Protecting Law

They arrived two and a half weeks ago.  They had proven themselves in other venues, but this was the biggest venue.  How they performed here would make or break them.  They stood in the morning sun awaiting their leader.  As he stepped to the front of his men, all eyes were on him – the eyes of his men and the eyes of those he would be responsible for protecting.  His lone voice sounded out, breaking the morning calm.  As he called his troops to attention, the sound of 160 boots clicked together in unison.  As he barked out order, the men responded with a loud acknowledgement of their orders.  The snapped their rifles to port arms and ran to their posts.  The Judicial Security Unit had arrived.

I had been to the Afghan Supreme Court before the Judicial Security Unit (JSU) took over security duties and saw half-uniformed troops from another agency milling about as if there were no security concerns.  Vehicle checks were cursory and even some civilians could be seen operating the gate.  There were no firing positions to protect against ground attacks.  There seemed to be a mass of people whose only purpose was to generate confusion at the gate.  I was very glad to be armed.

Flash forward a bit and the scene was entirely different.  The JSU were making the most of their opportunity.  The colonel placed in charge took every precaution he could.  Trash and discarded car parts were removed from the bus holding pen, thereby allowing for more orderly handling of the buses that bring in employees and preventing internal generation of additional fragmentation in the event of rocket fire.  Barriers were employed to channel incoming people thereby insuring that if a suicide bomber entered one of the channels, death and destruction could be minimized.  Each person received a thorough pat down; these guys were not shy about getting to the groin area either (any TSA agent would be proud).  Firing positions were placed outside the gate and in overlooking positions.  They were manned with AK-47s and PKM heavy machine guns.  Sandbags were ubiquitous. 

What stuck out the most, however, were the JSU troops.  Having served with two different branches of the US military and trained with militaries from around the world, I can see the tale-tale signs of disciplined, motivated troops.  These guys fit the bill.  They were proud of their mission and intensely dedicated to proving their worth.  I could see it in the neatly pressed uniforms properly worn, each JSU member outfitted with the same kit.  I could see it in the way they carried their weapons – muzzles pointed in a safe direction, fingers off the trigger and alongside the lower receiver rather than on the trigger like the undisciplined and dangerous Afghan National Police I often see.  Smart salutes were rendered to their officers, troops moved with urgency, and the level of alertness was commendable. 

As we opened a security gate to examine the street outside and the dangers it presented, JSU troops moved out in a defensive perimeter, weapons at the ready.  Their heads seemed to be on swivels as they constantly assessed the scene for any threats.  Traffic was halted briefly and then diverted to allow for safety while the gate was open.  You could see the training these men had gone through and the esprit de corps instilled within them.  Their commander exuded professionalism and attention to detail as well.  Since the heightened level of security results in slower progression through checkpoints, the commander walked the line explaining the process and the rationale behind it.  He warmly greeted those in line, shook their hands, and answered any questions they had.  Although standing in line, the folks were smiling; they knew a professional force was looking after them. 

In the judicial security business there really isn’t a bigger stage than a nation’s supreme court.  It is the symbol of law and order within a nation.  These guys know that and are taking it seriously.  They know that they guard not just judges but a judicial system.  It is a fledgling judicial system that needs an immense level of protection as judges are threatened daily and sometimes pay for their faith in law with their life.  This is a sign of hope, in a place with very little of it.  The US Marshal Service, Special Operations Group is creating a security force capable of performing at a high level and they are doing it in a way that can be sustainable after the international community leaves.  We take this security for granted in the United States; maybe the next time you enter a federal courthouse, you’ll notice the Marshal and know that he symbolizes the free exercise of law and that those like him are bringing it to a worn torn country.  Maybe next time you see that US Marshal, you’ll say thanks.  

Why?

It was raining.  Normally, this would be of little note, but this was Kabul.  It never rains in Kabul.  The rain fell as if symbolizing the sorrow that permeated her very existence.  She stood there, oblivious to the rain and wind – a solitary figure on the hill.  The lush, green landscape fell down the hill, away from her and into a city of dirt and grime.  Behind her lay the jagged brown peaks of the mighty Hindu Kush.  She was equidistant from each of these imposing figures – the city and the mountain.  But she was what you noticed.  Out there, alone, almost regal she stood.

