REUTERS In The Arena Call Karzai’s Bluff

When Chuck Hagel, the U.S. secretary of defense, touched down in Afghanistan on Saturday for an unannounced visit to U.S. troops and Afghan officials, it was telling that he had no plans to meet with Afghan President Hamid Karzai.

The snub appears deliberate; it reflects American frustration with Karzai’s recent decision to place fresh obstacles in front of a stalled security pact with the United States. Among other new conditions, Karzai threatened to delay ratification until after April and demanded that Washington engage the Taliban and release certain detainees from the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Tensions rose further after a U.S. drone strike killed civilians in Helmand province, provoking this outburst from Karzai: “For as long as such arbitrary acts and oppression of foreign forces continue, the security agreement with the United States will not be signed.”


It’s time to play hardball. If Washington has any chance of de-escalating the situation, it should look to the lessons of negotiating a similar agreement in Iraq and prepare in earnest for the “zero option”—leaving no troops in Afghanistan after 2014. Hagel’s visit, unfortunately, has the potential to reinforce two unhealthy facets of Karzai’s thinking: bolstering his fears that the United States seeks to undermine Afghan sovereignty, and underscoring his belief that he—and Afghanistan—occupies a place of strategic preeminence in American policymakers’ minds.

The lessons from Baghdad are instructive. Soon after the Iraq invasion, Washington tried to negotiate a comparable accord, known as a Status of Forces Agreement, that authorized the presence of troops and defined their status and role. But interim Iraqi leaders recoiled, citing sovereignty and legitimacy concerns. Instead, coalition officials summarily granted themselves de facto SOFA rights—a provisional measure that actually lasted for years and caused major blowback after contractors killed civilians and were subsequently shielded from prosecution. When SOFA talks reopened in 2008, they were so contentious and destabilizing that some policymakers murmured about “replacing” Iraq’s Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. In late 2008, the George W. Bush administration eventually secured a three-year deal after substantial compromises: Troops would withdraw first from cities and then Iraq entirely, and would nominally be subject to shared jurisdiction. As that agreement neared its conclusion, the Obama administration put forward another SOFA that would have authorized a residual U.S. military presence past 2012. But the negotiations were profoundly divisive, and the Obama administration eventually gave up and proceeded with a complete withdrawal.

Afghanistan bears striking similarities. Interim Afghan officials once agreed to a de facto SOFA via a two-page diplomatic “note.” In 2005, Karzai planned to offer a full-fledged agreement—but after a 2008 airstrike caused numerous civilian casualties, he insisted on a reassessment of foreign forces and a SOFA similar to Iraq’s. By 2012, Washington and Kabul had hammered out some high-level goals and reopened SOFA talks, but controversy quickly ensued, particularly surrounding issues of jurisdiction, village/night raids and security guarantees. After months of negotiations and a personal intervention by Secretary of State John Kerry last month, it appeared that a deal was finally done. Karzai convened a loya jirga of 2,500 tribal elders to vote on the SOFA, which somewhat unexpectedly approved it. But then Karzai added new conditions and re-escalated his rhetoric.

There’s little mystery here: Karzai has taken a page out of Maliki’s playbook. His move holds three lessons for Washington:

1. The zero option is real. Karzai apparently dismisses the seriousness of a full U.S. withdrawal, recently smirking at the prospect. Washington should now prepare for this option in earnest—both to call Karzai’s bluff and also because it increasingly appears to be the only feasible course. The White House should immediately ask the Pentagon to update its plans, particularly since some officials there have anonymously disavowed the practicality of the zero option. Washington should also begin negotiating expanded access rights in neighboring countries and consider reallocating naval assets in the area to facilitate and compensate for withdrawal of ground forces.

2. All politics is local. Analysts are widely baffled about what now motivates Karzai—perhaps some combination of political and legacy concerns, with a dash of the paranoid and erratic. But if anything will sway Karzai, it is likely domestic political pressure. In Iraq, several spoilers lined up against the SOFA. Afghanistan is different. Outside of the Taliban, the SOFA enjoys much greater local support—including among elders and members of Karzai’s Cabinet, some of whom publicly disagree with his latest demands and have threatened to quit. Washington should stay closely attuned to local political movements and work all back channels to build and amplify support for the SOFA in the coming weeks.

3. Look for a face-saving resolution. Karzai clearly cares deeply about the SOFA, however misplaced his actions, so providing him a graceful means of de-escalation is important. While some policymakers have staunchly insisted that Karzai must sign the accord, sheer adamancy failed in the final days of Iraq’s SOFA. Indeed, if Karzai is seeking to prove his independence from Washington, then publicly insisting that he obey U.S. diktats is not necessarily helpful. It would be better to look for a few relatively harmless concessions to offer Karzai, or frame discussions so as to allow him to fall back upon the loya jirga’s decision.

But ultimately, the United States needs to be ready to walk away. The aim of U.S. policy is not to keep troops in Afghanistan indefinitely—the goal is to cooperate on security in mutually beneficial and comparatively modest ways, and that can be done without boots on the ground. If Karzai is unwilling to accept reasonable terms that his own negotiators and loya jirga have approved, then the United States should prepare to protect its interests through other means. At this point, the zero option is entirely realistic and might even yield more favorable negotiating terms with Karzai’s successor.

John Paul Schnapper-Casteras is national security crisis law fellow at Georgetown University Law Center. Lawrence Korb is senior fellow at the Center for American Progress.