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Afghanistan's India–Pakistan dilemma:

advocacy coalitions in weak states
a
Avinash Paliwal
a
King's College London
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To cite this article: Avinash Paliwal (2015): Afghanistan's India–Pakistan dilemma:

advocacy coalitions in weak states, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, DOI:
10.1080/09557571.2015.1058617
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Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 2015
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09557571.2015.1058617
Afghanistan’s India –Pakistan dilemma: advocacy

coalitions in weak states
Avinash Paliwal
King’s College London
Abstract This article seeks to examine the foreign policy behaviour of weak states in
regions marked by politically turbulent geostrategic environments. An analysis of
Afghanistan’s foreign policy behaviour vis-à-vis Pakistan and India lends focus to this
aim. India – Pakistan rivalry has gained traction as a key factor in determining
Afghanistan’s stability in the wake of the drawdown of Coalition forces. Missing from this
debate, however, is consideration of Afghanistan’s agency as a weak state with an
independent set of policy preferences. Based on primary interviews with a diverse set of
Afghan political actors the article outlines two competing policy advocacies: Pakistan
friendly and Pakistan averse. The article argues that these advocacies are key to
understanding Afghanistan’s India– Pakistan dilemma. Departing from the ethnic lens
used to explain Afghan politics and its regional linkages, this article shows that Kabul’s
relations with Islamabad determine its approach towards New Delhi regardless of ethnic
rivalries. Understanding domestic Afghan narratives in this regional context is therefore
imperative to adequately assess South Asia’s prospective security calculus.
Introduction
This article seeks to examine the foreign policy behaviour of weak states in
regions marked by politically turbulent geostrategic environments.1 An analysis
of Afghanistan’s foreign policy behaviour vis-à-vis Pakistan and India lends
focus to this aim. Not simply of empirical interest in the wake of the withdrawal
of Coalition forces by the end of 2014, Afghanistan’s foreign policy behaviour in
South Asia also has interesting theoretical implications. It defies the phenomenon
that neorealist scholars (Walt 1987) term ‘bandwagoning’ when explaining the
1
This article was authored as part of the UK – India Education and Research
Initiative—Trilateral Research in Partnership (UKIERI-TRIP) project that was awarded to
the Defence Studies Department, King’s College London (KCL). I would like to thank
UKIERI, and the King’s Graduate School for funding my fieldwork in India and
Afghanistan. The ‘India – Pakistan – Afghanistan Trilateral Relations: Beyond 2001’
workshop held at KCL in August 2014, and the feedback therein, added immense value
to this paper. My sincere thanks to the editors and the three anonymous reviewers at the
Cambridge Review of International Affairs and to Harsh Pant, Theo Farrell, Mark Erbel, Martin
Bayly, David Scott, Khalid Nadiri, Nina Kaysser and Kaustav Chakrabarty for providing
very helpful comments. A special thanks goes to all the interviewees who very kindly gave
the time and effort to share ideas and information. All errors and omissions are the sole
responsibility of the author.
q 2015 Centre of International Studies

2 Avinash Paliwal
foreign policy behaviour of weak states vis-à-vis bigger powers. Afghanistan

does this by balancing competing interest and aspirations of regional powers
exceptionally well. For instance, Kabul signed a Strategic Partnership Agreement
(SPA) with India in 2011 without seriously antagonizing Pakistan (Miglani 2011).
Additionally, despite some contention, Kabul and Islamabad agreed to form a
joint commission on border management in 2014 without antagonizing New
Delhi.2 Not only at odds with the dominant theory of international relations (IR),
Afghanistan’s approach towards India and Pakistan is also at odds with the few
dominant empirical works on the topic. Though there is no work specifically on
Afghanistan’s foreign policy, the key argument on the Afghanistan – India –
Pakistan trilateral dynamic can be captured in historian William Dalrymple’s
(2013) argument that ‘hostility between India and Pakistan lies at the heart of the
current war in Afghanistan’. Ganguly and Howenstein (2009) also argue that
bilateral conflicts shape India and Pakistan’s policy behaviour on Afghanistan
and contend that both these countries have ‘proxies’ in a fragmented

Afghanistan. These proxy groups help India and Pakistan secure their national
interests and regional aspirations in Afghanistan. A case in point is India’s
support of the United Front against the Pakistan-supported Afghan Taliban in the
1990s and its uncritical backing of President Hamid Karzai after 2001, as well as
Pakistan’s continuous support of the Taliban (Coll 2005; Ganguly and
Howenstein 2009).
Missing from this debate, however, is consideration of Afghanistan’s agency as
a sovereign state with an independent set of policy preferences, or even the agency
of those proxy groups that are assumed to be acting on behalf of either India or
Pakistan. Based on primary interviews with a diverse and influential set of
political actors in Afghanistan, this paper identifies internal narratives among the
Afghan political elite. Conceptualized using the Advocacy Coalition Framework
(ACF), these narratives are termed ‘Pakistan averse’ and ‘Pakistan friendly’.
Despite accepting the merits of focusing on India and Pakistan’s Afghanistan
policy, this approach compels explication of domestic Afghan interpretation of
Indian and Pakistani policies. To be clear, this paper is not an attempt to
operationalize the ACF quantitatively and neither is it a systematic analysis of the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Afghanistan. Rather, the aim of the article is
to open a debate on the usage of developing frameworks of foreign policy analysis
to conceptualize the diplomatic history of weak states. Secondly, this article shows
that Afghanistan’s rivalry with Pakistan determines Kabul’s relations with New
Delhi. Though most Afghans would like good relations with India, relations with
Pakistan are key to Kabul’s approach towards New Delhi. Thirdly, exploring
continuities and change in these policy narratives, the article shows that
Afghanistan’s policy advocacy in South Asia experienced changes after 2001.
Domestic Afghan policy realigned, evolving and responding to India and
Pakistan’s policies towards Afghanistan, thus balancing both factional and
national policy interests. Effectively, the article reasserts a previously argued
theoretical point that the foreign policy behaviour of weak states may not simply
2
‘Pakistan, Afghanistan to initiate joint commission on border management’, Express
Tribune, 10 February 2014, ,http://tribune.com.pk/story/669910/pakistan-afghanistan-
to-initiate-joint-commission-on-border-management/. .
Afghanistan’s India – Pakistan dilemma 3
be decided by external systemic and regional factors, but is also influenced by

domestic factors.
The first section of this article places the ACF in the context of existing
literature on the foreign policy behaviour of small and weak states.3 The second
section places Afghanistan’s approach towards South Asia in historical and
political context. Highlighting Afghanistan’s territorial sensitivity—manifest in its
stand on the Durand Line—it provides a snapshot of Afghanistan’s India –
Pakistan dilemma in the context of the 1999 Indian Airlines flight IC814 hijack
case. The third section details the existence of Pakistan-friendly and Pakistan-
averse policies in the wake of the 2001 Bonn Conference. This section argues that
the view of Pakistan as either a friend or a foe impacts on policy beliefs,
consequently shaping Afghan policy output vis-à-vis both Pakistan and India.
The fourth section explains how these advocacies underwent a shift in their
composition over the course of the war. Refracted through a weak state dependent
on external sources for power and legitimacy, contradictions between these

advocacy groups became embodied in the presidency of Hamid Karzai. The fifth
section focuses on the 2002 – 2005 timeframe and highlights the impact of a North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) backed electoral political system on the
ethnic and regional politics of Afghanistan. The sixth section looks at the 2006 –
2010 timeframe and shows how the West’s fading interest in Afghanistan and the
domestic reconciliation process sharpened Kabul’s India – Pakistan dilemma. The
final section explores Afghanistan’s shifting advocacies after 2011 as the NATO
security umbrella began to lift. Islamabad’s rising importance in the domestic
calculus of Kabul keeps New Delhi struggling to retain its relevance in
Afghanistan. The paper concludes that the sovereign agency of a weak state is
deeply impacted upon by competing internal advocacies, which in turn are
defined by the conduct of external powers. Therefore, regardless of India and
Pakistan’s contrasting public images in Afghanistan, the strategic importance of
balancing the two South Asian neighbours is not lost on Afghanistan’s political
elite, including the Afghan Taliban.
Foreign policymaking in weak states

