I was left quite depressed on Friday after spending the afternoon with a good Afghan friend, a colleague from the Ashraf Ghani for President campaign which run its course during this summer’s elections there. My primary feeling after discussing the ins and outs of the election, the various Western “strategies” in the country (ironic how each country has its own flavour of engagement there: the Americans with their brute force & power, the French who pick a horse and stick with it, the Italians who bribe the Taliban in their own special way, and the British, who really aren’t doing much high profile there except for the military force we have), is that there doesn’t appear to be a coherent strategy for the medium/long term there at all. And listening to PMQs this week, all we really understood from the exchange over Afghanistan is that our armed forces are there to protect the streets of Britain, not to hold up the government in Kabul.

As the world waits with bated breath for the American military elite, and President Obama to announce their new strategy in the country over the coming weeks, I wonder if the UK should begin now to look at its own Afghan strategy separately to the Americans. Whilst I still believe that we should maintain our significant military presence in the country, I think the UK should forge a unique soft power policy in the country, in order to help Afghan society move forward from the difficult few decades it has lived through. Britain’s so-called “soft power”, the extended influence of our culture, language, economic & business clout, as well as our history and national brand, is one of the reasons that this country remains a powerful nation today. Through institutions such as the BBC and the British Council, and through our major international businesses and the top quality universities here in the UK, Brand Britain has been plied all around the globe for decades, leading to greater goodwill and respect for our country, improved governance in various parts of the world, healthy business environments and an increase in entrepreneurship, and a plethora of UK-educated national leaders in many countries.

The United Kingdom’s soft power should be put to better use in Afghanistan, and here are four ideas which could be implemented right now:

- Extend the British Council’s mission in the country, and make youth leadership training a large part of its remit. Young people should be taught leadership and organisation skills by the British Council in Kabul and one or two other major cities. The BC should build a flagship headquarters in the capital, with a library and access to the Internet and other media, open to anyone. A whole generation of forward-looking, internationalist young Afghans, with quality leadership skills and contacts would lead to a more skilled political class, and will give a huge boost to Afghan civil society.

- Educate a new class of modern Islamic mullahs. Afghanistan is an Islamic country, and there’s no getting away from that. Afghanistan’s population is 99% Muslim according to the CIA World Factbook and so it would be logical to conclude that to improve Afghan society and make it more forward looking, a new class of mullahs should be educated to encourage Afghans to feel at ease with themselves as Muslims but at the same time modern and forward-looking in their religious attitudes. Many moderate Afghans feel that their society has been hijacked by more fundamentalist attitudes toward Islam, and this is one of the main reasons that a large part of society feels that the ideals of the Taliban resonate with them. We can counter this by showing Afghans the other side of Islam.

- Set up a fund to encourage entrepreneurship and business building in the country. Let’s be more bullish about encouraging Afghans to be more entrepreneurial and industrialist, by making start-up funds available for people in Afghanistan to set up business, create wealth and create jobs. Afghans are ambitious and bold, and by making it easy for entrepreneurs to create businesses, more people there will have a stake in a peaceful society, which leads to stable jobs and prosperity for themselves and their families. The United Kingdom should immediately create a fund to encourage those willing to take risks to set up technology, agricultural, hospitality and other such businesses in Kabul and around the country.

- Export British media and culture more visibly. My Afghan friend told me that people in Afghanistan like to make fun of the culture and habits of the Western countries that are present in their nation. Shows such as Afghan Star, which are based on British templates show another, less serious side of countries like the UK and the US. I also understand that political power bases are strong when they control TV & radio stations in Afghanistan. Political blocs control television and radio stations, and that brings both revenue to their political masters and increased awareness and agreement with their political views (propaganda basically!). Why not set up a BBC Afghanistan television station to go with the BBC World Service Pashto services? And while we’re at it, we should export more of our TV show templates too – Afghan Eastenders anyone?

I haven’t touched on the political issues in this post. I now believe that it was hopelessly naive to think that we could simply install Western-style democracy in Afghanistan. British and American military and political planners clearly don’t have much of an understanding of the Afghan culture, and that’s really why we’re in such a mess right now (this year’s presidential election there demonstrated that direct elections aren’t really going work at the moment – corruption is strife, and President Karzai has sold his political soul to warlords and other negative vested interests). But we are where we are and we will have to continue with the path we’ve created. If the UK improves its soft power efforts in the country, and creates a new generation of leaders both in politics in business, hopefully in the long term we will see improved, organic and locally bred results.