Paramilitarization and Security Sector Reform: The Afghan National Police

Abstract

Abstract An accelerating trend to establish paramilitarized security forces has been occurring in peace operations to help fill security gaps. But the practice is problematic from a security sector reform (SSR) point of view, because SSR aims at distinguishing between the military and the police and at promoting civilian policing. This article shows that while the SSR concept leaves room for paramilitarization, it demands much caution. The paramilitarization of regular police forces is incompatible with even a flexible interpretation of SSR principles. The US-driven paramilitarization of the Afghan National Police (ANP), reflecting a search for quick fixes, is a dramatic case in point. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This article is based on research conducted in Afghanistan in 2009 and Germany in 2010. Interviews and informal discussions were held with police, military and civilian government officials, and with representatives of international organizations and civil society. For comments and information I am grateful to the interviewees, Jörg Krempel, Jörn Meyer, Chris Pallaris, Michael Pugh, Philipp Rotmann and the anonymous reviewers. Notes Royal United Service Institute (RUSI), Reforming the Afghan National Police, London and Philadelphia: RUSI and Foreign Policy Research Institute, 2009, p.61. UN, ‘Report of the Secretary-General on the Implementation of the Report of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations’, New York, 20 Oct. 2000, para.96f (at: www.un.org/peace/reports/peace_operations/docs/55_502e.pdf). UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations, Handbook on United Nations Multidimensional Peacekeeping Operations, 2003, pp.88,93. OECD, The OECD DAC Handbook on Security System Reform (SSR): Supporting Security and Justice, Paris, 2007, p.124. On the shortcomings of evidence collection by the military in Kosovo, see Annika Hansen, ‘Civil–Military Cooperation: The Military, Paramilitaries and Civilian Police in Executive Policing’, in Renata Dwan (ed.), Executive Policing: Enforcing the Law in Peace Operations, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002, p.27. See also Alice Hills, ‘The Inherent Limits of Military Forces in Policing Peace Operations’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.8, No.3, 2001, pp.79–98. David H. Bayley and Robert M. Perito, The Police in War: Fighting Insurgency, Terrorism, and Violent Crime, Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2010, pp.152–3; RUSI (see n.1 above), p.16. Senior Police Adviser to the OSCE Secretary General, International Police Standards: Guidebook on Democratic Policing, Geneva: Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF), 2009, p.19. This definition draws partly on Robert Perito, Where is the Lone Ranger When we Need Him? 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On the risks of this programme, see Martin Chulov, ‘Fears of Al-Qaida Return in Iraq as US-backed Fighters Defect’, The Guardian, 10 Aug. 2010 (at: www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/aug/10/al-qaida-sons-of-iraq). Hans Born (ed.), IPU–DCAF Handbook on Parliamentary Oversight of the Security Sector: Principles, Mechanisms and Practices, Geneva, 2003, p.54. For criticism of NATO's initial reluctance to help police Bosnia and Herzegovina, see Jane Sharp, ‘Dayton Report Card’, International Security, Vol.22, No.3, 1997/98, pp.101–37. See also Rupert Smith, The Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World, London: Penguin Books, pp.379–81. OECD (see n.4 above), p.164. Ibid., p.171. See Cornelius Friesendorf, The Military and Law Enforcement in Peace Operations: Lessons from Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo, Vienna: LIT (for DCAF), 2010. Ibid. Author's interview with UK police officer, Kabul, Sept. 2009. Gendarmerie officers in Sarajevo and Pristina stressed that they were police, not paramilitaries, and that they had no problems switching from a military to a civilian command arrangement. Author's interviews, Sarajevo and Pristina, autumn 2007 and summer 2008. For criticism of the penchant for quick fixes, see Mark Sedra, ‘Security Sector Reform in Afghanistan: The Slide Towards Expediency’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.13, No.1, 2006, pp.94–110. Andrew Wilder, Cops or Robbers? The Struggle to Reform the Afghan National Police, Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, July 2007, pp.52–3. See Dough Beattie, An Ordinary Soldier, London: Simon & Schuster, 2008. Human Rights Watch, ‘“Troops in Contact”: Airstrikes and Civilian Deaths in Afghanistan’, New York, 2008. Asia Foundation, Afghanistan in 2009: A Survey of the Afghan People, Kabul, 2009, pp.85–97. James Dobbins, Michele A. Poole, Austin Long and Benjamin Runkle, After the War: Nation-Building from FDR to George W. Bush, Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2008, p.xx. Robert M. Perito, ‘Afghanistan's Police: The Weak Link in Security Sector Reform’, Special Report 227, US Institute of Peace, Washington, DC, Aug. 2009. Andrew Legon, ‘Ineffective, Unprofessional, and Corrupt: The Afghan National Police Challenge’, E-Note, Foreign Policy Research Institute, Philadelphia, June 2009 (at: www.fpri.org/enotes/200906.legon.afghannationalpolice.html); Anthony H. Cordesman, ‘Shaping Afghan National Security Forces’, review draft, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC, 