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Hamid Karzai is causing his fair share of agita this election season. Maybe more. The hand-wringing occurring in Washington is accompanied by violence in Afghanistan, making Karzai and his administration look like liabilities in the stabilization of the country. Things didn’t seem like they would end up this poorly; the idea that the new government would seem to be worse than the Taliban seemed patently absurd considering the atrocious mismanagement and chaos of Taliban-era Afghanistan. Knowing how Karzai managed to boldly stride his way into a situation he is now unable to limp out of is essential to understanding what to do next.

Member of one of the most powerful Pashtun tribes, and son of a man who, under Afghanistan’s Pashtun dominated monarchy, was extremely powerful, Karzai went on to bolster his credentials by fighting with the Mujahadeen against the Soviets, supporting the Taliban against some of the Mujaheds, and finally backing the remaining monarchists and the Northern Alliance against the Taliban after they were implicated in the murder of Karzai’s father. Not content to derive his authority in Afghanistan exclusively from the Afghans, Karzai was named chairman of the UN-commissioned interim government.

With the full backing of the Germans, Americans, and international community, Karzai was named Interim President by the Western-backed Loya Jirga (Parliament) of the new Afghan state. Karzai even felt strong enough vis a vis the Americans to openly call for the normalization of relations between the US and Iran while still holding chummy weekly teleconferences with President Bush. So far, so good, right?

What happened? The broad backing of the Transitional Government, the US, the UN, and various internal Afghan factions all palatable candidate for leading the nation. But the darling of foreign capitals was roundly ignored by his own people. Despite the assent of elites in Bonn and warlords in Afghanistan, Karzai now openly acknowledges that his election victory to the permanent presidency in 2004 involved massive election fraud.

Karzai may have been legitimate to the Americans, NATO, and the faction leaders in his cabinet, but he was neither elected nor part of a mass electoral party. This disconnect between Karzai and the fractious Afghan public might have served to make him palatable to his Western backers, but it also made him unable to draw support from anyone but warlords over whom he had dubious control.

The situation wasn’t helped when the broad coalition that brought him into power took political sniping too far. The warlords and powerbrokers Karzai needed to rely upon to shore up his power kept offing each other. The ties between people close to the President, like his brother, and the opium trade destabilizing the country and fueling warlords and terrorism is a peek into the insane logic propping up the Karzai regime. Karzai cannot rely on the Afghan people, so he has to rely on his brother and his ilk.

People like his brother rely on the money and influence garnered through their ties with illegitimate trade, which in turn feeds the endemic violence that threaten Karzai in the first place. This need to find people with guns to prop himself may have done more to prompt Karzai’s recent calls to involve so-called “Moderate Taliban” into the government than hopes of ending the war.

It is sobering to think that the root cause of the paralysis of the Karzai government might be the ambitious goal to rope in all sorts of Afghans: warlords and technocrats, religious and secular, Pashtun and everyone else. Karzai may have initially hoped to live up to his promises, and to the Bonn Agreement, before things went badly out of hand.

Despite the chaos, the poverty, instability, and violence Karzai insists on hitting different notes than McChrystal and Obama. He seems to have a different agenda: handing out favors to his friends and broadening his base of support in the Pashtun south, a necessary evil to ensure he can continue to cling to power. And considering the recent history of murdered and assassinated Afghan leaders, he has good reason.

Photo by Flickr user KarlMarx used under a Creative Commons license.