"How to Overcome Afghanistan's Security Challenges" A Director's Forum with His Excellency Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan

The Wilson Center hosted a Director's Forum with His Excellency Hamid Karzai, president of Afghanistan, on September 26, titled How to Overcome Afghanistan's Security Challenges. The president's speech was an overview of the state of Afghanistan since the United States launched Operation Enduring Freedom, its war on terrorism in Afghanistan and other states following the terrorist attacks of September 11. Citing statistics on health care, education, and Afghan efforts against the country's drug trade, Karzai provided a snapshot of the country today alongside figures from 2002, illustrating the benefits of foreign aid from American and coalition governments, and Afghans' ability to utilize that aid. He also acknowledged missteps that the U.S. and Afghanistan had made, both in fighting terrorism—namely limiting the war's scope to Afghan borders—and in the shortsightedness with which they dealt with the country's poppy growers, which undergird its drug trade.



But for the bulk of his speech Karzai emphasized the threat of terrorism, particularly as it exists directly outside Afghanistan's borders, where he believes it can undo his nation's accomplishments and impede further progress. The villages that are home to terrorists, he said, are not harboring them but rather are "held hostage." Rather than place the onus on governments such as Pakistan's, Karzai said that the people living in occupied areas—both in Afghanistan and elsewhere—are victims in need of liberation. Because of terrorism's cross-border effects, he called for joint action between the region's governments in combating it.



"The Afghan story seven years on is one of achievements, no doubt; one of hope for further progress, no doubt; and one of challenges and difficulties of a great nature, no doubt," Karzai began. He described two Afghanistans: one in 2002, abject, poor, and helpless to the Taliban and Al Qaeda; and one today, with vital signs improving after seven years of combating terrorism and foreign aid.



In 2002, Afghanistan had "not even a kilometer of paved roads," Karzai said. Nine percent of the population had access to basic health services—that is, cotton and alcohol—and anyone that had the means would go to Pakistan or Iran for treatment. Today, 85 percent of Afghans have good health services. Financially, the country's reserves have grown from $180 million to $3 billion (largely due to United States aid), and trade with Pakistan has expanded from $25 million to $1 billion. Afghanistan is also opening new embassies while seeing permanent embassies open within their borders. "Our flag is flying all around the world," Karzai said.



Looking back, Karzai acknowledged some efforts that were mishandled or could have been done more effectively. Afghan police should have been trained earlier. The theater of war in fighting terrorism should have been expanded beyond Afghan borders to neighboring countries, where terrorists now camp. And the country's attempts to stifle poppy farming were misguided: Paying farmers to stop growing poppies encouraged others to start, while the effects of crop eradication would only last a year, until the next crop cycle.



But terrorism is persistently the most dangerous threat to Afghanistan's recent achievements, Karzai said. Even if Afghan villages are rid of the Taliban, they exist across the border in Pakistan, from which they still target Afghans. Currently in border regions, 300,000 Afghan children don't attend school because the Taliban attacks their schools and community leaders. Pakistani villages face similar dangers—terrorists that now control them were able to do so by enticing them with money and resources, and they've since "held them hostage." So the villages themselves must not be blamed but rather liberated just as Afghans must, and this will require a concerted effort.



"The nature of the problem is regional, and the struggle against it must be regional," Karzai said. "Only when we have evolved a joint regional strategy backed by the international community will we succeed and succeed definitely against terrorism."



Karzai concluded by emphasizing that Afghanistan is still a poor country in need of foreign aid, and that this aid is best used through "the Afghanization process," or allowing the Afghan government to oversee its employment. He looked forward to a safer, more prosperous Afghanistan that could welcome tourism, and he described majestic views and geographical wonders of the country's landscape. But he said that this form of liberation, too, would come only when the region's leaders began cooperating to defeat terrorism.



"Some of us in that part of the world must now recognize, must realize, that radicalism and extremism can never be an instrument of policy. That it is like a snake. That you can't train a snake against someone else, that it can turn around and bite the trainer any time it wants. And it has happened already, in a tragic way."