How did we get here, to this debacle? For that it is what it absolutely is – a debacle, a tragedy, a geopolitical misstep. You, our clients, have known for many months, even years, our fervent position that negotiations with the Afghan Taliban (henceforth Taliban, as opposed to the Pakistani Taliban or TTP) would fail, but perhaps we omitted to explain why this was inevitable. Three broad mistakes, then the consequences for Pakistan, global insecurity, and Western power:
First: The Western Lense
North Americans and Europeans view the world with Westphalian eyes; every parcel of land is a part of a nation state and its people are defined by, and identify themselves by, the borders and name of that country. Yet, Afghanistan has never been, nor likely ever will be, a Westphalian nation state. Its borders were imposed by others, with the Durand Line cutting through Pashtun tribal lands in Pakistan and what we call Afghanistan a case in point. Yes, some of its people see themselves as Afghans, perhaps even as Afghans first and foremost, but many are Pashtun or Hazara or Tajik or Uzbek or Baloch and that alone, paying no heed to names or borders imposed by others. We Westerners struggle to understand this and are arrogantly dismissive of it, looking down on this mindset as small and simple.
In the same vein, and also precisely because we fail to understand the tribal and warlord nature of life in that land, we can’t help ourselves from lumping myriad groups that we don’t understand together under one name. ‘Taliban’ just rolls off the tongue better than ‘loose collection of warlords temporarily aligned from time to time by tribal, religious, economic, or political objectives, a proportion of whom call themselves Taliban’. We knew the latter to be closer to reality, but over time our political and military leaders, journalists and talking-heads used the term ‘Taliban’ so often that eventually we came to believe it – that our enemy was a centrally controlled, homogenous, unified organisation. Do we really believe that the Taliban had a force of hundreds of thousands (given the Afghan National Army (ANA) was 300,000 strong) just sitting, waiting for the order, ready to make a coordinated sweep across the country in weeks? A six-week Blitzkrieg across a land of mountains, dirt roads, dusty tracks, motorbikes and donkeys? Or is it more realistic that that ‘advance’ was instead comprised of a mosaic of individual and localised battles against government forces by myriad individual groups under local leaders, temporarily aligned with the true Taliban by the withdrawal of the coalition, seizing the opportunity to once again be in control of their own fiefdoms, no longer subject to edicts from far-off Kabul?
So, once you trick yourself into believing that ‘Taliban’ is such a unified, national organisation you can then believe that negotiating with this mythical entity is actually a possibility. Yet, in reality, who was on the opposite side of the negotiating table in Qatar, who did he really represent, who did he actually control or even have modest influence over? All ‘Taliban’, all of the Pashtun that make up 40-50% of Afghanistan’s population, all of the local warlords, or just some of any of these groupings? If an elected government failed to represent all groups, do we think the Taliban could? Would the Taliban negotiator actually just say whatever he felt he needed his opponents needed to hear to hurry along their exit, laced with just the right amount of poker-faced resistance to make them think they’d nabbed that “great deal”? In truth, we negotiated with one faction in a complex medley of groups, and in our desperation to be rid of the nightmare convinced ourselves they exerted control over all our foes. We don’t doubt our intelligence agencies knew full well that these negotiations would end in debacle – contacts have privately confirmed as much – but there was no amount of telling politicians that were hungry for that popularity victory of ending the “forever war”, a hunger that every POTUS since Obama has displayed. So, our Western Lense doomed us into repeated bouts of confirmation bias, layering misconception over misnomer over misconception, setting the foundations for decisions based on incorrect understandings of Afghanistan, Afghans, and our enemies.
Second: Premature Withdrawal
A recent article in a US daily argued that, to paraphrase “we were always going to need to get out, it was always going to be messy, and there’re no examples I can find that say otherwise.” Poppycock. Yes, continued US presences in Germany, Japan and South Korea are not comparable, and truthfully those presences are sustained not to aid the host nation in maintaining security and stability but for the strategic advantages of having military bases within geographic range of our foes. Yet Oman is directly comparable. After an insurgency erupted in 1963 the British fought alongside newly installed Sultan Qaboos bin Said’s forces from 1971 to 1976 to quell it, and then spent over 30 years building the Omani armed forces – indeed today the UK still embeds British military Officers and Senior Non-Commissioned Officers with the Omani forces. Oman is now a stable, prosperous, and delightful country, an anchor in a troubled region.
