Afghanistan: The intimidating face of America

"Go back to your vehicles, now!" he bellowed at the gates of the presidential palace here.

A handful of French and German officers, members of the NATO peacekeeping forces in Afghanistan, tried to explain that the group of journalists with them had come at the invitation of the French defense minister, who was meeting inside with the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai.

The journalists had arrived in NATO armored personnel carriers, looking like middle-aged Gomer Pyles in mismatched flak jackets and helmets. The president's Afghan security guards had already ushered the group through metal detectors and identity checks.

But the American security detail, outsized men in civilian clothes, some carrying M-16's, were not in a mood to listen. With wraparound sunglasses, longish auburn hair, mustache and "soul patch" - a tuft of beard below his lower lip - the man atop the Humvee was no United States soldier. He wore no identification on his black T-shirt. He offered none, either.

Cowed, the European officers, delicate by comparison in their insignia-flecked uniforms and navy blue berets, turned meekly and led the journalists away.

"I am a soldier and normally I don't take orders from civilians, but they have machine guns, which are a better argument," said Capt. Georg Auer, a German officer escorting the journalists.

Left to guess, he surmised that the men were employees of DynCorp, a private security firm hired by the United States State Department to protect President Karzai.

The ambiguousness is not incidental, but goes to the core of America's relations with its allies in places like Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as the public face that the United States projects.

A century or so ago, American missionaries fanned out across the globe to spread not just their religion but Western ways to the "uncivilized" masses. Then came the Peace Corps, which sent idealistic young Americans to build schools and dig wells and show the world how good the United States could be. These days, though, belligerent men with sunglasses and guns are America's most visible civilian representatives in some parts of the world.

The United States has hired private contractors to perform functions like palace security and even interrogations both here and in Iraq, where they were implicated in the prison abuse scandals. A C.I.A. contractor in Afghanistan has been charged in connection with the death of an Afghan man in custody in June 2003. Their relationship to the American military is sometimes unclear even to Americans, let alone to their allies.

Captain Auer and Western diplomats complain that the American government's use of such ambiguous forces has sown confusion and resentment in Kabul.

So murky are the lines of authority, Captain Auer said, that it sometimes seems any American with enough muscles and guns can pose as a representative of the United States government. He gave the example of Jonathan K. Idema, recently convicted by an Afghan court on charges of detaining and torturing Afghans as part of an apparently private hunt for terrorists.

Even NATO's International Security Assistance Force thought Mr. Idema was working for the United States, and on three occasions responded to his calls for backup. So overwhelming is American force these days that NATO officers ostensibly in charge of Kabul's security do not challenge the authority of Americans, even those out of uniform.

Contractors do not live by the same constraints as active-duty soldiers. At best, they reinforce the stereotype of Americans as brawny and boorish. At worst, their blurring of the military-civilian line serves as a reminder that military discipline not only keeps up morale, but encourages moral behavior.

DynCorp is the same company whose employees hired child prostitutes while working in Bosnia a few years ago, until some people started complaining. Rather than face local justice or courts-martial, the perpetrators were simply sent home.

One of the whistleblowers, a DynCorp employee named Ben Johnston, lost his job for speaking out. He later told Congress, "DynCorp is the worst diplomat our country could ever want overseas."

Texas-based DynCorp's parent, CSC, declined to comment on any of these incidents, saying that it is "constrained" from doing so by its contracts with the State Department.

But the United States Embassy in Kabul is aware of the problem and has moved to curb the aggressive behavior of the DynCorp guards who accompany Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, according to one embassy staff member.

"Their behavior is unacceptable," said one European diplomat in Kabul, adding that their brusque manner did more harm than good. "We've all had experiences like that at the presidential palace."

He suggested that a bombing outside DynCorp's Kabul headquarters in August, in which 10 people died, including 3 Americans, "specifically targeted the special presidential guard, which is odious."

After the bombing, DynCorp blocked off a street to protect a second residence, but neighbors are now demanding that the company move out of residential areas to the edge of the city, near the American and NATO military bases.

No one denies the need for extraordinarily tight security in Afghanistan, especially for President Karzai, who has escaped at least two assassination attempts.But allies in Kabul say that America would do well to act a little gentler, particularly as it presses the same NATO allies to come up with men, money and matériel for the tedious reconstruction work needed to stabilize Iraq and keep Afghanistan from unraveling into a dangerous narco-state. The private security forces, they warn, only breed resentment among allied soldiers engaged in the unglamorous work of peacekeeping - not to speak of Afghans.

They can also undercut part of that mission. Diplomats point out that the presence of peacekeeping troops is meant not only to keep troublemakers at bay but also to put a friendly face on the foreign military presence in the country.

The French defense minister, Michèle Alliot-Marie, said the incident at the presidential palace so irritated her that she asked some of those present to send her a report on what had occurred. The journalists' presence at her meeting with President Karzai, she said, had been cleared with his office in advance.

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