There’s been a lot recently about the tension between President Obama and Afghanistan President Karzai, but precious little about the Afghan politicking going on behind the scenes. Ahmad Majidyar has a great piece out — written back in December and published in January — describing the jockeying going on with regard to timing and organizing the Afghan elections and how it is contributing to the rise in tension. Here.

A sample:

During his campaign, Barack Obama was critical of Karzai. On his July 19, 2008, trip to Afghanistan, Obama chided Karzai for not doing enough to promote good governance. “I told President Karzai that I thought that he needs to really focus on issues of corruption and counternarcotics and to counter the narcotics trade much more aggressively than has been done so far.”[67] In an earlier interview, he told CNN, “I think the Karzai government has not gotten out of the bunker and helped organize Afghanistan and government, the judiciary, police forces, in ways that would give people confidence.”[68] In the second presidential debate on October 7, Obama said, “We have to have a government that is responsive to the Afghan people, and frankly it’s just not responsive right now.”[69] The last meeting between Vice President Joe Biden and Karzai was reportedly so tense that Biden walked out.[70] Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was the latest to blast Karzai’s administration. Just days before taking office, she branded Afghanistan a “narco-state” whose government was “plagued by limited capacity and widespread corruption.”[71] Such criticism is not lost on Afganistan’s population and has fueled speculation that Obama plans to enact his mantra of change here as well. A front-page headline in the independent daily Arman-e Melli read, “Obama will begin changes in Afghanistan by dismissing Karzai.”[72] And the Daily Afghanistan wrote, “The lucky star of President Karzai will fall with the victory of Obama.”[73] Hasht-e Sobh opined that Obama would seek a replacement for Karzai.[74] The Iranian media has also fueled such speculation. “Americans are trying to call into question the president’s popularity and damage his standing in Afghanistan to replace him with another individual in the forthcoming presidential elections,” the Voice of the Islamic Republic of Iran said in a special news bulletin on Afghanistan.[75] The Iranian daily Sarmayeh described Obama’s foreign policy team as a “nightmare” for Karzai.[76] Karzai’s fears that he can no longer take U.S. support for granted are manifested in a recent dramatic shift in attitude. Beyond his outreach to the Taliban, his tone has become more confrontational since Obama’s victory. In offering protection for the Taliban’s reclusive leader, Mullah Omar, Karzai told the press in Kabul on November 16, “If I say I want protection for Omar, then the international community has two choices: remove me or leave if they disagree. And both are good.”[77] Never before has the president described the departure of foreign troops as “good” for the country. In a November 25 speech to a visiting UN Security Council delegation, Karzai for the first time called for a timetable for ending the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan.[78] Karzai’s confrontational posture should concern Obama–who, despite enormous domestic and foreign challenges, has pledged to put Afghanistan at the top of his agenda–especially since Karzai’s call for a timetable to withdraw foreign forces comes as the Pentagon sends an additional twenty thousand to thirty thousand troops into the theater.[79]