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The Bilateral Security Agreement deal, forged by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and Afghan President Hamid Karzai, will be quickly undone since the U.S. is not focused on the right kind of settlement.
Attacks on Afghan officials in the last week show how quickly things can unravel.
That Afghanistan's Loya Jirga is now the decider on legal jurisdiction over U.S. troops post-2014 gives the impression that an independent decision on troop immunity was reached by Afghans.
That is hardly the case. In fact, it will be interesting to see how much tampering happens in choosing the delegates for the Jirga and what changes between Karzai Administration and U.S. in the next few weeks.
It can go either way. There might be a cut and run by the U.S., or a "let's stay long enough to make it look like we really tried." We witnessed this in Iraq as well.
The U.S. and Afghan government are making sure that the deal's language doesn't go public too far ahead of the Jirga, because the Afghan press would seize upon it and the public would protest loudly against troop immunity.
Karzai, consequently, is engaging in smart political strategizing. By having the Jirga accept the deal -- and he can use his influence to bring enough tribal and political delegates that favor a deal with U.S. -- he doesn't run the political risk for himself or his brother's campaign.
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