President Hamid Karzai's leadership is weak, his government corrupt and nearly a third of the votes he won in the August election were thrown out as fakes. But in the end, the Obama administration is sticking by the Afghan president – because it has no other option. Karzai is far from the strong and capable partner that Washington had hoped would emerge from the electoral process that it and Western allies had pushed for in Afghanistan. They hoped the elections would stabilize the country and bleed support from the Taleban. But the process effectively has ended in turmoil, even as the war with the Taleban intensifies. Abdullah Abdullah, bowed out only six days before a scheduled runoff, charging that no fair election was possible, making Karzai Afghanistan's president for a second term. Now the United States, barring other developments, must find a way to work with Karzai, who was widely favored to win the runoff anyway, and encourage him to embrace supporters of Abdullah and other groups opposed to the Taleban. Unless such groups are brought into the government, the Taleban are likely to grow in strength, capitalizing on widespread public discontent with the ineffectual government. “The government is more of a headache for us than the Taleban,” said Ahmed Shah Lumar, a businessman in Kandahar in the south, who complains that development plans in his area gather dust waiting for government approval. Karzai enjoyed close ties with President George W. Bush's administration, which maneuvered him into power when the Taleban first collapsed in 2001. But he fell out of favor when Barack Obama took the White House. US officials have since been openly critical of Karzai as a weak leader, beholden to warlords whom he cultivated as allies. Nevertheless, the Obama administration clearly concluded at some point that for all his faults, Karzai was the best it could get, given the ethnic and political realities of this impoverished country. “We are going to deal with the government that is there,” White House presidential adviser David Axelrod. “And obviously there are issues we need to discuss, such as reducing the high level of corruption. These are issues we'll take up with President Karzai.” US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Saturday that Abdullah's decision to quit the race would not undermine the legitimacy of a new Karzai administration. The runoff was called after UN-backed auditors confirmed massive fraud on behalf of Karzai in the first vote last August. Abdullah accused Karzai of using the resources of the government, including the election commission, to rig the vote – although the auditors never backed up that charge. Clinton said when Karzai accepted the runoff, “that bestowed legitimacy from that moment forward.” She did not mention that Karzai agreed to the runoff only after strong American pressure, including marathon talks with Sen. John Kerry. Now the US administration must deal for the next five years with an Afghan leader whom Obama once described as suffering from a “bunker mentality” and out of touch with his own country. “We are fed up with this government,” said Kabul shopkeeper Shah Mohammad Husseini. “The situation is getting worse and worse and worse. I want a government that has the power to implement laws and doesn't deal with warlords.” Nevertheless, the options among Afghanistan's pool of potential leaders are limited. Others such as Abdullah carry ethnic or historical baggage dating back to their roles in the civil war that devastated the country in the 1990s and led to the rise of the Taleban. Abdullah, a former foreign minister, is widely seen as the candidate of the northern Tajik community, which accounts for about 15 percent of Afghanistan's people. He was an ally of a late, legendary warlord beloved by fellow Tajiks but despised by the Pashtuns who are Afghanistan's majority – because of the warlord's role in the civil war. Karzai named a different former Tajik warlord as his running mate to draw off Tajik votes. As for Pashtuns, Karzai, the son of a Pashtun tribal chief, has long held their support. That ethnic group makes up more than 40 percent of Afghanistan. Pashtuns also form the overwhelming majority of the Taleban, and the US hopes to lure away moderate Taleban members. That difficult task would likely be impossible if Afghanistan was led by a Tajik. “If by chance Abdullah Abdullah (had) won a runoff, that's the makings of a civil war in the country,” said Thomas H. Johnson, the director of culture and conflict studies at the US Naval Postgraduate School, in a recent interview with the Council on Foreign Relations. Meanwhile, Westernized Afghans such as Ashraf Ghani, who ran a distant fourth in August, had the skills to run a government but lacked popular support. And none of the other Pashtuns in the race had the stature or resources of Karzai, who has effectively been in power since 2001. Some US and UN officials have floated the idea of a broad-based coalition or unity government, bringing together supporters of Karzai, Abdullah and other public figures to stand against the Taleban.
