On Tuesday, we learned that the United States will be "surging" in Afghanistan with an additional 30,000 troops over the next year.  There has been a much discussion over whether the U.S. military strategy in Afghanistan focuses on the "right" (often meaning most realistic) outcomes and employs the most effective strategies to reach those ends.  But the war in Afghanistan does not just employ military means.  Humanitarian and development aid is a significant piece of the U.S. stabilization plan in Afghanistan, and as the Obama administration moves forward with its Afghanistan policy, they will need to critically examine the impact of this money on peace and security.

As The New Republic recently pointed out, under the post-9/11 Bush administration, development aid was increasingly framed as a tool of counter-insurgency and security promotion.  The idea was, if you could provide a better standard of living for people than insurgent groups, then you would win "hearts and minds" and draw people away from violent action.  Afghanistan is the poster child for this kind of targeted aid: Foreign Policy reports that, in 2007, more than half of USAID's Afghanistan budget was spent on four insurgency-affected provinces in the south of the country.

Yet, as researchers at the Feinstein International Center at Tufts University point out, development aid does not actually have a successful track record of winning hearts in mind in Afghanistan or in other countries.  Their research has found that, while Afghans are generally pleased when schools or roads are built, they are more concerned with the country's broken government and the role of national corruption in fanning the flames of insurgency.  Additionally, Afghans appear to be turning against the United States in part because of their dissatisfaction with the impact of aid.  According to the Feinstein researchers:

As the conflict has proceeded, Afghans' perceptions of U.S. and international aid, as well as those who deliver it (be they military forces, the government, aid contractors, or NGOs) have grown overwhelmingly negative. Common complaints included: too little or nothing accomplished (despite in some cases considerable evidence all around of many recently implemented projects), a perception that other communities received more aid, very poor quality workmanship, the wrong kinds of projects for the setting, and the list goes on.

Afghans are also angry because of the role U.S. aid money plays in fueling corruption.  There is increasing evidence that insurgents siphon off aid money to support their military activities, directly undermining the security purpose that was behind the aid in the first place and harming ordinary Afghans (see here and here).  More aid money is being poured into the country than its authorities can productively use - and honestly account for.

In short, the link between aid and security is tenuous at best in Afghanistan.  That doesn't necessarily mean that the United States should end aid altogether.  We do, however, need to realize that aid is not a silver bullet and take a clear-headed look at the impact of different projects.  And in the end, a continued surge of aid money is probably not the right path.  Instead,  a draw down in funds to a level that supports projects with a positive development impact but also does not provide excessive amounts of funds to fuel corruption is essential.  It's not a strategy that will win a war, but hopefully it can do some good.