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Afghanistan: How Is Hamid Karzai Still Standing? | William Dalrymple

6 January 2014

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Magazine, The New York Times - November 20, 2013

How Is Hamid Karzai Still Standing?

by WILLIAM DALRYMPLE

The Karzai family graveyard lies a few miles outside Kandahar, on the edge of the village of Karz. On the day I drove there, burned-out cars stood rusting by the sides of the road, children splashed through open drains and bullet holes riddled the mud walls opposite checkpoints. Amid all this, the graveyard stood out — gleaming, immaculate. Straggling bougainvillea and mulberry trees blossomed over the calligraphic tiles topping the cream-colored walls. Through the double gates were lines of cypresses. In the middle stood a domed enclosure containing the graves of the clan elders.

Hamid Karzai was entering the final lap of his presidency, and I had traveled to Karz with Mahmood, one of the president’s elder brothers, accompanied by a phalanx of his bodyguards. Afghanistan’s presidential election is set for April, and as the deadline for registering candidates approached, the country’s future seemed to hang in part on the fraught internal family politics of the Karzais. Hamid is ineligible to run for a third term, and it had been long rumored in Kabul that he would anoint his brother Qayum as his successor. Mahmood had made it clear that he wanted the presidency to stay in the family; he had even begun to raise campaign funds for Qayum, just as he once had for Hamid.

So far, however, the president had been publicly silent on the subject, and Qayum had yet to tip his hand. Mahmood’s business dealings — banking scandals and supposedly dodgy real estate deals — had long been perceived as Hamid’s Achilles’ heel, and it remained unclear whether family loyalty would trump the president’s growing preoccupation with his own legacy. All this, along with Karzai’s angry rhetoric against the alleged misdeeds of his American backers, had caused some tensions around the family table. “I don’t feel comfortable talking to Hamid these days,†Mahmood said as we rode in his armored Land Cruiser, sandwiched between pickup trucks full of troops. “These ridiculous conspiracy theories. And his cynical view of the West. These ideas aren’t helping Afghanistan. I don’t think he understands the importance of a good economic policy.â€

On arrival, however, the sight of the massed Karzai dead quickly brought back Mahmood’s sense of dynastic solidarity. “See over there — the grave with the old carved headstone?†he said. “That was my grandfather, the real leader of the family. He migrated to Karz from the west of the province and bought this land.â€

He then pointed to a poster of a mustached man on the guardhouse: “That’s my uncle, Khalil.†Khalil was killed in the 1980s. Some say he was murdered in a family dispute, but Mahmood told me he was assassinated during the war with the Soviets. “And over there,†he continued, “another uncle. Also assassinated.â€

We walked into the domed mausoleum where two recumbent gravestones were covered with pink plastic flowers: “My father’s grave,†he said, lowering his voice to a whisper. “He was shot dead leaving a mosque. And that, by his side, is Ahmed Wali, my half brother.â€

He didn’t bother saying what we both knew, that Ahmed Wali Karzai, the head of Kandahar’s provincial council, effectively governor of Kandahar and the man suspected by the West of controlling part of the Afghan heroin trade, but who also helped the C.I.A. operate an anti-Taliban paramilitary group, was himself killed by a trusted member of his inner circle. The shooting took place not far from where we were standing, two years earlier, almost to the day. I asked if anyone else in the family died violently. “Many!†Mahmood replied. He pointed to the different grave plots: “One, two, three . . . altogether about eight. Maybe more.â€

From the graveyard, we headed on into Karz, where the brothers spent their childhood. Low mud-brick houses flanked the road. “Imagine having to live in these conditions!†Mahmood said. “If I had my way, I’d demolish the entire village, rehouse everyone in apartments and turn this space over to agriculture.†After decades in the United States, where he started an Afghan restaurant chain, it all seemed a bit of a surprise to him: “Imagine hanging up goat meat in the sun in this heat! So unhygienic. . . . And all these people just sitting there. Do they have nothing to do, for crying out loud? Just look how weak the retail community is here. Call these shops? What era are we in — the Roman Empire?â€

I had asked to see the house where the brothers grew up, but after several false turns, we still couldn’t find the place. None of them had been back for years, not least because the village is now in the hands of a rival leader of the clan, their cousin Hashmat Karzai, and relations between the two factions of the family are not cordial.