The foreign policy behaviour of weak and small states has elicited multiple
conceptual explanations over the years. Ranging from the dominant structural
and systemic explanations rooted in neorealist traditions of IR to the focus
on domestic sources and the constructivism of identity and ideas, foreign
policymaking in weak states has been rigorously conceptualized using various
cases. Within the hermeneutic literature of neorealism sits Waltz’s (1979)
classic argument that small powers are likely to bandwagon with threatening
great powers rather than balancing them. With the international system
assumed to be the most relevant level of analysis, this school of thought
argued that weak states are afforded little space to manoeuvre. For Walt
(1987, 31),
3
Though vastly different in many ways, the terms ‘weak’ and ‘small’ are used
interchangeably in this paper. Given the nature of Afghanistan’s state structure since 2001,
it can be categorised as both weak and small.
4 Avinash Paliwal
Although strong neighbours of strong states are likely to balance, small and weak
neighbours of great powers may be more inclined to bandwagon. Because they will
be the first victim of expansion, because they lack the capacity to stand alone, and
because a defensive alliance may operate too slowly to do them much good,
accommodating a threatening power may be tempting.
Snyder (1991, 20) and Levy (1989) support this argument, stating that external
factors define the operational foreign policy contours of weak states, which
‘bandwagon’ and do not ‘balance’, the latter being a trait of strong states or great
powers. Labs (1992, 406) confirms Walt’s hypothesis that the availability of allies
impacts on the policy choices of weak states, though also argues that weak states
may value sovereignty more than safety. However, Handel (1981) and Skidmore
(1994) argue that weak states operate on a survival instinct and that Waltz’s level
of systemic analysis is most relevant to understanding weak state behaviour.
Given that these studies emerged mostly in the context of the Cold War or its
immediate aftermath, it is unsurprising that most of these studies employed a

neorealist argument to explain the policy behaviour of weak states. Complement-
ing this line of neorealist argument are studies on weak state behaviour during
World War II and the Cold War by Rothstein (1968), Keohane (1969) and Fox
(1959), among others.
However, as the neorealist thesis was contested using other theoretical lenses,
including constructivism and liberalism within the discipline of IR, so was the
idea that systemic pressures necessarily determine the foreign policy behaviour of
weak states. In a critique of the neorealist approach, Elman (1995, 171) argues that
‘the distribution of power and the balance of threat do influence domestic
institutional formation and change in emerging states. However, the subsequent
military strategies of . . . weak states are likely to reflect . . . domestic institutional
choices in a number of important and predictable ways’. Building on this critique
are recent works by Doeser (2010) and Gvalia et al (2013) that focus on domestic-
and individual-level variables. Using the case of Georgia’s balancing strategy with
Russia, Gvalia et al (2013, 100) argue that ‘elite ideas, identities, and preferences
over social orders . . . play a greater role in explaining foreign policy behavior of
small states’. Doeser (2010), on the other hand, demonstrates using the case of
Denmark that change in a small state’s foreign policy ‘is a result of a combination
of external pressures and domestic political concerns’. In an interesting study
connecting rationalist and constructivist approaches to the foreign policymaking
of weak states, Hancock (2006, 117) analyses Belarus’s surrender of sovereignty to
Russia. Steering away from the straitjacket of both systemic and constructivist
approaches, Hancock employs a ‘process-tracing’ technique to show how
Belarusian President Aleksandyr Lukashenka used fuel pipelines to his advantage
in negotiating with Moscow, yet domestic factors such as weak nationalism and
weak democratic norms forced Lukashenka to give up some degree of sovereignty
(Hancock 2006, 132– 134). Raising important questions about ‘hierarchy and
sovereignty in the international system and the role of weak states’, Hancock
complicates the hermeneutic approach to analysis of the foreign policymaking of
weak states. Finally, Giacalone (2012) provides an exhaustive review of the
evolution of foreign policy analysis in Latin America. Covering Brazil, Argentina,
Mexico, Colombia, Venezuela and Chile, Giacalone (2012, 335) concludes that
‘incorporating the cultural-institutional context in which Latin American
academics write enhances our understanding of national variations and how

national and international factors get connected’.
The above review shows that the foreign policy behaviour of weak states has
been studied primarily using hermeneutic approaches, but there has lately been a
shift in favour of heuristic tools of analysis as proposed by Hancock (2012).
Moreover, in addition to foreign policy analysis (FPA) of weak states, the wider
literature on theories of public policy processes are dominated by rationalist (Allison
and Zelikow 1999) and structural or bureaucratic (Moe 1990) approaches. While the
rationalist approach gives primacy to the state as a rational actor, structural theory
deals mostly with bureaucratic and organizational approaches to policymaking and
behaviour. Though important in their own right, most of these studies ignore the
influence of beliefs—which often turn into powerful myths and norms in the South
Asian and Afghan context—in shaping the course of policy. Filling this gap in the
policy literature is Sabatiers’ (1991) ACF. Emphasizing policy change, learning and
coalition behaviour, the ACF emerged in the 1990s as a response to the dominant
bureaucratic and rational choice theories of policy processes. Having been widely
applied to the environmental, energy and nuclear policymaking of developed
countries, there are fewer cases using the ACF to understand foreign policy. The few
existing examples include a comparative study of Swiss foreign policy vis-à-vis
South Africa and Iraq (Hirschi and Widmer 2010) and analysis of American foreign
policy on the question of the creation of Israel (Pierce 2011) and the American
strategic approach towards the Soviet Union (Lee 2014). This paper uses the ACF to
conceptualize competing Afghan policy beliefs vis-à-vis India and Pakistan between
2001 and 2014 and argues that this framework of policy analysis can assist in
understanding the foreign policy behaviour of weak states.
The key hypothesis of the ACF is that there is a strong causal relationship
between the dependent variables ‘beliefs systems’ and ‘policy change’ and the
independent variables ‘policy-oriented learning’ and ‘external shocks’, as well as
‘negotiated agreements’ (Sabatier 2007). At the macro level, the ACF assumes that
specialists within a particular ‘policy subsystem’ play an important role in
policymaking (Sabatier 2007). The behaviour of these specialists is affected by
broader socioeconomic and political factors. Moreover, the ACF holds that
individuals are heavily impacted upon by social psychology and that multiple
actors in a subsystem should be aggregated into ‘advocacy coalitions’. The belief
system according to the ACF is a three-tier system including core beliefs, policy
beliefs and secondary beliefs. Core beliefs are ontological and normative
assumptions about human values whereas policy beliefs are the application of
core beliefs by policy participants within a policy subsystem. Secondary beliefs,
however, are more about tactics than strategy. Though these beliefs are
institutionalized in developed states, the influence of competing advocacies on
final policy outputs may seem ad hoc in weak states. In the case study for this
article, for instance, Mohammad Halim Fidai, former governor of Afghanistan’s
Wardak Province, states, ‘I don’t think that Afghanistan yet has a clear cut foreign
policy in regard to the neighbouring countries including India [and Pakistan].
Whatever stances are taken are on ad hoc basis and are not well thought out.’4
4
Interview with Mohammad Halim Fidai, former governor of Wardak Province,
Kabul, 27 April 2013.
6 Avinash Paliwal
Based on primary research and using a historical review methodology, this paper
conceptualizes policy advocacies of the Afghan elite vis-à-vis India and Pakistan
between 2001 and 2014, demonstrating how Afghan political orientation towards
the two South Asian neighbours evolved during the war. However, before delving
into advocacies, the next section locates the idea of territorial sovereignty—mostly
vis-à-vis Pakistan, where it is challenged—in modern Afghan history.
Interpreting territorial sovereignty

Modern Afghanistan’s approach towards Pakistan is conditioned by debate over
the Durand Line (Saikal 2012). Designed to mark the British Raj’s zone of
influence and secure its frontiers, the 1893 Durand Line Agreement controver-
sially decided the fate of Afghanistan’s contemporary territorial construct. The
agreement having incensed the Afghan leadership and divided the Pashtuns of
the frontier region, disagreement over the Durand Line and Kabul’s firm desire to
seek independence from the British led to the Third Anglo-Afghan War of 1919.
The war having resulted in an armistice and Afghanistan’s total independence
from British influence, the Afghan leader, King Amanullah Khan, in 1919
accepted the frontier with the British Raj in the Treaty of Rawalpindi (1919), which
states that ‘[the] Afghan Government accepts the Indo-Afghan frontier accepted
by the late Amir [Abdur Rahman]’.5 Amir Abdur Rahman Khan, however,
wanted control over the northern Mohmand tribal agency and viewed Peshawar
as an Afghan city, both of which had gone to British India. Though Kabul was
unable to wrest territory from the British, it viewed the creation of Pakistan, which
inherited Peshawar in 1947, with antipathy. Perceiving an opportunity to discredit
the Durand Line and take back territory, Afghanistan voted against Pakistan’s
creation at the United Nations (UN) in 1947. As the tone for Afghanistan –
Pakistan relations became set as adversarial, Kabul and New Delhi bonded.
Afghanistan signed a Treaty of Friendship with India in January 1950. That same
year Pakistan claimed that Afghan troops and Pashtun tribesmen attacked its
northern border and entered ‘30 miles northeast of Chaman in Baluchistan’
(Gartenstein-Ross and Vassefi 2012). Cross-border skirmishes between Afghani-
stan and Pakistan arose in the early 1960s as the territorial sensitivity of both
countries increased (Montagno 1963). The 1970s brought further deterioration of
bilateral relations.
The interpretation of territorial sovereignty by contemporary Afghanistan’s
elite and the wider population is visible in the fact that not a single Afghan
government conceded to Pakistan on the issue of the Durand Line. Even the
Pakistan-backed Taliban refused to sanctify the Durand Line during its rule from
1996 to 2001. The Taliban stated that there should be no borders between Muslims.
In fact, just months before 9/11 a 95-member armed delegation of the Taliban
visited the Mohmand Agency in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA)
region. Not only was the delegation welcomed, the local chieftain also hoisted the
Taliban flag on the occasion, enraging Pakistan. According to Pakistani media, the
visit ‘revived Afghanistan’s claim on the area and left Islamabad shocked’
(Roashan 2001).
5
Article V, Treaty of Rawalpindi, 8 August 1919.
Afghanistan’s pre-2001 India –Pakistan dilemma and the impact of the Taliban’s
agency as an independent political and security actor were acutely visible in
December 1999. The hijack of Indian Airlines flight IC814 en route to Delhi from
Kathmandu by Pakistan-based militants, and its forced landing in Taliban-
controlled Kandahar, demonstrated this dynamic. With the plane on their territory,
it fell upon the Taliban to mediate between the hijackers and Indian officials. After
eight days of gruelling negotiations, India acceded to certain demands of the
hijackers and all hostages were released. During this time, India’s plans to
undertake commando action became impossible because Taliban militia had
surrounded the plane. Exercising territorial sovereignty, the Taliban refused Indian
military engagement on Afghan soil while preventing the plane from taking off if
the negotiations were to fail (Malhotra 2009). Crystallizing the popular image of the
Taliban being a Pakistani ‘puppet’, the incident left India convinced that
Afghanistan did not have independent political agency.6 For Pakistan, this was a
strategic coup bringing it close to its imagined military ‘strategic depth’ vis-à-vis
India in Afghanistan. However, the Taliban, which was expecting a diplomatic
opening with India for being impartial mediators, was left wondering why India
refused to engage. According to Hakim Mujahid, former Taliban envoy to the UN,
The Taliban authorities very wisely dealt with that case [IC814] and they could
release safely the Indian airplane at that time. That was a point of making good
relations between the Indian government and the Taliban authorities. But they
[Taliban] could not exploit that opportunity and neither did the Indian government
[exploit it] at that time.7
Syed Akbar Agha, chief of the Jaish-ul-Muslimeen and a former senior aide of
Taliban chief Mullah Omar, voices similar sentiment.8 Additionally, according to
Wakil Ahmad Muttawakil, the Taliban foreign minister involved in the hijacking
negotiations, the ‘key actors [hijackers] wanted to take the plane to another
destination, but we [Taliban] didn’t allow that’ (Malhotra 2009). Interestingly,
despite India’s rhetorical aversion to the Taliban, the latter’s desire to exercise
sovereign agency was not lost on Indian officials. New Delhi officially thanked the
Taliban for its ‘correct’ role as mediators, and the debate on whether to politically
engage the Taliban or not became acute within India.9 However, the incident also
shows that, despite being dependent on Islamabad for political and physical
survival, the Taliban did not necessarily sympathize with Pakistan. This raises the
important question of how Pakistan is in fact viewed within Afghanistan.
Pakistan: friend or foe?

