Last week President Obama flew to Afghanistan to rally the troops before the upcoming offense in Kandahar He also paid . visit to President Karzai. According to the Associated Press, “The trip was intended to let Obama tell Karzai that he must business deal with corruption and cut the flowing of money from poppy production and drug trafficking that is sustaining the insurgency.” As if a quick flight to Afghanistan in absolute secrecy amid extremely high security concerns is a small price to earnings in the name of anti-corruption.

Perhaps it is. Afghanistan’s corruption situation does not appear to have changed much over the months since the fraudulent presidential election in 2009. The United States is hoping it is headed for the endgame in Afghanistan but this may require partnership with clean afghan government and not just Obama’s 30,000 additional soldiery Any country’s problems can only truly be solved by its own people, but in Afghanistan’s case the specific problem of outlaw elements infiltrated into the public and buck private sector means that the people pull the string section are not those on the Americans’ side .

Obama’s trip gives a powerful message that fighting corruption is a precedency for the administration, at least in Afghanistan. That message may not have come across. Karzai has his own battle to fight at home, and the United States’s anti-corruption agenda is likely a low pressure priority As Karzai play to the house servant crowd with accusations such as that the United States was the culprit of last year’s election fraud, the Obama administration may wish it had rigged the election a bit more securely.