“It’s changed beyond all recognition,†Mahmood said. “This mosque I remember: I used to play with Hamid over there. But the vineyards! Where have they gone?†Eventually his driver came to a stop. “This is it?†Mahmood asked. “It can’t be.†We got out in a field of dried mud, surrounded by mud houses with egg-carton domes. Mahmood summoned an old man in a turban wandering past and after conferring with him, announced: “The driver’s right. This is our home.†He gestured at the empty space around us.

“What happened?†I asked.

“The Russians.†He paused. “Any clan who were known to be prominent in the mujahedeen had their property seized or demolished.â€

For the first time, Mahmood looked deflated: “Qayum and I were in the U.S., but Hamid and my father were prominent in the jihad. These houses here,†he said, pointing at the mud houses, “this was where my cousins lived. The same night the Soviet governor sent troops to demolish our house, they were all called out and lined up. Then they were shot. Every last one of them.â€

‘Nothing left at all? Just an empty space?†Hamid Karzai dropped a cherry into his mouth. “Not even the outbuildings?â€

Another cherry followed the first: “I haven’t seen it since the 1980s, but I remember it all so well.†He paused to extract the two stones, lining them up neatly on a plate in front of him. “It was a typical Afghan village house,†he continued. “A mud house. With a long tunnel leading in from the main gate on the street. That was where I was born.â€

He pushed the fruit bowl toward me. “Have you ever tried Afghan cherries?†he asked. “You don’t get them anywhere else — they are the most delicious of all.†I did as I was bid. “They’re not meaty like the others. They’re juicy, soft and good. Slightly bitter: sweet and sour — what’s the word? Tart.â€

It was nearly midnight during the first week of Ramadan. Most business in Kabul had come to a halt, and Karzai, having more time on his hands than usual, had agreed to spend three evenings with me talking about Afghanistan’s future. When I arrived at the palace, security was exceptionally tight. On each visit, my papers and passport were examined seven times. I went through three body scanners, and my BlackBerry and pens were confiscated. When I at last gained admittance, the palace was all but deserted. Only the president’s personal bodyguards were around, clutching their M-16 assault rifles and stalking about under the lights in double-breasted pinstripe suits.

There was good reason for the heightened vigilance. A week earlier, a Taliban raiding party, dressed in Afghan National Army-style uniforms and equipped with fake IDs, penetrated the first two checkpoints in the seven rings of security surrounding the palace before being gunned down in a two-hour battle. They got as far as Ariana Chowk, near C.I.A. headquarters, where, in 1996, Najibullah, the last president of the Soviet-backed government, was killed after being castrated by the victorious Taliban.

The preceding weeks were particularly bad ones for Karzai’s embattled relationship with his Taliban enemies as well as his U.S. backers. After years of postponed negotiations and hedging, Karzai, the United States and the Taliban agreed to meet in Qatar for peace talks. The Americans and Karzai believed that the Taliban would describe their Doha premises as an office. Instead, they erected an embassylike plaque at the entrance that read “the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan†and unfurled the old Taliban flag. Karzai believed that the Obama administration had secretly agreed to this, and it played on his paranoia that the United States was making secret deals with the Taliban and their Pakistani backers, hoping to break up Afghanistan and create a Taliban entity in the south of the country.

Because of all this, I anticipated meeting a careworn Karzai, coming to terms with the unraveling of his regime. Instead, on our very first evening, he bounded into the room and grasped my hand firmly. I commented how well he looked considering the stress, and he laughed: “I don’t feel under pressure,†he said. “The first days of Ramadan are completely off days — nobody comes. Today was my first totally free day in all these 10 years! I did not even leave my room.†His wife, he said, was in Belgium with the children. “I just took naps and read my newspapers.â€

The nervous tic that often makes Karzai wince with his left eye, and which is said to get worse when he is upset, was almost absent. His robust health also gave the lie to the rumor that in adversity, Karzai had become addicted to various narcotics. The rumors had gained credence in Kabul’s gossip mill in part because of the president’s mood swings and fits of anger. They are nonetheless nonsense, according to those who know him well. “He’s very fit indeed,†says Amrullah Saleh, his former security chief, now a political opponent. “He takes at least an hour’s exercise each night and exhausts the guards that have to keep up with him.†Mahmood agrees: “He’s very disciplined physically. And he’s extremely moderate in his eating. You know how delicious our melons are? I’ve often seen his hand hovering over a second slice, and then he resists. He has steely discipline.†After a day of fasting, however, there was no such restraint. As Karzai munched his way through a huge platter of Afghan melons, grapes and figs, as well as mountains of tiny cherries, he merrily began denouncing what he described as the “betrayal†of Afghanistan and its people by what he referred to as his so-called Western allies.