The Afghan political camp remains split over the Pakistan question. One coalition
is largely hostile towards Islamabad, and many of its members advocate a forward
6
Interview with Vikram Sood, former chief of R&AW, India’s external intelligence
agency, New Delhi, 20 March 2013. Plus: interview with ‘A’, a top Indian intelligence officer
involved in IC814 negotiations.
7
Interview with Hakim Mujahid, former Taliban delegate to the UN, Kabul, 6 May
2013.
8
Interview with Syed Akbar Agha, senior Taliban official, Kabul, 30 April 2013.
9
Suo Moto statement by India’s External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh in both
Houses of Parliament on the hijacking of Indian Airlines Flight IC814, 28 February 2000.
8 Avinash Paliwal
diplomatic and military approach. This could be achieved by fomenting

insurgency in Pakistan’s Baluchistan Province and the FATA by supporting the
Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and the Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA). This
idea is intended to develop asymmetric military capabilities to gain strategic
parity vis-à-vis Islamabad. From this perspective, friendship with India would act
as insurance against Pakistani aggression. The second camp promotes measured
diplomatic engagement with Islamabad and prioritizes Pakistan over other
countries in the region, including India. Pashtunistan as a political issue has little
resonance in this camp. This advocacy stems from the fact that Pakistan is
militarily strong and confrontation with Islamabad is not viable. Cutting across
the Afghan sociopolitical spectrum, these advocacies are not static.
The# 2001 Bonn Conference brought a clearer articulation of Afghanistan’s
policy preferences vis-à-vis India and Pakistan. The four Afghan groups
participating in the conference—the Rome Group, the Cyprus Group, the
Peshawar Group and the United Front—represented Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras and
the Durrani Pashtuns. Each group was critical of Pakistan’s involvement in
Afghan affairs before 2001. Absent from the conference, however, were the
Pashtun Islamists—Hizb-e-Islami (Gulbuddin Hekmatyar), Hizb-e-Islami (Yunus
Khalis), the Haqqani Network and other Taliban figures—all of whom had
Pakistan’s support. Islamabad sent Arif Ayub, Pakistan’s former ambassador to
the Taliban, and Farooq Afzai, a Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) officer
(Lambah 2006). India sent its special envoy Satinder Lambah. Initially isolated,
Lambah, along with the Iranians and Russians, helped negotiate a settlement
between the different Afghan factions (Lambah 2011, Dobbins 2008, 73). Pakistan,
on the contrary, became marginalized as the conference proceeded and Hamid
Karzai was announced the head of the interim government. Former Afghan king
Zahir Shah, a Durrani Pashtun and supporter of the Pashtunistan issue, headed
the Rome Group. The Cyprus Group was close to Iran, while the Peshawar Group
mostly represented the Gailani family, known for its secular royalist credentials
despite having lived in Pakistan (Lambah 2011). The United Front, a conglomerate
of various armed factions dominated by non-Pashtuns, had enjoyed India’s,
Russia’s and Iran’s support in their fight against the Taliban before 2001. As for
Karzai, his belief that Pakistan’s ISI was behind his father’s assassination in 1999
contributed to his lack of sympathy towards the Pakistani establishment even
though his political links with India, where he completed his university
education, were limited. Almost every group at the conference was averse to
Pakistan’s role. The reason was simple: between 1994 and 1999, ‘an estimated
80,000 to 100,000 Pakistanis trained and fought in Afghanistan’ along with the
Taliban against the United Front (Maley 2009, 288). The November 2001 Kunduz
airlift by Pakistan was undertaken to evacuate its military and intelligence
personnel in addition to senior Taliban figures.
Having dominated the conference, the Pakistan-averse advocacy became
somewhat institutionalized in the June 2002 Loya Jirga.10 As for India, with the
interim government led by Karzai and dominated by members of the former
United Front, it was set for a re-entry into Afghanistan after six years of non-
10
Loya Jirga is a traditional Afghan grand assembly or grand council, as referred to in
the Pashto language.
engagement during Taliban rule.11 New Delhi found close allies in the Pakistan-
averse advocacy coalition constituting military commanders and leaders of the
United Front who now took key government posts. Additionally, Karzai’s
elevation of Zahir Shah as the ‘Father of the Nation’ at the Loya Jirga symbolized
the acceptability of political ideals pursued by the former king, Pashtunistan
being one. Though a purely symbolic gesture, the elevation of Zahir Shah had
historical significance with regard to how Pashtuns imagined the territorial
configuration of Afghanistan. Reinforcing this territorial sensitivity was Karzai’s
emphatic statement in 2005: ‘A line of hatred that raised a wall between the two
brothers’ (Harrison 2009). In 2006 he initiated ‘Pashtunistan Day’ celebrations to
take place on 31 August every year. Wider public opinion, which viewed the
international community’s renewed interest in Afghanistan as a blessing to
emerge from the morass of civil war (Clark 2012), welcomed Indian engagement—
framed as a ‘development partnership’—while Pakistan remained anathema.12
However, political equations changed as the war turned out to be a slow-motion

disaster for the Coalition forces and the Taliban confidently resurged (Bird and
Marshall 2011).
It is important to note here that, despite the dominance of the Pakistan-averse
advocacy, the Taliban and other Pashtun Islamists (not present at Bonn) viewed
the Indian support for the Soviets and the Afghan communists in 1980s with
disdain.13 India’s covert logistical support for the non-Pashtun United Front
further disconnected India from the Pashtuns in the 1990s, particularly the
Taliban. Dependent on Pakistan, these groups remained marginalized in post-
9/11 Afghan political settings. Not surprisingly, Indian diplomacy after 2001
sought to transform its image among Pashtuns. However, political alignments in
Afghanistan are highly flexible. Often considered closely knit, the Taliban and
other Pashtun Islamists had many differences with the Pakistani establishment.
As emerged later in an autobiography of the former Taliban ambassador to
Pakistan, Mullah Abdal Salam Zaeef, the Taliban distrusted the ISI (Zaeef 2010).
Having been isolated and condemned internationally and less than capable of
running a state themselves, the Taliban were politically and economically
dependent on Pakistan and the Gulf countries. Asserting sovereign agency was
nearly impossible in this context. Even Hekmatyar, a long-time Pakistan ally, felt
betrayed when Islamabad shifted support to the Taliban in 1994, and approached
India for armed support, only to be rebuffed.14
Similarly, rivalry between non-Pashtuns and Pakistan is not historically
enduring despite its contemporary political intensity. In fact, Burhanuddin
Rabbani and Ahmad Shah Massoud of the Jamiat-e-Islami were nurtured by
Pakistan in the 1970s against President Daoud Khan and later the Soviet and
11
The United Front included the Sunni Tajik-dominated Jamiat-e-Islami of Massoud
and Rabbani, the Uzbek-dominated Junbish-e-Milli of Abdul Rashid Dostum, the Pashtun-
dominated Eastern Shura of Abdul Qadir, the Hazara-dominated Hezb-e-Wahdat of
Mohammad Mohaqiq and Karim Khalili and the Shia Tajik- and Hazara-dominated
Harakat-e-Islami of Sayed Hussain Anwari.
12
‘India and Afghanistan: a development partnership’, Ministry of External Affairs of
India, , http://mea.gov.in/Uploads/PublicationDocs/176_india-and-afghanistan-a-
development-partnership.pdf. .
13
Hakim Mujahid, interview, 2013.
14
Sood, interview, 2013.
10 Avinash Paliwal
Afghan communists, all of whom were close to India. The idea was to put pressure
on Daoud, who was a staunch supporter of the Pashtunistan movement and used
Pashtun irregulars to foment insurgency on the Afghan periphery. Ordered by
Pakistani Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto against what was viewed as
Afghanistan’s transgression of Pakistani territory, the ISI was close to
Afghanistan’s non-Pashtun jihadists and the Mujahideen well before Soviet
intervention. Sustained throughout the communist era and the Soviet interven-
tion, the relationship broke after the 1992 Peshawar Accord. Pakistan chose
Hekmatyar and later the Taliban over the United Front’s leader Ahmad Shah
Massoud and other non-Pashtuns. The latter received support from Iran, Russia
and India (Coll 2004). The next section shows how the composition of these
Afghan advocacies evolved during the war.
#Ethnicity and regional alignments

