Will Afghanistan Go Down The Tubes?

Afghan policemen operating in Kandahar Province on Wednesday discovered cans of acid that could be used to make explosives. Allauddin Khan/Associated Press. (Photo from New York Times)

U.S. Study Is Said to Warn of Crisis in Afghanistan
-- New York Times

WASHINGTON — A draft report by American intelligence agencies concludes that Afghanistan is in a “downward spiral” and casts serious doubt on the ability of the Afghan government to stem the rise in the Taliban’s influence there, according to American officials familiar with the document.

The classified report finds that the breakdown in central authority in Afghanistan has been accelerated by rampant corruption within the government of President Hamid Karzai and by an increase in violence by militants who have launched increasingly sophisticated attacks from havens in Pakistan.

The report, a nearly completed version of a National Intelligence Estimate, is set to be finished after the November elections and will be the most comprehensive American assessment in years on the situation in Afghanistan. Its conclusions represent a harsh verdict on decision-making in the Bush administration, which in the months after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks made Afghanistan the central focus of a global campaign against terrorism.

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My Comment: The National Intelligence estimate was wrong on Iraq. I hope that they will be more accurate on Afghanistan.