The United States, Karzai said, was now plotting with Pakistan to abandon his regime and replace it with a divided Afghanistan, too weak to resist U.S. demands. To this end, America had long been deliberately destabilizing the region: “Has the war on terror made this region less radical or more radical?†he asked. “Is this the unintended consequence? Or has this been the result of policy?

“The picture is now becoming clear,†he continued, thumping the table for emphasis. “The West wanted to use Afghanistan, to have bases here, to create a situation whereby in the end Afghanistan would be so weak that it would agree to a deal in which Afghanistan’s interests will not even be secondary, but tertiary and worse.â€

Karzai’s rhetorical flights over the years have perplexed and dismayed his allies. More recently, they were the cause of something approaching despair as negotiations over the Bilateral Security Agreement (B.S.A.), which outlines the terms of the continued American military presence, stalled. At the time of our meeting, the two sides seemed irreparably deadlocked. Karzai wanted the United States to protect Afghanistan from outside attack — even if that meant sending forces into Pakistan. The United States wanted full immunity for its troops under Afghan law and was threatening a complete pullout if its terms were not met. Karzai let it be known that if necessary, Afghanistan would forgo a U.S. alliance and seek help elsewhere. This prospect terrified Karzai’s supporters at home as much as American officials, who feared the government they had installed at such cost might quickly collapse to the Taliban.

As Karzai warmed to his subject, he waded in deeper. Behind the facade of Western assistance and the ambassadors lining up to offer support, what he called “the Deep State†was working to undermine him. “I think the ambassadors don’t know what the Deep State is up to, so they get in trouble,†he said. “They are asked to do something, while on the ground the Deep State is busy doing something else.â€

The Western media was also party to the plot — underrating his successes as instructed by the governments of the West. The New York Times is, he believes, deliberately negative about his achievements. “They behave more like the Pravda of the Soviet Union. The difference is that Pravda does not have the mask of democracy on its face. The New York Times does.â€

Yet however overheated his rhetoric, Karzai is personally charming and has the ability to win over even his critics. During our evenings together, he took pains to assure me that he still believed in democracy and that he enjoyed Western newspapers and movies, particularly British ones. He also spoke about his love for the British royal family, recalling that Prince Charles once invited him for a weekend in Balmoral: “He is a good man: tremendously hospitable . . . Camilla an excellent lady.†As far as he was concerned, he had not changed his position; it was his allies who had let him down.

Did he really feel that he was betrayed by America? I asked.

“As a nation,†he replied immediately, “yes, very much.â€

I pointed out that this would come as a surprise to many Americans, given the investment in lives (around 2,000) and money (around $500 billion). “Look,†he replied, “Admiral Mullen said in one of his very important statements to the U.S. Senate, that the Haqqani network†— a leading insurgent group allied with the Taliban — “is the veritable arm of the ISI†— Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency. “Those are his words. . . . So if they know that the terrorist bases — the Taliban bases, the Haqqani bases — are in Pakistan, how could they be killing people and bombing in Afghanistan? This is a betrayal.â€

“And for you this is the big issue?†I asked.

“Civilian casualties — that is the biggest issue. I don’t care about their money, spent well or spent badly. We can live without that money. It’s the reason for which America came to Afghanistan: the fight against terror. They didn’t fight terrorism where it was, where it still is. They continued damaging Afghanistan and its people.â€

Independent reports by human rights groups back Karzai’s contention that there are too many civilian deaths in Afghanistan. But if they have become his rallying cry, it is also because they bring to mind the broader issue of Afghan sovereignty — the feeling Afghans have that they have become colonized subjects. Anyone who travels in Afghanistan can see the facility U.S. troops have for irritating their hosts. Driving to Kabul from Jalalabad recently, I got stuck behind a military convoy traveling at 20 miles per hour. The troops refused to let drivers overtake them, for fear of suicide bombers, firing warning shots at any who attempted to. By the time we reached the top of the pass there were hundreds of vehicles backed up behind the convoy, all full of seething Afghans. Every day, small incidents like this make the anger grow, and Karzai knows there are political points to be gained by regularly complaining of the insensitive behavior of his “so-called allies.â€