Afghanistan’s independent agency is reflected in the changing composition of the
Pakistan-averse and Pakistan-friendly camps over the course of the war.
Members of the former United Front, the staunch Pakistan-averse group, started
actively engaging Pakistan.15 However, Pashtuns who had traditionally been
close to Islamabad grew critical of Pakistan. Tajiks close to India since the 1990s
became ‘disillusioned’ by New Delhi’s unambiguous thrust towards the
Pashtuns and the Karzai government,16 while Pashtuns, particularly Karzai,
developed close links with India.17 The post-2001 new elite, with professional
qualifications and academic degrees from, and families in, Western countries,
remained unconvinced about India’s role and were wary of Pakistan. According
to Waheed Omar, former spokesperson of Karzai and head of the Afghanistan
1400 political movement, ‘The feeling at the highest level of the government [of
Afghanistan] was that India is confused as to what level of political involvement
it exactly wants in Afghanistan.’18 Changing composition in this case may not
necessarily mean that the Pakistan-averse advocacy lost its dominance. With
public perception still critical of Pakistan and positive towards India, political
groups who are willing to negotiate with Islamabad often find it difficult to
publicize their ideas. Operating within a post-2001 state apparatus, legitimized
and supported by the international community, these advocacies are subject to
domestic political pressures. Fuelling existing ethnic and political schisms, the
presidential system that concentrates power in one individual is fraught with
15
Interview with Ahmad Wali Massoud, Kabul, 29 April 2013.
16
Interviews in Kabul: presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah, 2 May 2013; Hizb-e-
Wahdat leader Mohammad Mohaqiq, 3 May 2013; former political aide of Massoud ‘B’, 9
April 2013; journalist Fahim Dashty [Tajik camp], 8 April 2013; journalist Omar Sharifi
[Tajik camp], 2 May 2013, former deputy foreign minister Jawed Ludin, 21 April 2013;
Deputy Foreign Minister Ershad Ahmadi, 7 April 2013. In Herat: Governor Daud Saba, 17
April 2013.
17
Interview in Kabul: Afghan Ambassador to Pakistan Janan Musazai, 7 April 2013;
journalist Sanjar Sohail, 24 April 2013; Syed Akbar Agha from the Taliban, 30 April 2013;
Hakim Mujahid from the Taliban, 06 May 2013; and Bacha Khan Foundation’s Sanaullah
Tasal, 19 April 2013.
18
Interview with Waheed Omar, former spokesperson for the President of Afghanistan,
Afghanistan’s India– Pakistan dilemma 11
contradictions. As the external source of legitimacy and power recedes—for a

state that has little control over its periphery—the struggle to generate domestic
legitimacy and patronage shapes policy. As a result, whilst there is a centrifugal
force that divides politics on ethnic lines, there is also a centripetal force that
unites different factions over the sanctity of a democratic electoral system of
governance.
Pakistan and India’s response to this internal Afghan dynamic determined the
composition of Afghanistan’s foreign policy preferences. Pakistan responded by
politically and militarily supporting Pashtun Islamists and diplomatically
lobbying the non-Pashtuns. While Islamabad maintained relations with the
central government, its diplomacy was decentralized in nature. India responded
by giving primacy to the central government and, apart from some large
infrastructural projects, focused on small developmental projects in Pashtun-
dominated areas.19 While it maintained links with non-Pashtun factions,
primarily Tajiks and Hazaras, its diplomacy was highly centralized with a strong
tilt towards the Pashtuns. From a regional strategic standpoint, while both India
and Pakistan would like influence over Kabul, a strong Afghan state close to New
Delhi is in India’s interest, while a weak Afghan state under Pakistan’s influence is
in Islamabad’s interest. In essence, while India supports a centripetal democratic
process in Afghanistan in practice, Pakistan supports it only in principle. Pakistan
often capitalizes on centrifugal pressures in Afghanistan to retain influence over
Kabul. These disparate overtures by India and Pakistan, coupled with differences
of geographical reach, offset the importance of one over the other as Afghans
attempt to balance the two. Perceptions persist, however, that India is refusing to
engage in Afghan affairs to the extent of being afraid, while Pakistan interferes in
Afghans affairs to the extent of being intrusive.
Three critical junctures since the 2001 Bonn Conference mark the shifts in
Afghan advocacies on South Asia. First, the 2004 Afghan elections coupled with
the resurgence of the Taliban by early 2005. Second, the 2009 Afghan elections
after the Taliban surge and the 2010 London Conference, which saw a major
diplomatic thrust towards dialogue with the Taliban. And, third, the period from
2011, when the US declared its intention to halt combat operations and leave
Afghanistan by 2014. The US intervention in 2001 had provided the US little time
to rethink its long-term strategy. In what later came to be known as a ‘double
game’, the Pakistani leadership tactically reversed its Afghan policy by vowing
support for the US against terrorism and supporting Karzai (Tellis 2008). In line
with the ‘war on terror’ rhetoric, there was little acceptance of Islamist discourses.
India, too, threw its weight behind the newly established central authority. Tajik
leader Wali Massoud, younger brother of the late Ahmad Shah Massoud and until
recently a hawk of the Pakistan-averse camp, notes India’s and Pakistan’s shift
after 9/11: ‘It was a new age, a new chapter, so people in the Resistance [United
Front] did not take much notice of what happened . . . Things were so immediate,
so quick.’20 As the following paragraphs detail, Wali Massoud and other non-
Pashtuns changed their political line on South Asia with the changing regional
19
‘India and Afghanistan’.
20
Interview with Ahmad Wali Massoud, Tajik politician, Kabul, 29 April 2013.
12 Avinash Paliwal
security dynamic. The next section details the contours of Afghan advocacies from
2002 to 2005.
Electoral politics and security

With Pakistan-averse advocacy dominant, positive attitudes towards India
strengthened significantly between 2002 and 2005. However, according to
Abdullah Abdullah, the then foreign minister of Afghanistan, diverging
narratives emerged early on in 2002.21 One said that Afghanistan should strike
a balance in its relationship with India and Pakistan. The other stated that
achieving that balance at such a nascent stage would be impossible.22 The
international community, particularly the UN Special Representative to
Afghanistan, Lakhdar Brahimi, continued to remind Afghan leaders to maintain
distance from India given Pakistani concerns.23 However, these internal
discussions lost traction almost as soon as they had started.24 Fissures between
political factions had widened by the 2004 elections and regional balancing lost
political steam. Parachuted into Afghan politics by the US, Karzai’s ascendancy
generated political friction. His appointment as the interim president, from a
historical perspective, was déjà vu of sorts. It was similar to the British Raj’s
installation of Shah Shuja, the nineteenth-century Pashtun king, or, more recently,
the installation of Babrak Karmal, leader of the communist People’s Democratic
Party of Afghanistan (PDPA), by the Soviet Union in 1979. Karzai was more
dependent on Washington for his presidency than on the Afghan ballot. Secretly
accepting funding from the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), he used the US to
pressure his opponents into accepting his decisions (Rosenberg 2013).
Karzai actively played one domestic faction against the other to maintain
control, a tactic he employed with equal dexterity externally. Cooption
mechanisms included luring warlords into ministerial posts and offering
administrative positions to key individuals from different ethnic groups.
However, the challenge in the 2004 elections came from Yunus Qanooni, a
protégé of Massoud and chief negotiator for the United Front at the Bonn
Conference; Mohammad Mohaqiq, a Hazara warlord; and Abdul Rashid Dostum,
an Uzbek warlord. Qanooni had support from fellow Tajiks like Abdullah
Abdullah, and Vice President Marshall Fahim, while Mohaqiq and Dostum
formed a coalition. Karzai ran independently with support from the Pashtun-
dominated social-democratic Afghan Millat Party, and the Dawat-e-Islami of ex-
Mujahideen Abdul Rab Rasul Sayyaf. Against all odds, Karzai won 55.4 per cent
of the vote as opposed to 16.3 per cent for Qanooni, 11.7 per cent for Mohaqiq and
ten per cent for Dostum.25 It was only a matter of time before allegations of rigging
and corruption surfaced. In fact, according to former UN Special Representative to
Afghanistan, Kai Eide, the levels of corruption in the 2004 national elections were
21
Abdullah, interview, 2013.
22
23
24
Sharifi, interview, 2013.
25
Afghanistan presidential election results 2004, ,http://www.iec.org.af/public_
html/Election%20Results%20Website/english/english.htm.
Afghanistan’s India –Pakistan dilemma 13
higher even compared to the 2009 electoral process that is widely known for being
marred by fraudulent practices (Marquand 2009).26
Political and ethnic standoffs between Karzai and his opponents coincided
with the resurgence of the Afghan Taliban. Having found sanctuary in the tribal
areas of Pakistan, the Taliban quietly regrouped while the US shifted attention and
resources towards Iraq. They began staging a comeback after 2004, targeting
international forces and Afghan government bodies. In a secret cable sent to the
State Department in 2005 by the US Ambassador to Afghanistan, Ronald E
Neumann, Taliban resurgence was attributed to the ‘four years that the Taliban
has had to reorganize and think about their approach in a sanctuary beyond the
reach of either government’ (Jha 2010). The Taliban attempted to disrupt the
elections and employed Iraq-style suicide bombing tactics as well as the use of
improvised explosive devices against international forces and government bodies
(though the Taliban did not, or could not, significantly disrupt any of the three
elections). Washington did little to quell the movement despite Neumann’s