What could, and should, have happened in Afghanistan, was pretty much exactly what the coalition had been doing for the last two years or so; training and advice to the ANA / Afghan National Police (ANP), contractor support for key areas like aircraft maintenance and fuel infrastructure, arms supply, intelligence and surveillance support to aid targeting, and fire support in the form of armed drones, close air support from ground attack aircraft, and perhaps indirect fires from artillery. For another 10 years at least. This model would continue to cost treasure yes, but by not deploying coalition troops into combat (largely the model of the last few years) it could have been politically tolerable, whilst avoiding the disastrous outcome we see today. Without these support resources the collapse of the ANA was inevitable; we built the ANA in the image of our own standing armies, trained them to fight like us, always with those resources in support. We would not expect our own troops to prevail without such resources, so why would we expect the ANA to? In fact, intelligence agency contacts have confirmed that they fully expected the ANA collapse/ ‘Taliban’ victory, just not that it would be so rapid. We don’t doubt that they made this clear to their political masters, but again it fell on deaf ears. Dominic Raab has inadvertently admitted that we expected this collapse, as he strives to deflect blame onto faceless intelligence analysts for not predicting it down to the precise day and hour. So, when you hear Ministers, Senators and Congress-people flinging mud at the ANA for folding remember; it is we who cut the ANA off at the legs, not the ‘Taliban’. We handed victory to the ‘Taliban’.
Third: Withdrawal Execution
It’d be simplistic to lay this all at the foot of Trump – he campaigned on withdrawing, and instigated the negotiations; mistakes one and two above. Yet, President Biden has been in power for roughly eight months now and it is he who is responsible for the chaos that we saw in the execution of the withdrawal – indeed he actually advanced the timeline set by Trump. True, once Trump set this train in motion, politically Biden could not stop it, and needed to add his own livery, but there is a wealth of precedence for POTUS’ dramatically altering the stances of their predecessors – see Trump’s U-turn on the JCPOA (nuclear agreement with Iran) negotiated under Obama. He could have stretched it out, pushing the timeline back, and he could have dramatically influenced how the final weeks played out.
Back in early July US forces literally disappeared overnight from Bagram airbase 60km or so outside Kabul. Yet, when it became apparent that Kabul’s fall was imminent there was a need to, having already taken out troops and materiel, now take troops and materiel back in so as to be able to extract NATO citizens and local friends. Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA) is no soldier’s first choice for such an operation – lumbering transport aircraft approaching and departing the runway must fly over the city and past peaks, making them vulnerable to Surface to Air Missiles (SAMs) and even to small arms (rifles etc) fire when closest to the ground, and the airport itself is a challenge to defend from ground forces, as recent events clearly illustrated. Word from contacts who were on the ground during the evacuation suggest that the US Army’s 82nd Airborne were preparing to conduct an opposed combat jump (i.e. parachute in, destroy opposing forces, and secure the base) onto Bagram airbase – far easier to defend from ground assaults and with far less risky approach and departure flightpaths. However, we’re told, the Whitehouse barred them from doing so, presumably because they feared the Taliban would perceive such as an act of aggression and carte blanche for reprisals against US citizens and local friends attempting to move between Kabul and Bagram. Yet, that the significant asset that was Bagram was voluntarily relinquished in July, long before Kabul was threatened, and when the intervening period (if Bagram had been retained) might have allowed for a more orderly, controlled, and thorough evacuation, rather than hastily having to redeploy into a far, far less desirable tactical position at HKIA, speaks volumes about the lack of thought, preparation, or indeed care that went into planning the withdrawal. The troops know this, see it as a needless risk of their brethren’s lives and wanton waste of their sacrifices, and dissent is bubbling under the surface; US Marine Corps Lieutenant Colonel Stuart Scheller, a 17-year veteran, was recently fired for willingly torpedoing his career by voicing his and his colleagues’ ire and demands for accountability amongst both politicians and those senior military leaders that failed to make those politicians listen.
Britain’s Role
And what of Britain amongst all this? Whilst those of our troops that were involved in the evacuation showed clear empathy, compassion, innovation, bravery and determination in trying to rescue as many as they could, the same cannot be said of our leaders. Grand speeches in both houses of parliament, and Foreign Affairs Committee interrogations have been little more than hot air and cynical attempts to jump up the party ladder – they simply could not be anything else because the UK was entirely impotent in this debacle, unable to influence US decisions, cut out of negotiations, playing to the US fiddle. In an interview with Sky News General Sir Nick Carter suggested that the “Taliban might have changed”. For the moment, look past the simplification of the term ‘Taliban’ that we have explained above, because that simple statement told us something very significant, and something that does not appear to have been noted by the media; that the UK’s strategy in this withdrawal was one of hope, just hope, because that was all the UK could do. Once our American cousins decided that negotiation was a viable option, then set and even advanced the timeline, all the UK could do was dance to the US’ tune and hope that, by some miracle the Taliban et al might forgive and forget, and be a little more tolerant and inclusive. Whilst we would not shy away from it, this isn’t actually a criticism of General Sir Nick – far from it; in going on TV, and making that statement, he was tacitly admitting our impotence, whilst still toeing the party line of his political masters, and deftly swerving any criticism of our American cousins.