“What do we show as a result of the war on terror?†he continued. “Just yesterday, we had 22 women and children killed in Herat. Who did that? How long will this go on? We want to give America the bases they want. But in return for those bases, they must make sure that Afghanistan is secure, peaceful, stable with a unitary, centralized form of government. Not one that is insecure, thrown into fiefdoms and anarchic.†He shrugged his shoulders. “If they want to pull out, it’s up to them. But if they want to stay, Afghanistan’s interests must be delivered.â€

Returning to the subject the following evening, he said: “I would like to give a message through you to the West. Pressure tactics will not work on me. We are only looking for a fair deal — a deal in which the interests of Afghanistan are kept in mind. . . . You will not get an Afghanistan divided into fiefdoms. We will not allow it. Over our dead bodies.â€

I first met Karzai several months earlier, when he asked me to the palace to discuss my recent book on the First Anglo-Afghan War. It had resonated particularly for him as it centers on his forebear Shah Shuja ul-Mulk, the Afghan king who the British placed on the throne as part of their Great Game of imperial rivalry with the Russians. It is hard not to see echoes of present-day divisions in the past: Shah Shuja was the chief of the Popalzai tribe in the mid-19th century; Hamid Karzai was appointed chief of the same tribe. Shah Shuja’s principal opponents were the Ghilzai tribe, who now comprise a majority of the Taliban’s foot soldiers.

The First Anglo-Afghan War is not, however, a happy precedent. What began with an effortless act of regime change ended with a major military humiliation. After the British were massacred in the snow-blocked passes by the Ghilzais, Shah Shuja was assassinated by one of his inner circle. As we talked this spring, the parallels hung uncomfortably in the air.

Karzai made it clear he thought the United States was trying to bully him as the British did to Shah Shuja. But he was determined to learn the lessons of history and not be perceived as a puppet. “America and Britain behave as if we also came through a colonial experience,†he said. “We did not. We always won in the fight, but we lost politically. This time I want to make sure we win politically too.â€

When Karzai was elected president in 2004, he was hailed as a unique figure: a pro-Western Pashtun who fought the Soviets but stood against the Taliban, and so was acceptable to the country’s various sectarian groups and also to the West. But even as Karzai was building his new government, the Taliban were reorganizing. By the end of 2004, the United States captured images of Pakistani Army trucks rescuing Taliban fighters at the border; just three years later the Taliban had a permanent presence in more than half of the country, even collecting taxes and enforcing Shariah in Pashtun areas. Karzai blamed the Taliban resurgence on what he saw as the clumsy NATO handling of the war and the repeated U.S. failure to eradicate Taliban bases in Pakistan.

The United States, meanwhile, believed that Karzai was playing his own game — railing against the West to please his diverse constituents even as he relied on Western fears that Afghanistan would collapse into civil war for continued investment in defense and infrastructure. In 2009, Karl Eikenberry, the general appointed by Obama as his first ambassador to Afghanistan, was writing cables, later published by WikiLeaks, that revealed Washington’s growing frustration with its ally: “His inability to grasp the most rudimentary principles of state-building and his deep-seated insecurity as a leader combine to make any admission of fault unlikely, in turn confounding our best efforts to find in Karzai a responsible partner.â€

Yet at the same time, Karzai was becoming an increasingly powerful figure within Afghanistan. The man once dismissed as a powerless puppet, as only “the Mayor of Kabul,†learned to play his political enemies against one another and turn a range of tribes into his supporters.

