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Afghanistan

Taliban Builds Momentum as Western Troops Withdraw

As the experience of the last year has shown, no reliance can be placed on outside imperialist countries, who will always out their imperialist interests first, second and always...

Friday, 16 July 2021 13:09 (UTC)
Bob Sulatycki
Socialist Alternative (ISA in England, Wales & Scotland)
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With the date for withdrawal of US and coalition forces from control Afghanistan fixed by Biden for the end of August, a momentum has built up behind the Taliban. An unwinnable war, initiated by the President Bush and Prime Minister Blair almost two decades ago, is being brought to an ignominious and humiliating conclusion for western imperialism. For all the destruction, the loss of lives, the trillions of dollars spent, and the empty promises made, there has been no tangible benefit gained by the US and its allies, let alone for the people of Afghanistan.

President Ghani and the Afghani government are seeing their power visibly evaporating as the basis of its support, US and allied armed forces, are pulled out. There is an unravelling of central authority. Daily there are reports of defections of Afghan army troops with their weapons to the Taliban. Whole units have fled across the borders to neighboring Tajikistan. Very swiftly, most border crossings, on all sides of the country, have fallen to the Taliban. One third of districts are now under Taliban rule, although for the moment the main urban areas remain outside their direct control.

There are echoes of the last days of the South Vietnamese puppet regime in 1975, whose power and authority collapsed once the US ended direct military intervention. The chaotic scenes that accompanied the final pullout of US personnel from Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) have long haunted the ruling class in the US, and it is certainly a possibility that such a scenario could play out sooner rather than later in Kabul.

By comparison with the forces leading the fight for national liberation in Vietnam (with all their Stalinist deficiencies), the Taliban cannot be seen as any kind of progressive force. They are religious obscurantists and political reactionaries, with a brutal record of persecuting minorities, and of enforcing anti-women measures, including the denial of education and work for girls and women, and placing repressive controls over every aspect of women’s lives. Such controls are underpinned by barbaric punishments such as flogging.

The speed and scale of the collapse has surprised and alarmed a big section of the ruling class in Europe and the US. Many, especially in Europe, had been hoping that incoming President Biden would pull back from the agreement signed in Doha in Autumn 2020 between the Trump administration and the Taliban which signalled the ending of direct American intervention in Afghanistan. But in fact Biden has doubled down on the withdrawal of forces, trying to ensure that it takes place as soon as possible.

The history of the west’s intervention is one of a brutal war waged against large sections of the rural population, which, far from cowing opposition, has helped to foster it, and to rebuild support for the Taliban. There has been a complete failure to root out tribalism, corruption and cronyism or develop the economy, or to build an infrastructure. For all the trillions spent by the West on bombs over the past two decades, only a pittance was spent on improving the lives of ordinary Afghans. Kabul remains the only capital city in Asia where there is no railway station.

Biden’s hope is to bring Taliban on-side. Despite the repeated claims from the US that the interests in Afghanistan stem from concerns for human rights, those arguments have now been largely dropped.

Of course, it is often conveniently overlooked that the Taliban were originally the proteges of the US back in the 1980s, acting in cahoots with Pakistani intelligence, when the overriding aim was to overthrow the ‘Communist’ regime in Afghanistan a regime that was supported militarily by the then Soviet Union. But, as with Al Qaeda, the Taliban very soon turned round to bite the (American) hand that had fed them.

The prime interest of Biden is to ensure that neither Al Qaeda or Islamic State establish a base in Afghanistan from which they can direct attacks on the US. A long-drawn-out war and continued instability could make that nightmare scenario more likely. It is for that reason that the US does not rely simply on the continued survival of the current Afghani government, but is prepared to deal with the Taliban on the understanding that they do not provide any support for AQ or IS.

In effect, the Islamic regime in Iran has the same considerations as the US. Viewing the prospect of chaos, the Iranian regime has just concluded talks in Tehran with senior Taliban representatives. Despite the fact that the Iranian regime and Taliban promote two very different versions of Islam, Tehran is keen to ensure stability in the region, on the basis that the Sunni minority in border areas of Iran are not encouraged to press their interests, and Islamic State is kept under control. Neither of these is certain, although the last time the Taliban were in control, both regimes coexisted happily enough, both oppressing their populations and enforcing fundamentalist Islam — one a Shia version, the other Sunni.

What will happen in immediate future? The Afghan army, trained and armed by the west, looks demoralised and incapable of mounting a sustained military campaign. Ghani is increasingly turning to the discredited warlords to bring in their private militias to fight the war. Such forces do not have popular support, even in anti-Taliban areas.

With the pull out of NATO forces, out too will go the logistical back up for Ghani’s army, as well as air support, plus much of the intelligence network. US intelligence estimates suggest it is only a matter of months before Kabul and the other urban centres fall to the Taliban. However, this is not certain.

The Taliban itself is heavily dependent for support on the Pashtuns, but other national minorities, especially in the north of the country, view them with hostility. Moreover, in the urban areas, especially Kabul, the Taliban are detested.

There have been indications of the creation of popular, and especially of women’s militias to fight a defence against the Taliban. Although these are at an early stage, if in the urban areas popular militias can be created that have democratic structures, then a genuinely popular resistance to the Taliban may be possible.

Above all, as the experience of the last year has shown, no reliance can be placed on outside imperialist countries, who will always out their imperialist interests first, second and always. That is as true in Afghanistan as it was previously in Kurdistan.

A genuine resistance movement will be based on the working class and the poor, linking with women’s committees, and independent of the war lords and tribal leaders whose legacy of corruption and brutality have been a principal factor in leading to the resurgence of the Taliban. The working class in Afghanistan and countries in the region, in Iran and Pakistan and beyond to China, India and Russia, are the key to a lasting solution to the war, poverty and underdevelopment that has for so long blighted Afghanistan.

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Taliban Builds Momentum as Western Troops Withdraw (16 Jul 2021)

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