warning that if Taliban sanctuaries in Pakistan were not addressed, there could be
a ‘re-emergence of the same strategic threat to the United States that prompted our
OEF (Operation Enduring Freedom) intervention’ in 2001 (Jha 2010). However,
with the focus on al-Qaeda, the Bush administration was less willing to push
Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf, its regional ally, into fixing Taliban
strongholds in Pakistan’s tribal agencies.
These developments sowed the seeds of realignment in advocacies inherited
from the civil war years. Both India and Pakistan had expressed public support for
the Karzai government and the electoral process. While Pakistan’s support was
considered cosmetic given the strains between the Pakistani President and Army
Chief Pervez Musharraf and Karzai, India’s policy signified a shift towards the
Karzai government. India met members of all different factions, but mostly as
government representatives. Qanuni, in the capacity of minister of the interior,
had flown with Lambah to New Delhi from Bonn after the conference. Abdullah
Abdullah, Mohaqiq, Dostum and Karzai soon followed. Karzai visited India three
times within a span of three years and sought aid and assistance, which came in
abundance.27 India was already contributing to large projects, including highways
and dams in Afghanistan. However, in a subtle tactical departure from such
projects, New Delhi announced small development projects in the health,
education, medical and infrastructural aid sectors during Indian Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh’s 2005 Kabul visit (Suhrawardy and Agencies 2005). While the
large projects were often symbolic, smaller projects assisted in reaching grassroots
levels in Pashtun-dominated areas. With popular sentiment in its favour and
relations with most warlords in the government remaining strong, India’s shift
went largely unnoticed. New Delhi was closely watching Taliban movements and
searching for ways to build political constituencies in the Pashtun hinterlands
along the border with Pakistan. Thus, as far as India was concerned, the
advocacies had not shifted and its policy remained unproblematic.
26
Eide’s statement remains contested, as many observers believe that the 2004 elections
were the least tainted of all three elections prior to 2014.
27
‘Indian commitment to Afghanistan touches USD 2 billion: PM’, Hindustan Times, 13
May 2011, , http://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/Afghanistan/Indian-
commitment-to-Afghanistan-touches-USD-2-billion-PM/Article1-697007.aspx..
14 Avinash Paliwal
For Pakistan, however, these years were difficult because the Pakistan-averse
advocacy remained dominant. Musharraf’s pivot towards the US had created
enemies at home. The tribal areas were buzzing with Islamist hardliners as well as,
according to US intelligence, al-Qaeda operatives.28 Groups like the Jaish-e-
Mohammad (JeM), formerly cultivated by the ISI, had turned against Musharraf
and came close to assassinating him on three different occasions.29 At the same
time Karzai harshly denounced Pakistan for sheltering and controlling the Taliban
and al-Qaeda. Kabul had already been facing the brunt of increased cross-border
insurgent activity from Pakistan. Caught in this Afghanistan –Pakistan dynamic,
the US made unsuccessful attempts to pacify relations between Afghanistan and
Pakistan. As this was a high-priority area, US President George W Bush convened
a trilateral meeting with Karzai and Musharraf on the sidelines of the UN General
Assembly in September 2004. Though Afghan elections were the focal point of the
talks, the process became an important trilateral process over the following years.
Moreover, with support from his opponents, who were also in the government,
Karzai government officials blamed Pakistan for harbouring bin Laden in 2004
(Boone 2011). With Kabul speaking with a unified voice, and Bush tilting towards
Karzai, Musharraf remained on the back foot. This, however, changed over the
course of war, as Karzai increasingly lost legitimacy domestically and his non-
Pashtun opponents ceased supporting his anti-Pakistan stance, often in public.
In India, too, the strategic worth of strong relations with Pashtuns, at the risk of
losing non-Pashtun support, came under question. The next section highlights the
contours of Afghan advocacies between 2006 and 2010.
Politics of reconciliation
While public opinion between 2006 and 2010 remained firmly against Pakistan
and favourable towards India, political undercurrents changed. Pakistan’s
relevance in Kabul increased during this phase, while India, despite its
developmental projects and cooperation on security, grew politically isolated.
In essence, Afghanistan’s political dilemma became acute as Western interest in
the country started fading. Factionalization deepened as the Taliban rose and the
2004 elections unleashed centrifugal pressures. Karzai’s problematic governance
polarized advocacies along ethnic and sectarian lines as the security, political and
economic environment worsened. These domestic fissures were amplified by
changing external dynamics. The ascendance of President Obama in the US and
the People’s Party of Pakistan (PPP) led civilian government in Pakistan altered
Afghan calculations. A democratically elected PPP government was welcomed in
Kabul and so was Obama. However, the simultaneous emergence of the TTP in
December 2007 and the 26/11 Mumbai attacks in November 2008 intensified
regional security dilemmas. While the former gradually shifted Pakistan’s
attention to internal security concerns, the latter ruptured an ongoing
28
‘Top al Qaeda operative caught in Pakistan’, 2 March 2003, CNN, , http://edition.
cnn.com/2003/WORLD/asiapcf/south/03/01/pakistan.arrests/index.html?_s¼ PM:
asiapcf . .
29
‘Jaish-e-Mohammad’, National Counterterrorism Center, , http://www.nctc.gov/site/
groups/jem.html..
comprehensive dialogue between New Delhi and Islamabad. From the American
side, rather than reducing the American military presence, Obama announced a
troop surge in 2009 and intensified drone attacks in Pakistan. These
developments, coupled with a weak state, further complicated Afghanistan’s
existing political dynamics.
NATO’s increasing engagement with Taliban fighters from 2006 onwards also
influenced political equations. According to Karzai in June 2006,
For two years, I have systematically, consistently and on a daily basis warned the
international community of what was developing in Afghanistan and of the need
for a change of approach in this regard . . . The international community [must]
reassess the manner in which this war against terror is conducted. (Liethead 2006)
According to Human Rights Watch, more than 669 civilians were killed in 2006 in
about 350 armed attacks by the Taliban that were intentionally aimed at non-
combatants.30 The proportion of civilians killed by insurgent activities in