As the summer sun fought with the storm clouds, rays of light danced about her.  The sparkling of the light across her had the look of glitter – flittering about her like camera flashes trying to catch her beauty.  And, from this distance, she did look beautiful.  As I drew closer, however, I saw that the years had faded her beauty.  I could still see it though – a beauty that once was.  If you looked past the years, you could still see her, as she was then – a queen standing among her people.   

But now it was different.  She had scars – scars borne of a battle by two men.  Whether it was jealously, pride, or power, the men fought for her.  It was not enough simply to possess her, however, the fight was to deny the other her beauty.  At this they were both successful for the fighting had wounded her.  It had aged her beyond her years, irreparably damaging her, the only true beauty, save nature, in the area.  She was the symbol of what was and what could be and they destroyed her.  She stood there now, empty and devoid of life – a broken shell of once was.

As I walked through the Queen’s Palace, I could indeed see the beauty that once was.  This massive structure stood, watching over the city, as a symbol of Afghanistan under the monarchy, when it had a modicum of success and a promising future.  That was destroyed now, ground into the rubble of the selfish dreams of man.  This beautiful structure was not destroyed by the Soviet or even the American invasion.  Afghans – Afghans so selfish they were blinded to the true and utter destruction that fell in their wake, destroyed it.  As the Soviets left and the Communist government fell, Afghanistan had a chance, a chance at success.  But Afghanistan needed men who would stand for it rather than for themselves.  They got warlords instead. 

As I walked the lonely halls, listening to the winds echo along the bare walls, I could not help but ponder war’s destructiveness.  This building, a Queen’s Palace, was once fit to stand among the world’s finest palaces, but now it was a trash heap.  Graffiti painted the walls, tumbleweeds camped in the corners, and feces stained the floors of some rooms used as bathrooms.  It didn’t have to be this way though.

Some visitors, seeing the same damage, must have thought as I did on seeing it.  What a waste.  What a tragic waste.  But perhaps a lesson can still be learned.  As I walked through a doorway and turned to look up, I saw the only real color in the building.  It was a bright mural, a tribute to Christmas 1988.  St. Nick was there, standing beside a Christmas tree.  Russian words indicated that a Soviet Special Forces unit had spent their Christmas there, dreaming of home and peace. 

Throughout many of the other halls, the most ubiquitous drawing was of the dove.  Sometimes it stood alone; other times it clutched a twig from an olive branch or a love letter.  In these drawing we see the one similarity among military members.  The Soviets fought the Mujahedeen; when the Soviets left, they fought each other.  Now, some of them fight Americans.  But the desire for peace filled them all.  The Soviets wished for peace at Christmas.  The Mujahedeen asked for peace by using the dove.  As we Americans walked through the destruction, we wondered aloud what the purpose was.  We had a moment to contemplate the destruction, the death.

After returning to my office, I checked my email and found the casualty report waiting.  One Department of Defense civilian, two Marines, and six Soldiers just died.  Why?

Metrics

Unfortunately for our beautiful blue-eyed girl discussed in the 20 May post, America is a realist nation.  Sure, the leaders come and go and policies change at the margins, but we follow a realist template – all nation-states do.  Nation-states do what is in their best interests because their citizens demand it.  Do you really think the citizens of western countries would bankrupt and bleed themselves to death for some moral objective?  I think not and I point to Rwanda and Darfur as my examples.  Since these places have no strategic interest, we took no action.

I’ve heard some argue that we are here in Afghanistan to help the Afghans.  The idealism oozes forth as the argument invokes notions of rule of law, women’s rights, child education, and whatever other pursuit the speaker favors.  These are all noble goals and most of us would support them at first glance.  But does our country support this as our goal here?  I say no.  These ideals are merely means to an end in the realm of realism.    