“Maybe to begin with he was slightly taken for granted,†says Obama’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, the ambassador James Dobbins. “But he’s won two elections, he’s established a constitutional government with broad acceptance at home, is willing to step aside and in all probability will pass on power peacefully for the first time in Afghan history.†As his longtime rival for the presidency, Dr. Abdullah Abdullah acknowledges, “As a politician he has many qualities, especially energy and tactical skill.†But, he added ambiguously, “he is also one of the greatest actors Afghanistan has ever produced.â€

Even the U.S. military, which Karzai has criticized, has come to admire him. “What he says about us inflicting deliberate civilian casualties is absolutely untrue — in fact, preposterous,†says Gen. John Allen, who ran U.S. military operations in Afghanistan until this year. “But some of this is for political consumption, and partially it’s just rhetoric. He desires to be seen as his own man and the sovereign leader of a sovereign country. Defining himself apart from us is part of his political positioning. He knows he cannot allow himself to be perceived as an American Shah Shuja. He is a brilliant man in many ways.â€

His recent brinkmanship with the United States over the Bilateral Security Agreement is a measure of his growing skill. His withdrawal from security talks led to face-to-face negotiations with Secretary of State John Kerry in October. Karzai agreed, in principle, to allow U.S. troops to remain in Afghanistan but shrewdly left key details undecided, submitting the treaty for ratification to a loya jirga — a traditional gathering of elders — which, at press time, was scheduled to begin Nov. 21. Many believe it is very unlikely the loya jirga will grant U.S. troops immunity from prosecution. The council’s vote will give Karzai another card to play in negotiating a politically unpopular deal with the United States and help distance him from any fallout at home.

“In the process of wielding power, he has become quite an effective negotiator,†Dobbins said by phone from Washington. “He’s learned that it’s the squeaky wheel that gets the oil.â€

Karzai learned much about how to maneuver in Afghan politics from his father, Abdul Ahad, a powerful royalist, during Afghanistan’s brief political and social flowering in the ’60s and the ’70s. His sense of Afghan history and his family’s place in that story dates to that period as does his love-hate relationship with the West.

His beginnings were not altogether auspicious. Born in 1957, he was the last son of Abdul Ahad’s first marriage — after Abdul Ahmad, Mahmood and Qayum. Shortly after Hamid’s birth, his father left the boys’ illiterate mother for his younger and more educated second wife. It was three years before Abdul Ahad finally brought the two families together. Hamid himself doesn’t admit to any problems with this: “It was very common in Afghanistan, even today,†he said of the second marriage. “No tension. None at all.†But family friends are less certain: one said that Hamid’s mother was “treated in an inferior manner†and that his father never really bonded with his son. Relations with the half brothers were initially “bad.†Mahmood says explicitly: “Our mother was not happy. Hamid may have been a bit neglected. He lived partly in his own world.†According to Ayub Rafiqi, a family friend, it was not a happy time for Hamid: “His father was slightly embarrassed by him, and he was bullied by his brothers. I think he must have been very lonely. We would all be playing in the backyard, and he would sit making faces at us.â€

That began to change when, over the next decade, the family split up. In the wake of the 1978 leftist coup and the 1979 Soviet invasion, Karzai’s father fled to Pakistan. Before long, Mahmood and Qayum had taken up residence in the United States, where they both found work as waiters: Mahmood in San Francisco at the Carnelian Room, and Qayum near Washington, D.C., for the Marriott Hotel chain. It was Mahmood who had suggested that Hamid study in India, and the brothers each sent $50 a month to finance his education.

Hamid enrolled at Himachal Pradesh University, in the hill station of Shimla, where he studied English and adopted the persona of a bookish fop. “We all looked a mess,†says Hamid Helmandi, who remembers Karzai from college. “But Hamid always wore a suit and would strut up the Shimla Mall with an umbrella. He was determined that his English was going to be perfect, so he found some old Anglo-Indian ‘stayer on’ to teach proper posh English pronunciation. You can still hear the effects today.â€

It was in India, away from his brothers, Ayub Rafiqi says, that Hamid “really discovered himself.†Certainly Karzai, who remains fairly terse when describing his childhood, beams with delight when he talks about his student days in Shimla: “On arrival I fell in love with it,†he recalled during one of our Ramadan conversations. “That’s where I began to read about Britain and the British Raj — where I began to develop a lot of respect for the British. Not forgetting what they have done to us.†The Raj, he added later, had served India very well. “There was a lovely cinema called the Regal by the ice-skating rink. Fridays I would go and see Peter O’Toole movies . . . ‘Goodbye, Mr. Chips’ and ‘Man of La Mancha.’ †It was also in Shimla that he fell in love with English literature. “I read Thomas Hardy and Tennyson, but my favorite is, of course, Shelley. I like him very much. Very much.â€