Afghanistan rose to as high as 80 per cent in 2011, only to decrease marginally in
2012 and 2013. The resurgence of the Taliban complicated Afghan politics and
gave Pakistan increased traction in Kabul. While Karzai’s attempts to disarm and
demobilize warlords had failed, the rise of the Taliban gave former warlords a
reason to rearm and remobilize (Bowley 2012). Moreover, the rise of the TTP in
Pakistan ensured continuous violence in the border areas. With most of the
Taliban leadership either physically in Pakistan or close to the ISI, the role of
Rawalpindi and Islamabad became crucial for reconciliation.31 India, on the other
hand, had little reach on the ground and almost no links with the Taliban.
The 2009 Afghan elections further ruptured the domestic political fabric.
Marked by low voter turnout, political violence, ballot stuffing and other electoral
fraud, the elections sharpened the politico-ethnic divide (MacDonald-Gibson
2009). Political loyalties were now mapped on the basis of pro-Karzai and anti-
Karzai camps. Apart from electoral fraud, which struck a blow to the fragile
democratic fabric of Afghanistan, Karzai gave more power to warlords in 2009.
This was in complete contrast to his 2002 pledge to weaken the role of warlords
and private militias in Afghanistan. Allegations of armed coercion and rigging
were also made against the opposing candidate, Abdullah Abdullah. The 2009
elections, in effect, gave legitimate political space to warlords who still had private
militias (running into thousands of foot soldiers) and were unpopular among the
public. Two of these warlords included the staunch Islamist Abdul Rasul Sayyaf,
who invited Osama bin Laden to Afghanistan during the Taliban era, and the
Uzbek warlord Dostum. The idea was to gain block votes from the Uzbek and
some Pashtun pockets. Abdullah challenged the election results and blamed
Karzai for undertaking fraudulent practices. According to Mohaqiq, ‘Karzai has
begun the ethnic war’ (Filkins 2010). In the words of Rahman Oghly, an Uzbek
member of parliament (MP), ‘Karzai is giving Afghanistan back to the Taliban,
and he is opening up old schisms’ (Filkins 2010). As a result, the central
30
‘Afghanistan: civilians bear cost of escalating insurgent attacks’, Human Rights Watch,
, www.hrw.org/en/news/2007/04/15/afghanistan-civilians-bear-cost-escalating-
insurgent-attacks. .
31
This includes the Quetta Shura, the Peshawar Shura, the Haqqani Network and the
Hizb-e-Islami (Gulbuddin).
16 Avinash Paliwal
government became split from within and different ethnic groups began seeking
partnerships with their favoured regional patrons. Almost immediately, India’s
state-to-state and government-to-government diplomatic approach became
problematic, while Pakistan’s lobbying efforts with groups outside the
government and links with the Taliban reaped results.
Further denting Afghan political equations and advocacies in favour of
Pakistan was the institutionalization of the peace process at the London
Conference in January 2010 and the Afghan Peace Jirga in November the same
year. The idea was not new and had already been floated by British Foreign
Secretary David Miliband and London’s Ambassador to Afghanistan, Sherard
Cowper-Coles, in May 2008 (Borger 2008; 2010). The British advocacy of
reconciliation had initially put them at odds with their American counterparts, as
the latter had announced a troop surge and the idea of talks did not fit their ‘war
on terror’ discourse (Walsh and Boone 2010). However, with economic recession
in full swing, the idea of reconciliation gained weight. Western discourse shifted
from viewing the Taliban as a monolithic terrorist entity to a notion of a ‘good and
bad Taliban’ depending on which Taliban figure was willing to negotiate.
However, success on the negotiation table would require Pakistani cooperation.
Due to the UK’s close ties with Islamabad, London’s diplomatic offices were
sought to push forth the idea of talks. The London Conference thus baptized the
peace process, leaving New Delhi fuming.32
At the conference, Karzai categorically stated that Afghanistan and its Western
supporters must ‘reach out to all of our countrymen, especially our disenchanted
brothers (Taliban) who are not part of Al Qaeda’ (Khan and Shinwari 2010).
However, the Indian Minister of External Affairs, SM Krishna, said that there was
little difference between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ Taliban (Malhotra 2010). The London
Conference was viewed in New Delhi as a diplomatic victory for Pakistan in
marginalizing India. Not only was India wary of reconciliation, it felt
systematically isolated from international forums on Afghanistan—including
the important Istanbul process in November 2011—due to pressure from
Islamabad. According to a senior Western diplomat posted in Kabul in 2008, India
was ‘slow footed in accepting the idea of reconciliation, and its diplomats in Kabul
were not comfortable discussing it either’.33 Pakistan, on the other hand, became
increasingly vital not only for reintegration and reconciliation, but also to allow
the US-led Coalition forces a face-saving exit from Afghanistan.
India’s concerns about the proposed reconciliation with the Taliban and
engaging armed militants had precedent. On the morning of 7 July 2008 a suicide
attacker blew up a vehicle-bound improvised explosive device outside the Indian
Embassy in Kabul. The blast killed 58 people and left more then 150 injured.
According to reports, the Haqqani Network had facilitated the attack at the behest
of the ISI (Mazzetti and Schmitt 2008).34 A similar attack took place on 8 October
2009 outside the Indian Embassy, killing 17 and injuring more than 80 people. This
32
In retrospect, the proposed reconciliation process failed and these talks had little
practical influence.
33
Interview with ‘C’, a senior Western official posted in Afghanistan.
34
‘Indian Embassy attack in Kabul: details revealed in Wikileaks’, NDTV, 27 July 2010,
, www.ndtv.com/article/world/indian-embassy-attack-in-kabul-details-revealed-in-
wikileaks-39798..
time it was the Taliban (Walsh 2009). Moreover, just a month after the London
Conference, a suicide bomber levelled the Arya guesthouse in central Kabul,
popular among Indians—mostly Indian army and border police officers—killing
18 and injuring 36.35 Though the Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack,
according to Afghan intelligence officials it was carried out in coordination with
the anti-India outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), which had been trained by the ISI
(Nelson 2010). The message of these attacks was clear: India should keep out of
Afghanistan. India’s support for Karzai, as was being noted, came with a price.
Karzai had termed the Taliban ‘disenchanted brothers’ and often called them
‘Talib-jan’, which means ‘Talib, darling’ (King 2010). Despite its staunch anti-
Taliban line, India, having invested tremendous political capital in Karzai, had no
option but to reluctantly accept the peace process. Pakistan, on the other hand,
made its importance felt by arresting Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, second to
Mullah Omar, and a proponent of direct peace talks with Kabul, in February 2010
(Nelson and Farmer 2010). A direct channel between the Quetta Shura and Kabul
would have undermined Pakistan’s influence over the peace process, which
Islamabad was unwilling to surrender. The next sections detail how this dynamic
unfolded after 2011, when the US declared its intent to withdraw its forces.
US# withdrawal and security dilemma

Kabul’s deepening domestic and regional security dilemma after 2011 decisively
altered advocacies vis-à-vis Pakistan and India. Public opinion favoured an Indian
role in the future development of Afghanistan and remained critical of Pakistan.36
Politically, however, fading Western interest laid bare the regional dynamic.
Pakistan, given its proximity to Afghanistan, was critical in Kabul’s security radar.
India, despite its growing economic might and positive image, simply became
Kabul’s negotiation card with Islamabad. As mentioned earlier, members of the
former United Front camp, traditionally close to India, grew disillusioned with New
Delhi, while the Pashtuns close to Pakistan developed antipathy towards
Islamabad. While on the surface most groups sought positive relations with both
India and Pakistan, Washington’s announcement of an exit plan in June 2011
unleashed a scramble among different stakeholders (Cord 2011). As regional players
jockeyed for influence, domestic constituencies in Afghanistan underwent a critical
change. Three camps emerged. First, the Pakistan-influenced Afghan Taliban and
other insurgent networks including the Haqqani Network and the Hizb-e-Islami
(Gulbuddin). Second, warlords of different ethnic and sectarian hues in and outside
the current government. And, third, the Afghan new elite comprising lawyers,
doctors, scholars, businessmen and other professionals, both men and women, who
had strong links with the West. Unlike in 2002, the third group now occupied
positions in the Afghan state machinery and could influence policy.37
35
‘9 Indians among 17 dead as Taliban bombers attack Kabul’, Times of India, 26
February 2010, , articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2010-02-26/south-asia/28129796_
1_afghan-government-officials-kabul/Indian-doctors . .
36
‘India: an outside presence Afghans actually welcome’, RT, 22 January 2011, , http://
rt.com/news/india-afghans-afghanistan-projects/..
37
The Afghanistan 1400 in Kabul and the Professional Shura in Herat are two such
movements representing civil society voices in Afghanistan.
18 Avinash Paliwal
Though pro- and anti-Karzai sentiment flourished among members of all these
groups, their method of dealing with political challenges was radically different.
The Taliban and its offshoots were comfortable resorting to violence while the
reconciliation process progressed. However, other warlords such as Dostum,
Mohaqiq, Sayyaf, Ismael Khan, the Massoud brothers and Fahim, well known for
their human rights violations during the 1990s, adopted a politically savvy public
image. Most of them have young, English-speaking, culturally aware assistants and
have established foundations intended to enhance their ‘soft’ image.38 Dostum
even apologized for his violent past. Over the years in which they have held
important political offices in Kabul, their soft side has received tremendous media
attention. Interestingly, most of these warlords have been charged with corruption
and own media houses that are often biased (Jafar 2009). Moreover, almost all of
them have private militias protecting them and providing muscular agency to their
politics. Ismael Khan from Herat Province, for instance, is known to have delivered
inflammatory speeches to foment violence and has been accused by his detractors
of causing instability in his province.39 The third group, whose political reach is
largely limited to city centres and the international community, advocates legal
trials of warlords and strengthening of the democratic process. While both the
second and the third group are averse to the return of the Taliban in any concrete
form, they hold deep reservations about one another. As a result, there often are
political standoffs between warlord-cum-politicians and the civilian political elite.
Not surprisingly, to balance the warlord–civilian equations, Ashraf Ghani
Ahmadzai, former chancellor of Kabul University and current president of
Afghanistan had to collaborate with Dostum to contest the 2014 elections.
Power struggles between various civilian politicians and warlords have
erupted in different parts of Afghanistan. According to Sanaullah Tasal of the
Bacha Khan Foundation, ‘these people [the civilian professional elite] don’t have
money, they don’t have gun, they don’t have power in the government. So this is
the reason they can’t run for the government, they are afraid.’40 Holding dual
citizenships these civilians mostly exert influence as a result of their links with
Afghanistan’s international patrons. Yet in order to retain political relevance and a
steady flow of funds from the international community, warlords have silently
kept some degree of instability intact. In the words of Daud Saba, the strong civilian
Governor of Herat Province, the warlords are ‘politically weak’ and very ‘corrupt’.
As for Ismael Khan, a Herati warlord and Saba’s bitter adversary: ‘[He] is a
warlord, he is threatening people, he can kill, and he can do bad things as he has
done in the past. But he is not the controller of the city [Herat] . . . his era is over.’41
Saba is one of the many in the civilian elite who rose to prominence due to political
38
Charity and social organizations like the Massoud Foundation, run by Ahmad Wali
Massoud, and the Dostum Foundation, run by Abdul Rashid Dostum, are used to soften the
image of former warlords. On details of the children of Afghan warlords see, Mashal (2012).
39
Saba, interview, 2013, and interview with Haji Jaweed Zeyaratjahi, senior reporter,
Tolo TV, Herat, 15 April 2013. It must be noted here that Ismael Khan, like many other
‘warlords’, is not viewed as such by many people in his region of influence. Khan, for
instance, despite being at odds with Saba, played a critical role in making Herat a
prosperous city in the early 2000s (though this was achieved, allegedly, by diverting
customs revenue to Herat rather than sending it to Kabul).
40
Tasal, interview, 2013.
41
Saba, interview, 2013.
connections and professional expertise. Despite the Taliban being a common

