Taliban besiege major Afghan cities, putting Biden in difficult dilemma

When the Taliban fled Kabul in December 2001, one of their top clerics and a former minister stayed at his home to pray. When I went to interview him he fired me with a “Don’t worry, we’ll be back. It’s God’s will “. Two decades later, the bearded pastor’s prediction is about to come true. Taliban militias meet besieging the main cities of the country and in no time, they could launch an offensive that would lead them, once again, to control Afghanistan.

The Sunni Islamic fundamentalist forces which ruled between 1996 and 2001 by imposing their beliefs through terror have already been very close to this current position on several occasions during these twenty years, but they have never done so with so many men and in as many cities at the same time. . They have taken several military posts in the key town of Kunduz, near the border with Tajikistan, and are already ruling neighboring Pul-i-Khumri. This gave them control of the road to Kabul, the capital. Something similar is happening in Kandahar in the south, across the Hindu Kursh mountains and on the border with Pakistan. It was the flagship city of the Taliban when it was built in the 1990s. The rulers came from the madrassas, the Koranic schools, which the refugees had raised on the Pakistani side to flee the invading Soviet troops.

The Defense Ministers of NATO countries, the Western Military Alliance, ratified on Thursday that they will keep the 12,000 troops from 38 countries who are there to train and support the Afghan army. Among them are also the 2,500 members of the US military that by an agreement signed last year by the Trump administration with the Taliban envoys expected to retire on May 1. With the exit of these troops from the longest war in American history, a vacuum would be created that the Taliban would immediately fill. Mainly, because the air force operating from bases and aircraft carriers in the area would also be withdrawn. A huge challenge for the new Joe Biden government. If he abides by the deal, the 20 years that have passed since the United States invaded the country to deactivate the training camps that the Al-Qaeda terrorist network maintained in Afghanistan under Taliban protection would be thrown away by above board. And if he stays, the troops will be exposed to rebel attacks, as has happened all this time, and integrated into another unpredictable stage of the conflict.

“The threat of Taliban military victories, especially in an area as symbolic and strategic as Kandahar, makes it difficult for the Biden government to assume the risks of finalizing the troop withdrawal,” he said in the NYTimes.com, Andrew Watkins, International del Crisis Group Analyst. “Withdrawing could be politically impossible if Kandahar is in the spotlight.”

Around the same time, at the end of 2001, I witnessed what was already common in the civil war that preceded the entry of the Taliban. The tribal leaders, who maintain their own small militias, negotiated all the time to belong to one or the other. They defended their own territorial interests and only They wanted to be on the side that protected them and paid them the best reward. Something that collapsed when General Abdul Raziq took command of Kandahar in 2011. A tough man who tidied up by watering poppy-planted fields with blood. Opium and heroin are extracted from these plants. Afghanistan is the world’s largest producer of this drug. Raziq was killed by a Taliban infiltrated by police and control passed to one of his brothers. Everything went back to custom for centuries on this land. Tribal chiefs negotiated with the Taliban again and they were able to move forward as the Afghan soldiers and police retreated without a fight.

The Taliban demand that the agreements reached in 2020 in Qatar by which an interim government should be formed to call for elections. They are also demanding the release of thousands of prisoners. So far Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, refused to comply with the agreement. The rebels also failed to honor their commitment and continued their offensive. In the past three months, they have conquered more than 200 army checkpoints and acquired a significant arsenal including heavy artillery.

In areas controlled by the Taliban, the draconian rules of the time they ruled the country have been imposed again. Now the “Quranic Law Fulfillment Inspectors” music is prohibited because it distracts from the duty of praying five times a day and they destroy any cell phone they find. Obviously, women must be covered from head to toe in burqaThey cannot work or attend schools or universities. But, at the same time, this order emanating from the writings of the fourteenth century, eliminates corruption from the state bureaucracy and deprives the power of local gangs, which is welcomed by peasants and tribal leaders.

In this context, a withdrawal of Western troops paves the way for the Taliban’s resumption of power over Kabul in a few months. Stefano Stefanini, former Ambassador of Italy to NATO and now analyst of Project associates, believes that no one should be surprised that Trump went out of his way to effect the pullout, as he sought the legitimacy to continue to deny the loss of the presidency to Biden or a legacy to run again as a candidate in 2024. But he says the new administration will radically change the situation. “A major US withdrawal would be seen as a great loss for the countries that remain in the current NATO mission and for the Afghan army. US special combat troops have already returned home, and those who are still there must train, assist and advise Afghan forces. And they rely on the American presence for their protection and security. Otherwise, they will be very vulnerable ”, underlines the Italian expert. “On the other hand, I don’t think the Pentagon generals are going to want to be defeated in Afghanistan“.

The mythical land of the “sweet pomegranates”, which no one could conquer definitively and to which Alexander the Great, when he was there, offered an extraordinary cultural mix with Greek, Persian and Indian elements, before the Mongol invasion of Genghis Khan does not impose barbarism, is back locked in his own labyrinth. The Taliban know the exit very well.