Karzai spent his summers working with Afghan refugees in Pakistan and later joined his father in the moderate and pro-royalist party of Sibghatullah Mojaddedi, one of the diverse factions that made up the mujahedeen. When Najibullah’s pro-Soviet regime fell, the divisions within the mujahedeen widened into a full-scale civil war. Like many Afghans, Karzai — who served as a minister in the new government before fleeing to Pakistan to escape the fighting — saw the Taliban as the only force that could reunite the country. He quickly came to believe, however, that they were depriving Afghans of their culture and “doing the will of Pakistan.†He shuttled between Quetta and Islamabad, Istanbul, Bonn and Rome, trying to rally support to fight the Taliban. The Taliban eventually took their revenge. Hamid’s father was on his way home from the mosque in Quetta when two men drove up and fired a Kalashnikov: one bullet, direct to the head, from 30 feet.

The rest became part of Karzai’s legend: driving unarmed to Taliban-ruled Kandahar to bury his father in the family graveyard; being appointed chief of the Popalzai tribe; negotiating an anti-Taliban front with Ahmad Shah Massoud of the Northern Alliance, shortly before Massoud was assassinated by two suicide bombers; and finally, soon after 9/11, driving back into Afghanistan from Pakistan on a motorbike to bring the southern tribes out in rebellion.

If Karzai’s sense of carrying on his father’s legacy dates from the earliest days of his rise to the presidency, so does his dislike of what he came to see as the cavalier use of American weaponry. He recounted that on the eve of his inauguration in 2001, a convoy containing his supporters was bombed by U.S. jets in Paktika Province, killing some of his closest friends.

“Why does this continue to happen?†he said. “This is why I believe in the Deep State. Maybe even the generals didn’t know what was going on.†But why would it be in America’s interest to kill civilians? I asked. He said: “That’s the question — why? It is dangerous for a country to have so much carelessness. The words of the top leadership are good; the action on the ground is bad.â€

The Americans might well return the compliment. Though corruption in Karzai’s government is rampant — Afghanistan is now tied with North Korea and Somalia as the most corrupt country on earth — Karzai has developed a theory that it is the fault of the United States: “There is corruption, no doubt,†Karzai told me. “Our own petty corruption in the delivery of services was there before, is here today and will continue for some time. The big corruption was designed by the Americans. The contracts were used by the U.S. government to buy influence in Afghanistan. It was designed to corrupt the Afghan political leadership so as to be usable by them.â€

Others would maintain, however, that much of the corruption in Afghanistan can be laid directly at Karzai’s feet. The heroin industry boomed afresh under men like Sher Muhammad Akhundzada, Karzai’s chosen governor of Helmand and the country’s most infamous trafficker. Then there was the 2009 election, which was notoriously flawed: as many as 1,500 “ghost polling stations†were set up in remote areas beyond the supervision of electoral monitors.

But it is Karzai’s brothers who are widely regarded as the biggest stain on his legacy. Mahmood, in particular, has been accused of a litany of scams, ranging from using his proximity to the president to secure a lucrative Toyota dealership to contributing to the collapse of the Kabul Bank. Almost all of the bank’s loans were given to 19 individuals and companies, a number of them, including Mahmood, closely affiliated with the president and his associates. The ensuing government bailout cost $825 million. Mahmood was never charged with any crimes and claims to have repaid all the money he owes — a figure he put at $5.3 million.

Though Qayum was involved in neither the Kabul Bank nor any of Mahmood’s other business scandals, he is often tarred with the same brush. “Hamid and his father we respect,†said Ustad Abdul Halim, a grizzled mujahedeen commander, whom I met in Kandahar. “They are wise and knowledgeable persons. But these others — the Westerners used them to wash their dogs. Now they come back, and they don’t respect our people or our culture. People do not respect Qayum and Mahmood. We have thousands of dog washers like that. People don’t care for them.â€

Others go further. “He himself may be clean, but he tolerates corruption all around him,†says a former senior official in the Karzai government who spoke under the condition of anonymity, saying he feared retaliation. “That is where the people of Afghanistan have a problem with him. His associates are involved in so many controversies, yet Karzai has kept completely quiet on these matters. It’s very sad. The same media that used to see him as our Nelson Mandela now thinks of him as our Robert Mugabe.â€