20 April 2010, p.6. Legon (see n.29 above). However, the same person was often trained several times, not least because no functioning database had been created. Uncertainty over the total number of ANP personnel remains. US Department of Defense, ‘Report on Progress Toward Security and Stability in Afghanistan’, 28 Apr. 2010, Washington, DC, p.119 (at: www.defense.gov/pubs/pdfs/Report_Final_SecDef_04_26_10.pdf). For criticism see Pratap Chatterjee, ‘Policing Afghanistan: How Afghan Police Training Became a Train Wreck’, TomDispatch, 21 Mar. 2010 (at: www.tomdispatch.com/post/175220/tomgram:_pratap_chatterjee,_failing_afghanistan's_cops_/). International Crisis Group, ‘Policing in Afghanistan: Still Searching for a Strategy’, Asia Briefing No.85, 18 Dec. 2008, p.5. US Department of Defense (see n.31 above), p.122. Responsibility for police mentoring and partnering on the operational level was held by ISAF Joint Command. See Peter Dahl Thruelsen, ‘Striking the Right Balance: How to Rebuild the Afghan National Police’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.17, No.1, 2010, pp.85–6. US Department of Defense (see n.31 above), p.115. Ibid., p.122. Scott Chilton, Eckart Schiewek and Tim Bremmers, ‘Evaluation of the Appropriate Size of the Afghan National Police Force Manning List (Tashkil)’, Final Report for the EC Commission, Kabul, 15 July 2009, pp.49–50,64. Bayley and Perito (see n.6 above), p.95. Ibid., p.23. Cordesman (see n.29 above), p.113. Chilton et al. (see n.39 above), p.60. RUSI (see n.1 above), p.90. Quoted in International Crisis Group (see n.33 above), pp.9–10. US Department of Defense (see n.31 above), p.113. Bayley and Perito (see n.6 above), p.81. See Beattie (see n.24 above), p.222. Tonita Murray, ‘Police-Building in Afghanistan: A Case Study of Civil Security Reform’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.14, No.1, 2007, p.118; Wilder (see n.23 above), p.51, n.169. Author's interview with ISAF officer, Kandahar, Sept. 2009. James Dao, ‘In Mission with Afghan Police, Issues of Trust’, New York Times, 11 Aug. 2010 (at: www.nytimes.com/2010/08/11/world/asia/11battalion.html). Cordesman (see n.29 above), p.104. Author's interview, Sept. 2009. Office of the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, ‘Actions Needed to Improve the Reliability of Afghan Security Force Assessments’, 23 June 2010 (at: www.sigar.mil/pdf/audits/SIGAR%20Audit-10-11.pdf). For positive assessments see RUSI (see n.1 above), p.108; Cordesman (see n.29 above). Quoted in International Crisis Group (see n.33 above), p.8. Author's interview with EUPOL official, Kabul, Sept. 2009. Quoted in ‘Deutsche Polizisten fürchten Afghanistan-Desaster’ [German police fear disaster in Afghanistan], Der Spiegel Online, 1 Apr. 2010 (at: www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/0,1518,686968,00.html). Such risk perceptions also help to explain the shortage of police trainers and mentors. Author's interviews with US and European officials, Kabul, July 2009, Sept.–Oct. 2009. Author's interview, Kandahar, Sept. 2009. RUSI (see n.1 above), p.87. According to an ISAF officer at a Patrol Base in Kandahar province, combat operations and raids on compounds were based on intelligence usually provided by the NDS (author's interview, Sept. 2009). Duncan Gardham, ‘Britain “Hands over Prisoners in Afghanistan to Face Torture”’, Daily Telegraph, 19 Apr. 2010 (at www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/7607442/Britain-hands-over-prisoners-in-Afghanistan-to-face-torture.html). Author's interview with international officials, Kabul, Oct. 2009. Author's interview, Kabul, Sept. 2009. David H. Bayley, ‘Police Reform as Foreign Policy’, Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, Vol.38, No.2, 2005, p.213. The Asia Foundation (see n.26 above), p.37. Author's interview, Jalalabad, July 2009. Cordesman (see n.29 above), pp.93–4,101. Atmar had to resign in June 2010. Author's interview with international corruption experts, Kabul, July 2009. Author's interview with Afghan MPs, Kabul, Sept. 2009. COM ISAF's Initial Assessment, Headquarters ISAF, Kabul, 30 Aug. 2009 (at: http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/Assessment_Redacted_092109.pdf?sid=ST2009092003140). Bayley and Perito (see n.6 above), p.122. Author's interview, Kabul, July 2009. Bayley and Perito (see n.6 above), p.49. Author's interview, Sept. 2009. Quoted in Cordesman (see n.29 above), p.109. Chilton et al. (see n.39 above), p.12. Bayley and Perito (see n.6 above), p.3. Germany attempts to avoid drawing both its own police and the ANP into combat. Author's interviews with German military and police officers at locations in Germany, summer 2010. As of 2010 German financial support for ANP reform was €54 million annually. Albrecht Schnabel, ‘Ideal Requirements versus Real Environments in Security Sector Reform’, in Hans Born and Schnabel (eds), Security Sector Reform in Challenging Environments, Vienna: LIT (for DCAF), 2009, p.16. US Department of Defense (see n.31 above), p.114. Afghan Ministry of Interior Affairs, ‘Afghan National Police Strategy’, Mar. 2010, p.32 (at: http://ntm-a.com/documents/other/anps.pdf). Author's interview with EUPOL official, Kabul, July 2009. Asia Foundation (see n.26 above). See Benjamin Kwasi Agordzo, ‘Filling the “Security Gap” in Post-conflict Situations: Could Formed Police Units Make a Difference?’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.16, No.2, 2009, pp.287–94.