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Taliban raise the stakes in
Afghanistan
By Syed Saleem Shahzad
KARACHI - After two years of guerilla warfare
with almost dry supply lines, the Taliban are now in a
position around the important cities of south and
southeastern Afghanistan to begin the next phase of
their campaign to oust foreign troops from the country.
At present, they are poised to close in on
Kandahar, Khost, Jalalabad, Asadabad and Gardez.
A top jihadi field commander told Asia Times
Online on the condition of anonymity that over the past
few months the Taliban have continued with their policy
of guerilla strikes, even though they have incurred
heavy casualties. This has helped the Taliban, who were
removed by the US-led attack on Afghanistan at the end
of 2001, in two ways. Firstly, the attacks have largely
demoralized the Afghan militia, which has virtually
stopped conducting search and seize operations, and is
now focussed on protecting its base camps. Secondly,
Taliban supporters among the masses have gained in
confidence and are more openly extending their support
in practical terms.
As a result, the Taliban
have established their own "governorates" in villages
across Kunhar, Nanaghar, Paktia and Paktika. The ground
situation in Afghanistan is identical to the post-USSR
occupation period and during communist rule in
Afghanistan in the early 1990s when the Afghan
government's rule was restricted to the cities, and the
outskirts and villages were controlled by mujahideen.
To use a practical example, one could look at
the situation in Nanaghar. From Turkham, in the
Pakistani tribal area on the border, Jalalabad in
Afghanistan is barely an hour's drive away along the
Jalalabad highway. There are dozens of villages along
the route, all of which are occupied by the fighters of
the Hizb-i-Islami (HIA) of former mujahideen commander
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. The village of Killa Shinwari
serves as a form of headquarters where daily resistance
meetings are held.
The Afghan militia is well
aware of this situation, but it has established what
amounts to a truce with the HIA, and neither side
transgresses across their marked borders. A similar
situation exists around Khost and Kandahar, where verbal
truce agreements have been made. As a result, the
widespread skirmishes that have characterized these
regions the past months have all but stopped, allowing
the resistance the time to plot for bigger things.
In the past few weeks, the Taliban have sent
representatives, including former Taliban minister and
leader Mullah Omar's key lieutenant, Mullah Jalil, on a
mission to Pakistan. At a time when Pakistani troops
were searching for the Taliban and al-Qaeda in the
rugged mountains of South Wazirstan, Jalil and company
quietly roamed around the Pakistani port city of Karachi
collecting several million rupees (US$35,000) in funds
from their sympathizers, and had it transferred through
many hands to the "governorates" in Afghanistan.
With these relative safe havens in the corridors
around the cities, "global jihadis", whether of
Pakistani or Arab identity, have been able to
congregate. For instance, Mullah Magrassi, a renowned
guerrilla fighter of Bengali or Burmi origin, has
reached the Jalalabad area and started training new
recruits in the technicalities of ambushes and laying
bombs.
Sources close to the Afghan resistance
have told Asia Times Online that the battles for the
cities are expected to begin next summer. In the mean
time, during the long harsh winter that is already well
advanced, the mujahideen will lie low in their caves,
from where, for the first time, they will launch a
series of suicide missions. At present, these squads are
few in number, but they are expected to grow in coming
months as Bengali, Pakistani, Chechen, Arab and Afghan
jihadis swell their numbers. Their targets will include
foreign forces in the big cities, and on a much bigger
scale than anything in the past to incur maximum
casualties.
US-led forces, according to
diplomatic sources, are aware of these developments, but
they are unable to draw up a comprehensive containment
plan without additional forces, which would have to
establish camps in all the major cities and important
districts. As it is, US forces are spread very thin
across the country, with most focussed on the Pakistan
border areas where many resistance fighters often take
refuge.
In other parts of the country, the
resistance grows in strength, and influence, as it
prepares for its next phase in its war which has only
one goal: The total withdrawal of all foreign troops
from Afghan soil.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times
Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact content@atimes.com for
information on our sales and syndication
policies.)
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