that the war was imposed by others on us, and if the way of understanding is chosen instead of war, we are committed to the end of this [the negotiations].

Reacting to just one attack, just before the signing of the agreement, shows neither patience nor experience. Despite that, a little time before the mentioned attack, the US and its domestic supporters [the Afghan government], martyred hundreds of Afghans and burnt their properties. Doctor Khalilzad, gave us the invitation of Donald Trump in late August. We had delayed the mentioned travel to the US till after the signature of the agreement in Doha.

The Islamic Emirate has had a constant policy and a consistent stance. We have voiced understanding 20 years ago, and we have the same stance today as well. We believe that the American side will turn back to this stance [of negotiations]. Our past eighteen-year long policy would have proved to America that, without a complete end to the invasion and so long as the Afghans are allowed to make their own decision, we will not be satisfied by any other thing. We will keep going with the jihad because of this big aim and believe in our final victory.