KABUL (PAN): Some Afghan political analysts believe US Special Envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke, who died after surgery on Monday, had failed to deal with the situation in the war-torn country.

The 69-year-old diplomat had been in critical condition since he collapsed during a meeting with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the State Department on Friday.

Holbrooke was a senior, wise and successful diplomat, said Ahmad Saeedi, who acknowledged the envoy's untiring efforts to end the Bosnia war in 1995.

However, the top diplomat had been unsuccessful in Afghanistan, the analyst noted. "He never achieved what was expected of him in this country." He could not succeed because the problem in Afghanistan was not limited to its territory, Saeedi explained. It was a regional problem, a fact Holbrooke could not grasp.

The diplomat, who served in his latest position for two years, wanted to pay more attention to Pakistan than Afghanistan according to Saeedi, who believes his death would not affect President Barack Obama's Afghan war strategy review, scheduled at the end of 2010, because he had already submitted his assessment to the administration.

A teacher at Kabul University, Syed Massoud, accused Holbrooke of damaging relations among the US, Afghanistan and Pakistan. Due to Holbrooke's "complicated diplomacy" Afghans were the ultimate losers, he opined.

"He was in disagreement with President Karzai on civilian casualties and nighttime operations; at times he tried to instigate the opposition against Karzai," the teacher alleged. "Because of his failed plans, the entire US strategy seems to have failed."

According to Massoud, Holbrooke also backed the idea of Afghanistan's division. He hoped the Obama administration would find a suitable replacement.

Given complexity of the Afghan imbroglio, Holbrooke was unable to bring about a positive change in Afghanistan, said another analyst, Waheed Muzhda. In his view, His only achievement was to encourage Kabul and Islamabad to sign the Afghanistan-Pakistan Transit Trade Agreement (APTTA). "He didn't do what he should have over the past two years."

However, US officials call Holbrooke one of the successful foreign policy figures.

President Obama praised him as a "true giant of American foreign policy".

ss/mud