Afghanistan was a basket case of a country long before the America military leviathan arrived on scene.  Ask yourself why we came.  Was it to help the Afghans crawl out of the past and into the twenty-first century?  Was it to provide Afghan women with hope for the future?  Was to provide their citizens with an economic future?  We had the chance to do this in the aftermath of Soviet withdrawal in 1989, but decided our dot-com economy and pursuit of “more” was infinitely more important at the time.  Hindsight is twenty-twenty, right?      

It wasn’t until America was attacked that we decided Afghanistan was in our national security interest (echoes of Eisenhower warning of the military-industrial complex run through my mind).  But this doesn’t mean that anything has changed.  The plight of Afghan women and children is still not our main concern here.  Our concern is American security and to the extent that rule of law, democracy, women’s rights, etc. assists in providing that security, it will get attention.  To put it bluntly, we are not here to help Afghanistan; we are here to help America.  However, to the extent that helping Afghanistan helps America, we will do it (or try to). 

So what does this mean in relation to withdrawal?  The reality here on the ground, at least from my perspective, is that this strain of realism permits an Orwellian view of Afghanistan to permeate all thinking.  For those that may not have read George Orwell’s 1984 (you should), among other things, it introduces the concept of “newspeak.”  This fictional language assists the totalitarian regime of the book in quashing alternative thinking.  This same effect is accomplished here through metrics.   How is this done? 

Some seem to think that metrics are the Holy Grail or a panacea.  They believe that when data is properly gathered, metrics will give them a accurate picture of the ground truth.  “See, we’re winning, the metrics say so!”  Well, the crux of that line of thinking is accurate data.  Nearly everyone can point this out immediately and I really have no idea if the data is being gathered properly or not because I’m not out there doing it (and neither are most of those that rely on this data, incidentally).  However, what most people miss is the really crucial question.  The primary question is not whether our data is accurate, although that is certainly important, but whether we are measuring what is appropriate when considering our goals.

Let’s illustrate:  One of the goals here for rule of law is to measure judicial capacity.  Now this seems pretty self-explanatory: courts need judges, prosecutors, etc. to operate.  If we supply these things, and a courthouse, we’re good to go, right?  So we measure the number of judges trained to determine judicial capacity.  We keep cranking out trained judges and at some point we’ve trained enough to reach the mythical judicial capacity we desire.  It’s that simple.  Or is it?

In one major city here, the judicial center has a tashkil of 18 judges.  This means that the court requires 18 trained judges to be at full capacity.  We train 18, send them to this major city and report having done so to whoever the keeper of the metrics is.  Now, when we look at the metrics measuring number of trained judges at our next meeting, we can all pat ourselves on the back with the satisfaction of knowing that we helped the Afghans achieve full judicial capacity in that city.  But what if we dig deeper?  Instead of asking how many judges we’ve trained, what if we ask how many show up for work?  You should understand that judicial positions here aren’t like that in the US.  Here pay is very low and, in some places, judges (and sometimes their families) are shot dead by the Taliban.  Thus, if we ask the right question, we learn that in this same major city only 6 judges routinely show up for work.  Our metrics show 100% judicial capacity, but the reality is 33% capacity.

You’ve all heard the expression “declare victory and go home.”  This is how it is done.  There is no lying or manipulation of data.  That isn’t necessary (and, quite frankly, it’s a bit amateurish).  All that is needed is selective measurement.  We measure the things that support a declaration of “victory” (whatever that means) and the end result becomes preordained.  Is the mission here to bring effective, efficient, western-style, internationally compliant rule of law to Afghanistan?  It may be advertized that way in some circles, but that was not our original mission and, based on how we’re measuring progress, I don’t think it is our mission now.  But what exactly is the mission?  As Washington seems to vacillate on US policy here, it is impossible for me to accurately answer that question.  Are we here to eliminate Al Qaeda?  To fight the Taliban?  To make Afghanistan a beacon of democracy?  Who knows?  I certainly don’t.  But what I do know is that politics drives war (some will recognize Clausewitz here) and our politicians are looking for a way out.  Metrics will show the way.