Why did the façade of Afghan disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) develop? How did the reality on the ground diverge from the bureaucratic process? What are the implications of such an approach? This Conflict, Security & Development paper examines the contradictions at the heart of DDR and successive Disbandment of Illegal Armed Groups in Afghanistan DIAG processes in Afghanistan, analysing the conflicts of interest and limited impacts.
It was a political decision to limit the impact of DDR in order to provide US forces with effective Afghan partners as well as legitimise a pro-American regime in Kabul. So while saving face for the international actors, the main Afghan players could expand their leverage and influence through retaining links to militias.
Key to the failure of DDR was the system of patronage operating in Afghanistan. In particular the Jami’at-I Islami used their position within the Afghan Ministry of Defence to distribute benefits to followers and allies.
The inadequacies at the heart of DDR-DIAG process stemmed from Afghan ownership and deliberately weak international oversight. Combined with these inbuilt flaws, reality was to diverge from the bureaucratic objectives due to:
- Implementation delays, with the DDR programme commencing two years after the end of the conflict. This ensured a minimum of weaponry was collected and a deterioration in security.
- Poor planning led to a failure in weapon disarmament. In particular the DIAG programme was to see less than 10 per cent of weapons collected.
- Inadequate reintegration planning did not identify several relevant groupings of combatants and excluded thousands of Taliban fighters. Many genuine ex-combatants did not make it to DDR.
- Lack of coordination between different agencies and organisations involved in the DDR programme. Deficient preparation, analysis, understanding and planning ensured ineffective and counter productive reintegration.
Strong formal bureaucratic procedures to prevent abuses and manipulation were merely superficial in regards to DDR. Key Afghan people were able to seize control of the process for their own gain in order to develop powers of patronage and further influence. However, the flaws in the DDR process as a whole were irrelevant due to the lateness of implementation. The acquiescence of local military leaders was gained in return for preserving their localised control and influence. Thus DDR and DIAG were essentially a means of promoting international actor respectability with little long-term benefit.
While beneficial in the short term this was to have a number of negative implications:
- Official militias were disbanded but continued to exist in the shadows, with a substantial number of leaders incorporated into governmental ministries. A climate of insecurity and distrust was to develop, in particular over the factionalism inside the police force, impacting on disarmament throughout the region.
- Local military commanders would prove difficult to control once the marginalisation of their political patrons commenced. Militias were not successfully delegitimised due to the returns in the 2007 parliamentary elections.
- Short term stability was achieved at the cost of medium to long-term popularity of foreign intervention and failure to fulfil expectations. Abuses against the villages and non-state taxation continued.
- Notably, the exclusion of former Taleban fighters in DDR would later lead to many joining the Neo-Taliban insurgency. Reports of intensified rearmament amongst DDR-ed militias occurred from 2006.