The Consequences
Umbilically linked as they are by the Durand line bisecting Pashtun tribal lands, August’s events in Afghanistan will have the most immediate, enduring, and exacting impacts for Pakistan, above all other nations. For Washington and London the question of Pakistani leanings is black and white; you’re either with us and against the Taliban, or you’re against us. For Pakistan though, this is, and always has been, an intricate mosaic of shades of grey. Win fleeting Western favour by condemning the Taliban and live with an angry neighbour that has a long memory and is content to host Pakistan’s enemies as they launch attacks across the border. Or cosy up to the new regime, hopefully starving the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) of safe haven, and become a near pariah state to the rich West, cut off from aid, with the tantalising oh-so-near exit from the Financial Action Task Force grey list yanked from their grasp like grapes from Prometheus’ reach. Rock and a hard place indeed. PM Khan and COAS Bajwa must now dance a fine, fine line, all the while judging the mood of their people and being sniped at by India, whose influence on the far side of their nemesis is evaporating. At present, it appears the Khan-COAS dance partners are pirouetting with grace and poise; two days after the TTP congratulated the Taliban, the TTP were told they were not welcome in Afghanistan. COAS Bajwa recently called on the Taliban not to host international militant groups, deftly appeasing the West whilst also pursuing Pakistan’s own security interests. Islamic State Khorasan Province (ISKP – if you read an article that mentions “Isis-K” then just stop reading; the writer doesn’t know their onions, and is regurgitating not researching), no friend of Pakistan or the Taliban, are set to come under increased pressure now that the Taliban no longer have to contend with the ANA, the ANP, or the NATO coalition. Baluchi separatist groups will likely remain a thorn, especially if India can fund them, but a Taliban squeeze on the TTP and ISKP would free up Pakistani security forces to counter Baluchi separatists, and protect continued Chinese BRI investment in Gwadar and surrounds. That’s one scenario, and a simplistic one. As with everything in geopolitics, the reality will be far more complex and prone to change. In coming weeks and months though, from an already rising base anticipate increased terror attacks across Pakistan and a general and persistent decline in security. Anticipate too some powerful IEDs – right now, in dusty workshops here and there, NATO made munitions (perhaps some of the 70,000 x 70mm explosive rockets that were left for the ANA, but need specialised systems to be fired in their intended way) will be being hungrily pried open in pursuit of their high grade explosive content which will then be repurposed into IEDs far more powerful than some of the Ammonium Nitrate Fuel Oil (ANFO – essentially homemade explosives comprised of finely ground agricultural fertiliser mixed with flammable fuels, and a favourite of the Irish Republican Army and subsequent splinter groups) devices that have marred recent decades in Pakistan.
More widely, outside of Pakistan, what is the impact? We’ve set ourselves back by 10 years, at least, maybe 20. Instead of ending this “forever war” we have simply kicked the can down the road. The Taliban don’t have expansionist aims but aside from the fear that Afghanistan will once again play host to international terror groups, now those fighters that were previously drawn to Afghanistan will flow elsewhere. Existing conflict zones in the Middle East and Africa in particular will intensify and Al Murabitoun-style cross-border raids into areas hosting Western tourists could conceivably reoccur in years to come. You remember those days. They’re coming back – not immediately, no; Pakistan will first feel the effects, but later we will see the rot spread. Plus, the millions of rounds of 5.56mm and 7.62mm and 0.50-inch ammunition, rifles, body armour, night vision equipment and so on that the coalition left behind, will now also proliferate. A vibrantly unhealthy black market in these high-grade arms and ammunition is already springing up to capitalise on the gifts the coalition left for the ANA. Ignore though, the headlines about hundreds of helicopters and fixed wing aircraft. Many were disabled beyond repair before the coalition left, and if the locals don’t find a way to sell them to unpalatable regimes the aircraft will likely rust in place for lack of parts, maintenance, or pilots. More importantly, if we hoped to recruit some local allies as proxy forces to fight on our behalf in the newly energised and freshly equipped conflict zones of Africa and the Middle East, we’ve fully torpedoed any chance now. When we deserted the Kurds that fought alongside us against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) we made other potential allies a little jittery about signing up with us, but now we’ve utterly deterred them by throwing our ANA friends to the wolves. In the history of geopolitical screw-ups this ranks among the biggest. It’s not quite snatching defeat from the jaws of victory in the traditional sense, but in Afghan terms it’s as near as damnit.