Chief Ajmal Khan Zazai (second from right) on the way to Kabul

Hillary Clinton has been chattering brightly about fighting "corruption" in Afghanistan, and isn't that a beautiful idea? If you're looking for a target that nobody will defend, "corruption" is just about as unpopular as cancer, which is certainly a very bad thing.

Corruption!

Boooooo!!!

Honesty! Transparency! Good governance!

Hurrah!!!

And how difficult could it possibly be to eliminate what Americans call "corruption" in Afghanistan? Eliminating corruption is everywhere and always a simple two-step process:

1. Create a self-examining bureaucracy with lifetime job-stability and a university-educated bourgeoisie to staff it, and then...

Whoa! What's that first step again?

Create a self-examining bureaucracy with lifetime job-stability and a university-educated bourgeoisie to staff it, and then...

Whoa! How the heck can you create such a thing in Afghanistan, where all good things have inevitably passed through the sticky fingers of tribal chiefs for thousands of years?

And now it's time for a very brief excursion into the reality of Afghanistan...

SP: Your own father was assassinated, I understand, under orders from Mullah Omar. You yourself have survived two attempts on your life. Can you tell us about your father and what you and he are fighting for?

Chief Zazai: My father was Chief Raiss Afzal Khan Zazai; he was murdered in 2000. My father led our Zazi tribes in the fight against the Soviets and later he organized the Tribal Chiefs from three provinces (Paktia, Paktika & Khost) in order to upraise against the Taliban. Some ex-commanders were visiting him at our family home and there they carried out this heinous crime. I have not found who gave the orders yet but the motive behind this was to bring a full stop to this movement and also to frighten the rest.

My father was one of our country's first industrialists. He and my uncle founded the first Afghan transport company, Mrastay Transport, using old British Bedford trucks. His company, Wazir Ltd, exported raisins, dried fruits and Afghan carpets to Russia, Germany and Britain, while importing vehicles, appliances and medicines.

I highlighted the last paragraph of my excerpt from Steven Pressfield's outstanding blog as a relatively simple indication of how money flows in Afghanistan.

The chief owns the trucks.

And Chief Ajmal Khan Zazai of Paktia Province is a star among tribal chieftains in Afghanistan... a good friend of the United States and blood-enemy of the Taliban and all who openly or surreptiously represent the Taliban, and that is what Chief Ajmal Khan Zazai means by "corruption."

Chief Zazai: We are up against a level of corruption that the Coalition commanders still can't or won't understand. You cannot imagine the pressure I, Amir Mohammad [commander of the fledgling 80-man Tribal Police in Chief Zazai's home district] and our Chiefs are under. The TPF guys worked for five months and only received one month's salary. The Tribal Police are totally under-resourced, no weapons [other than their own] or proper clothing. Can you imagine how we are surviving?

SP: Who exactly is the enemy? I don't mean the "far enemy," I mean the "near enemy."

Chief Zazai: The Afghan people ask over and over, "Why don't the Americans do something?" The answer is the Americans' hands are tied by the need to support a corrupt and hopelessly compromised regime. Here is what I mean: in my district, a new border Police Chief has been appointed. This man has been on the payroll of the ISI Pakistani military for 30 years. Two weeks ago the Zazi Chiefs protested against this appointment. About 20 elders went to Kabul to meet with the Interior Minister. He refused to even see them!

SP: What does such an appointment mean in day-to-day terms? How does it affect your Tribal Police Force?

Chief Zazai: These officials go to meet with the Americans and poison their minds against the TPF. I spoke to the [American commander in the Zazi Valley] for two hours over the phone and explained to him why the Tribal Police Force was formed and what is the agenda behind this program, and still he was telling me to talk to the Governor, the District Administrator and the border Police Chief. I said I will not speak to these corrupt men who are doing everything in their power to dissolve the TPF and turn everyone against it.

Details! Who cares about details when Washington has a beautiful new buzz-word, "corruption," which allows our wishy-washy President and the advertising genius who created him to waffle wherever their focus-groups tell them to waffle?

But if you're looking for real resistance to the Taliban which won't dissolve like the morning dew just as soon as the last Marine brigade pulls out of Afghanistan, then what you find is Chief Zazai's union of 11 tribes in Paktia Province, and in every one of those 11 tribes, the chief takes a taste of all good things, and owns the trucks.

That's what Americans mean by "corruption," and I have to confess...

A self-examining bureaucracy with lifetime job-stability and a university-educated bourgeoisie to staff it isn't really the only way to eliminate "corruption."

Instead you could install a gang of self-policing fanatics like the Taliban.

Update: Although the United States continues to make impossible demands on Karzai's national government in Kabul, events have forced our delegation of idiots to recognize the primacy of tribal associations...

American and Afghan officials have begun helping a number of anti-Taliban militias that have independently taken up arms against insurgents in several parts of Afghanistan, prompting hopes of a large-scale tribal rebellion against the Taliban.

The emergence of the militias, which took some leaders in Kabul by surprise, has so encouraged the American and Afghan officials that they are planning to spur the growth of similar armed groups across the Taliban heartland in the southern and eastern parts of the country.

So while our official policy continues to emphasize the creation of a strong central government, we are radically undermining that same project by supporting the establishment of independent militias, a device than which nothing could be more inimical to national control.