What might a Karzai dynasty look like? When I first came to Kabul in the spring, everyone was talking about how Qayum had been anointed as Karzai’s successor at a family wedding in Dubai. When he entered the reception, Mahmood reportedly announced, “Behold the next president of Afghanistan.â€

I met Mahmood and Qayum for tea in their central Kabul apartment. A spread of sticky sweetmeats had been arranged on a glass-topped table amid the crystal chandeliers, wide-screen TVs and mock-leather sofas. As an array of Afghan delicacies was served, I asked the brothers about their years in the restaurant trade. “Our chain is called Helmand,†Qayum said. “We have one in Baltimore — that one has been voted one of the top 100 restaurants. We pride ourselves on the quality of our service and train all our waiters to talk nicely to the customers.†Mahmood, who was dressed in a cravat and tweed jacket for the occasion, nodded vigorously. “Other ethnic restaurants have good food, but they skimp on the service,†he said. “We promise French-style service and quality cooking.â€

Mahmood talked about how the business skills of the diaspora could boost the Afghan economy — “the only way for Afghanistan to get in line with the rest of the world,†as he put it. The conversation moved toward Afghanistan’s desperate need for infrastructure. “The Russian government built roads,†Qayum said. “This time everything was handed over to contractors. No concern for quality. So short-term.â€

Qayum spoke with the watchful air of a true politician: he was active in Washington during the period when the Karzais were prominent in the fight against the Taliban; he was present at the Bonn Conference that first elevated Hamid to the presidency; and after a brief stint as a member of the Afghan Parliament, he has been engaged in back-channel talks with the Taliban. “With the cooperation of tribal elders and the ulema’’ — Muslim legal scholars — “we’ve been making steady progress,†he said. “As long as we keep talking to them, I’m optimistic peace can come to this country. It is doable.â€

It was during that tea that Mahmood offered to take me around his controversial development project at Aino Mena. Mahmood’s critics say he was given the 10,000 acres of land at bargain-basement prices and that he used government subsidies to develop its infrastructure, before selling it at vastly inflated rates. Mahmood will have none of it. The land was offered at a competitive price, he says, and entrepreneurs like him, who take risks to develop the country, should be honored as the real heroes of the new Afghanistan, “not vilified for political ends.â€

Either way, there is no denying that Aino Mena forms a remarkable contrast to the battle-scarred Kandahar that surrounds it: the honking rickshaws, the crowded sidewalks, the barrows piled high with fruit, footwear and chicken cages. Aino Mena is a gated oasis of cool, shady eucalyptus avenues — an ambitious scheme to import Dubai-style gold-tap luxury to the birthplace of the Taliban.

“Well, some of the guys here may have gone a little over the top,†Mahmood said as we drove around: “Look at this beauty!†We pulled up outside a villa, a four-story Narco Rococo wedding cake that somehow mixes Swiss chalet, Taj Mahal Mughal and Cosa Nostra Baroque. “Just look at the flair our investors show!†he said. “This is the future!â€

We drove on, past a trash truck. Mahmood screeched to a halt, gesturing excitedly: “We have the first garbage collection in the country!†We then circled around what looked like a giant piece of Tupperware spouting jets of water. “I designed the water features myself,†he said proudly. “Beautiful, no?â€

Building a 10,000-acre dream suburb close to one of the most violent cities in Afghanistan has not been entirely without its problems. The development has proved popular with suicide bombers. It has also become a target of Afghanistan’s growing kidnap-for-ransom networks. That’s been bad for business, Mahmood admitted, but he remains unbowed: “So far we’ve had three motorcycle attacks and two car bombs. Much better than in the city.â€

He also shrugged off the little family dispute involving his half brother, Shah Wali Karzai, a former project manager of the development, now Ahmed Wali’s successor as Kandahar strongman, who, Mahmood says, siphoned off some $55 million from the Aino Mena bank account, leaving the project close to bankruptcy. Instead he moved the conversation onto Qayum’s political ambitions: “I will support him,†he said firmly. “We’re working out our policies right now.â€

And Hamid? “I’m not sure,†he replied. “I think he should support Qayum as it would be good for the country. People are comfortable with our family. If we told them a Karzai is standing for another five years, the majority would like it. Qayum would be an excellent president. And he would have a good chance if Hamid supports him. In that case he will be the next president.â€

On my return to Kabul, I asked Karzai about his brothers — everywhere I went I was told that they were undermining his legacy. What did he think about that?

