The US was not too inclined to hold these elections before the agreement so that the Taliban could also have put up their candidate. The conclusion of the Afghanistan election process has complicated the situation. Instead of power-sharing between the two major contenders, there is also a third player to be accommodated, who cannot be ignored. This is likely to weaken the Afghan government’s position, which may become an advantage to the Taliban.
Lt Gen NPS Hira (retd)
Former Deputy Chief of Army Staff
The United States and the Taliban have signed an agreement, which both are happy to sign for their own reasons. A reduction of hostilities by the Taliban was a good face-saving clause for the US to sign the agreement and start withdrawing its forces. The Taliban are happy to see the US troops pull out. The essence of the agreement is that the Taliban will not permit the Afghan soil to be used for launching attacks on the US and the US has agreed on a time schedule of withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan.
There is no guarantee about peace in Afghanistan or the contours of a future political set-up. Down the line, if the hostilities re-escalate, the gainer will be the Taliban, who will have to fight the weakened Afghan government forces due to the partial or full US pullout. Trump will also not be unhappy either to have found a reason to extricate a part of his forces in the election year, this being a part of his election manifesto in the last elections. The Taliban having refused the ceasefire, the United States agreed for a ‘reduction in violence’ as a pre-condition for the pullout. Since the Taliban are keen to see the US exit from Afghanistan, they did reduce the violence to give them a reason to exit.
Another stage-managed development coming out of Afghanistan is the words of Sirajuddin Haqqani, deputy leader of the Afghan Taliban. He wrote a letter to the New York Times expressing the Taliban’s desire for peace in Afghanistan. He stated that the Taliban were committed to working with other parties in a consultative manner, to form an inclusive political system, in which the voice of every Afghan is reflected. He espoused that in future, the support of the international community would be crucial to stabilising and developing Afghanistan. After the US withdraws its troops, the US may play a constructive role in the post-war reconstruction of Afghanistan.
Sirajuddin is the head of the Haqqani faction of the Afghan Taliban, which is one of the most dreaded militant groups in Afghanistan. No one may believe that the Taliban have had a change of heart, but these good words do indicate the new posture of the Taliban, who want to project themselves as a mature political force to take over the reins of Afghanistan.
The only baton available with the Taliban to achieve their agenda on their own terms is their military pressure on the Afghan government. The peaceful postures besides, they cannot afford to let the military pressure go, nor can they slow it down for a long time. They are likely to maintain adequate pressure on the Afghan government till their objectives are met.
The new spanner in the works seems to be the recently concluded Afghan presidential elections. The election commission has declared Ghani to be the winner. The elections have been anything but smooth. The initial voting was 2.7 million. After about one million votes were purged, only 1.8 million votes were counted.
Abdullah Abdullah has lost out by only a 10 per cent vote share. He has already declared the elections to be a fraud by Ghani. He has declared that he will form a parallel government. He is supported by General Abdul Rashid Dostum, the vice-president in the previous government, and some other warlords, with a sizeable following.
The US was not too inclined to hold these elections before the agreement so that the Taliban could also have put up their candidate. As per indications, the US has not accepted the legitimacy of these elections so far. The conclusion of the election process has complicated the situation. Instead of power-sharing between the two major contenders, there is also a third player to be accommodated, who cannot be ignored. This is likely to weaken the Afghan government’s position, which may benefit the Taliban.
Subsequent to the signing of the agreement, a new development is that Ghani has refused to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners which is a part of the deal between the US and the Taliban. This clause is indeed a precondition for the talks between the Taliban and Afghan political groups. Ghani’s apprehensions are valid that if peace talks do not fructify, releasing 5,000 Taliban prisoners will be counter-productive for him.
Secondly, these prisoners are an important bargaining chip with him during the talks. In response to Ghani’s stand, the Taliban have expectedly responded with a tough stand by announcing re-commencement of operations against government forces. Such a stand by the Taliban appears to be the harbinger of the things to follow.
Should India agree to send a peacekeeping force to Afghanistan, if so requested? This is a subject on which opinion could be divided. If India agrees to induct some troops in Afghanistan, it will give India an enhanced leverage on the Afghan situation in future. However, this request from the Afghan government is also an indication that in case hostilities do not come to an end, the Afghan government is not confident of holding the Taliban on its own. India has so far not built enough confidence with the Taliban for them to treat India as a neutral force. Therefore, there are inherent risks in the situation, which can boomerang on India. It could lead to a direct confrontation with the Taliban, which India has been able to avoid so far by design or default.
It is difficult for any army to operate in another country in a fluid situation like the existing forces operating in Afghanistan. An Indian contingent with a peacekeeping monitoring mandate may be acceptable. But if the situation turns to peace enforcement, the military operations tend to cause unavoidable collateral damageto civilians. Such incidents tend to anger the local populace against the security forces of the outside countries.
We have had a similar experience in Sri Lanka. Afghanistan is more volatile. Pakistan will be happy to fight India in Afghanistan through its proxies. India would find itself sucked into the quagmire. Therefore, we may like to avoid such a situation.
The US-Taliban agreement has given a leg-up to the Taliban over the Afghan government. The agreement is unlikely to end the conflict immediately. But whatever time frame it ends in, the Taliban are likely to emerge as the dominant player in the future political set-up. To defeat Pakistan’s long-cherished design of strategic depth in Afghanistan, India may rather build on the goodwill of Afghan people and the resurgent Taliban. This agreement has further enhanced the political legitimacy of the Taliban. It’s time for India to be pragmatic.
