Iraq was a largely secular society, whereas Afghanistan is strongly religious. Iraq's history was more stable, despite the war with Iran. Afghanistan, on the other hand, has a long history of war and battling invasions.
Iraq and the Balkans are similar in terms of nation-building in that they both have sources of wealth at their disposal. The Balkans enjoy a European location, with easy access to markets for their goods. Iraq has oil. The Afghans, conversely, have a lucrative product but it is illegal in nature. Also, while the Balkans and Iraq both have politics and conflict predominantly on ethnic lines, Afghanistan's political structure is more complex (Maloney, 2004), based along clan lines such that conflict can arise even within members of the same group.
Overall, the efforts in Iraq have some similarities with the Balkans, but little with Afghanistan. That country's situation is unique among recent post-conflict nation-building efforts.
4. Terrorism tends to gravitate towards regions of instability and poor governmental control (Felbab-Brown, 2005). The power vacuum in many parts of Afghanistan allows for terrorist networks to operate and train. While there are other regions, such as bordering areas of Pakistan and parts of Africa, where such terrorist training can also be conducted, winning the war on terrorism inevitably means establishing political stability and economic prosperity in Afghanistan.
The present situation in Afghanistan, just as with the situation under the Taliban, has resulted in thousands of Afghanis joining terrorist and insurgency groups. There are relatively few such recruits coming from more stable, developed regions.
Furthermore, if such stability were to be achieved in Afghanistan, it would represent evidence of success in the "war on terror." The term, and movement among the world's leading states, essentially began with the overthrow of the Taliban. The first objective of the war on terror was to establish a stable and prosperous Afghanistan. Without this objective met, the war on terror can easily be interpreted as a punitive action against the Islamic world, resulting in more recruits to terrorist organizations. Success in Afghanistan would substantially staunch this image of the war on terror and the flow of new recruits to terrorist organizations.
5. States,...
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