“No!†he replied. “Look, the story of my brothers is a very open book. One of them, who was party to the Kabul Bank, had some shares. The case has gone to the courts, the case is public. The allegations about Ahmed Wali were largely Western propaganda. Have some melon.â€

He pushed the bowl toward me. “My brothers are free individuals in a free democratic country,†he continued. “They have to respond to their own doings. As far as I am concerned, I have run a clean hand, without nepotism of any kind. I have not appointed a single person from my family in the government.â€

“What about Ahmed Wali?â€

“He was elected by the people. I don’t determine elections. It would be terrible if I determined elections.â€

And would he eventually come out and support Qayum for the presidency? Would Afghanistan soon have a Karzai dynasty like the Gandhis in India or the Bhuttos in Pakistan?

“The Bhuttos and Gandhis were in very different circumstances,†he replied. “They have parliamentary forms of government. Afghanistan is a presidential form of government. In this system, a dynasty isn’t the right thing to do. I have recommended to Qayum that it’s better for him, though he has all the rights as an Afghan to stand as a candidate, but I don’t think it’s good for himself or the family. I would respect his right, but I would not advise it.â€

“Mahmood hopes you will still support Qayum,†I said.

“It’s not a matter for the family,†he said firmly. “It’s a matter for the country. He will be happier the way he is right now.â€

When I telephoned Qayum after he officially announced his candidacy in early October — to the surprise of many who thought he would have no chance without the backing of his brother — he portrayed himself as building on Hamid’s political successes but with a focus on the private sector: “I’ve been a successful businessman. Created a good life for my family, starting from nothing. Those who dismiss me as a dogwasher are just envious of my achievements.â€

Whatever he really feels, Qayum said he could not expect his brother to support him. “It’s good that the president remains independent, and takes a neutral stand.†I asked what his reaction would be if Hamid ended up supporting someone else. “He has a perfect right to support who he wants. And I’m sure if he did support anyone, that candidate would win.â€

Would that lead to difficulties in the family?

“All of us are mature enough,†he added diplomatically. “Politics is a small part of life, not the whole. I see Hamid every other night. I am proud of him. He’s been a successful president in difficult circumstances, and we need to continue with that.â€

In the course of our Ramadan conversations, Karzai and I discussed what he might do after the elections. Would he leave Afghanistan, as had been speculated?

“I will be staying in the country,†he said. “They decided to build a house for me, a government house. . . . The first thing is to take a few days off and relax. To be in charge of my own time — a month to three months so I can recuperate fully.†He looked forward, he said later, to being “free like a bird to go around this lovely country. I will visit people, go to bazaars. . . .â€

Could he really do that? With the security situation? “Still I will do it. Security is a fact of life. The U.S. president has much more security than I have when he goes out in America.â€

But was he hopeful for the future? With the economy tanking and the Taliban controlling so much of the country, wasn’t civil war a real possibility?

“There will not be a civil war at all. Unless foreign powers plot against us.†Fearmongering was part of “the American psychological warfare†against him. “But it did not shake me, it did not weaken me, it rather strengthened me.â€

He said he remained focused on the future.

“This is what I am busy with day to day, planning the future. I feel it is my responsibility to make sure that the future is better for the Afghan people than ever before. I just hope the Americans will realize I have a responsibility toward Afghanistan, and that my being adamant about issues is not in opposition to them.†He paused: “I am not an opponent of the West. I am just the slave of the interests of the Afghan people. And that I shall fulfill.â€

William Dalrymple is the author, most recently, of “Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan 1839-42.â€

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: December 8, 2013

Because of a transcription error, an article on Nov. 24 about President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan misquoted Karzai’s brother Qayum. He said, “The Russian government built roads.†He did not say that “even the Russians gave us better buildings and roads than the Americans have done.â€

A version of this article appears in print on November 24, 2013, on page MM45 of the Sunday Magazine with the headline: How Is Hamid Karzai Still Standing?.

P.S.

The above article from Magazine of The New York Times is reproduced here for educational and non commercial use