In October 2001 those who saw American bombers drop tons of bombs on a Taliban controlled Afghanistan may have felt it was a defining moment for the country. Almost two decades to the day we now have another defining moment for Afghanistan and the region with the Taliban's return to power. A 'new' Afghanistan is emerging not only because the Taliban are trying to impress upon us that they have changed, but because ground realities of Afghan society have changed. Gone are the war lords and private armies that helped the US and its allies. The new generation of Afghans, in the cities especially, may not be so submissive to the Taliban as they were in 1996. The West has pulled out with clarity that they do now wish to be involved in the country they tried to build back because the emotional, material and political cost was no more tenable.
USA argues that if the purpose of the invasion in 2001 was to stop terrorist activity targeted against America then they see their Afghan war as a success. However, this is far from the truth because leaving Afghanistan in the manner they have and the Taliban's lack of cohesiveness on this issue means that countries fearing terrorist activity have to be more worried. There is a historical perspective to the Taliban's position on terrorism and its track record that influences its conduct in the future.
Since its inception the Taliban's central leadership has been firm only in terms of spiritual leadership. This central leadership has had some claims on spiritual and religious leadership and some of its senior leaders have either attended higher religious education or have studied under the tutelage of respected ulema (teachers) of Islam. However, local commanders of the Taliban, especially in far flung provinces, were lacking the knowledge and experience to be considered capable of even understanding the basics of Islamic traditions. This was true in the 1990's and even today holds true to a great extent. This explains the dichotomy in the way the Taliban have dealt with issues of women's rights, presence of foreign fighters and in general its conduct on social matters.
Mullah Omar, who led the Taliban through the 1990's, relied heavily on the support of the local commanders and was surrounded by many who guided him on matters of policy. These local commanders used Pushtun codes of conduct in dealing with many issues. This explains why Mullah Omar refused to hand over Osama bun Laden to the Americans because under Pushtun code he was a guest and therefore under Pushtun code he was to be protected. The more modern minded 'mullahs' within Taliban felt that since bin Laden had continued to carry arms as a guest he had violated the code of protection and therefore could be handed over. In Mullah Omar's defence he did offer the US the option of trying Osama bin Laden in Afghanistan or sending him to Saudi Arabia to be tried under their laws, an offer Washington ignored.
This fractured leadership explains why the Taliban ended up having such contradictory policies where they banned prostitution and forced sexual slavery but still local commanders encouraged Arab and Pakistani fighters of Al Qadea to enslave women from the Uzbek and Tajik minorities. It seemed in many districts under Taliban control it was left to the local commander to decide if he thought foreign fighters were welcome or not. In most cases these commanders had little if any understanding of the issues of global terrorism and saw foreign fighters as allies who fought the Soviets alongside the Mujahideen and therefore were welcome.
While the Taliban of today has presented a more understanding face when it comes to the issue of Afghanistan becoming a base for foreign fighters it does seem this is an assurance designed only for Western consumption. In 2021 when the Taliban swept through the country it released many prisoners which included about 2000 fighters of the Tehrik e Taliban Pakistan (TTP) including its leader Mullah Fazullah. Pakistans request to the Afghan Taliban to either hand over Mullah Fazullah to Pakistan or at least not to release him were ignored by Taliban. Interestingly there are a number of groups active in Iranian and Pakistani Baluchistan who have some presence in Afghanistan and also receive tacit support from India. Some sources have claimed that the TTP is very much a terrorist group that has India's support even though India has, in the past, not been very warm to the Afghan Taliban.
It is unlikely that the Taliban government will be able to curb existing militant groups from establishing some presence on their soil. There are already reports that some of the ultra conservative commanders within Taliban in provinces like Helmand, are not pleased with the 'concessions' the main leadership in Kabul is giving on issues of women's role in society. As these fissures grow it is highly likely that groups like ISIS-K (an off-shoot of ISIS) will draw these disgruntled Taliban to its ranks, as indeed it has done so in the past. On a more emotional perspective the Taliban take over of Afghanistan will be a boost to many militant groups in the region who may hope they can replicate the Taliban success elsewhere.
In the years ahead the Taliban governments 'promise' of not allowing their country to be used as a base of any attack on another country will be put to test. However, there are subtle points to consider in the Taliban promise. While they may keep their 'promise' of not letting attacks be launched from their soil they cannot assure that attacks could be planned and supported from Afghanistan without any direct attacks from Afghan soil. It is highly likely that groups opposed to the US and its allies will slowly gravitate to Afghanistan and will set up shop in varying degrees. The groups may not need a 'friendly' government to make their presence felt, all they need is a government that is not actively seeking to shut them down and in this regard the Taliban may fit the bill.
It is interesting to note that some elements within Pakistan have embraced and rejoiced at the Taliban victory in Afghanistan. The only positive one can see for Pakistan is that Kabul now has a government not hostile to Islamabad, however, this does not mean that the Taliban will reign in TTP. We have already seen a couple of attacks on the border areas of Pakistan carried out by TTP fighters operating from Afghanistan. Thus the notion that since Pakistan, along with Saudi Arabia and the United States, had a major role in the creation of the Taliban in the 1990's it will continue to exert its influence today is not entirely correct. Without a doubt the relationship between Kabul and Islamabad will be a testing one, made all the more difficult with India wanting to not only mend fences with the Taliban but to counter act any influence that Pakistan (and perhaps China) might have in Kabul.
Western intelligence agencies are most certainly not comfortable with the changes that have happened within Afghanistan. First of all they these changes were too rapid for the agencies to develop new plans and relationships within Afghanistan that can give it the intelligence gathering capability to neutralise terrorist groups. Secondly, while at the district and village level the Taliban intelligence and knowledge may well be superior to that of the previous Afghan government, such intelligence is purely targeted towards elements who oppose the Taliban and may not necessarily be concerned about activities beyond the borders of Afghanistan. There are very deep questions to be answered about how the Taliban will develop an intelligence service capable of being useful to Western intelligence agencies.
It is precisely these shortcomings which will attract the likes of ISIS, Al Qadea and dozens of other splinter groups to consider some sort of presence in Afghanistan. Such groups are assured that apart from the major cities, especially Kabul, they will have enough sympathisers within the far flung districts from amongst Afghans who have had a terrible experience of US and Western presence in the country. To the academics the biggest puzzle to solve is that how the United States went from being the country that helped the Mujahideen liberate Afghanistan from Soviet occupation to becoming the 'occupiers' who ended up being hated just as much as the Soviets?
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