5/3/11 

Against the backdrop of the death of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee today convened a hearing "to debate the end-state in Afghanistan, assess the strategic relationship between the United States and Pakistan, and examine regional implications," according to chairman John Kerry (D-MA). Bin Laden's death may open a unique opportunity for negotiations with the Taliban - a necessary component of a political solution that goes in tandem with the military campaign and enables a significant drawdown to begin this summer. As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated yesterday, "Our message to the Taliban remains the same... you can make the choice to abandon al Qaeda and participate in a peaceful political process."

Bin Laden's death strengthens U.S. hand, presents an opportunity to split the Taliban and al Qaeda. Yesterday Secretary of State Hillary Clinton outlined what bin Laden's death means for the U.S. mission in Afghanistan and negotiations with the Taliban: "Our message to the Taliban remains the same... You cannot wait us out, you cannot defeat us, but you can make the choice to abandon al Qaeda and participate in a peaceful political process." In fact the death of bin Laden may actually make the Taliban more likely to seek a political solution. "The extremist Islamist movement harbored al-Qaida after forging a bond during the Afghan civil war in the 1990s. But ‘it was mainly a debt of gratitude to bin Laden personally, for all the assistance he offered,' says Paul Pillar, a former CIA national intelligence officer for the Middle East and South Asia. Bin Laden's terrorist network has spawned independent factions in other parts of the Middle East and North Africa, but Pillar says ‘the Taliban wouldn't give a hoot about something like al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula or in the Maghreb. They only care about things going on in Afghanistan,'" reports NPR.

Financial Times columnist and Taliban expert Ahmed Rashid further explains: "bin Laden's death will make it easier for peace talks between the Taliban and the Kabul government and the Americans. The Taliban do not owe al-Qaeda anything now bin Laden is dead. Al-Qaeda continued funding and training the Taliban after their collapse in 2001. But the older generation of Taliban leaders had long ago become fed up with the arrogance of Arab jihadists. The Taliban want to return home to their country free of foreigners including Americans but they don't want, for example, to bomb supermarkets or embassies in western capitals... Renouncing their links with al-Qaeda and negotiating as Afghans rather than as members of an international jihad has just become much easier for the Taliban. Nato and Afghanistan's neighbours have swiftly to take military and political measures that will help President Hamid Karzai negotiate with the Taliban to end 33 years of war." [Hillary Clinton, 5/2/11. Paul Pillar, via NPR, 5/2/11. Ahmed Rashid, 5/2/11]

Political solution must begin now, but will take time. Former British Foreign Minister David Miliband recently wrote in the International Herald Tribune, "The 2014 end date set by NATO will prove illusory unless there is an endgame. And that endgame must be negotiations, involving Western powers led by the United States, with all factions in the Afghan struggle and their backers in the region. The issue is not simply that the political arm of the Defense-Development-Diplomacy triad has been missing in action. A political settlement is not one part of a multipronged strategy in a counterinsurgency; it is the overarching framework within which everything else fits and in the service of which everything else operates."

A Century Foundation task force co-chaired by Ambassador Thomas Pickering, former undersecretary of state and former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, and Lakhdar Brahimi, former UN special envoy in Afghanistan, similarly concludes:  "Securing defections of insurgents or trying to co-opt senior-level Taliban to join the Kabul regime is unlikely to be sufficient to bring peace; reconciliation with insurgents will eventually have to involve creating a broader political framework to end the war." The task force points out that this process needs to start immediately. "[W]e believe the best moment to start a political process toward reconciliation is now. For the government's allies, the optimal window would seem to be before their capacities peak, not when force levels have commenced a downward trajectory." Longtime South Asia analyst and New America Foundation President Steve Coll writes that, as we have seen historically, this process will take time. Coll notes, "the first secret talks between the United States and representatives of North Vietnam took place in 1968; the Paris Peace Accords, intended to end direct U.S. military involvement in the war, were not agreed on until 1973."[David Miliband, 5/12/11. The Century Foundation, 3/23/11. Steve Coll, 2/28/11]

Political reconciliation works in tandem with a troop drawdown to align resources with U.S. goals in the region. Pillar noted yesterday that "Bin Laden's death provides an opportunity for bringing the costs of this war more in line with the questionable benefits."

Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee commented to Politico that, "Everyone in the military, civilian and uniform believes there should be reductions in July... I think the president's inclination will be a robust reduction and that will be reinforced by the events of yesterday."

Steve Coll writes that "even a partly successful negotiation might help create political conditions that favor the reduction of American forces to a more sustainable level." A bipartisan report from the Council on Foreign Relations last fall spells out how: "The solution to Afghanistan's insurgency will need to be political, not military. Irreconcilable insurgents will need to be killed or captured, but enduring stability will come only when the vast majority of Afghanistan's people reach minimally acceptable terms with their state. That political arrangement, backed by more capable Afghan security forces, economic development, and regional diplomacy, offers the United States the best way to achieve a permanent withdrawal from Afghanistan at a reduced risk of resurgent terrorism or civil war." [Paul Pillar, 5/2/11. Carl Levin, via Politco, 5/3/11. Steve Coll, 2/28/11. CFR, 11/10]

What We're Reading

The Assad regime said it will give protestors until May 15 to surrender and relinquish their arms. Analysts say more than 560 people have been killed in anti-regime protests in Syria in the past seven weeks.

Several doctors and nurses who treated injured anti-government protesters during months of unrest in Bahrain have been charged with acts against the state and will be tried in a military court, the justice minister said

Prosecutors in South Korea say North Korean hackers were behind an attack that paralyzed a leading bank last month.

Another Thai soldier has died in border clashes with Cambodian troops, as Cambodia petitioned the UN's highest court to clarify a judgment at the heart of the dispute.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative Party has won a majority of seats in Canada's general election, according to provisional results.

Switzerland says it has frozen nearly $1billion worth of assets linked to Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and the deposed leaders of Egypt and Tunisia.

Russia's domestic intelligence agency said that it had established the guilt of a man local media have identified as the spymaster who betrayed a ring of agents operating in the United States last year.

Train passengers in Argentina, furious about delays, have set fire to three commuter trains.

Sudan's Islamist opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi, who helped Osama bin Laden settle in Khartoum in the 1990s, was freed after more than three months in jail.

Ivory Coast's deposed former president Laurent Gbagbo urged his supporters who are still resisting government forces to end political battles and help the country reconcile.

Commentary of the Day

Former FBI interrogator Ali Soufan writes that the death of Osama bin Laden is a serious blow to al Qaeda, as it is not only the loss of the organization's leader but also its chief fundraiser and recruiter.

Heather Hurlburt explains why the U.S. was able to kill bin Laden.