AFGHAN MISSION UNRAVELS

Iraq continues to consume the oxygen in Washington, but a new
congressional report should shift public attention back to the first
front in the war on terror.

The Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of
Congress, reported in alarming detail last month on the extent to
which the security and domestic situations have deteriorated in
Afghanistan, where NATO and a U.S.-led coalition are fighting Taliban
and al-Qaida terrorists.

The United States attacked Afghanistan a year and a half before
invading Iraq as punishment for the Taliban government harboring al-
Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and has spent $15-billion, not including
the cost of military operations, to stabilize and rebuild the country.
While the GAO acknowledged areas of progress, such as in diversifying
the economy and training an Afghan army, it found that after five
years of international efforts, the security situation "has not
improved and, moreover, has deteriorated significantly in the last
year." The rebuilding is hampered by a resurgence of the Taliban, the
limited capability of Afghan security forces, an inept government,
corruption and the labor force's reliance on growing opium, with some
of the profits going to fund terrorist activity.

The picture is bleak across the board. While Washington provided $6-
billion through last year to train and equip the Afghan security
services, no army combat units or police units are fully capable of
operating by themselves. Even with coalition support, only one of 72
police units can lead an operation. Trainees have sold their equipment
before reporting for duty, hoarding is a problem, and of those absent
from their posts, 60 percent are AWOL.

Broader dysfunctions within society only compound the security
problem. The report notes: "Afghanistan still has no formal national
judicial system for the police to rely upon, opium poppy cultivation
is at record levels and the Afghan police often find themselves facing
better- armed drug traffickers and militias." The population of
32-million is largely illiterate, and nearly half is younger than 15.
The penal system is "nonfunctioning" and reforms are "undermined by
systemic corruption." No wonder officials predict the foreign mission
"will take at least a decade."

The United States and its allies will need to spend billions more on
security, economic development and democratic reforms to prevent
Afghanistan from reverting to the terrorist haven and narco-state it
was under Taliban rule. Even if American troops were withdrawn from
Iraq tomorrow, we would still have a major war on our hands in
Afghanistan.