Exporting elections

Simon Jenkins on the exportation of democracy to others countries:

The west's proudest export to the Islamic world this past decade has been democracy. That is, not real democracy, which is too complicated, but elections. They have been exported at the point of a gun and a missile to Iraq and Afghanistan, to "nation-build" these states and hence "defeat terror". When apologists are challenged to show some good resulting from the shambles, they invariably reply: "It has given Iraqis and Afghans freedom to vote."

I'm wondering if it is possible to argue with a straight that Afghanistan and Iraq are sustainable democracies, meaning that their citizens have as many political choices as Americans for example.