adversary, the warlords, at some point, were concerned that they would be brought
to trial if Afghanistan’s civilian-dominated judicial and political system became
stronger.42 For example, Sayyaf, a Karzai supporter, actively demanded amnesty
for former warlords, which was granted in 2007. His support base includes former
warlords, even ones from the anti-Karzai camp such as Mohaqiq and Dostum.
Former warlords are often open to negotiating with the Taliban and other insurgent
groups rather than accept an authentic transformation to democracy as understood
in the West. According to Fidai, ‘I am not afraid of the Taliban that they will take
over the cities and the government, but am afraid that there will be a civil war
among groups that are already in the government.’43 This often leaves the third
group of professionals and civilians politically marginalized and insecure.
Afghan attitudes towards India and Pakistan after 2011 were shaped in this
political context. On the surface, all three groups sought good relations with their
South Asian neighbours. However, their domestic compulsions, interests and

ambitions determined the nature of their engagement. To start with, the Karzai
government made sure that it deepened its political links with New Delhi in order
to keep Islamabad’s interference in check. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan
Singh’s Kabul visit in May 2011, followed by the signing of the India –Afghanistan
SPA in October 2011, was Karzai’s way of signalling to Pakistan. As for India, the
SPA marked a departure in its thinking, which now accepted an Afghan-led
reconciliation process. In his speech after signing the SPA, Karzai called India a
‘friend’ and Pakistan a ‘brother’.44 The timing of the SPA was particularly
interesting. On 3 February 2011, a Pakistani soldier was killed in an exchange of
fire between the Afghan and Pakistani armies on the Durand Line (Moore and
Faeiz 2011). Armed skirmishes between the two neighbours and shelling from the
Pakistani side increased at a spectacular pace and became a regular feature after
this incident. Moreover, already strained US –Pakistan relations hit rock bottom
when Karzai’s earlier claim that Osama bin Laden was in Pakistan was proven
true in May 2011. Further, the killing of 28 Pakistani soldiers in the border areas by
American forces in November 2011 caused Islamabad to boycott the second Bonn
Conference in December 2011 (Coleman 2011). Thus, whereas Pakistan started
blaming Karzai for being an ‘obstacle’ to peace in Afghanistan, India invested
more in his government.45
India’s government-centric approach, already under strain since 2009, became
problematic. While many Afghans viewed Pakistan as practising a ‘divide and
control’ strategy, India’s focus on the Karzai government ‘disillusioned’ its former
42
This, however, does not hold true in the current political setup where former warlords
hold important government offices. Also, they persuaded parliament to vote them full
amnesty in 2007. See , http://www.hrw.org/news/2010/03/10/afghanistan-repeal-
amnesty-law..
43
Fidai, interview, 2013.
44
‘Transcript of the lecture by H.E. Hamid Karzai, President of the Islamic Republic of
Afghanistan at the Observer Research Foundation’, 7 October 2011, , president.gov.af/en/
news/3884 . .
45
‘Pakistan sees Afghanistan’s Karzai as obstacle to peace with Taliban’, Dawn, 25
March 2013, , beta.dawn.com/news/797836/pakistan-sees-afghanistans-karzai-as-
obstacle-to-peace-with-taliban . .
20 Avinash Paliwal
United Front allies.46 In the words of Abdullah Abdullah, the current chief
executive officer of Afghanistan:
As far as India is concerned, we didn’t have any particular expectations on a
personal or a factional level. But at the same time it has been our advice to all the
countries involved that only listening to the government will not do the job.47
Though Abdullah appreciates India’s engagement with the central government
and gives it primacy over factional dealings, he remains hesitant about India’s
focus on the Pashtun-dominated southern and eastern parts of the country.
‘Looking at the situation there [south and east Afghanistan] and how helpful those
assistance were towards stabilising those areas is a big question mark,’ he says.
Similarly, Daud Saba, Governor of Herat Province in west Afghanistan, says that
the emerging Afghan leadership is ‘approaching the realm of realism in its
relationship with India and Pakistan’.48 A former minister and a senior advisor to
Karzai on foreign affairs voices similar ideas and believes that India has not met
Afghanistan’s expectations in the political and security sphere, whereas Pakistan
remains actively, and adversely, involved.49 This had led to a re-evaluation of the
two countries’ roles in the minds of Afghanistan’s political elite. Interestingly,
despite India’s focus on the Pashtun areas, senior Afghan Taliban figures have
similar problems with New Delhi’s Afghan policy. Taliban’s Syed Akbar Agha
wants India ‘to have relations equally with people who are in the government and
who are against the government’.50 The Taliban leadership wonders why India
has been so averse to the Taliban when the latter has never made any anti-India
statement and does not want to harm Indian interests in the region. Even though
growing anti-Pakistan sentiment has provided India space to develop political
capital, it remains unclear whether this is translating into political influence.
Finally, even within the Karzai camp the popular feeling is best articulated by
former deputy foreign minister Jawed Ludin: ‘We are paying the price of a
friendship, that we don’t seem to even enjoy that much because India seems to be
a bit careful about being too involved.’51
Just as Afghanistan’s internal centrifugal dynamics steamrolled Indian efforts
to build a favourable political consensus, they gave Pakistan the role it wanted.
Despite a negative public image, in November 2012 a document titled ‘Peace
process roadmap 2015’, prepared by the Afghan High Peace Council, offered non-
elected governorships to Afghan Taliban leaders and made Pakistan part of the
core negotiation group. Interestingly, the document was drafted by the publicly
Pakistan-averse Jawed Ludin.52 To Ludin, Pakistan’s involvement, however
problematic, was the only solution to the Afghan quagmire. Nonetheless, ‘this
needs to be done without giving away the accomplishments of the past twelve
years’.53 This position is best stated in the statements of the Heart of Asia
46
‘B’, interview, 2013.
47
48
Sab,a interview, 2013.
49
Interview with ‘D’, former minister and senior advisor to Hamid Karzai on foreign
policy, Kabul, 20 April 2013.
50
Akbar Agha, interview, 2013.
51
Ludin, interview, 2013.
52
53
Conference, or the Istanbul Process.54 From the warlords’ camp, traditional allies
of India such as the Massoud brothers and Mohaqiq started engaging Pakistan
actively.55 According to Wali Massoud,
They [Pakistan] wanted me to meet the head of the ISI in whichever part of the
world I like . . . they ask me why are we fighting each other when we could be
friends . . . they come with logic.56
While Massoud wants to have good relations with India in the long run, he is
wary of New Delhi’s focus on the Karzai government.57 Even Haneef Atmar, the
National Security Advisor of Afghanistan, believes that ‘one big mistake that
Afghanistan did was the signing of the SPA first with India rather than with
Pakistan. Islamabad had offered us an SPA before India did but we refused to
sign it.’58 Ahmad Zia Massoud, former vice president of Afghanistan and leader
of the National Front Party, criticizes Karzai’s focus on the Durand Line issue,
saying,
By benefiting from such national issues, the President wants to stir people’s support
in favour of his favourable candidate in the forthcoming polls. . . . This, in no way,
will be the solution to solve our complicated border issue with the neighbouring
countries through the media and stimulation of public emotions and sentiments.
It could be solved through logical diplomatic dialogues.59
Non-Pashtun politicians, who have been traditionally at odds with Pakistan, now
say that Pakistan is a more stable partner than India for those whom it supports.
The popular double game that Pakistan played with the Coalition forces in
Afghanistan after 2001, despite international condemnation, interestingly, has
earned it respect among Afghan power brokers.
Pakistan’s pressure on the Afghan Taliban and politicking between different
insurgent networks have angered the Pashtuns tremendously. The ISI had pitched
the Peshawar Shura against the Quetta Shura and the Haqqani Network against
almost everybody. It held Mullah Omar and other Taliban figures in Pakistan and
supplied fighters to the Pashtun areas of Afghanistan. Such actions had
problematized its image among the border tribes. Military actions in the South
Waziristan tribal agency and recently in North Waziristan also undermined its
image among Pashtuns. This has allowed India the political space to build
constituencies and capitalize on anti-Pakistan sentiment. Former Taliban
ambassador to Pakistan Mullah Zaeef’s autobiography clearly notes the Taliban’s
anxieties about Pakistan. Further, according to Akbar Agha,
54
‘Istanbul Process: a new agenda for regional cooperation’, 14 June 2012,
, heartofasiaministerial-mfa.gov.af . .
55
‘B’, interview, 2013.
56
Wali Massoud, interview, 2013.
57
Wali Massoud was particularly unhappy over India’s lack of support for the Massoud
Foundation.
58
Interview with Haneef Atmar, Kabul, National Security Advisor of Afghanistan, 27
April 2013.
59
UNAMA news articles, 6 May 2013, , http://unama.unmissions.org/Default.aspx?
ctl¼Details&tabid ¼ 12329&mid ¼ 15870&ItemID ¼ 36778 . .
22 Avinash Paliwal
Pakistan is the country that shows its back to us . . . and in that situation we have
India to have close and friendly relations with, because India is a country that
wants, forever, to make good brotherly relations with us.60
As for the third group and civil society members, while India appeals as a stable
economic and social partner in the long run, Pakistan is critical in the short-term
security sphere.
Conclusion
The new president of Afghanistan, Ashraf Ghani, indicated clear and firm interest
in engaging with Pakistan diplomatically in 2014. His first round of international
trips included Saudi Arabia, China and Pakistan. Departing from the staunch anti-
Pakistan line of Karzai, Ghani went to Islamabad seeking cooperation to bring
about peace in Afghanistan.61 The two sides made public statements that neither of
them would support insurgents harming the interests of the other on its soil and
expressed intent to develop deeper defence links. At the same time, Ghani gave the
cold shoulder to New Delhi, with which Kabul had signed its first strategic
partnership agreement in 2011. Whether or not Kabul and Islamabad will be able to
retain a positive diplomatic momentum in the future remains to be seen. What was
made clear by Ghani’s overtures to New Delhi and Islamabad, however, was that
Pakistan played a central role in Afghanistan’s domestic political stability and that
sustaining rivalry with Islamabad was proving costly for Kabul. India, on the other
hand, remained peripheral. Ghani’s engagement with Pakistan marked a firm shift
in the balance of power between the Pakistan-friendly and Pakistan-averse
advocacies in favour of the former. If Pakistan-averse advocates dominated Kabul
in December 2002, the failure of the West to contain the Taliban, as well as tensions
between different political groups within the Kabul government, paved the way for
the Pakistan-friendly advocacy to emerge dominant in 2014. This does not mean
that the image of Pakistan among the people of Afghanistan has improved over the
course of the war. In fact, quite the opposite, most Afghans believe that Pakistan is
responsible for Afghanistan’s misfortunes (Craig 2014). However, those who are in
power in Kabul and are responsible for the security and stability of Afghanistan
view these issues in a different, and often, very nuanced manner.
This paper has two key implications—theoretical and empirical. Firstly,
theoretically, the ACF’s focus on the interaction of beliefs with advocacy coalitions
can assist in explaining the policy actions of weak states better than systemic or
structural explanations. Opening doors for further investigation into this topic, this
paper shows that beliefs in conflict-ridden areas have tremendous political potency.
Seen as a supporter of the anti-Afghan Soviet intervention and later the non-Pashtun
United Front, India managed to develop political constituencies in Pashtun-
dominated areas and a popular positive image across Afghanistan by 2014. Pakistan,
on the other hand, despite having supported the anti-Soviet Mujahideen in the 1980s
and giving refuge to Afghans displaced by war, came to be seen as an aggressive state
undermining Afghan territorial sovereignty. Interestingly, as the war progressed, the
60
Akbar Agha, interview, 2013.
61
‘Afghan President visits Pakistan to reset troubled ties’, BBC News, 14 November
2014, , http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-30049115..
composition of political coalitions advocating either Pakistan-averse or Pakistan-

