November 7, 2001	Wednesday	Shaba’an 20, 1422

LOS ANGELES: The destruction of Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda terrorist network and the destabilization of Afghanistan’s Taliban regime will be difficult enough to achieve. Recently, though, US Secretary of State Colin Powell and others have begun to hint at another objective: influencing the composition of a post-Taliban government.

There are reports that US leaders have slowed the pace of the US military campaign lest the Taliban collapse before an alternative regime is ready. Such a flirtation with nation-building is both unwise and unnecessary.

One might hope that the US had learned from the disastrous experiments in Somalia, Haiti and Bosnia. Despite years of work and billions of dollars, the efforts failed big-time in all three cases.

The US apparently hopes for an effort under the auspices of the United Nations to form a broad coalition government to replace the Taliban. Reports have surfaced of negotiations to broaden the Northern Alliance by bringing in non-Taliban Pashtun political leaders. Some US officials have dropped hints about enticing moderate Taliban factions to join such a coalition. The capstone to such a scheme is the proposal to invite Mohammad Zaher Shah, the Afghan king who was ousted in 1973, to return to the throne.

Such a plan is ill-conceived. First, the notion of moderates in the Taliban is absurd. The Taliban is the most bizarre, extreme movement in Islam. Even the most moderate members would be considered wild extremists in any other setting. Second, although the proposal to bring back the king has some appeal, he was an often erratic and difficult figure when he occupied the throne. At 87, he is not likely to be any easier to work with. Finally and most important, the long-standing antipathy among the Pashtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks and assorted other tribes is not going to end because of a US or UN nation-building presence.

It is not necessary for the United States to step into the quicksand of nation-building in Afghanistan. The United States’ security does not require the existence of a stable, democratic government in Kabul. Such a regime is not likely to emerge in any case. America’s security requires only that whatever government controls any portion of Afghanistan not harbour and assist terrorists the way the Taliban has. —Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) Los Angeles Times.