Moving Finger writes Afghan future, and ‘having writ, Moves on’
http://blogs.rediff.com/mkbhadrakum...rites-afghan-future-and-having-writ-moves-on/
By
M K Bhadrakumar – March 25, 2014
On the face of it, Afghan president Hamid Karzai’s
endorsement of the right of self-determination of the people of Crimea does not come as surprise because the principle is important to Kabul in its application to the Pashtuns who live on the Pakistani side of the Durand Line (which Afghanistan never recognized). But, having said that, Karzai is not a one-dimensional man.
Notably, he revealed his mind while at a meeting with a visiting US congressional delegation in Kabul. Karzai is a keen student of geopolitics — actually, all Afghan rulers have been, considering that their land-locked country had to ward off the predatorial instincts of foreign powers near and far through corridors of time.
Karzai has most certainly been following the tensions in Russia’s relations with the West. Lately, Russia began loosening its purse strings and is wading into ‘development assistance’ for Afghanistan, which works well for Karzai because Moscow (unlike US) routes the funding through Kabul government and not directly to the contractors of aided projects.
By endorsing Russia’s annexation of Crimea, Karzai has joined a select band of world statesmen — Kim Jong Un of North Korea, Bashar Al-Assad of Syria and Nicolas Maduro of Venezuela. But his intention goes beyond that — in strategic terms, he is signaling that the US is not the only show in town. The Obama administration has been threatening Karzai that the US aid will be cut off unless the US-Afghan security pact is signed and the American and NATO military bases get established.
By coincidence, the US Congressional delegation was visiting Kabul in yet another last-ditch effort by Washington to expedite the US-Afghan security pact when Karzai voiced support for the right of self-determination of the people of Crimea.
Karzai would estimate that his prospects of giving the US-Afghan pact a decent burial is now better than ever with the ‘new cold war’ in the offing. Simply put, Crimea could be a ‘game changer’ for Karzai’s politics.
Washington seems to grasp the writing on the wall. In a tell-tale sign, just ten days before the Afghan presidential poll on April 5, two key Western observer and support missions — one American and the other European — have
withdrawn their teams on the specious plea of security considerations.
The Barack Obama administration seems to have drawn the conclusion that the push to get Dr. Abdullah elected as Karzai’s successor has flopped. On the other hand, the candidacy of former foreign minister Zalmai Rassoul (whom Karzai supports) is
pulling ahead steadily. Rassoul claims lineage to the Afghan royal family and was the principal aide to former King Zahir Shah while in exile in Rome and that’s a halo that mesmerizes powerful Kandahari tribes.
The desperation in Washington is apparent from a vilification campaign by the government-funded Radio Liberty & Free Europe that Rassoul is a bachelor. Now, you and I may wonder what’s wrong with that? Why should
RFERL highlight that Rassoul is “living in sin” or that his “dishonorable bachelor status” jars in the conservative Afghan society?
It’s the US-Afghan pact, stupid! Of course, the possibility remains that Rassoul, being a follower of the late Zahir Shah and a blue-blooded Kandahari, may not sign a pact that legitimizes open-ended foreign occupation of Afghanistan.
If Rassoul’s surge can be stopped, the next best thing will be to get Ashraf Ghani (former World Bank employee) elected as the president. Ghani be counted on one hundred percent to sign the pact within one month of his election (which has been Abdullah’s pledge to Washington.)
Now, what happens if Ghani too doesn’t pull through? (In the 2009 election he polled two percent votes.) That’s where Plan B comes into play.
The withdrawal of the American and European election observers leaves the field open for the US to question the legitimacy of the poll verdict. The big question is, what lies beyond? A color revolution for regime change?
No wonder, Karzai has tried to establish a symbiotic relationship with what unfolds in Eurasia. He wishes Russia well and expects robust backing from President Vladimir Putin in the event of Washington pulling the rug beneath his feet.
Karzai assesses that Putin could be averse to a color revolution at the present juncture on the soft underbelly of (Soviet) Central Asia. To be sure, Afghanistan’s modern history has come full circle. Thirty-three years ago, it was the fear of a CIA coup in Kabul that precipitated the Soviet intervention.
In the post-modern Great Game, color revolutions have made redundant those old-fashioned messy coups. As Omar Khayyam wrote circa 1120 in his mystic work
The Rubaiyat, “The Moving Finger Writes, and having writ, Moves on…”
