Want to be a provincial police chief? It will cost you $100,000.

Want to drive a convoy of trucks loaded with fuel across the country? Be prepared to pay $6,000 per truck, so the police will not tip off the Taliban.

Need to settle a lawsuit over the ownership of your house? About $25,000, depending on the judge.

It's called Vietnam in the mountains, as Iraq has become Vietnam in the desert. This kind of crap is why we can't win this war and it's because we're all to happy to take the easy way out and buy our way to a solution, when buying the opening is only a stopgap measure. What's worse is the bribes cause an already untenable situation to degenerate further, faster.

This route is insanity. We've been down it multiple times before and ALWAYS, it leads to places we don't want to be. Why the hell are we going down it again?

Bribes Corrode Afghans’ Trust in Government - NYTimes.com