friendly narratives also evolved. For instance, the Pakistan-averse advocacy in 2001
constituted mostly of non-Pashtuns under the United Front umbrella. However,
many of these advocates had toned down their criticism of Pakistan by 2013 and were
open to engaging Islamabad. Further, Pashtun Islamists supported and nurtured by
Pakistan before and after 2001 had turned against Islamabad by 2013. Despite the
merit in the regional proxy thesis, its focus on systemic factors steers analysis towards
the relatively stronger South Asian states. However, as this paper shows, domestic
policy beliefs can direct policy actions of stronger states at a systemic level as in the
case of India and Pakistan vis-à-vis Afghanistan. For example, India’s developmental
focus on Pashtun-dominated areas and determination to nurture an image of being a
neutral player that respects Afghanistan’s sense of sovereignty has a great deal to do
with domestic Afghan belief systems and narratives.
Secondly, from an empirical perspective, there is a need to focus more on how
Afghans view their regional security environment. The Soviet and NATO
experiences of warfare in Afghanistan compel academic accounting of domestic
Afghans narratives on domestic and regional security and politics. Though there is
journalistic and policy-oriented commentary on these issues, academic analysis is
missing. While works by Saikal (2013) and Giustozzi (2011) stand out for their
analysis of domestic Afghan politics and opinion, they do not provide a conceptual
review of Afghan opinion on South Asia. The need to delve deeper into this particular
field of enquiry is not just academic but also policy oriented. With the complicated
Afghan political situation—in the wake of the Taliban’s confident resurgence and the
longevity of the Ghani government in serious doubt despite the promised support
from the West—the role of domestic Afghan advocacies and their linkages with the
region will be critical. Afghan perceptions of the recent Narendra-Modi-led Hindu
nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in India and Pakistan’s
encroachment on Afghan sovereign authority will determine the nature of India’s
and Pakistan’s engagement in Afghanistan in coming years. For instance, Karzai
renewed Afghanistan’s demand for heavy weaponry from India in June 2014,
expecting New Delhi to have a more muscular security posture under the Modi
government (Ghanizada 2014). In the context of increased border tensions with
Pakistan (Buncombe 2013), the Pakistan-averse advocacy in Afghanistan sought to
capitalize upon Kabul’s warm relationship with New Delhi. However, Ghani
changed policy stance soon after and shelved the demand altogether (Swami 2014).
Withdrawal of Coalition forces will further strengthen domestic Afghan advocacies
in the coming years in ways unknown. Therefore, dynamic application of policy
beliefs and advocacy coalitions in the case of weak states—in this case Afghanistan—
can add value to debates in both theoretical (IR and FPA) and empirical (South Asian
and Afghan security) debates.
DISCLOSURE STATEMENT
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes on contributor
Avinash Paliwal is a teaching associate at the Defence Studies Department, King’s
College London. His current research concerns South Asian strategic affairs,
24 Avinash Paliwal
Indian foreign policy, foreign policy analysis and Afghanistan. His doctoral thesis
examines shifts in India’s Afghanistan policy after the Cold War. He was
previously a visiting fellow at the Observer Research Foundation (ORF), New
Delhi. Email: avinash.paliwal@kcl.ac.uk
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APPENDIX. PRIMARY INTERVIEWS CONDUCTED BY AUTHOR

Names and details of interviewees have been released with their permission.
Where permission was not granted, the details have been withheld.
1. ‘A’, top Indian intelligence officer involved in IC814 negotiations: identity,
location and date of interview undisclosed on interviewee’s request.
2. Abdullah Abdullah, current chief executive officer of Afghanistan, Kabul, 2

May 2013.
3. Ahmad Wali Massoud, younger brother of Ahmad Shah Massoud and senior
Afghan politician, Kabul, 29 April 2013.
4. ‘B’, former Ahmad Shah Massoud loyalist: identity, location and date of
interview undisclosed on interviewee’s request.
5. ‘C’, senior Western official posted in Kabul over the last few years: identity,
location and date of interview undisclosed on interviewee’s request.
6. Daud Saba, Governor of Herat Province, Herat, 17 April 2013.
7. ‘D’, former minister and senior advisor to Hamid Karzai on foreign policy,
8. Ershad Ahmadi, Afghan Deputy Foreign Minister, Kabul, 7 April 2013.
9. Fahim Dashty, journalist and Massoud loyalist, Kabul, 8 April 2013.
10. Haji Jaweed Zeyaratjahi, senior reporter, Tolo TV, Herat, 15 April 2013.
11. Haji Mohammad Mohaqiq, Hazara warlord of the Hizb-e-Wahdat faction,
Kabul, 3 May 2013.
12. Hakim Mujahid, former Taliban delegate to the United Nations, Kabul, 6 May
2013.
13. Haneef Atmar, National Security Advisor and former minister of the interior
of Afghanistan, Kabul, 27 April 2013.
14. Janan Musazai, Afghan Ambassador to Pakistan, 7 April 2013.
15. Jawed Ludin, former deputy foreign minister of Afghanistan, Kabul, 22 April
2013.
16. Mohammad Halim Fidai, former governor of Wardak Province, Kabul, 27
April 2013.
17. Omar Sharifi, Director, Afghan –American Institute for Research, Kabul, 2
May 2013.
18. Sanaullah Tasal, Bacha Khan Foundation, Kabul, 19 April 2013
19. Sanjar Sohail, senior Afghan journalist at 8 AM News, Kabul, 24 April 2013.
20. Syed Akbar Agha, senior Taliban official, Kabul, 30 April 2013.
21. Vikram Sood former chief of the Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW),
India’s external intelligence agency, New Delhi, 20 March 2013.
22. Waheed Omar, former spokesperson for the President of Afghanistan, Kabul,
11 April 2013.

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On: 08 July 2015, At: 13:42

Cambridge Review of International

Afghanistan's India–Pakistan dilemma:

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To cite this article: Avinash Paliwal (2015): Afghanistan's India–Pakistan dilemma:

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Afghanistan’s India –Pakistan dilemma: advocacy

q 2015 Centre of International Studies

foreign policy behaviour of weak states vis-à-vis bigger powers. Afghanistan

and contend that both these countries have ‘proxies’ in a fragmented

be decided by external systemic and regional factors, but is also influenced by

on external sources for power and legitimacy, contradictions between these

Foreign policymaking in weak states

immediate aftermath, it is unsurprising that most of these studies employed a

academics write enhances our understanding of national variations and how

Interpreting territorial sovereignty

Pakistan: friend or foe?

diplomatic and military approach. This could be achieved by fomenting

However, political equations changed as the war turned out to be a slow-motion

#Ethnicity and regional alignments

contradictions. As the external source of legitimacy and power recedes—for a

Electoral politics and security

elections). Washington did little to quell the movement despite Neumann’s

combatants.30 The proportion of civilians killed by insurgent activities in

US# withdrawal and security dilemma

connections and professional expertise. Despite the Taliban being a common

South Asian neighbours. However, their domestic compulsions, interests and

composition of political coalitions advocating either Pakistan-averse or Pakistan-

APPENDIX. PRIMARY INTERVIEWS CONDUCTED BY AUTHOR

2. Abdullah Abdullah, current chief executive officer of Afghanistan, Kabul, 2

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