Washington’s fixer gets chance to correct his own errors
The man who brokered a deal for Afghan peace bears some blame for the need ed for it, writes Ben Farmermer
When Donald Trump needed a dealmaker to extricate him from America’s longest war, one name was at the top of the list. Zalmay Khalilzad has for two decades been a go-to diplomat for Republican presidents in need of a troubleshooter in Afghanistan and the Middle East.
Yet when the 68-year-old known as Zal was chosen to find Mr Trump a way out of his Afghan quagmire, many Afghans and international observers also remarked on the irony of the choice. The man tasked with forging a political settlement that would allow a US troop withdrawal is also held by some to be responsible for many of the failings which led America to its current predicament.
The mistakes Mr Khalilzad and the US made setting up a new Afghan political order in 2001 and 2002 sowed the seeds for the Taliban to return. “There’s Shakespearean justice in Zal struggling to fix the errors of US policy, many of his own creation,” said a former United Nations official. “It’s a heroic struggle in the classic sense.”
Mr Khalilzad had been born in the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif, and as a bright student had won a scholarship to the American University in Beirut. On graduation, he went to the University of Chicago and then into advising the US State Department and Pentagon, via the world of foreign policy think tanks.
His background made him the perfect choice as George W Bush’s special envoy to Afghanistan after the Taliban were ousted. When Mr Khalilzad arrived in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban’s oppressive emirate in 2001, the optimism about the country’s future was a far cry from the gloom of later years. The international community was buoyed by the rapid collapse of the Taliban, and set about forging a new constitution and political order. It was here that the US and Mr Khalilzad made critical mistakes which would undermine nation-building efforts, said Thomas Ruttig, director of the Afghanistan Analysts Network, a research group.
Firstly, Mr Khalilzad pursued a “big tent” approach to the country’s leaders, allowing the hated warlords of the Nineties, who had been kicked out by the Taliban, to regain a central place in Afghan politics. Secondly, he was accused of strong-arming the former Afghan king out of politics, and depriving the Pashtun ethnic majority of their preferred candidate to lead the country. “He stood at the beginning of the re-escalating conflict,” said Mr Ruttig.
Moreover, by handing over large parts of the government to former commanders of the largely nonPashtun Northern Alliance who had fought with US forces against the largely Pashtun Taliban, he was accused of setting up an ethnic polarisation which contributed to the later Taliban comeback.
The fruits of those decisions were not immediate. Mr Khalilzad was appointed ambassador to Afghanistan, hanistan, and at first, all seemed well. But ut bit by bit, the initial optimism began n to evaporate. Hamid Karzai’s weak ak government could not bring the he reconstruction it had promised. d. The warlords he and the West relied ed on were preying on his people. Clumsy lumsy counter-terrorism campaigns led by international troops were alienating Afghans. Corruption n was rampant.
As the promise of 2001 soured, red, resentment grew. The Taliban n re-emerged, operating from safe afe havens in Pakistan. International nal attention switched to Iraq, and d in 2005, Mr Khalilzad was headhunted to be Mr Bush’s representative first in Baghdad d and later at the United Nations. s.
With the arrival of the Obama administration, Mr Khalilzad returned to think tanks and private consultancy, y, though there were rumours in n 2009 that he was considering running for Afghan president. . Meanwhile, Mr Obama first
‘He stood at the beginning of the re-escalating conflict. Actually, he is trying to clean up the china he had broken himself’
surged tens of thousands of troops to try to defeat the Taliban, then pulled them out, and concentrated on supporting the Afghan government. Violence kept getting worse.
It was not until the election of Mr Trump that Mr Khalilzad was recalled, well over a decade after leaving Afghanistan.
By then, the US campaign was a stalemate with tens of thousands of Afghans and more than 2,400 US dead. Mr Trump wanted a deal that would get him out.
Sources familiar with negotiations say Zal has charmed all sides during 18 months of tireless shuttle diplomacy and late-night rounds of talks with Taliban leaders in Doha. Unlike the other often aloof and buttoned-up US diplomats, diploma Mr Khalilzad is warm and a natural r raconteur.
“I’ve never n met anyone who didn’t like him him,” said one senior diplomat. “But he seems to tell people what they want to hear. You often find that he’s told people peo different things.” Peace is still a long way off in Afghanistan. Afgha However, the Doha agreement agre signed by Mr Khalilzad at a ceremony attended by Mike Pompeo, Pom the US secretary of state, sta was inconceivable only tw two years ago, and diplomats s say that whatever happens next, much of the credit for it must go to him.
That achievement must also be weighed against his earlier mistakes, many in Afghanistan believe.
“Actually, he is trying to clean up the china he had broken himself,” said Mr Ruttig.