The Foreign Service Journal, December 2014

26 DECEMBER 2014 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL E ective U.S. leadership is more important than ever in Afghanistan. What policies should we adopt to help as Afghans take the reins of their own country? BY DAV I D SEDNEY David Sedney is a senior fellow (non-resident) at the At- lantic Council’s South Asia Center and a senior associate (non-resident) at the Center for Strategic and Internation- al Studies. He was deputy assistant secretary of Defense for Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia from 2009 to 2013 and deputy assistant secretary of Defense for East Asia from 2007 to 2009. Earlier he served in a variety of Foreign Service postings, including as chargé d’a aires ad interim and deputy chief of mission at Embassy Kabul and as DCM in Baku and Beijing. He also served as director for Afghanistan at the National Security Council in 2003. A fghanistan has changed profoundly since the United States went into that country in the fall of 2001. We have kept the country from being used again as a base to launch attacks on the United States, and made a decent start on building a new, professional Afghan Army. In addition, Afghans are much better o today in many sectors, ranging from health and education FIVE THINGS WE CAN STILL GET RIGHT FOCUS ON AFGHANISTAN